Elie Wiesel is always put forward as a fair-minded libertarian and champion of decency, liberty and tolerance.
Well, that might have been at one time - even though people have questioned him in some situations in which he has placed himself - but his latest support of a venture in Jerusalem borders on the graceful.
"One of the leading land-grabbers in East Jerusalem is an Israeli settler NGO, Elad, one of whose tactics has been to have Palestinian homes declared archaeological sites. This allows them to condemn and expel the residents and then create artificial archaeology parks. Elad celebrated one of its major projects, opening a hitherto “secret tunnel” from the City of David (one of its archaeological sites) to the Western Wall (Kotel) at such a Selichot ceremony.
Elad’s goal is to rid Jerusalem, especially those parts of it with Jewish historical significance (which most often happen to be within Palestinian neighborhoods), of Arabs. It will do so by hook or by crook. Since Palestinians don’t generally take well to their homes being taken out from under them–it’s usually by crook. Elad is part of the settler movement that seeks, either intentionally or unintentionally to create a religious conflict between Israeli Jews and Palestinians. For Elad, this is a Jewish jihad, literally a Jewish struggle for dominance of the Holy City.
Who should join these settlers in commemorating their service on behalf of the Jewish people and their expropriation of Palestinian land? None other than Nobel Peace Prize winner and Jewish humanitarian par excellence, Elie Wiesel. In fact, he’s the chair of this settler group’s Advisory Board. He was joined by two former Israeli intelligence chiefs, Shabtai Shavit and Amos Yadlin, a number of prominent judges, lawyers, entertainers and government officials. It doesn’t seem that the introspective spirit of Selichot in which we contemplate our sins and ways we and our people have fallen short, penetrated Wiesel’s brain. None of this should surprise us since Wiesel has already taken hundreds of thousands of dollars from John Hagee and spoken to one of his CUFI, Christian Zionist pro-Israel celebrations. The money I’m sure went to replenish some of the millions Bernie Madoff pilfered from him. Wiesel has also joined together with Alan Dershowitz in sponsoring a Jewish anti-Iran group. He called the Goldstone Report a “crime against the Jewish people.” How the (once) mighty have fallen."
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