Date: Mon, 10 Nov 2003 20:36:59 +0200 From: "Israel Shamir"
shamir@home.se

The election of Michael Howard to the position of the Conservative Party
leader (in Britain) should be considered as another victory of the Jews,
or shouldn't it?

Here is an extremely interesting letter by Mr Martin Webster, a British
friend of this list, who is certainly no philosemite, (see below his
pertinent letter about the Wall) answering this question: -----

You may be aware that the Conservative Party (the main opposition party
in the Westminster Parliament) has just dumped its leader, Ian Duncan
Smith, and Michael Howard QC was appointed, uncontested, as the party's
new leader. Howard is "Jewish" acccording to Halachic rules.

A friend of mine e-mailed me about this today to say:

"I have just looked into the TotallyJewish.com news site and they have
an opinion poll going on 'Do you think Michael Howard should be the next
leader of the Conservative party?' At 23.40, 62% of those who took the
poll were saying 'NO'. Curious."

A little later the same friend forwarded the following article which
appeared in the Daily Telegraph and which deals with a debate between
Michael Howard's son Nick and a Rabbi whilst Nick was a student at
Oxford University.

The Rabbi concerned was the notorious self-publicising vulgarian and
cash-hungry opportunist Shmuley Boteach, a peripatetic messenger for the
Lubavitch ultro-orthodox version of Judaism, who based himself at Oxford
University for a while. His name is well-worth entering into your
favourite search engine.

The debate may throw some light on the reason why the Jewish community
in Britain is, to say the least, tepid about the prospect of Michael
Howard becoming the leader of the Tory Party.

Apart from having a Christian ("mamzer") son who contradicts a rabbi in
public about Jesus, I gather that Michael Howard has a gentile wife.

We can surmise that these facts did not endear Nick to Rabbi Boteach and
do not seem to have endeared Nick's father to 62 per cent of the
respondents to the TotallyJewish.com survey. The TotallyJewish.com
group are also publishers of the weekly 'London Jewish News', a paper
noted for its militant right wing Zionism.

Regards,

Martin. 

Spiritual Nazism

"I believe in Jesus - Not Hitler". This headline recently appeared in
The Daily Telegraph. It was above an article written by a Jewish
Christian, Nick Howard, the son of the Conservative MP and former Home
Secretary Michael Howard. The article arose out of an Oxford University
debate between Nick Howard and a Jewish Rabbi on "Is Jesus the Messiah?"
After the debate the Rabbi accused Nick Howard of "spiritual Nazism"
because he was promoting one faith "as superior to another". Below is an
edited version of Nick Howard's response in The Daily Telegraph .

Spiritual Nazism?

Last Friday, I picked up a copy of the Oxford University student
newspaper, Cherwell, to find that I had been accused of "spiritual
Nazism" by one of Oxford's rabbis Shmuley Boteach.

This is a horrifying claim. It is extremely serious to be associated
with the Nazis - who shattered the windows of every Jewish shopkeeper in
Berlin in Kristallnacht, who extracted the teeth of their concentration
camp victims, and who attempted to wipe out every living member of an
ancient race. It might well be asked why I have been publicly condemned
in this way. The origin lies in my willingness to argue that Jesus is
the Jewish Messiah. Though I have a Jewish background, I became a Jewish
believer in Jesus well before arriving in Oxford. My efforts to convince
Jewish students that Christianity is fulfilled Judaism, and my
willingness to uphold this belief in public have been followed by Rabbi
Boteach's statement.

Is Jesus the Messiah?

The basis of the Rabbi's claim is that spiritual Nazism is the promotion
of one faith "as being superior to another". It is certainly true that
the Christian Union has recently held an event with a talk entitled "Is
Jesus The Messiah?", to which Jewish undergraduates were invited....The
aim behind this event and others like them addressed to different
audiences, is always to present the claim of Jesus Christ to be the
risen Lord of the whole world....However, Rabbi Boteach would still
argue that it is wrong to give a talk that implies that Jewish people
who do not believe in Jesus are mistaken, and ought to reconsider. He
would still say that my actions have displayed "spiritual Nazism".

Numerous Witnesses and Claims

In considering his point of view, it must be remembered that Jesus is a
historical figure, whose teaching was recorded by witnesses. On numerous
occasions, He claimed to be the Jewish Messiah - the one promised
throughout the Hebrew scriptures to be the rescuer of mankind. For
example, the Gospel of John includes His conversation with the woman at
the well. In reply to her statement: "I know that the Messiah is coming.
When he comes, He will explain everything to us," Jesus says: "I who
speak to you am He."

Right or Wrong?

This claim is either right or wrong. And if Jesus was wrong, if His
claim to be the Messiah was a delusion, then He can be no one's Messiah.

Christianity really is fulfilled Judaism - you could call it Judaism
plus Jesus - and if you take away the Judaism part by saying that Jesus
is not the Messiah then you are left with a confused liar. He would not
be worthy of anyone's respect - let alone their obedience.

If all the sacrifices demanded in the Jewish scriptures did not point to
the great, final sacrifice of Jesus himself on the Cross, then Jesus is
on the same level as the loyalist terrorist Billy Wright - a petty rebel
dying an ignoble death, despised by his countrymen.

Greatest Sacrifice

How strange and ridiculous it would be for Christians to wear crosses
around their necks, as some do, if the Cross were not the place of the
most important sacrifice in the history of Judaism. It would be like
wearing a silver replica of an electric chair, or of a hangman's noose.
If Jesus did not fulfil the Jewish laws and prophecies, then the
Christian religion would be based on the claims of a liar.

So if Rabbi Boteach and others are willing to hold debates with the
intention of disproving Jesus' claims to be the Messiah, are they not
trying to prove that Christianity is false - in other words, that
Judaism is true, Christianity untrue, and that therefore "one faith is
superior to another".

If this is so, surely the most loving thing for them to do would be to
hold events with the specific aim of persuading Christian that they are
living a lie.

True Love

There is another point, which involves our freedom and willingness to
present the ideas we believe to be true to others. If we are not
prepared to face up to claims that are either wrong or right, and to try
to persuade others of our views, how can we expect to stand up to any
future Nazis? On what basis could we argue against their claims? We must
contend for the things we believe to be true, with humility and respect,
if we are to guard against the future domination of men like Hitler.
This is not "spiritual Nazism", but its opposite: love for our fellow
human beings.

(September 1998) -----------------------

From Shamir:

Michael Howard behaved decently as the Home Secretary: he refused to
enforce the infamous 'hate laws' (France took this medicine and burned
my book) and gag the holocaust sceptics, disbelievers and other
heretics. He claimed that Freedom of Speech is more important. Thus we
came to a situation when many 'Gentile leaders' (like Bush or Blair) are
subservient to the Jews, while some people of Jewish origin (like
Howard) ignore Jewry and disregard the 'party line'. It should not be
construed as an endorsement of Howard or of Conservatives; just as a
reminding that 'it is not black and white'. My favourite British
Conservative is Chesterton, but he is not running for parliament
:-) On the other hand, Blair and his position vs Israel and the Jews is
well known; as well as the unsavoury figure of Michael Levy, the power
behind Blair. Levy is presented in this short piece:

www.red-star-research.org.uk/levy.html

Lord Michael Levy

Lord Levy is one of the most important fundraisers for the Labour Party
and Tony Blair's unofficial envoy to the Middle East. He met Blair at a
dinner party in 1994 held by Gideon Meir, a senior Israeli diplomat, and
be