Rabbi Aaron Panken's Diatribe against Trump

I responded to Rabbi Aaron Panken, President HUC JIR Post in the Huffington Post

I am saddened by Rabbi Aaron Panken’s diatribe against Trump. Trump never suggested the open ended exclusion of Muslim’s from our country.  He said they should be excluded until we “figure out what is going on.”

We have had close to 30 people killed in the US by Muslim Fanatics over the past few years, 14 in San Bernardino, 13 in Fort Hood, and many people wounded in these attacks.  What Trump said was: Until we figure out how to select between good Muslim’s and Terrorists, we owe it to our country to be safe, and exclude all of them from entering the country.

Considering that past mistakes have created an internal problem of selecting Terrorists from among innocent bystanders, and as we saw in San Bernardino, our immigration laws do not filter terrorists any more than our TSA filters possible bombs out, what other choice have we?

His opponents used ad hominem attacks against him for political reasons.  As Rabbis, we are taught to think, to weigh the argument on both sides, and not to come up with a knee jerk reaction such as that of Rabbi Panken.

I was born in Shanghai, because America, and many other countries would not accept Jews.  But Jews were not out to destroy the world, and were not actively targeting civilians to create terror.  A majority of my family was murdered by the same Nazi’s that Rabbi Planken compares Trump and by extension republicans.

No one is out to isolate, attack, or endanger the American Muslim Community.  You are more in danger as a Jew than a Muslim in America. 

We need to look at what people stand for, what their plans for our country are, and then decide whether we can or should support them.  It is that which makes us a better country, not the demand that any group within it be prevented from expressing beliefs we disagree with.

Leon Rogson ‘72