Mets and Major League Baseball: Strike Out Racism!

(November 17, 2009) The Brooklyn-based Hebron Fund supports violent, racist Israeli settlers in Israeli-occupied Hebron who are taking over Hebron's Old City in violation of international law, and driving out the Palestinian residents. The New York Mets are aiding the Hebron Fund's activities by allowing the organization to hold a fundraiser at Citi Field on November 21st, despite a November 3 letter calling for the event to be cancelled (1). The fundraiser will be held above the Jackie Robinson Rotunda, an insult to Robinson's legacy.

With your help, we have generated over 2,000 emails of concern sent to the Mets, asking them to take a stand against racism and cancel the Hebron Fund dinner at Citi Fields. The settlers in Hebron, never known for subtleties, have had choice words to describe us all: "infectious bacteria," and "germs ... eating away at the Mets front office." (2) I wonder whether they are aware that they are paraphrasing Nazi terminology. (3)

Here are three things you can do: ONE: Join us on Wednesday to tell Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig to Cancel the Event! Tell the Mets & Major League Baseball Not to Support Violent, Israeli Racist Settlers. WHEN: Wednesday Nov 18, 12:30 - 1:30 PM WHERE: The office of the Commissioner of Major League Baseball, 245 Park Avenue (between 46th and 47th Sts, two blocks north of Grand Central Station)

Protest organized by: Adalah-NY, CODEPINK Women for Peace, Jews Against the Occupation-NYC, Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, Jews Say No!, and Jewish Voice for Peace TWO: Write to the Mets demanding that they cancel the dinner! Click here to send your email and here to tell your friends and family to do the same.

THREE: join Jews Say No on November 21st for a vigil at the same time as the shameful Hebron Fund fundraiser

WHEN: Saturday Nov 21, 7:00 - 8:00 pm. WHERE: At the 92nd St. Y at Lexington Avenue (for more information contact jewssayno@gmail.com)

Thanks!

Sydney Levy Jewish Voice for Peace

PS. In-between Hebron Fund protests, join a discussion with International Law and Human Rights Experts on the Goldstone Report. Confirmed speakers include: Iain Levine (Program Director, Human Rights Watch), Jeanne Mirer (President, International Association of Democratic Lawyers and Member, National Lawyers Guild International Committe), and Peter Weiss (International Human Rights lawyer and Vice President of the Center for Constitutional Rights). WHEN: Thursday, November 19, 2009, 12:30 - 2:00 p.m. WHERE: Fordham Law School, Room 204 This event is sponsored by the Fordham Law Student Chapters of the National Lawyers Guild, Amnesty International, and Jews Say No!

(1) http://adalahny.org/index.php/letters-a-statements/17-letters/327-mets-hebron-cancel

(2) http://www.hebron.com/english/article.php?id=599

(3) "Jews are pests and disseminators of diseases. In whatever country they settle and spread themselves out, they produce the same effects as are produced in the human body by germs." (Der Stuermer, September, 1938, http://www.ess.uwe.ac.uk/genocide/antisem14.htm)

and

"We doctors have done a lot and have good treatments. But still, the bacteria are always there. They could only be made harmless if everyone in the whole world would take up the fight against them! Everyone would have to follow the strictest medical practices! If everyone would work together, they could forever destroy the bacteria, the causes of such terrible illnesses! Bacteria, however, appear not only in the form of the tiniest of living creatures, but also in human form. They are the Jews!" (Nazi children's book, German Propaganda Archive, http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/pudel.htm)

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