Bruce Ticker is a freelance writer based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
It must be a bad dream – the spectacle of police in New York City and Lakewood, N.J., breaking up Orthodox Jewish funerals. What was a mitzvah a few months ago has morphed into a curse. So have refreshing oneself on the beach and sharing the joy of a rousing wedding party. [Bruce S. Ticker]
Covid-19 hits Haredim in Israel, N.Y., N.J., and Florida Read More »
Bruce Ticker, Middle East, USAWe have been living with the glaring presence of Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar in Congress for 15 months. Finally, we have some idea of the forces that could decide Tlaib’s political future. Likewise for a Republican congressman who is perceived as anti-Israel. The other week, Detroit City Council President Brenda Jones announced that she will challenge Tlaib in the Democratic primary next August to represent part of Detroit and some of the city’s suburbs, according to the website Jewish Insider. [Bruce S. Ticker]
Campaigns shape up against 3 anti-Israel Congress members Read More »
Bruce Ticker, Middle East, USAOn her first two days as a freshman, two teachers laughed when pronouncing a student’s last name, Guiffre, as Jew-Frey. One teacher remarked, “I wouldn’t want a last name like that,” and the same teacher would later recommend Mein Kampf as a great book. An anti-Semitic photo displayed in a group chat in 2018 prompted an investigation by the state attorney general, which last October found probable cause that Paige fell victim to discrimination by the school and the school district based on her religion. [Bruce S. Ticker]
Neo-Nazi youth taunt Jewish student in New Jersey Read More »
Bruce Ticker, Science, Medicine, & Education, USABaltimore Mayor Jack Young sounded a curious plea this past Wednesday: “We cannot clog our hospitals and their beds with people that are being shot senselessly because we’re going to need those beds for people infected with the coronavirus.” Yet it seemed commendable nearly a month earlier when the House of Representatives passed the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act which, true to its name, would make lynching a federal hate crime. It occurred to me that perhaps a century from now the House will vote to make gun violence a federal hate crime – thousands of bullet-ridden bodies later. [Bruce S. Ticker]
Are there enough hospital beds for Covid-19 and gun victims? Read More »
Bruce Ticker, USAMaybe now the threat of anti-Semitism – government-sanctioned anti-Semitism, to be specific – could be slackening with Bernie Sanders’s slackening presidential campaign. American Jews feared that a Bernie Sanders presidency would intensify the anti-Semitic movement that has been haunting our country, especially during the past few years. Had Sanders swept Super Tuesday states last week, we should still be worried. [Bruce S. Ticker]
Biden’s victories reassure Jews worried about Sanders Read More »
Bruce Ticker, Middle East, USAHatikvah, as Israel’s national anthem, stirs tender emotions among us whenever it is played, but for others it is a provocation. Likewise, a $225 million expenditure is seen as worth the price to defend Israel, but some newly-minted members of Congress do not readily understand that. Two episodes surfaced last week that reflected missed opportunities in communication for Jewish organizations that seek to be protective of Israel. Most prominent was the sharp bickering between Sen. Bernie Sanders and Jewish and political leaders over his attacks against AIPAC and Israel’s prime minister. Despite the offensive attitudes of some Israel critics, some of this acrimony could be grounded in AIPAC’s tactics to lose friends and influence people – the wrong way about Israel. [Bruce S. Ticker]
AIPAC should take a gentler approach toward Israel’s critics Read More »
Bruce Ticker, Middle East, USAPossibly our first Jewish president, and already Americans are panicking. This sigh of relief: Democratic leaders and others are raising concerns about an overreaching agenda and a misguided approach to Israel, not over his religion or ethnicity. It looks like that, anyway. We must face it – the election of a President Bernie Sanders could become a reality. It is yet too soon to predict the outcome, but this one result is foreseeable: Sanders will confront an adversarial Congress, if not a hostile Congress. [Bruce S. Ticker]
Sanders has short coattails, if any at all Read More »
Bruce Ticker, Middle East, USASomeone finally did it – publicly blaming the Jewish people for the crucifixion of Jesus and, even more disgracefully, applying this libel to explain Israel’s so-called occupation of the Palestinian territories. Henry M. Bradford’s words were printed on Jan. 27 in The Chronicle Herald, the daily newspaper serving Halifax in Canada’s Nova Scotia. His letter to the editor responded to a commentary about anti-Semitism by freelance journalist Ralph Surette. [Bruce S. Ticker]
Deicide libel against Jews surfaces in Nova Scotia Read More »
Bruce Ticker, International, Jewish History, Middle East, USAHe is a Jewish military officer, from a disputed foreign territory, wrongly accused, publicly disgraced, banished across an open body of water, and abandoned to an isolated location. No, not Alfred Dreyfus, the French officer who was falsely convicted of colluding with Germany and then whose badges, stripes, cuffs and sleeves of his jacket were torn off on Jan. 5, 1895, at the Military School in Paris, and sent across the Atlantic Ocean to a prison on Devil’s Island in French Guiana for five years. Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman was removed from the National Security Council by President Trump on Friday after he testified before the Intelligence Committee of the House of Representatives of the chief executive’s attempted collusion with the president of Ukraine. Vindman’s testimony contributed to Trump’s impeachment in the House followed by his acquittal in the Senate. [Bruce S. Ticker]
Alexander Vindman unfairly treated, like Dreyfus Read More »
Bruce Ticker, International, Jewish History, USALast week Attorney General William Barr traveled to Boro Park in Brooklyn and vowed to bring down the full weight of the federal government upon anti-Semitic violence. Who did he target? She who slaps Jews or those who gun us down? Our esteemed attorney general went after what must be the most dangerous of these forces. He announced federal hate-crime charges against…drum roll, please…Tiffany Harris. [Bruce Ticker]
Gun laws, not more prosecution of slapper, needed Read More »
Bruce Ticker, Jewish History, USAWorries that Sanders could jeopardize the party’s standing coincided with the impeachment trial, Trump’s so-called peace plan for Israel and the Palestinians, and the aftermath of the parliamentary elections in Britain. [Bruce S. Ticker]
Sanders could hurt down-ballot Democrats Read More »
Bruce Ticker, Middle East, USAFast-forward to this past September when Nicholas Bogan, 17, sent his store manager a message that he was “celebrating the Jewish holiday tomorrow night.” In Eatontown, N.J., 75 years after the Holocaust, Francesco Scotto Di Rinaldi responded: “F-k the Jewish. Put them on fire/like Hitler was trying to do/He had a point,” according to The New York Post. Predictably, Bogan never returned to his part-time job as a pizza delivery driver, and two months later he filed a lawsuit against the owners of the restaurant, Maurizio’s Pizzeria & Italian Ristorante, a short drive from Asbury Park. [Bruce S. Ticker]
There are tools for fighting the anti-Semites Read More »
Bruce Ticker, Jewish History, USA– Two policy positions should disqualify any candidate for president – casting a vote to invade Iraq or distorting Israel’s role in its struggle with the Palestinians. That would eliminate former Vice President Joe Biden and Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, the three consistent front-runners for the Democratic nomination. In October 2002, then-Senator Biden joined 76 other senators in voting to send troops to invade Iraq, and Sanders and Warren cannot pontificate on the Middle East for long without placing a disproportionate amount of blame on Israel. {Bruce S. Ticker]
Why I won’t vote for Biden, Sanders or Warren Read More »
Bruce Ticker, Middle East, USAFrom the outset, Grafton Thomas’s mother and attorney harped on his 20-year history of mental illness. They said he was diagnosed with schizophrenia long ago and ceased taking his anti-psychotic medication two months before he allegedly drove to a Chanukah party at a rabbi’s house in Monsey, N.Y., on Dec. 28, and wounded five or more Orthodox Jews with a machete. [Bruce S. Ticker]
Insanity defense for anti-Semites is itself insane Read More »
Bruce Ticker, USA