The Media Shrugs
I was there with a busload from Boston standing outside the Israeli Consulate in New York City Sunday, April 25,2010. An awesome sense of solidarity warmed the atmosphere on a raw and rainy day. Four hours standing in cold rain was a small price to pay to honor Jerusalem , but the media's silence about this event has been deafening. Did you hear about it anywhere but on Face Book or AtlasShrugs.com? I was interviewed by CBS and the NY Post, yet where is the coverage on this event?
Former Mayor of “the Big Apple”, Ed Koch put out a powerful message on YouTube promoting the event and asking “why the silence?” Our elected leaders should be standing up for our longtime friend, Israel, because our President is sending the wrong message…dissing PM Netanyahu but bending over backwards to appease the enemies of Israel in a bogus quest for peace in the Middle East through the Road Map and Two State Solution which leads to the unthinkable ‘Final Solution’ Israel’s enemies have been wanting all along…annihilation.
At the event a speaker declared, Bibi Netanyahu, by default, the “Leader of the Free World”, an astounding abdication of American leadership by our current president. We have taken for granted the US position of prominence yet President Obama seems to be tossing that all away even saying we are a Muslim nation. It behooves each one of us to stand up and be counted. Let the Lord’s people say so! We need to exhibit moral clarity on Israel and not be afraid to proclaim we are a Judeo-Christian nation, we shall have no other gods before us.
I stood for four hours in the bone chilling rain with sincere folks, mostly older, who have not had their world view programmed by liberal press and academia. Many Russian Jews were in attendance, they have ‘been there and done that’…and are not goin’ there again! They smell an ill wind, like 1938 all over again and they will not be silenced. If it had been sunny there would have probably been double the size crowd which swelled at one point to around 3,000 according to estimation by organizers and Atlas Shrugs activist Pamela Geller who was one of the organizers and speakers on Sunday.
A petite, older Jewish lady stood to my left for hours; together we made sure signs propped up did not fall into the path of the thousands of yellow cabs, city buses and countless SUVs that passed carrying curious onlookers taken by surprise.
The Media failed to even report on it afterward. Perhaps it shrugs because no violence erupted. No nasty comments were flung at the counter-protesters.
My hands were too cold and busy holding my sign to use my umbrella which dangled from my wrist. A kind, senior gentleman to my right was sharing his umbrella and making encouraging comments. Many thanked me, a Christian, for coming the distance, a four hour trip each way on a bus with 23 other assorted FOI, about half of them Russian Jews with a zeal for the freedom they have enjoyed in the USA. If only the home grown would wake up and smell the coffee.
Those who made it to the event, stood under their umbrellas, holding signs, listening to rousing speeches by rabbis and radio personalities as bus fumes filled their nostrils. The police asked us to stay within their barricades. We were corralled in an ever expanding five-foot fence which was moved several times cutting off two whole lanes on Yitzak Rabin Way in front of 801 Second Ave between 42nd and 43rd Street. It was a short walk back to the bus which had dropped us off at the United Nations Building . We knew a message had been sent. Time will tell if the media will do their job to relay it.
Most importantly, did President Obama hear our message? President Obama, Don’t throw Israel under the bus!
We have another opportunity in Boston on May 23rd to show our support at the Boston March for Jerusalem beginning at 3pm at Kehillath Israel 384 Harvard St (near Coolidge Corner) Brookline, rain or shine!
Chris Noonan Funnell Commonwealth Covenant Keepers
--
Chris Funnell, Freelance writer
Commonwealth Covenant Keepers, Director
