Soccer Dad and Snoopy have both had their shots at Roger Cohen’s unbelievably naive column that claims that Iranian Jews are free. Now it’s my turn to reply to his response.
The indignation stems from my recent column on Iranian Jews, which said that the 25,000-strong community worships in relative tranquillity; that Persian Jews have fared better than Arab Jews; that hostility toward Jews in Iran has on occasion led to trumped-up charges against them; and that those enamored of the “Mad Mullah†caricature of Iran regard any compromise with it as a rerun of Munich 1938.
Actually, the point is far more simple than that. Are Iranian Jews free?
Roger Cohen talked to Iranian Jews who are not free to voice their opinions. Ergo, Iranian Jews are not free.
It doesn’t matter that Iran is “the least undemocratic” than any other Middle East nation but Israel (and that’s no longer true, as Iraq has proven). What matters is this: Iranian Jews cannot speak their minds freely. They cannot worship freely as Jews. They are in fear for their lives. They can be jailed and/or killed for supporting Israel—or even because the regime wants to say they support Israel.
Cohen’s entire column was premised on the freedom of Iran’s Jews to speak and worship as they please. Cohen’s defense concentrates on the straw man argument that his detractors are trying to say Iran is just like Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union. But let’s cut straight to the point instead: Roger Cohen, do you think that Iranian Jews are completely free to live, think, and worship as they please?
Life is more difficult for them than for Muslims, but to suggest they inhabit a totalitarian hell is self-serving nonsense.
So Cohen, in defense of his column, essentially guts the entire concept of his previous column. He admits that Jews suffer “difficulties.” He then constructs the straw man argument that he will then defend against for most of the rest of the column. But let’s stick to what people were really taking Cohen to task about: Whether or not Jews are free.
Here are a few of those “difficulties” that Cohen does not delineate: Iranian Jews are forced to attend school on Saturdays, the Jewish Sabbath, and Muslims are in charge of all Jewish schools.
Cohen, again:
The compromises being painfully fought out between Islam and democracy in Tehran are of seminal importance. They belie the notion of a fanatical power; they explain Jewish life.
It is not a “compromise” when Muslims refuse to allow Jews to keep their own Sabbath. But Cohen is right; it does explain Jewish life in Iran.
Cohen, one last time:
But the equating of Iran with terror today is simplistic. Hamas and Hezbollah have evolved into broad political movements widely seen as resisting an Israel over-ready to use crushing force. It is essential to think again about them, just as it is essential to toss out Iran caricatures.
It isn’t simplistic to equate Iran with terror, it is factual. Iran is supplying missiles to the Taliban. Iran supplied Iraqi insurgents with the deadly EFPs that killed more soldiers than any other weapon. Iran offered the British a deal to stop killing their soldiers in Iraq if Britain backed off Iran’s nuclear program. Iran just gave Hezbollah $1 billion to help in the upcoming elections in Lebanon. Iran has in recent years turned Hamas into a well-funded and well-organized terror organization that now feels competent to wage war on Israel. Iran bankrolls both organizations, and both of them drew Israel into two wars in the last two years by firing rockets on her citizens, and killing and kidnapping her soldiers. Hamas has fired or allowed to be fired over 100 rockets into southern Israeli civilian areas since the end of the Gaza war. Hezbollah has fired or allowed to fire katyusha rockets into northern Israeli civilian areas. Hezbollah has tends of thousands of rockets aimed at Israel. The danger on Israel’s borders is not “simplistic.” It is real.
Cohen’s claim that these groups are “widely seen as resisting an Israel over-ready to use crushing force” is laughable. I regularly see myself as the winner of the weekly lottery and yet, in reality, I do not win. As for tossing out Iran caricatures, well, that would be a lot easier to do if Iran were being caricatured, instead of being portrayed accurately.
Finally, leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah were just in Tehran for a conference where first Ahmadinejad, and then Khameini, declared an end to Israel.
And yet, even after all that information about Iran as a terrorist-supporting state, we come back to the main point of Roger Cohen’s article: That Iranian Jews are free to worship as they please. I’ll let Roger have the last word on that:
Life is more difficult for them than for Muslims…
As I noted at Simply Jews, I don’t really have a problem with Cohen referring to accusation of Iran’s complicity in terrorism as “simplistic.” Cohen’s apparently never heard of Occam’s Razor.
Your saw my letter there in the NYTimes? http://myrightword.blogspot.com/2009/03/my-letter-in-todays-new-york-times.html