Rabbi David Nesenoff, who asked Helen Thomas the questions that elicited her now infamous responses, has written a piece for The Washington Post about what happened that day and his reactions to the inordinate amount of animosity so freely and ‘gently’ given.
If Thomas’ reactions to the innocent questions were gut punches, the Rabbi’s thoughts are the bruises of the encounter revealed.
The gentle give and take has now been broadcast, transcribed and thoroughly dissected. However, a strict transcription misses the accuracy of the audiovisual. Only in the director’s cut, the video, are the nonwords, the sound, the noise, the true reaction. And that was my “oooh.”
“What were you thinking when you said ‘oooh,’ rabbi?” asked Fox News, as did many of the other national and international media outlets that probed and jabbed for my innermost thoughts. Well, I was thinking “oooh.” Oooh. Most heard it the first time. Certainly during the multitude of reruns, “oooh” became part of the song. It was a response by a rabbi to Thomas’s comments, and it was from my soul.
I merely asked a question with a video camera to a columnist. She answered me with an opinion that was unacceptable not just to me but to former and current press secretaries, politicians, the president, her agent and a great many other people. Her freedom of speech was not stifled; on the contrary, it was respected.
She didn’t say that the blockade was unjust, or that aid was not getting to Gaza, or that there was a massacre on the high seas, or that East Jerusalem is occupied, or that the settlements are immoral . . . and get out and go back to West Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa and Eilat. No. This was not the two-state solution. This was get the hell out and go back to the places of the final solution, Poland and Germany. The Jew has no connection with the land of Israel.
And why? Because, as Thomas went on to explain to me, “I’m from Arab descent.” That’s it? That’s all you got? Do we all travel with only our parents’ stereotypes to guide us, never going beyond them to get to a peaceful destination?
My “oooh” was the sound of the shofar ram’s horn calling a loud primal tikeya, the extended ancient whole note from my very core. My existence was being erased. Every room in every Holiday Inn in America has, next to the bed, in the drawer, a Bible, beside the yellow pages and the breakfast menu. Christianity believes in the Jewish ancestry. Islam believes in the prophets Moses and Jesus. Can we just rip away the history of Jews in Israel like a Band-Aid, one quick motion across the centuries? Oooh.
Too many would simply rip it away… and I still don’t understand why.
Read the entire article here.
20. June 2010 at 1:32 pm
Hmm, “I’m from Arab descent” speaks volumes. I wonder if a certain President’s apparent hostility towards Israel isn’t due to his Muslim descent.
20. June 2010 at 2:23 pm
“Do we all travel with only our parents’ stereotypes to guide us…”
What a great line!
20. June 2010 at 4:33 pm
I’d say it guarantees it.
I love the intimacy of his writing!
20. June 2010 at 4:32 pm
20. June 2010 at 4:35 pm
21. June 2010 at 1:18 am
Some people just can’t let go of the insanity and hypocrisy.
21. June 2010 at 8:40 am
…and I still don’t understand why.
21. June 2010 at 3:58 am
The Jews are being punished. You see, away back when Yaweh commanded the Tribes of Israel to kill all the Philistines. They missed a few and, ever since, their progeny have been giving the children of Israel a hard time.
I dunno how serious I am about that. It makes as much sense as anything about that unfortunate corner of the world.
21. June 2010 at 8:54 am
Hmmm… I don’t remember that from Sunday School… but then my teachers weren’t too focused on Jewish problems, other than the persecution Jesus, His family and followers suffered.
I often think it’s a damn shame that Christians chose to forgo – or conveniently forget – Judaism. Shove it aside as if it’s not the well from which Christianity springs…
21. June 2010 at 7:46 am
It was breath taking when she said it, it still is…
21. June 2010 at 8:49 am
I must have seen it a dozen times and each time it’s just as stunningly horrible as the first time.
21. June 2010 at 10:21 pm
My friend Max just had this convo with his mom and they got into an argument over it. She’s 78 and she’s in the “but that’s history and there’s nothing you can do about it” group. My dad has often voiced that same sentiment about…well, everything. The thing is, if you don’t grow beyond history, what’s the point? We’re supposed to learn and understand and be better than past generations, aren’t we?
22. June 2010 at 10:19 am
I thought that’s why we study history; not simply to see where we’ve been but to avoid making the same damned mistakes!
Some people do become more fatalistic the older they get; my MIL makes me crazy that way.