Leora Chava

I’m a Millennial Jew who has yet to deplete my sense of wonder. 🇿🇦South African- 🇮🇱Israeli, Jewish Educator based in small town Ontario, Canada 🇨🇦

[Yos Tarshish | יוס תרשיש @yossaysyes]

Six months ago I started writing on Substack. Today I’m sitting at 97 subscribers. Three more to hit 100.

If you’ve enjoyed any of my writing on Jewish leadership, campus life, Zionism, peoplehood or antisemitism, I’d love to have you along for the ride.

https://t.co/qnWGm0wx6y

[Yos Tarshish | יוס תרשיש @yossaysyes]

On Sunday, we named our daughter.

Her middle name is Miriam, named for Leora’s direct ancestor, Rabbanit Miriam Shapira-Luria.

I just published a piece about her story and why it matters…
https://t.co/ZIwxQfp0TV

[Yos Tarshish | יוס תרשיש @yossaysyes]

This week’s double parasha (Vayakhel-Pekudei) explores something practical:

How communities move from vision to construction.

Two kavanot. Two questions.

Shabbat Shalom.

[Yos Tarshish | יוס תרשיש @yossaysyes]

I was quoted this week in the Kingston Whig Standard about the March 1 gathering in Springer Market Square, where local Jews stood with members of Kingston’s Iranian community in solidarity with the Iranian people.

[Yos Tarshish | יוס תרשיש @yossaysyes]

@WhigStandard 1/ As someone who attended the March 1 gathering in Springer Market Square, and was quoted in the article, I was deeply disappointed by how this story was framed.

[Karim Sadjadpour @ksadjadpour]

5 It should be noted here that Iran's leaders have never been motivated by the welfare of Lebanese or Palestinians, but the destruction of Israel. Their official slogan has never been ‘Long Live Palestine’ (or even ‘Long Live Iran’) but ‘Death to Israel’. https://t.co/ul7JkHcIpF

[Karim Sadjadpour @ksadjadpour]

2 Arab Hezbollah has been Persian Iran’s bridge to the five failing Arab states-Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and Gaza-that Tehran has been dominating. Iran provides the resources, but it was often Hezbollah, under Nasrallah’s leadership, that set up and trained these proxies.

[Karim Sadjadpour @ksadjadpour]

🧵1) Israel's killing of Hassan Nasrallah is hugely consequential for the Middle East. Hezbollah is the crown jewel of the Islamic Republic of Iran-the one effective enterprise Iran’s revolutionaries have built since 1979-and Nasrallah has been crucial to Iran’s power expansion.

[Elica Le Bon الیکا‌ ل بن @elicalebon]

Briahna Joy Gray claims she was fired from The Hill because they were suppressing her free speech.

One common trait that defines the horseshoe merging of the far left and far right is possessing a conspiratorial worldview because of a basic lack of understanding of how the world works.

Let’s go through this:

Free speech is a constitutionally protected, First Amendment right. For somebody to take your speech from you, you have to have been afforded that right first. So since the constitution afforded all of us as citizens the right to free speech, it is only a government actor (“state action”) that can pull that right away, in violation of the constitution. It is not possible for a private actor to “suppress” your “free speech” because a private actor does not “give” you the right to speech, nor can they take it from you.

When you are employed by a business, they employ you to provide certain services. As a journalist, you are employed to speak, but this isn’t “free speech.” Your free speech exists independently of your occupation. The content you provide as part of your employment must align with the company’s standards, which any reputable media company will require at the very least, ethical conduct, a commitment to honest reporting, and conforming to journalistic standards of integrity.

Briahna Joy Gray sat on a panel and told the audience that Hamas was seeking to create a democracy in place of Israel, in a state “like the United States.” It would not have even taken 11 seconds of research to quickly debunk this. She also smirked and rolled her eyes at the family of hostages asking her to believe the treatment of women in Hamas captivity, which she still refers to as the “mass rape hoax,” even after the U.N. reported that it found credible evidence of such rapes. These are just two small examples of falling far, far short of the most basic standards of journalistic integrity.

Anyone in such a position should understand that they were way out of their depth and honestly was neither qualified, nor compassionate enough to be doing this work.

The perfect horseshoe merges the self-victimization of the extreme left with the conspiratorial attitude of the extreme right to frame the most justified (and long overdue) termination of all time as a plot to “suppress free speech” by an entity that has no capacity to enact such suppression as a non-governmental actor, and never afforded such a right to deprive her of it.

Personal responsibility is the touchstone of emotional maturity. You are free to act as you choose, but you are not free from the consequences of your actions.

[Leora Chava @LeoraTarshish]

IsraAid sends team to Papua New Guinea landslide, its first emergency mission since Oct. 7 https://t.co/t6RyhiFKan
Proud that doing this is still very much an Israeli thing despite our own calamities.

[Hamza @HowidyHamza]

The story of this war can be summarized in two videos: in the first, Yahya Al-Sinwar is hiding like a rat from tunnel to tunnel, his wife and children safe; in the second, civilians are fleeing the Israeli bombardment, which has reached almost everywhere, and almost every Gazan family has lost one of their members.

[Leora Chava @LeoraTarshish]

@Darkiora @leekern13 There is literally zero context to this video.

[Hillel Fuld @HilzFuld]

Someone asked me a question today that really pissed me off.

“What did the Jews do that makes them so hated?”

I had to take a few deep breaths before responding.

Can you imagine asking that question about any other minority???

“What did African Americans do to deserve so much racism?”

“What did women do to deserve so much sexual assault?”

Somehow, when it comes to the Jews, it is totally acceptable to blame the victim of persecution and not the ones perpetrating the bigotry.

What a backward world we live in.

This really got under my skin.

[Yael Bar tur @yaelbt]

Since your eyes are on Rafah, would you mind looking around and letting us know if you see 125 hostages? Ages 1-86. Some missing limbs. Thanks 🙏

[John Aziz @aziz0nomics]

Antisemitism is becoming normalised and is boiling over into mobs hunting for Jews.

Anyone who studied European history to any extent knows that there is a long and ugly history of this.

This will end very badly.

[Leora Chava @LeoraTarshish]

@lincolnmjay @RebelNewsOnline What does she say in a different language at the end ?

[Lincoln Jay @lincolnmjay]

"Canada doesn't exist."

It was disturbing to film this.

Disrespecting Canada and the opportunities this country provides...

If you don't like it here, leave.

https://t.co/LBSEulNN5r

[Rabbi Linda Goldstein (🇵🇸🍉I/P Commentary) @realrabbilinda]

In sum, @FranceskAlbs agreed to speak to students at @Columbia at my invitation about the “Morality of Intifada”, but when the encampments were broken up and the honorarium dried up, she backed out 😡🇵🇸 https://t.co/BzlUsjgPQj

[Leora Chava @LeoraTarshish]

@AvivaKlompas @Columbia I really hope none of them are allowed to graduate after this

[John Aziz @aziz0nomics]

My critics don't like when I say this, but I will say it anyway.

The ongoing 2023-24 Gaza conflict was a POLICY CHOICE by the military and political leadership of Hamas.

Their policy is to destroy Israel.

This policy has failed Palestinians.

https://t.co/on33EGH685