By Kathleen Gilbert
September 17, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) – In response to recent claims that Gov. Sarah Palin’s strong religious views may be “a cause of concern” for the Jewish community, noted Rabbi Yehuda Levin has issued high praise for Palin, saying that anti-Semitic claims could not be farther from the truth for “this phenomenal woman,” whom he calls “a gift from God” to America.
“Sarah Palin’s caring about the security of the residents of Israel is certainly important to Jews,” said Levin, “but to American citizens, Jews and non-Jews, her domestic policy of morality, decency, family values, fairness in education where parents have a choice of how and where to educate their children, all of this is great.” Rabbi Levin, who usually represents the Union of Orthodox Rabbis and the Rabbinical Alliance of America, says he has issued his video response simply as a Jewish U.S. citizen.
Levin blames liberal Jewish news media for stoking irrelevant fears about Palin. For example, Levin cites the words of former New York City mayor and pro-homosexual Ed Koch, who said “Governor Palin scares the hell out of him.”
If by “hell” Koch is referring to his zealous homosexual activism, which Levin says is “from a Torah Biblical perspective a hellish agenda,” then, Levin concludes, “It’s a good thing to scare that hell out of Koch.”
Levin goes on to blast the recent media claim that Gov. Palin’s pastor had “anti-Semitic” fidelities, which claim has been invoked by some to suggest that Palin’s own fidelity to her Christian beliefs poses a threat to the Jewish community. Palin’s pastor Larry Kroon had invited David Brickner, the executive director of Jews for Jesus, to speak at Palin’s parish. Many Jews consider Jews for Jesus a threat to the integrity of the Jewish community because of their proselytizing efforts.
But Levin, who is himself hotly opposed to Jews for Jesus, nonetheless criticized those who consider Palin’s association comparable to the relationship of Sen. Obama to the extremism espoused by his notoriously radical pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
In a separate video, Levin states, “We don’t expect Sarah Palin sitting in an audience where her pastor brought on David Brickner – that she has to know our Jewish theology and she has to get out, or stomp out, or make some sort of protest. To compare that to Obama sitting by Pastor Wright for twenty years, and all the things he said, is really ridiculous, and it’s just a sign of how desperate the liberals are because of the amazing success of the Palin phenomenon.”
In reality, says Levin, the addition of Sarah Palin to the presidential ticket is good news for the pious Jewish community, saying that Sen. McCain’s choice of a running mate “was certainly a gift from God,” and comparing Palin’s courageous stand for life to that of the holy women in the Bible.
“This phenomenal woman, pro-life, pro-normal marriage … a woman’s woman, somewhat of a reflection of the Jewish midwives in the book of Exodus, who stood up to the evil Pharaoh, and despite his anti-baby decree, they kept the babies alive.
“You go, Governor Palin! Keep championing a Godly agenda of a return to millennia-old standards of decency.”
See Rabbi Levin’s statement here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GG6JwYeVqhw