JTA: The Global News Service of the Jewish People

Star spangled tangle

By Daniel Sieradski · August 6, 2008

We just received a call here at JTA's marketing department about an ad for the Jewish Chaplains Council, depicted at right, which runs in our Daily Briefing email newsletter. The caller, who identified herself only as a "well-connected Republican," took umbrage with the display of the American flag upon the soldier's uniform, which she claimed was "backwards," and demanded that we explain our purported desecration of the flag.

After my co-worker politely explained that we were not responsible for the content of the advertisement and that there was no harm intended on JTA's part, the issue was brought to my attention.

I quickly noted that as a long-time volunteer in my father's Jewish War Veterans post and, therefore as someone who, in his day, has hung his fair share of American flags, I know quite well that the U.S. flag, when displayed on the right shoulder of a soldier's uniform, is intentionally worn in reverse.

As explained on the Web site of military uniform retailer Marlow White:

The blue field of stars should always be in the highest position of honor. When viewing the flag on a wall, the highest position of honor is the upper left when displayed horizontally, and at the top (upper left) when displayed vertically. When displayed on a "moving object" like a person or vehicle, the highest position of honor is the front, and not the rear; so the field of blue should be displayed to the front.

Though another co-worker, JTA managing editor Uriel Heilman, has urged me to temper my snarkiness, I must insist that if you are going to call into question the patriotism of our news organization over such trivialities, at least know the protocols that you accuse us of violating. Oh, and of course, also make sure that we're the ones supposedly violating them. In this case, it was a coalition of American Jewish military chaplains, who we all know hate America.

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Sharanksy on Solzhenitsyn

By Ben Harris · August 6, 2008

Former Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky shares his recollections of the Russian literary giant Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, who died Sunday in Moscow at age 89.

[audio:/images/archive/beninterview806.mp3] Audio sound funny? Upgrade your Flash player.

To subscribe to JTA's Behind the News podcast, click here.

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More on Agriprocessors: Child labor allegations and company response

By Ben Harris · August 6, 2008

It seemed for a while things might have quieted on the Postville front, but the past few days have brought a flood of new information. Let's briefly recap:

• Yesterday the Iowa labor commissioner referred 57 allegations of child labor violations to the state attorney general, calling the violations "egregious" and recommending they be prosecuted "to the fullest extent of the law."
• This news follows by one day the declaration by a group of 25 Orthodox rabbis that the plant was clean and modern and entirely different from the "jungle" described by New York Times editorialists.
• Shmuel Herzfeld, an Orthodox rabbi in Washington, penned an op-ed in today's Times saying the responses of the Orthodox Union and the Rabbinical Council of America have "fallen far short."

Agriprocessors spokesman Menachem Lubinsky also provided JTA with a number of documents last night that provide an interesting window into the way the labor commissioner's investigation unfolded.

Included in the documents is a substantial amount of communication between lawyers for the company and the labor commissioner's attorney that appear to show Agriprocessors cooperating with requests for information.

On April 28, barely two weeks before the raid, Agri's attorney wrote this to Gail Sheridan-Lucht, the labor commissioner attorney:

Second, although we have told you and provided documents demonstrating that Agriprocessors does not have any reason to believe it is presently employing any employee under the age of 18, you stated last week that you believe there are employees who may be under the age of 18. We all agreed that neither the State of Iowa, nor Agriprocessors, wants minors working in Agriprocessors's facility. We asked you for the names of those employees you believe to be under the age of 18, so Agriprocessors could take appropriate action to terminate their employment. You stated that you did not want to provide those names until you had the chance to review Agriprocessors's records to ensure the individuals in question previously worked or are presently working at Agriprocessors. Without those names, Agriprocessors is concerned that it may be inadvertently continuing to employ underage workers, a situation Agriprocessors would want to stop now. We would respectfully ask that you reconsider your position of not revealing the names until after your May 20-21 on-site review so Agriprocessors can address whatever additional information you have at this time, and terminate employment now of any underage worker if that is happening.

Dave Neil, the Iowa labor commissioner, told JTA that at the time that request was made, the state had no names, only reports. According to the Times report, Agri believes the government's failure to make those names available resulted in the arrest of some of those underage workers in the May 12 immigration raid.

Lubinsky also included termination documentation for four workers who were fired for being underage. One of the workers was apparently found out when her photo appeared in the local newspaper, which identified her as being in the eighth grade. Agri's HR manager, Elizabeth Billmeyer, reports that she then called the employee to her office, who was working at Agri under a different name, and asked her to provide a birth certificate. The employee became belligerent and was fired.

0 Comments | Share This | Agriprocessors, Kashrut |

The enemy of my enemy…

By Uriel Heilman · August 6, 2008

Some seemingly strange events have unfolded over the last few days in and around Gaza.

Fighting between Hamas and a Fatah-linked clan in the strip prompted Israel to allow 180 Palestinians – some of them suspected terrorists – to escape from Gaza into Israel. Then Israel had to figure out what to do with them, since the Fatah leadership in the West Bank wasn't much interested in them.

The New York Times' Ethan Bronner offers an in-depth look at the story.

Here's what Sufian Abu Zaida, a Fatah lawmaker, had to say about it:

"When a person is faced with the choice of being killed by his own people or arrested by his enemy, he will prefer to be arrested by his enemy," he told Israeli Army Radio. "And this gives you a pretty good picture of how bad and cruel the situation is in Gaza."

In Abu Dhabi's The National, Ayman Safadi writes that the infighting among the Palestinians is likely to continue:

The in-fighting is fuelled by an unbridgeable ideological divide and the argument is over who should lead the Palestinians and to what end. The Palestinian people are caught in the middle of this fight. As if living under occupation were not painful enough, they have had to endure the horrors of this internal war.

But neither Fatah nor Hamas is able to end their suffering. Abbas is too weak to bring his people the peace that they have been denied. Israel has made a mockery of him as it paralyses the peace process. Hamas, on the other hand, is not able to meet the basic needs of Gaza's residents, mainly because of Israel's closure of the Strip. And while Abbas makes promises he cannot keep, Hamas lives on slogans devoid of practical value.

For its part, the Jerusalem Post finds Hamas and Fatah six of one, half a dozen of the other:

Trying to distinguish between the good guys and the bad in the latest bout of Gaza fighting is bit like trying to decide who to hire as a babysitter - the Boston Strangler or Jack the Ripper.

0 Comments | Share This | Israel, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict |