December 2007 Archives

Much ado is being made out of Mike Huckabee’s, all I want to do is wish you "a Merry Christmas" TV advertisement. Huckabee's ad seems sincere. He is an ordained minister, a devout Christian, and someone who seems to be as honest as any politician. As a Jew, I really don’t find anything all that shocking or disturbing about the ad. If Mike wants to wish me a "Merry Christmas" that’s fine--it makes very little difference in my life. Come to think of it, God knows how many Jews are walking around New York right now (two weeks after Hanukkah) wishing every person they bump into "happy holidays" and "Merry Christmas." Just the other day one of my friends--and a fellow member of the tribe--waved across the street mouthing, "happy holidays." I smiled and waved back. Suffice it to say she was not referring to Passover.

With the Iowa caucuses just two short weeks away, the candidates are all scrambling against the clock to get their message out. And with Christmas as the backdrop, it seems that several of the candidates are trying to use the opportunity to outdo one another--to show the evangelical base in Iowa just what good Christians they are.

Mike Huckabee has most recently taken center stage after a surge in the polls. His quick wit and folksy manner have helped broaden his popularity beyond the evangelical community. But as the New York Times Magazine noted in a recent profile, this lulls many Americans into failing to realize just how conservative his religious views are. He was one of three Republican candidates at the time who acknowledged not believing in evolution at a debate in May and, according to the Times profile, “he considers liberalism to be a cancer on Christianity.” At the same time, Mitt Romney has been talking up (and distorting) his faith in order to make him more appealing to evangelical Christians who remain deeply suspicious of his Mormonism. (It was in that same Times profile that Huckabee implied that Mormons believe Jesus and the devil are brothers. He has since apologized.) At least John McCain has had the good grace to stop pandering to the evangelical base, as when he declared America a Christian nation.

While Rabbi Grossman’s sentiments are certainly heartwarming and worthy, and I tend to agree with Rabbi Stern’s analysis of the Adler-Askari incident, I don’t think this story proves that anti-Semitism is rampant on the Upper West Side of New York City--only that violent and ignorant punks exist anywhere and will happily beat the daylights out of a total stranger at the slightest, or no, provocation at all.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to take away in the slightest from Askari’s bravery. Intervening when someone is in danger, putting yourself in harm’s way for a stranger is an act of heroism. And when the victim belongs to a group toward which you might have some adversity, then that act is all the more heroic.

Only in America, was my response to the New York Post story referred to by Rabbi Grossman. Could one ever imagine the same scene playing itself out in a European subway? Aside from it being a truly heartwarming story of how a Muslim saved a Jew from Christian anti-Judaism, the happening highlights just how unique American religious relationships are vis-à-vis the rest of the world.

The story is basically proof of the randomness of religious discrimination in America. What strikes me is just how easily any of the roles or elements of story could theoretically be interchanged. We should never fool ourselves: Anti-Semitism still exists in this country. But Rabbi Grossman is wrong when she suggests, “that the story is both warm and chilling. It reminds us that anti-Semitism is prevalent not only in Europe and throughout the Arab world, but also remains a constant here in the good old US of A.”

I was in New York this week and actually bought a New York Post for the first time in my life. Why? Because it featured on it's Dec. 12 cover a photo of Walter Adler, a Jewish subway passenger, with his arm draped over Hassan Askari, a Muslim accounting student, over the title: “Peace Train: Muslim rescues Jew from subway thugs.”

According to the Post, when Adler and some friends boarded a Q train, someone wished them a “Merry Christmas,” and Adler responded with “Happy Hanukkah.” About 14 men and women then started shouting anti-Semitic slurs and others immediately began to pummel Adler. That is when Askari jumped in, taking some hits himself to save Adler.