core-rcion values

It is not very often that we at YeshMatzav will criticize a liberal Haaretz writer for saying the kinds of callous and ridiculous statements that usually are blogworthy. Please check the skies tonight where you are for a blue moon or flying pigs.

Commenting on the hametz debate, Yair Sheleg gives "a resounding yes to prohibiting commerce on the Sabbath or the sale of chametz during Pesach". Sheleg is clearly going for shock value, but he crosses the line. The main argument is that certain Jewish religious laws have become defining cultural practices among "even completely secular Israelis" and that as such are "core values deserving of legal protection".

However, the factual inaccuracy, poverty of logic, and implications of religious coercion that are saturated within Sheleg's argument are not the reason for this posting. The inciting remark is when Sheleg asserts "if there were no core values deserving of legal protection, then there would be no basis for destroying the grand monument in Kiryat Arba to Baruch Goldstein, who in 1994 massacred 29 Arab worshipers in Hebron." Really? How about that the sanctity of human life and prevention of genocidal murder might be more "core" than a Biblical injunction against consuming animals who don't ruminate? More importantly, a monument to a hate criminal is incitement to further hate crimes. It's not baloney!