Letters to the editor 24 May 2024

It seems that even now, when young soldiers are laying down their lives in defence of Israel, the Passover lesson has still not been learnt.

David Freeman

Barnet

Looking at the picture of protesters squatting outside King's College, Cambridge, where they are yelling for the destruction of Israel (Anti-Israel activism on campus, 10 May), it should be noted that at the same time the choristers on the other side of the wall are chanting from the Book of Common Prayer: "He remembering his mercy hath holpen his servant Israel".

Go figure.

Charles Heller

Toronto, Canada

In regard to Monica Porter's book (Cafe nostalgia, JC2, 17 May) she describes cafes in the Warsaw Ghetto as "a conduit for continued existence". Alexander Donat, who survived the Ghetto, wrote in his memoir The Holocaust Kingdom that “while the Ghetto was dying of hunger drunken orgies and banquets were being

held in the nightclubs”. These included the Jewish Ghetto police and members of the Judenrat.

Rather than glorifying this, I would describe this clientele as lowlifes and opportunists. If these people had any decency this smuggled and black market food should have been shared with

the vast majority of people who were starving to death.

I question whether this section of the book should be included as pre-war Jewish cafe life.

Matthew Suher

Southport

Am I alone in my concern at the stated emphasis by the Board of Deputies on interfaith activities - whatever that means.

In what is arguably the most overtly antisemitic period in this country since 1290, should not the Board, having divested itself of any interest in milah, shechitah and security, not now concentrate on defence, its sole remaining remit, by concentrating on addressing the ignorance and/or bias of the media and the masses, not always indirectly, towards our community.

Daniel Rosenfelder

London NW3

In his review of the biography of Chaim Weizmann by Reinholz and Golani (10 May), Stephen Pollard repeats the authors’ conclusion that Weizmann was the single most important person in the creation of Israel, and that without him it would not have come about.

Although playing a pivotal role at a critical time in Jewish history, it’s far fetched to accord his role as greater than Herzl’s, or that without his influence on Balfour the Zionist movement gathering steam in Europe would have been stopped.

In a bitter twist of fate, after the Balfour Declaration, it was Weizmann himself, following bad advice from Ahad Ha‘Am and his close friend, the well meaning CP Scott (of the Manchester Guardian), who delayed Jewish immigration and the creation of the state, with disastrous, unforeseen consequences.

Against the better advice of Sir Mark Sykes, (of the Sykes Picot agreement) to flood Palestine with large numbers of Jews immediately in 1917 when the British Government was most sympathetic to the idea of Jewish statehood, Weizmann preferred a “slow, gradual and laborious process” of Jewish immigration so that they could be properly absorbed.

This was a disastrous misjudgement since Britain, once ensconced in Palestine as Mandatory, quickly reneged on its obligations, appeasing the Arabs instead, by slowing Jewish immigration and encouraging illegal Arab immigration. Meanwhile, there was mass immigration of persecuted Jews from Eastern Europe to the U.S. , who, had they come to Palestine instead, would have enabled a Jewish majority and a de facto Jewish state.

Because Weizmann repeatedly disavowed any intention of bringing about an immediate Jewish state, whilst head of the Zionist Commission, a Jewish majority wasn’t achieved until after WW2, with the inevitable consequence that millions of trapped Jews in Europe who could have been saved from extermination , perished, because no Jewish state was there to receive them.

Stephen Green

London NW6

I am glad Tracy-Ann Oberman enjoyed her visit to Drapers’ Hall, and acknowledged the beauty of the building and the quality of the music and the food (I am suffering from a form of Social Antisemitism Tourette’s, May 10).

I dare say she is right that the Drapers’ Company excluded Jews from membership centuries ago, along with the universities, the professions, Parliament and pretty well everything else. Women and Catholics also suffered such exclusion.

Happily, all those restrictions have fallen away and that should be celebrated, especially in these troubled times. The Drapers’ Company is today an open and welcoming body. I was not its first Jewish Master, but (at the urging of my colleagues) the first to appoint a non-Christian Chaplain (Rabbi Dr Helen Freeman of the West London Synagogue) in the Company’s 700-year history, and during my year in office we visited Bevis Marks Synagogue, heard klezmer music in our Hall and celebrated Chanukah.

Today, the Company gives expression to its objective - “to be an enduring force for good“ - by supporting education and the elderly and disbursing several million pounds a year to charities.

My involvement with the Company has been one of the great privileges of my life and it is a source of enormous pleasure that both my children are liverymen, and I hope in due course my grandchildren will follow.

Professor Graham Zellick CBE KC

London NW11

In response to Andrew Rosmarine’s letter (Royal prayer, Letters, 17 May), I have been privileged to read the prayer at my synagogue on a number of occasions. I always include, the King, the Prince and Princess of Wales, and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex and express the hope that their differences will be resolved.

I have only just resisted the temptation ,as a practising Jew, to remind the Head of the Church of England of the Parable of the Prodigal Son.

Philip Levy

Stanmore