|
Jewish World Review April 10, 2000 / 5 Nissan, 5760
THE NIGHT before the pope arrived in Jerusalem, Israel's Dan Rather, Nissim Mishal, on a government-run TV station screened a film clip of four guys in the Safed Cemetery invoking the Angel of Death to expedite the departure of the pope, Yasser Arafat, and Hafez Assad from their earthly toil. The four were identified as fervently-Orthodox Jews affiliated with a Chassidic group.
That clip was eagerly seized upon by the world media. It
possessed all the elements for a great visual piece --- a
spooky candlelit ceremony enacted in an ancient
cemetery at midnight. For the station, the story also
provided a tailor-made opportunity to cast the fervently Orthodox
in the most ridiculous light. If that meant reducing Judaism
to black magic in the eyes of tens of millions of viewers
around the world, so be it.
Within two days, the police had arrested researcher
Avishai Bar-Haim on suspicion of having staged the pulsa
d'nura ceremony, and the organizer of the ceremony had
been identified as Meir Baranes, a well-known local
crackpot. By that time, however, the damage had been
done. Millions of viewers of the original clip never learned
that the entire ceremony was a fake. Fervently Orthodox Jews and
a Chassidic group had been successfully smeared.
The film clip smacked of a staged job. Who, for instance,
thoughtfully provided a neatly printed sign "Pulsa d'nura
ceremony against the pope" to be held up for the camera?
Of the four participants, two had to be commandeered at
the cemetery itself. One of them had so little idea of what
was going on that he kept calling for the pope to do
teshuva (repent in accordance with Jewish Law), until Baranes told him the pope isn't Jewish.
Whether or not Baranes was actually paid for his antics,
those involved in the broadcast knew that he represented
absolutely no one besides himself. Baranes was long ago
expelled from the said Chassidic group.
After notices of his expulsion were posted around Safed
last year, Baranes attacked and beat Rabbi Levi
Bistritsky, the chief rabbi of Safed, as well as of a Chassidic group. So badly was Bistritsky beaten, he had to be
hospitalized for several days. (Baranes was convicted of
felonious assault but let off with a small fine, thereby
reinforcing the conviction in the a Chassidic group community that he
is another mentally unbalanced individual being used by
the General Security Service.)
Haim Hecht, who dispatched Bar-Haim to film the
ceremony, knew very well that Baranes is a quack.
Baranes is a frequent caller to Hecht's radio call-in show.
Veteran Kol Yisrael reporter for the northern region
Shula Shmerling reported the pulsa d'nura story on Israel
Radio the following day, describing Baranes only as a
a Chassidic group member. Yet when asked privately whether she
knew about Baranes's expulsion from a Chassidic group and his
felony conviction, she replied: "Of course, everybody
knows that." Only her listeners were left ignorant.
If the staging of the pulsa d'nura ceremony sounds
familiar, it should. It apes the infamous Eyal (rabbidly-right-wing militia ) initiation
ceremony broadcast in September 1995. (Interestingly,
both the Eyal and the pulsa d'nura clip were edited by
the same person, Yisrael Segal.)
The clip of Eyal's supposed initiates vowing to murder
their opponents caused, in the words of then
attorney-general Michael Ben-Yair, "grave damage [to
the right-wing], and created a virtual public storm."
Yet Eyal was the creation of the GSS and its operative,
Avishai Raviv. The Shamgar Commission found that the
swearing-in ceremony was entirely staged and that
"anyone who was there had to be aware that it was
staged."
Nevertheless Eitan Oren, the journalist responsible for the
filming the fake ceremony, continues to be employed by the
Israel Broadcast Authority.
Israel Media Watch filed a criminal complaint against
Oren for broadcasting deceptive material. For 3.5 years,
the State Attorney's Office pushed off the complaint with
the excuse that the matter was under investigation. In fact,
the decision not to prosecute Oren was made over three
years ago by State Attorney Edna Arbel. (It was the
minutes of the meeting at which that decision was taken
that Attorney-General Elyakim Rubinstein tried so hard to
suppress last November.)
The faked pulsa d'nura ceremony shows that the lessons
from the failure to prosecute Oren were soon internalized
by Israel Broadcast Authority staffers: One runs little risk in staging "news"
events that will discredit the Right or the religious.
The staging of news events that discredit or delegitimize
certain segments of Israeli society is symptomatic of a
much broader problem. The free marketplace of ideas
has broken down in Israel, and those calling for its repair
are scarcely to be found, at least not among elite opinion
makers. As a consequence, we are experiencing a poor
man's 1984.
On the one hand, the media manufacture or distort news.
On the other, certain groups cannot even gain a hearing
for their views. Last week, for instance, both Ha'aretz
and Ma'ariv refused to accept a full-page advertisement
showing a group of members of the far-far Left wing party, Meretz, stomping a Chasidic
man at a Ramat Aviv protest, with an accompanying text
of quotes from prominent left-wing figures calling for
violence against fervently-Orthodox Jews .
For money, Ha'aretz did not hesitate to publish a recent
insert by a Christian missionary group, and Ma'ariv has
been only too happy to serve as the country's pimp in
advertising massage parlors and escort services.
But, hey, these people have principles! Even for tens of
thousands of shekels, they would not allow certain
uncomfortable facts to reach the Israeli public.
Two weeks ago, revivalist Rabbi Amnon Yitzhak was
invited by a group of students to speak at the Hebrew
University. More than 50 students showed up, but they
never got to hear him. A group of Meretz protesters
heckled him so loudly for over two hours that he could
not speak, and the university did nothing to defend his
right to speak.
Today whenever Rabbi Yitzhak rents an auditorium, defenders
of "freedom" of religion and pluralism institute legal
proceedings to stop him, forcing him to spend thousands
of shekels in legal fees. Aren't our enlightened ones even
embarrassed to be so scared of one little rabbi in a funny
costume?
First we had post-Zionism. Now, it seems, our elites
would bring us post-democracy as
Israel's post-democracy
By Jonathan Rosenblum
JWR contributor Jonathan Rosenblum is a columnist for the Jerusalem Post. He can be reached by clicking here.
04/03/00: Welcome to 'democratic' Israel, where speaking your mind can land you in jail --- especially if you are religious
03/27/00: The ADL's latest imaginary enemy: Religious Jews
01/25/00: Of ostriches and cavemen
01/14/00: Reason and madness
12/27/99: Love sweeter than wine
11/23/99: When lives are at stake, where's Israel?
11/17/99: The Mortara Affair Revisited
11/08/99: Do religious Jews make lousy parents?
10/28/99: Heed the heart
10/14/99: Tell me you love me --- please!
09/27/99: True Jewish rejoicing
08/09/99: Many Ways to be a Jew
07/15/99: Abolish the Three Weeks?
07/08/99: Memories of Entebbe
05/17/99: The Leadership We Deserve
05/10/99: Still a Hero
03/18/99: Israel’s "Little Rock Central High"?
02/19/99: Why Israel's fervently-Orthodox are mad-as-....
02/04/99:Those ornery Orthodox: Myth and Reality
02/01/99: Keep the money