Printer Friendly

Email to A Friend

Friday May 28, 2004

Former East Bay rabbi rips Israel for Gaza deaths

Rabbi Arik Ascherman, in the Bay Area this week, condemned his government for killing innocent Palestinian civilians in Gaza.

“Judaism teaches that even in times of conflict, there are red lines,” said the former spiritual leader of Richmond’s Temple Beth Hillel and executive director of Rabbis for Human Rights.

Saying that he was frustrated by the Palestinians smuggling weapons into Gaza through tunnels, Ascherman added that it was no reason to displace innocent civilians by demolishing their homes.

“Of course, the irony is that we’re doing this in an area that the vast majority of Israelis think we shouldn’t be in,” he said. “We must fight against terror, but we need to find ways of shutting down these tunnels without killing so many people.”

RELATED STORIES:

Withdrawal pangs

Israeli army pulls out of Rafah but may head back

Did you find this article interesting? Subscribe to our FREE newsletter and you'll be notified each week when "J." goes online. We'll tell you about the most important stories of the week and give you a link to each one.

This page contains a BETA version of Amazon contextual links. They are marked by the dashed underline.  Your purchases support our site. At times they point to items which are not related to the actual link. Please alert us by email if you discover objectionable links.