Podcast #160
John Steppling, Dennis Riches, Hiroyuki Hamada, Roger Johnson.
https://www.maryadams.net/classpages/309_609/poetry_downloads/leaping_poetry_complete.pdf
https://x.com/SMohyeddin/status/1919724427165446471
https://x.com/KevorkAlmassian/status/1920204783769513995
https://x.com/zei_squirrel/status/1919753832449318963
https://x.com/SabbySabs2/status/1920297901420384480
https://liberationnews.org/nypd-kkk-idf-theyre-all-the-same/
I just listened to your URMedia Spotlight on the wicked plans for Gaza. Your analysis was clear and unflinching in exposing the horrors and criminality of Israel and the Zionist project. I agree with you—it’s worse than what the Nazis did, not even in abstract cruelty but in the fact that it’s unfolding in real time, in full view of the world, and with open support from powerful states.
That said, during the discussion on this podcast, it sometimes sounded like you were conflating all Jews—both Israelis and Jews in the diaspora—with Zionists.
My family is Jewish, though we stopped practicing the religion after moving from New York/New Jersey to Orange County, California, in 1954. Still, cultural and ancestral identity aren’t easily shed. You mentioned that Israelis see gentiles as “treif,” and while I don’t disagree that Zionism has weaponized such beliefs into something more fascist than spiritual, you also seemed to attribute this mindset to American Jews at a New York dinner party.
Do you really believe that 98% of Jews—everywhere—are Zionists and share a belief in their superiority? Or were you specifically referring to Zionist Israelis?
As someone born into Ashkenazi Jewish culture, with grandparents from Poland, Russia, and Germany, and as a human being, I feel a deep anguish being linked—by culture, history, or religion—to a state committing genocide. These terms—religion, race, culture—are all contested, but the pain of association is real.
I’ll just leave a picture on my Substack. 😅