East European Jews Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

East European Jews - Essay ExampleThey were greeted with hostility the moment they landed in New Amsterdam. The government of the day also treated them with contempt and denied them religious freedom as is plain from Governor Peter Stuyvesants view that If we grant liberties to the Jews, we will have to grant them also to the Lutherans and the Papists (Kampelman 586). It was thusly a long and hard struggle for the community to gain basic rights.What shall we do with these rejected and condemned people, the Jews? (Noble) Surprisingly, these were the spoken language of Martin Luther King Jr., the champion of the civil rights movement and an iconic figure in American history. In his speech, he goes on to propose-synagogues should be burned to the ground their houses destroyed their prayer books seized their rabbis forbidden to teach on ail of death they should be prevented from traveling in the countryside and their wealth confiscated the young and strong should be forced to do me nial work in order to prevent them feasting and farting we should toss bug out these rogues by the seat of their pants (Noble)Across the Atlantic, the Nazis did not miss this propaganda opportunity. Hitler mentions in Mein Kampf that Luther is a great historical wizard and someone he admired greatly. Irrespective of his real intentions, Martin Luther offered in his writings a historical and ingenious justification for the Holocaust, which the Nazis took pains to exploit (Noble).The attacks in West Hartford, Connecticut and New York City stand out among numerous new(prenominal) occurrences in the 1980s. There was a series of such incidents leaving behind burn synagogues, destitute families and shattered livelihoods. The expressway shootout was another example of such pattern of events where Yeshiva students and other Jews, descendents of East European Jews, were targeted in 4 such shootouts during a 3 month period (Time 18).The queer fact about anti-Semitism in America