JTA: The Global News Service of the Jewish People

Agri troubles in Brooklyn, too

By Ben Harris · August 15, 2008

The Forward's Nathaniel Popper, who broke the story of alleged worker mistreatment at the Agriprocessors plant in Iowa in 2006, followed up today with an important story about a unionization struggle at the company's Brooklyn warehouse.

Aside from reports of additional alleged company shenanigans, the story notes that Agri challenged a vote in favor of unionization by arguing that the workers were – wait for it – undocumented illegal immigrants, and therefore their votes shouldn't count. Lawyers for Agri are now petitioning the Supreme Court to invalidate the vote, the story says.

Popper writes:

The situation at the Brooklyn plant also answers questions that have gone unanswered in Iowa. Most notably, it is unclear if the company knowingly employed undocumented workers, such as those who were arrested during the raid in Iowa. The company has pleaded ignorance. But the Brooklyn case suggests that long before the raid in Iowa, the company knew it had undocumented workers in its ranks and knew how to find them — when it was to the company's benefit.

1 Comment | Share This | Agriprocessors, Kashrut, Ritual |

An Israeli’s superiority complex

By Uriel Heilman · August 15, 2008

When American-born Israeli journalist Judy Siegel-Itzkovich returns to the U.S. for the first time in 26 years, she finds much to disparage – from the materialism to the assimilation to the supposed hypocrisy of American Zionism.

She notes that the American Jewish population is shrinking, while Israel's is growing; she writes of her former neighborhood emptying of moderate Orthodox Zionists and becoming haredi; she finds much to scoff at in the Westchester suburbs of New York, with their gas-guzzling SUVs, Jewish parents who don't send their kids to Jewish day schools and assimilation.

She writes in The Jerusalem Post:

US Jews have enjoyed a magnificent century of surging wealth, political and cultural influence and primacy in scientific research, medicine, the media and many other professional fields. But I fear they have passed their peak and entered an irreversible decline. If Hadassah is struggling, what about the future of smaller and much less influential Jewish organizations?

Siegel-Itzkovich's visit may have reinforced her Israeli superiority complex, but her analysis is selective. Post a comment and tell us why.

18 Comments | Share This | community, Israel, Zionism |

Lip service only on Palestine, and ignoring Darfur

By Uriel Heilman · August 15, 2008

Martin Peretz of The New Republic calls the Arabs out for their hypocrisy for paying lip service to the Palestinian cause while refusing to bankroll it, and for ignoring the genocide in Darfur, Sudan. He writes:

The fact is, of course, that the other Arabs do not care a fig for Palestine, not a fig. Even with their lush surplus of petroleum cash, the oil Arabs do not pay their self-assessed tax for Palestine...

The Palestine national movement is a fraud. Internecine killing has taken far more Arab lives than armed encounters with the Israelis. It is full of pomp but no ordinary circumstance...

How can the Arabs feign such great agitation about the unfortunate Palestinians when they maintain such composure about the truly bitter fate of the Darfuris? It is the blood of their blood who are committing the genocide. It is their diplomats who protect the murderers, pass it all off as if it were nothing when it is the rankest mass blood-letting in a decade. Sudan is the fault line of the Muslim world, the racial fault-line. Whatever standing the African Muslims of Darfur command as pious supplicants before Allah, they have none before his Arab servants. Apparently, this does not trouble the conscience of Islam. They are otherwise engaged in the hyper-drama of Palestine.

0 Comments | Share This | Arab-Israeli Conflict, Muslims |

Beijing blues skies to cheer up Israeli athletes

By Alison Klayman · August 15, 2008

With sailing competitions in Qingdao up and running today after being postponed due to insufficient wind, Israel's Olympic delegation has something to be happy about again. Already at the time of this blogging, Israeli sailing duo Nike Kornecky and Vered Bouskila had moved up to third place in the rankings for the Women's 470 event, and Shahar Zubari is still ranked first in the Men's Windsurfer competition.

By comparison, Israeli athletes in Beijing (aside from Alex Shatilov who just barely qualified for the Men's Floor event in Gymnastics) have been continually eliminated from their competitions, including medal hopefuls like Men's Tennis Doubles pair Andy Ram and Jonathan Erlich.

At least today in Beijing there are clear skies to pick up their spirits. Yes, that's right. Look at this picture of my office taken Friday, August 15 around 1pm. [caption id="attachment_1354" align="alignleft" width="225" caption="See, there are beautiful Beijing days."][/caption]

This is where I work for the official Beijing Olympic website (en.beijing2008.com). Not only are the skies blue and clouds distinguishable, but this is one of those rare days where you can see all the way to the hills that surround the city, hills that are normally veiled with smog. [caption id="attachment_1355" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Most days I don\'t know these hills are there."][/caption]

The reason for this beautiful weather is three nights and one day of pouring rain in the Chinese capital. The older Chinese translator who sits at the computer next to mine, Mr. Bai, says this year saw an abnormal amount of rainfall for the normally dry city. I asked if it was because of the government's cloud-seeding program, and he replied that it is sometimes, but the authorities also exaggerate their abilities. He thinks it's a shame that that every time it rains, Beijingers now wonder whether it's natural or manufactured.

Either way, the rain worked to clean the skies, and air, for tourists and competitors alike. How convenient that this improvement comes on the first day of the Athletics events…

0 Comments | Share This | Beijing Olympics, Environment, Sports |

Israeli Shooting

By Alison Klayman · August 15, 2008

This post's title might be alarmist considering I am blogging about Olympic competition, not an act of violence. Still, I find myself just a bit alarmed that Israeli shooters are not the sharpest in the world.

I think Jews, outside of Israel at least, like to mythologize the IDF and Israeli military prowess. Yet off the battlefield today, the Ukraine (gold), United States (silver) and Norway (bronze) showed they can wield a rifle better.

Then again, does the IDF even use rifles?

Israelis Guy Starik and Gil Simkovich both competed in the Men's 50m Rifle Prone qualification round, but neither finished in the top eight to reach the final.

Starik came in 12th with a score of 594, while Simkovich came in 22nd at 592 (many competitors tied with the same scores). Starik improved upon his Athens finish of 16th, and is one of two Israelis to be competing in his fourth Olympics.

Simkovich will also participate in the Men's 50m Rifle 50m 3 Positions event on August 17, joined by fellow Israeli Doron Egozi, who already competed in the Men's 10m Air Rifle Qualification and finished 41st in the qualification round.

1 Comment | Share This | Beijing Olympics, Sports |