New York, NY-(ENEWSPF)- From The Jerusalem Post, complete with a slap in the face to NYTimes columnist David Brooks:
As protest movements under the banner of Occupy Wall Street grow in cities across the United States, a parallel movement deemed “Occupy Judaism” has sprung up as well.
The protests are now scenes for vivid experimentation in Judaism as well as society. Like the succot built at several protest sites, Occupy Judaism is an indication that there are Jews among the “99 percent” of people protesting their sense of disenfranchisement and dissatisfaction with inequalities in American society.
“There are a lot of Jews who have been really affected by the economy,” Rabbi Alana Suskin, a participant in Occupy DC, said. “There may be one synagogue in the country where no one has lost their jobs. Jews also have their poor. It’s the unspoken elephant in the room. Not everybody’s well off. Probably most Jews are part of the 99%.”
Allegations have been made by some, including New York Times columnist David Brooks, that the Occupy movements are anti- Semitic. Suskin said such concerns were effectively defused by the reaction she and other organizers had to their efforts to erect a succa for the holiday in the Occupy protests in the nation’s capital.
When her group approached organizers about building a succa in MacPherson Square in DC, Suskin said, the organizers “were thrilled, and we received offers of help and supplies.”
