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Ben's avatar

If you read the past 365 days from The Free Press you will see an endless string of autobiographical references to "fear" expressed by American Jews.

Ira Stoll's avatar

Well that’s why they are more commercially successful than I am, the negativity bias generates the traffic. I don’t doubt that some Jews are afraid and in some cases with justification but check out that last line of Adon Olam—God is with me I shall not fear….”Adoni li v’lo Ira”

Michael Segal's avatar

Dara Horn takes the same optimistic view as Ira Stoll in the excellent roundtable at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBP9_pKyXMs, which also includes Ruth Wisse and the WSJ's Elliot Kaufman. It is 93 minutes but very high quality discussion.

David Weinkrantz's avatar

Reza Pahlevi says the present regime in Iran seeks to keep his people in chains.

He is correct but he fails to mention that his father was put in place by the U.S. and kept there with help from the secret police, Savak.

Michael Segal's avatar

News in Iran has a way of being transmuted. One of the stranger episodes in the early post-revolution period was UN Secretary General Kurt Waldheim's visit to Teheran in January 1980. Waldheim, on arriving at the airport, announced a mission of seeking a compromise on the issue of the US hostages. Apparently Farsi doesn't have a word for compromise in the honorable Western sense, and instead the word chosen to translate "compromise" was the word one would use for the compromise of a woman's honor. As you can imagine, a perception that Waldheim had announced a mission of arranging a rape of Iran's honor was not well received, and Waldheim was lucky to escape alive. Waldheim was such a despicable guy that it was hard to feel sorry for Waldheim even over this misunderstanding.