A recent news article reports “He’s Jewish in every way, but on New Year’s Eve, Alexei Shtukin (42) decided to dress up as Santa Clause ‘just for fun,’ and paid for his decision dearly. He was set upon by a gang of youths at the Dome nightclub in Tel Aviv, and beaten in front of his family. Youths were heard shouting, ‘dead Christian.’ Alexei and his wife had decided to head to the Dome night club in south Tel Aviv, in order to pick up their daughter, Dasha (14), who was celebrating the New Year. ‘We went inside to look for her, and then someone yelled: ‘Santa Clause.’ ‘ Alexei was convinced that the shout was one of enthusiasm, but was proved bitterly wrong. …the youths ‘kept coming after me and kicked me. I shouted to my wife and daughter: Get in the car fast. Dasha began to be hysterical. ‘Leave us alone,’ she shouted, but the youths gathered around the frightened family members, kicking Alexei, and yelling, ‘Dead Christian.’ ”
The original article may have been written in Hebrew, which may explain why it says “Santa Clause” instead of Santa Claus. Also it seems likely that the Israeli youth were yelling “Die Christian” instead of “Dead Christian” (unless they were making a negative remark about Jesus Christ).
This incident is absolutely inexcusable. The victim could easily have been a Christian pilgrim visiting the Holyland. The United States is giving Israel at least three billion dollars per year in financial aid, not to mention military aid and the occasional multi-billion dollar loan guarantees, which are thinly-veiled hand outs.
If this seems like an isolated incident, the Israelis killed an American peace protestor Rachel Corrie and shot a British peace protestor in the head, who died months later. The Israeli military killed 34 Americans on board the USS Liberty in 1967 in a deliberate attempt to sink that ship. (Five out of six radio frequencies used by the Liberty were jammed during that attack.) In the 1950s in the Lavon Affair, the Israelis bombed American facilities in Egypt hoping to blame the incidents on the Arabs to ruin relations between the US and Egypt.
Would we give billions of dollars in aid to Somalia where Americans risk being attacked on sight? Of course not. So why should we give this kind of aid to Israel?
