Reply To: Has anyone heard of this supposed quotation?

yerushalmi in exile:

DaMoshe said:

Satmar needs to remember that Reb Yoilish himself was saved by a Zionist. Show some hakaras hatov!

To which you responded:

If someone was saved by a priest or nun, do you think he should become a Catholic for hakaras hatov?

Do you always completely misrepresent what other people said when

you respond to them? It’s an annoying thing to do and makes you look stupid.

Things like refraining from blaming a group for the deaths of millions of Jews is hardly becoming a member of said group.

I don’t like the idea that Zionism and Catholicism are comparable, either. (Please don’t respond to that point. Becoming a Zionist is undeniably very different in halachah from becoming a Catholic. )

[Drafted before writersoul posted. Not about to waste it.]

DaMoshe: This week’s Mispacha featured a letter with an account of a dream in which Dr. Theodore Fisher’s mother appeared to him and told him that the transport would not be successful unless the Satmar Rebbe was on it. He arranged with those in charge of the transport for it to include the Rebbe.

The letter ends with a quote to the effect that it was the Rebbe who saved the Zionists. (Just throwing it out there – this is obviously not historically establishable fact, but hey, we’re used to that.)

______________________

Okay, having thought about it, they do mean to blame the Zionists for the War (including, presumably, the Holocaust) – but “starting” and “causing” a war are different things, and “ongehoiben” means started, not caused, throwing me off because I was getting angry about this guy accusing Satmar of saying the Zionists started the war. A boycott doesn’t constitute starting a war. I’ve changed my comment to read .

So the theory now becomes as follows:

1. The Zionists antagonised Hitler with their boycott.

2. This caused Hitler to plan the Holocaust and start World War II to execute it in an attempt to revenge himself on the Jews.

3. The boycott was an act of war against Germany, a violation of the 3 Shevuos – therefore Hitler was enabled by Hashem to kill many Jews.

You know what? That’s pretty much nuts.

While there is a report of Hitler being angered by the boycott,

1. Hitler had previously hated Jews – this is obvious.

2. Hitler had previously wanted to expand Germany, and it is very shver to say that Hitler’s motivation for the war was to kill Jews (though that would seem to have been Hashem’s reason for the war).

3. It’s hard to conceive of a boycott as an act of war – also,

there’s Reb Moshe to consider here – see above in thread.

4. The boycott can hardly be blamed exclusively or possibly even specifically on Zionists. See the “Anti-Nazi boycott of 1933” article on Wikipedia.

So what’s up with this nonsense they’re teaching their kids?

(Please don’t tell me the Rebbe taught this. He certainly didn’t teach, as a Satmar newspaper recently printed, that all of Israel’s wars have been preventable.)