ANNOUNCEMENT: new comments system is now operating [scroll down for newer posts]

The New Neo Posted on by

[I’m planning to pin this post to the top of the page for at least a few days, so scroll down for newer posts.]

I’ve turned on the new comments system and I hope it goes smoothly. I’ve already tested it out in various ways and it appears to be operating pretty well, as far as I can tell. But if you have any problems with it, please let me know in an email. You can find my email address underneath the photo at the top of the blog (the apple, books, and pointe shoes on the table). Click where it says “Email.”

If you’ve been commenting here already you shouldn’t experience any changes when you try to comment. As long as you use the username you’ve been using right along, and the email address you’ve been using right along (even if it’s not a real one), your comments should post without any problems and you wouldn’t even notice anything new if I hadn’t posted this announcement.

However, new commenters – that is, people with new usernames and/or new email addresses – will find that their first comment goes into moderation. It will not appear until I approve it. When I see it – which would be the next time I check the moderated comments, so there might be a time lag of a few hours – I will either approve it or disapprove it. If I approve it, you become a regular commenter and your future comments should post smoothly without going into moderation again.

So, in summary: old commenters no problem. New commenters, the first comment is moderated and after that no problem.

At least, that’s the way it’s supposed to work.

Why attacks on Jews lead to more Jew-hatred

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve got something like twenty drafts of posts dealing with different aspects of Jew-hatred. The topic is so multi-faceted and so overwhelming that most of them have remained in draft form and never been finished and published.

But it’s a topic so important that I need to deal with it more often. Why is it so important, and not just to Jews? It’s an old saying but it’s true that the Jews are the canaries in the coalmine. Jew-hatred is the mark of a society that’s sick. It’s also a sign of evil, if you want to get metaphysical about it. And it’s one of the longest hatreds in the world, perhaps the longest hatred, and so flexible that it can shape-shift endlessly from old reason to new reason and back again.

There’s the envy part and the contempt part, the “Jews secretly rule the world and are trying to destroy the rest of us” part, the “Jews kill little children and use their blood to make matzoh” part and its current manifestation about Jews purposely killing Palestinian children in a genocidal war, there’s the ancient Islamic hatred of Jews and the ancient Christian “they killed Christ” part that sparked murderous pogroms against Jews, there’s the “Jews poisoned the wells” part and the “Jews want to destroy the white race” part and the “Jews are whites and colonist agents of oppression” part. I’m sure I’ve left some parts out, as well, but you get the idea[s]. Israel-hatred and its double standards are often a screen for Jew-hatred, which gives it a special oomph to which no other country is subjected.

But for the purposes of this post I’ll stick to one idea which I’ve seen expressed more and more often online by Jew-haters. It is, in my opinion, the main reason why Holocaust education not only doesn’t work these days to counter Jew-hatred but often actually works to amplify it. There is also the general tendency of today’s young people to say that the history they’re taught is a lie, but I think another very important part goes like this [my emphasis]:

One lesson … is not to indulge the “fantasy … that imparting information about the murder of the Jews of Europe will ensure its never happening again.” Showcasing one’s own weakness does nothing to placate illiberal enemies. To the contrary, what to the West looks like “innocence” appears more like an admission of guilt to those for whom violence is routine. “Something must be wrong with the Jews if they were selected as a target.”

Paul Berman would elaborate upon this point a decade later, analyzing the seemingly paradoxical success of grotesque Palestinian suicide bombings in turning world opinion against Israel. “Each new act of murder and suicide testified to how oppressive were the Israelis,” because the liberal mind could not could not otherwise make sense of such depravity. “Palestinian terror, in this view, was the measure of Israeli guilt.” Politics against the Jews—indeed against the West that abhors depravity—has only become more explicit over the last three years. If Hamas and the Gazans that followed them to rape and pillage could commit such unspeakable acts, Israel’s sins must be even graver than previously thought. American support for the iniquitous regime, moreover, could not be because it sees Israel as a decent nation and democratic ally, but because the United States is controlled by Zionists.

It seems a paradox, but it has its own logic. Among other things, it makes sense of evil – defining Hamas’ acts on 10/7 as not so much evil as motivated and in some sense justified. It makes order out of the chaos of human life. I’m speaking not of those who spread the lies and hatred with full knowledge that they are spreading lies and hatred, but those who accept the lies as truth and believe themselves to be virtuous in doing so. The argument is that if Jews are attacked far and wide, and have been for centuries, they must have deserved it and continue to deserve it.

Even some Jews succumb to the reasoning. It’s something like what happens with certain abused children: rather than believe the world can be so unjust, they believe that they themselves must have done something very very wrong to be treated that way.

Fascinating discussion of voter fraud, the SAVE Act, and the filibuster

The New Neo Posted on by

This isn’t long – only a little over five minutes (faster if speeded up), and it’s well worth hearing. It’s an interview with Republican Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin. He explains why voting fraud is nearly impossible to prove in the court system after the fact (something I’ve been saying for a long time), why the SAVE Act is so important, and he makes a suggestion about how to deal with the filibuster problem.

Mamdani’s tax hit list

The New Neo Posted on by

At first Mamdani’s new property tax was only going to affect people whose primary residence was elsewhere than in New York, and who owned second or third properties in the city worth over five million dollars. That was considered to be a rarified group, nothing much to worry about for ordinary people. That’s the way it was sold to the public.

But funny thing, now it’s come to this:

Mayor Zohran Mamdani opened a new front in his ongoing battle with New York City’s wealthy after his administration published a searchable database identifying affluent property owners who could be subject to the city’s proposed pied-à-terre tax, a move critics say could expose them to harassment and public safety risks.

The database, released by the city’s Department of Finance, allows users to search properties and view the names and addresses of owners whose non-primary residences could be subject to the proposed tax. …

… A person familiar with the process, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the city has publicly released similar property tax rolls every year for many years in accordance with New York state law. …

However, critics argue the database goes well beyond traditional public records by compiling the names and addresses of affluent property owners into a single, easily searchable location, potentially creating new privacy and security risks. The debate carries added weight in America’s largest city, where public safety remains a persistent political issue and affluent residents have long cited crime as a top concern.

While property ownership records have long been public, opponents say the city’s decision to aggregate them into a dedicated database could make wealthy homeowners more vulnerable to harassment and potential violence.

Of course it makes them more vulnerable. Isn’t that the point? Mamdani got elected by appealing to the Luigi-worshipping crowd, and this will please them no end. It will also give important information to the bolder among them.

But that’s not all. Remember the five million dollar threshold?:

Meanwhile, the Real Estate Board of New York President James Whelan argued that the database also illustrates how broadly the proposed tax could reach beyond the ultra-wealthy residents its supporters have emphasized. Although Mamdani initially promoted the proposal as a tax on secondary homes worth more than $5 million and owned by the “ultra-wealthy and global elites,” the final rules use different Department of Finance valuation thresholds depending on the type of property. According to the New York Post, over 960,000 residences could be listed in the database, which makes it possible to search and download property owners’ information, including their names and addresses.

“What this database really demonstrates is that the second-home tax is far broader and more complicated than its supporters have suggested,” he continued. “Policymakers should take a hard look at the many homeowners who could be swept in despite not fitting the profile of the ultra-wealthy residents this tax was supposedly designed to target.”

For condos, the threshold is now one million dollars. That doesn’t get you all that much in NYC, especially in some parts of it. And although these are second homes, who thinks that’s where Mamdani and the DSA will choose to stop?

More:

“What this database really demonstrates is that the second-home tax is far broader and more complicated than its supporters have suggested,” he continued. “Policymakers should take a hard look at the many homeowners who could be swept in despite not fitting the profile of the ultra-wealthy residents this tax was supposedly designed to target.”

Kulaks never were especially rich, either. They were the topic of envy and resentment nonetheless. And that’s what Mamdani and the DSA trade on – envy and resentment.

More:

At the center of the debate is whether the city can ask more of its wealthiest residents without weakening the tax base that helps fund municipal government.

Ya think?? Thing is, New York City is – or used to be – a special place in which to live, and people were willing to pay a premium to do so. Mamdani and company are assuming it will continue to be attractive to enough rich people (and rich 2nd property owners) to continue to live there or own property there, despite the increased taxes.

The following is no surprise:

Fox News Digital reached out to Mamdani’s office asking why the administration chose to publish the searchable database rather than notify affected property owners privately and whether it conducted a legal or privacy review before making the information available online. The office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Here’s Mamdani again:

“If you have a second home in New York City worth more than $5M, check your mailbox when you’re back in the five boroughs — because you’ve got mail,” he crooned last week before promising the initiative would yield “the best parks, libraries, and schools in the world.”

Sure thing. And the best government-run grocery stores.

The tax was originally estimated to affect between 11,200 and 31,000 properties. But guess what? It presently is due to affect 960,000.

Mamdani is malevolent, but he’s not alone. He is part of a movement, one that is growing, one that uses the ignorance and resentment of a large proportion of young people in order to seize power and make society over anew in the image they think best – or at least, the image that will give them the most power.

[NOTE: Speaking of city grocery stores, there’s a lawsuit brewing:

An immigrant-led business group is gearing up to sue New York City over Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s controversial plan to open five taxpayer-funded supermarkets — claiming the $70 million project will create unfair competition for nearby stores, The Post has learned.

As the far-left mayor announced new details of his plan this week — including a 30% discount on basic items like produce, meat, milk, cheese and bread – the Multicultural Business Coalition’s board voted to file a lawsuit in the coming weeks to block the pricey initiative, the group’s chairman Frank Garcia told The Post.

“The mayor doesn’t seem to want to sit down with us,” Garcia said, adding that Mamdani “won’t be able to bully these lawyers we are going to bring in.” …

MBC — formed earlier this year to create a unified front against Mamdani’s grocery policy — includes 50 chambers of commerce representing Asian, African, Caribbean, Hispanic, Middle Eastern and Jewish-owned businesses in New York.

Good luck.

I repeat – whether or not you care about New York City, this is a movement that has no plans to limit itself to NYC.]

Ukraine will help us with drone warfare

The New Neo Posted on by

I don’t think anyone could have foreseen this development at the outset of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine:

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that the U.S. and Ukraine plan to build a drone factory in the U.S. as part of a new defense partnership combining American manufacturing with Ukraine’s battlefield-tested drone technology.

Speaking in an interview with far-right influencer Laura Zoomer, Zelensky said the agreement would expand on an initial drone cooperation deal reached with the U.S., describing the project as beneficial to both countries. …

Zelensky told Loomer that Ukraine’s drone capabilities continue to advance, with some systems now capable of operating at ranges more than 1,800 miles, adding that engineers are working to extend the distance even further.

A White House official told Reuters that the details of the agreement were under discussion ahead of Zelensky’s planned meeting on Tuesday with President Trump.

It’s a little bit like our military partnership with Israel, which has much greater depth and width. The Buchanan wing of the right is against both, but has mostly ignored the obvious benefits or lied about them.

This is a very interesting part of the article, however:

Zelensky met with Loomer this week in Kyiv after the far-right influencer, who is a loyal ally of Trump, reversed her long-held vocal opposition of U.S. military aid to Ukraine amid the Russian war.

She cited her firsthand experience witnessing air raid sirens while visiting Ukraine helped change her perspective and issued an apology to Ukraine and its government for her past critical comments.

It’s not common to change one’s mind so publicly on such an issue.

Drone warfare seems to be the wave of the future, and we need to play catch-up on it.

The Fauci diaries

The New Neo Posted on by

There have been a lot of news stories about revelations contained in Fauci’s diaries of the COVID years. For example, there’s this about how much he had to say about himself and his newfound fame:

A surprising recurring theme throughout the diaries is Fauci’s growing awareness of his own public profile during the most intense months of the pandemic, which ultimately claimed more than 7 million officially reported lives worldwide, including roughly 1.2 million in the United States.

On April 7, 2020, after recording the latest pandemic developments, Fauci wrote: “Press still hot and heavy about me. Multiple stories per day directly or indirectly involving me.”

Why would that be a surprising theme? I suppose it would matter if that topic completely dominated the diary, or if he was writing things like, “I am one of the most wonderful people of all time.” But merely noticing that he’d become a celebrity isn’t all that strange. The fact is, he was one of the most famous people in the world at the time, and it happened rather suddenly.

However – and it’s a big “however” – the diaries certainly reveal other extremely disturbing things about Fauci. But maybe the word “reveal” isn’t quite right, either, because they are mostly things we already knew. So perhaps the correct word would be “underline.”

For example:

[Fauci was] A man who claimed Covid had a mortality rate of a flu in his diary.

[Fauci was] A man who claimed Covid had a mortality rate 10X of a flu under oath in front of Congress.

Or the fact that Fauci was telling us not to have family gatherings because of the possibility of the spread of COVID at the same time he himself was having social dinners with none other than Jake Tapper.

It was released today that Anthony Fauci was dining with Jake Tapper at his home during a federally imposed quarantine.

We already knew, long ago, that most of our “betters” were defying the restrictive rules they were setting down for us peons. We already knew that they were allowing the 2020 demonstrations in the streets when all other gatherings were forbidden. We already knew they made up most of the rules with almost no scientific backing, and we already knew they strongly suspected a lab leak was the cause of the pandemic long before they admitted it.

That doesn’t mean it’s not still infuriating and destructive. But it’s no surprise at all.

I also see in the comments of most posts and articles on the subject some variation of the following: “Fauci should be arrested, tried, and sentenced, but the GOP doesn’t care.” Well, that’s absurd, because Biden gave Fauci a blanket pardon. Whether he could be tried for perjury if he lies at the Congressional hearings that will be forthcoming – in other words, whether the pardon will extend to future offenses involving his past behavior that has already been pardoned – I’m not 100% certain. But there can’t be any federal prosecutions for his previous alleged crimes.

That Christopher Nolan sound

The New Neo Posted on by

I noticed a couple of recent comments here by readers who have taken in the Nolan film The Odyssey and have remarked on the extreme loudness of the music and the almost-unintelligible dialogue – for example, see this.

I’ve seen another Nolan film: Diunkirk. I watched it in a movie theater in 2017, and I reviewed it this post, the title of which is “The Dunkirk Din.”

That title says a lot. One thing it says is that the sound problems are consistent and we can safely conclude they are a choice (and an echo). Here are some excerpts from that post:

I thought “Dunkirk” was the sort of movie that would be good to see in one of those RPX movie theaters. But I took the precaution of taking some earplugs along with me to protect my sensitive ears.

I was tremendously glad I did. One of the first things I noticed about the movie was the assaultive, hideous sound, which even the earplugs couldn’t dull enough for me. I felt the need to push them in deeper with my fingers and kept covering my ears, too. And even then, the blasting percussive bass made the seats vibrate so forcefully that it almost felt as though those Spitfires were flying right over us.

I assume that was the point. Unfortunately, it seemed to be almost the only point of the movie, which concentratee on giving the audience the feeling that we are participants in Dunkirk, The Video Game.

The film is a real blockbuster and has been widely and highly praised. But I had so many quarrels with it that I left the theater almost angry.

Read the whole thing, if you’re interested.

I had been forewarned by reviews about the sound problem; that’s why I came to the experience prepared with the earplugs. But although the sound wasn’t the only problem, it certainly was a big problem. I’ll not subject myself to that again.

The question is, why does Nolan do this? Apparently he’s more interested in spectacle and visuals than in the lowly human interaction known as spoken communication. Now, movies are definitely a visual medium, and so that’s very important. But if people can’t follow the plot and are bombarded by almost-assaultive music, that’s pretty awful. However, Nolan is so highly praised that maybe most people don’t care, or agree with him that spoken human interaction isn’t particularly important.

In that post of mine on Dunkirk, there’s a quote from some veterans of the actual WWII Dunkirk who had attended the movie. They remarked that the film experience was louder than Dunkirk itself had been.

If you’re interested in the technical reasons given for the sound choices in Nolan’s films, see either or both of these two rather short videos:

[NOTE: I also saw the Nolan film Interstellar, but I didn’t review it here. Nevertheless, I distinctly recall being frustrated at not being able to understand quite a bit of the dialogue.]

Whither alterations?

The New Neo Posted on by

I have a short jacket of which I’m very fond. It’s not especially lovely, but it fits well and it nicely occupies a niche between heavy and light. It also packs very very well because it can be scrunched down to almost nothing. But recently its zipper gave up the ghost.

I haven’t been able to find a good replacement for the jacket, so I figured I’d just have a new zipper put in, because it’s so badly broken it can’t be fixed. I took it to the local place I’ve used for years for alterations, and they said it would cost eighty-two dollars to replace the zipper.

Eighty-two dollars.

That’s considerably more than the jacket originally cost. I could replace the entire jacket for much less than that, if I only could find one a lot like it. I’ve looked and looked but so far no dice.

So I set about to find someone else to do the alteration, and discovered that such people are hard to find. It’s like shoemakers. I guess repairing clothing is outdated, although it seems to me that there’s still a need. But the craftspeople just aren’t there any more. I called a host of them and for the most part their phone numbers no longer work.

I did manage to find one person who still does that sort of thing, but she’s off for the summer, and she added that she’s already booked up in September and much of October. She charges forty dollars for a zipper replacement. But again, the entire jacket originally cost something like that, and it’s not even that old.

For that matter, why do zippers break so often these days? Do they not make them like they used to?

And don’t tell me to do the zipper replacement myself. I haven’t a clue how, although I can sew. They taught us in grade school, and it was pretty intensive. I know how to do all sorts of fancy stitches, but not how to replace a large zipper in a jacket. I actually tried to do something similar with a sweatshirt, but gave up.

My guess is that schools don’t teach kids how to sew anymore, either.

I’m in a grousing mood.

And now there’s Corey Ruiz (or, do all leftist roads lead to Israel-hatred?)

The New Neo Posted on by

Crowds in Madison, Wisconsin, are claiming that Corey Ruiz is the latest victim of police violence against black men. Here’s the story:

The Madison police officer who shot and killed Corey Ruiz should face criminal charges, civil rights attorney Ben Crump said Friday, after protests erupted in anger over videos of their struggle.

“They not only tackled him, not only tased him, not only kicked him, but you saw they shot him three times in his head and other parts of his body,” Crump said.

He spoke at an emotional news conference with Ruiz’s mother, siblings and 13-year-old daughter, Kah’liyah Aliomar.

Crump again.

What is left out? This:

Ruiz, 38, was killed on a busy city street Wednesday, just a couple of blocks away from his daughter’s home and along the route she walks to school. Police say Ruiz pulled a knife during a struggle with four officers, injuring one of them. That officer then fired the shots, according to police.

There is video, but it’s not from the police, it’s from a cellphone, and it does not show the incident from the police point of view. Madison is one of the few municipalities where the use of police videocams has been repeatedly blocked:

But unlike nearly every other similarly sized city, Madison doesn’t require its police to use body-worn cameras, so there is no footage from the officers’ perspective. Over the last decade city officials have repeatedly debated adopting the cameras — at times creating subcommittees and doing studies on the idea — but local officials have primarily blamed budget concerns and political inertia for the ongoing stalemate.

Another common source of opposition, identified in a 2021 feasibility study, came from community groups worried the cameras would be used to surveil and criminalize marginalized groups. Madison Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway said Thursday that she expects the new budget that takes effect in January to include funding for body-worn cameras.

I wonder how the protestors address the fact that the police officer was stabbed. Perhaps they deny it happened. Or perhaps they think a little stab wound isn’t so much; police should just let themselves be knifed.

More:

Wisconsin court records show Ruiz had been in and out of jail over the past decade for mostly misdemeanor offenses including disorderly conduct, drug possession, auto theft, battery and invasion of privacy. He was also convicted of felonies including possession of cocaine and marijuana, robbery, strangulation, resisting an officer and causing bodily harm.

“People are saying he’s a criminal. So what? He had a family, he had me,” Aliomar said, breaking down into tears.

A person can be a dangerous criminal and also have a family. In fact, most criminals have families. The two things are unrelated.

More:

Police said they were at the street to investigate reports that someone was trying to enter parked cars, something Crump said amounted to only the suspicion of a low-level property crime.

Well then, no need for the police to be there at all, right?

And then you have this sort of thing:

Nearly 500 people marched from the intersection of Williamson Street and South Baldwin Street [in Madison] — where the 38-year-old was shot three times on Wednesday during a struggle with several police officers — to the Madison Police Department headquarters on Friday.

Video showed some demonstrators stopping traffic and confronting at a female motorist who insisted she was an “ally” during a streetside struggle session.

“You’re going to sit there and watch it all go by and you’re going to think about it, c–t!” one yelled at the helpless driver.

“I am 100 percent an ally of the community,” she pleaded with the protestors who surrounded her car.

“I have lived in this neighborhood for 27 years. F–k the cops. I wanted to join the protest!” she said. “This guy calling me a c–t doesn’t help anyone’s cause.”

She added: “I’m an ally. I wanted to join the protest. I want to be part of this.”

That may read like a Monty Python skit, but it’s very real.

Also this:

“White silence is violence!” protesters chanted at others sitting outside [at a restaurant] enjoying their dinner.

A few hours later, a pair of protesters hit a car window when the driver refused to stop for their procession.

The Party for Socialism and Liberation held signs reading “jail killer cop. Kiel Peterson. Justice for Corey Ruiz.” …

One woman held up a sign that read: “Corrupt cops deserve to die too!! …

“You’re gonna say the same thing you all say every time a black body gets shot down in this city!” [a] man, who identified himself as Carlos Jackson, shouted. Jackson then launched into a tirade about corruption, revolution and “Zionists.”

It all comes back to the Zionists, right?

I wonder who funds the so-called “Party for Socialism and Liberation.” Here’s the Wiki entry:

The Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL) is a communist political party in the United States. PSL formed in 2004, when its members split from the Workers World Party.

PSL describes itself as a revolutionary socialist party in the Leninist tradition, because the party believes that only a revolution can end capitalism and establish socialism. PSL pursues this goal by participating in local protests, running candidates in elections, and conducting political education. …

PSL does not release membership numbers. In 2019, PSL reported branches in “some 90 cities” or “nearly 100 cities”. In 2022, PSL reported an “organized presence in over 100 cities”. In 2024, PSL reported being “in over 50 cities”.

PSL is a democratic centralist party, which means that “all members, including those who disagree, are duty bound to publicly defend and carry out” all PSL decisions.

So, “liberated” party members are not allowed to disagree with the Party of Liberation.

It’s no real surprise to learn that they are heavily involved in pro-Palestinian causes:

Since 2023, PSL has organized numerous rallies in favor of Palestinian liberation, including many of the Gaza war protests in the United States.

In 2024, PSL and American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) organized a protest outside of Ohr Torah synagogue in Edison, New Jersey, in opposition to the synagogue holding auctions for property in illegal Israel settlements in the West Bank. A minor scuffle ensured. …

In May 2025, Elias Rodriguez killed two employees of the Israeli embassy in Washington, D.C. Rodriguez was a former PSL member. PSL stated that they “do not support” the shooting. …

In May 2026, PSL campaigned with Hasan Piker on behalf of Cori Bush in Missouri. In June 2026, PSL campaigned for Seattle socialist Kshama Sawant.

This group seems to have its finger in a lot of pies. The group also unites with some of the “woke right” in blaming the US and NATO for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It also supported Assad in Syria. More here on its campaign against Israel and Jews, which turns out not to be peripheral but rather central to its purposes:

[The party] incorporates virulent anti-Zionism as a core organizing principle.

PSL has been involved in anti-Israel organizing since its establishment in 2004, ramping up its activity significantly following the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led terror massacre against Israel. In the first 18 months after Hamas’s attack, PSL sponsored or co-sponsored over 1,700 anti-Israel rallies around the U.S.; the majority of these rallies featured antisemitic rhetoric, as well as expressions of support for Hamas’s attack, belligerent calls to “smash Zionism,” and flags and other materials of U.S.-designated terror groups and more. Some PSL events also included on-the-ground harassment.

The party legitimized Hamas’s attack in an October 7, 2023, statement as a “bold counter-offensive,” said “the actions of the resistance” were a “morally and legally legitimate response to occupation” and called to cut off all U.S. aid to Israel.

One of the group’s members is Jodi Dean, who is still a professor at Hobart teaching courses such as Feminist Theory as well as Communism. Shortly after 10/7 she wrote this:

The images from October 7 of paragliders evading Israeli air defenses were for many of us exhilarating. Here were moments of freedom, that defeated Zionist expectations of submission to occupation and siege…The paragliders who flew into Israel on October 7 continue the revolutionary association of liberation and flight.

Helping to shape young minds.

But the reason I went to that ADL link was to find out about funding of the group. This is all I discovered:

PSL offers little organizational transparency and does not release membership numbers. …

PSL’s funding sources are also unclear. The group claims not to take money from foundations or corporate sources. Members are expected to contribute to PSL’s major annual fundraiser, the National Fund Drive.

The article discusses the funding of an affiliated group, The People’s Forum (there are many many affiliated groups; it’s really a huge web):

The PSL-affiliated group is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that receives funding from various sources. In 2022 and 2021, for example, The People’s Forum received $21,539 from the Amalgamated Charitable Foundation and $8,350 from CodePink, a virulently anti-Zionist group, respectively. In 2018, The People’s Forum received $3,015,000 from the United Community Fund (UCF), a grantmaking body primarily associated with Neville Roy Singham, an American businessman who has been accused of having associations with the Chinese Communist Party.

UCF has given most of its grants to The People’s Forum and the left-wing research institute Tricontinental Institute for Social Research. The People’s Forum’s Manolo de los Santos is also a researcher at Tricontinental.

In the fiscal year ending 2022, The People’s Forum had revenue of $4,428,869, significantly more than 2021’s $486,926. …

In 2023, the Alliance for Global Justice (AFGJ) granted The People’s Forum $26,894. AFGJ is an Arizona-based organization that serves as a fiscal sponsor to several progressive and anti-Israel initiatives, including Samidoun, which is labeled as the international fundraiser of the U.S.-designated terror group the PFLP, and the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI).

And this utterance by a speaker at one of the many meetings organized by the group says a lot about their point of view on the relationship between capitalism and Israel:

As far as organizational activity, The People’s Forum convenes numerous panels, protests, events, and other “educational” experiences, many of which are virulently anti-Israel.

At one such event, De Los Santos said: “When we finally deal that final blow to destroy Israel. When the state of Israel is finally destroyed and erased from history, that will be the single most important blow we can give to destroying capitalism.”

Whether or not that has any logic isn’t especially relevant. It has logic to a large group of very dedicated leftists.

When I began this post I did not expect it to end up with anything to do with Israel. And yet here we are. To the left, these things are all related – or at least can be described as related to a mostly ignorant and willing group of mostly young people.

Mamdani and violence against Jews in New York

The New Neo Posted on by

Two men were stabbed near Central Park by the same perpetrator, without warning or previous interaction. One of the victims was visibly Jewish (wearing a kippah) and the other Asian, and the perpetrator is alleged to have shouted “Allahu Akbar!” as he stabbed one in the back with a knife, and one in the chest with a screwdriver. The suspect is in custody:

Investigators were probing whether the suspect Raul Morales, 51, was motivated by hate, though Tisch also said “the initial investigation suggests that mental health may have been a factor.”

I don’t doubt both were possibly true: that the perp was indeed motivated by “hate” and that “mental health may have been a factor.” The questions are really legal ones: will this be charged as a hate crime and is there enough craziness to have caused diminished responsibility under the relevant laws? One especially strange element of the stabbings is that the perp yelled the Arabic phrase but does not seem to be either an Arab or a Muslim.

Ah, but not so fast:

[In the shared apartment of Raul Morales] … writings of Marx were found. New York Post reported New York Post reported that two Qurans, a Jehovah’s Witness Bible and a book on Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara were also found.

I suppose he had roommates who might be able to shed some light on things. That article also indicates that he was charged with this: “two counts of second-degree attempted murder as a hate crime and one count each of first-degree assault as a hate crime, second-degree assault as a hate crime, and attempted first-degree assault as a hate crime.” So apparently they’ve decided that yes, “hate” was a motivation.

I’m not keen on “hate crime” as a separate category, by the way – in general, not just for this particular crime. But as I said, I have little doubt that hatred was part of it. There’s an atmosphere of hatred towards Jews in New York, although for this particular perp, who also targeted an Asian person, it doesn’t seem to have just been towards Jews. I’ve noticed that some of these random killings have targeted Asians as well, and that’s been going on for quite some time.

More:

Language in the criminal complaint says that a witness saw Morales near a synagogue West 83rd Street saying “justice for Islam” …

He also has a criminal record for drugs in the 1990s.

Mamdani had a few perfunctory words to say after the crime, but it’s pretty obvious where his own heart is. And it’s not with the victims. His entire stint as mayor so far has featured a subtle and sometimes not-so-subtle fanning the flames of Jew-hatred, and for those inclined in that direction (and/or having mental problems) it acts as a releasor for aggression. See this:

Mayor Zohran Mamdani is a “no room for hate” hypocrite: His obsessive Israel-bashing — and the ravings of his rabid pro-Palestinian besties — encourages antisemitic violence.

Tuesday night, he released an incendiary video repeating (again) a litany of lies about Israeli’s war of self-defense against the Hamas terrorists and urging mass demonstrations when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu next comes to town.

Thursday, an attacker shouting “Allahu Akbar” stabbed two men — a Jew in a yarmulke and an Asian — on the Upper West Side; the mayor responded with noises about hate and mental illness.

But it’s not generic hate that encourages such targeted bloodshed, however unstable the perp might be: It’s very specific incitement that points the violent at a chosen class of victims.

And in the comments to that article I see something I very often see when such topics are discussed: “Maybe they shouldn’t have voted for him. Crazy, huh?” But the Jews of New York voted overwhelmingly for Cuomo in the primary and in the election as well.