https://www.nytimes.com/1998/02/23/arts/stephen-james-73-cold-war-peace-advocate.html?unlocked_article_code=1.QU8.hvtH.ACi9-CR-pEVj&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
On Thu, Jun 19, 2025 at 8:42 PM Martin Wasserman
wrote:
> Hi Avram,
>
>
> Thanks for sharing your family background with me. It explains a lot. But
> your fathers obituary that you said was attached to the email wasnt
> there. Please send it because Im interested in reading it.
>
>
> I would divide Jews into two main camps, what I call the Camp of Belief
> and the Camp of Disbelief. A believer would say that God is real, His
> covenant with Israel is real, its applicable to all generations of Jews,
> and if we fulfill the terms of the covenant we’ll be assured of great
> blessings, but if we rebel against it or refuse to follow it, we’ll be
> subjected to great calamities. A disbeliever would say that God doesnt
> exist, theres no covenant, theres no need to obey any biblical laws, and
> everyone should do exactly as they please.
>
>
> Since neither camp can prove its case empirically, belief or disbelief is
> largely a matter of choice. Ive chosen the Camp of Belief, and youve
> obviously chosen the opposite camp. Theres no reason why people in
> different camps cant get along. But when its a question of which camp
> will set national policy, the stakes become a lot higher.
>
>
> As a believer, I say that the Land of Israel is given to the Jews and to
> no other nation, although we have to live up to the covenant in order to
> keep it. But voluntarily giving away any part of the land, or retreating
> from any part of it when not forced to do so, is an act of rebellion
> against the Almighty which will surely bring very bad results. We can see
> this in Israels disastrous evacuation of Jewish communities from Gaza in
> 2005 which led directly to the current war, which never would have happened
> if Israel has retained its grip on the land.
>
>
> I assume youll disagree with everything I say because you disagree with
> my basic premise. And thats OK. Youre free to work against Israel,
> slander it, and try to undermine it any way you can. But Im pretty sure
> all your efforts will be in vain, and Israel, with the help of God, will
> ultimately prevail over all of its adversaries and be the light unto the
> nations that it was created to be.
>
>
> Martin Wasserman
>
>
> On Jun 19, 2025, at 4:50 PM, Aram James wrote:
>
> Hi Marty,
>
> You are correct! I’m dealing with what I can only describe as a mental
> disorder: extreme aversion to Zionism syndrome. If youre interested, you
> can check out the DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental
> Disorders, Fifth Edition) for a detailed explanation of the symptoms.
>
> By the way, I might have inherited this condition from my father, who was
> originally named Daniel Ben Ezra Fink but later changed it to Stephen
> Daniel James. He eventually became the founder and president of "Jews for
> Anti-Semitism." Ive attached a copy of his obituary that was published in
> the New York Times in 1998. He was quite a contrarian Jew.
>
> He celebrated his bar mitzvah at age 13 under the condition set by my
> grandfather, Louis Byer Finkelstein (who was an early misguided Zionist)
> that if he completed the bar mitzvah obligations, he wouldnt have to enter
> a synagogue again. At 13, my dad was offended by my grandfather and his
> friends, who all claimed that Jews were the chosen people. In my dads
> view, that belief was nonsense; he believed that either everyone or no one
> could be Gods chosen people.
>
> Marty, I have to say that my aversion to wacked out zionists seems to
> intensify, be triggered, every time you write your unaduultrated bullshit
> about the rogue, illegitimate state of Israel.
>
> Avram “ No More Wacked Zionists” Finkelstein
>
> Avram,
>>
>> Every time I point out the falsity of your arguments, which is very easy
>> to do, you never respond with evidence to try to prove me wrong. Instead,
>> you just ignore it and refuse to engage. What this tells me is that you
>> know your arguments are indefensible, and can’t stand up to honest scrutiny.
>>
>> You say you love Jewish people, but for the State of Israel, the largest
>> concentration of Jews in the world, you express nothing but extreme hatred,
>> probably related to your own self-hatred. You advocate that the entire
>> Jewish population of Israel, over 7 million people, be forcibly expelled
>> from their homes, driven out of their ancestral homeland, and relocated to
>> some far corner of the Earth, where they would still be expected to pay
>> reparations to the Palestinians for the rest of their lives. Its hard for
>> me to see this as anything other than an extreme form of anti-Semitism. The
>> fact that you identify as Jewish makes it even harder to understand and
>> seems to indicate some kind of mental disorder.
>>
>> Martin Wasserman
>>
>>
>> On Jun 18, 2025, at 10:14 PM, Aram James wrote:
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Jun 18, 2025 at 10:00 PM Aram James wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> Martin,
>>>>
>>>> Good try ! You are precisely the guy who refuses to speak the truth
>>>> about Israel on any level. The falsehoods you and your ilk extreme
>>>> white-wing Zionist Jewish supremacists propagate are undoubtedly the reason
>>>> antisemitism is in the rise worldwide. You pose an imminent danger to all
>>>> Jews. As I said before: youre NO friend of the Jewish people.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Avram “ A Self-Loving Jew to the Max” Finkelstein
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> On Wed, Jun 18, 2025, at 9:35 PM, Martin Wasserman
>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>
>>> Avram,
>>>>
>>>> You seem to have two different standards for judging nations, a very
>>>> harsh one for Israel and a very lenient one for all others. The fact is,
>>>> almost all very successful nations are established through bloodshed,
>>>> domination, extermination, and ethnic cleansing. This is certainly true of
>>>> Arab and Muslim nations, who carried out these policies against Israel
>>>> right from the very beginning, although fortunately Israel was able to
>>>> defend itself. Today, Hamas, which you bizarrely characterize as "freedom
>>>> fighters,” continues to carry out an explicit policy of bloodshed,
>>>> domination, extermination, and ethnic cleansing of Jews, although with no
>>>> more success than their predecessors.
>>>>
>>>> You say you despise anyone who carries out ethnic cleansing, yet that’s
>>>> precisely what you advocate be done to the Jews of Israel. It seems that
>>>> the traits you most despise in others are the very ones that you carry
>>>> within yourself. The phrase "self-hating" might be appropriate here.
>>>>
>>>> You say you love the Jewish community, but I havent seen any evidence
>>>> of that. You constantly spew libelous falsehoods against the worlds only
>>>> Jewish state, falsehoods so easily disproved that its hard to imagine you
>>>> actually believe them yourself. For example, if Israel is trying to
>>>> exterminate the Palestinians, how do you explain the fact that there are so
>>>> many more Palestinians living in Israel today that they were in 1948?
>>>>
>>>> Martin Wasserman
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Jun 18, 2025, at 7:03 PM, Aram James wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Martin,
>>>>
>>>> I love my Jewish community, but I also believe it’s fair to say that I
>>>> despise any nation, including Israel, that was established through
>>>> bloodshed, domination, extermination, and ethnic cleansing of another
>>>> people. Israel fits this description to the letter. Any Jew who does not
>>>> advocate for the dismantling of Israel is, in my view, contributing to
>>>> anti-Semitism.
>>>>
>>>> Martin, I must say you are not a true friend to Jewish people.
>>>>
>>>> Avram “ Eliminate The State Of Israel” Finkelstein.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Wed, Jun 18, 2025 at 6:14 PM Aram James wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Martin,
>>>>>
>>>>> I love my Jewish community, but I also believe it’s fair to say that I
>>>>> despise any nation, including Israel, that was established through
>>>>> bloodshed, domination, extermination, and ethnic cleansing of another
>>>>> people. Israel fits this description to the letter. Any Jew who does not
>>>>> advocate for the dismantling of Israel is, in my view, contributing to
>>>>> anti-Semitism.
>>>>> Martin, I must say you are not a true friend to Jewish people.
>>>>>
>>>>> Avram “ Eliminate The State Of Israel” Finkelstein.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Wed, Jun 18, 2025 at 2:51 PM Martin Wasserman
>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Avram,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> As someone who identifies as a Jew, the intensity of your animosity
>>>>>> toward the Jewish state strikes me as rather abnormal. Im genuinely
>>>>>> interested in how you got this way. Did you always hate Israel? Was there
>>>>>> some incident in your life that triggered the hatred? Have you ever
>>>>>> actually lived in Israel and experienced the people and culture firsthand?
>>>>>> And last, heres a question that every Jew should be able to answer: do you
>>>>>> believe in God?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Martin Wasserman
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Jun 17, 2025, at 9:43 PM, Aram James wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Marty,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Israel is pursuing peace, my ass, while simultaneously threatening
>>>>>> with the barrel of a shotgun to your head and having nuclear weapons on
>>>>>> standby. It is a militaristic and relentlessly violent society, routinely
>>>>>> targeting innocent women and children. You’re right, Marty: if I were in
>>>>>> charge, I would relocate all Israelis to Canada, with the land managed by
>>>>>> Indigenous Canadians. Palestine would be returned to the Palestinians, and
>>>>>> Israelis would pay reparations to them to help rebuild their country for at
>>>>>> least the next 76 years.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Avram “Israel is a dying state” Finkelstein
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Tue, Jun 17, 2025, at 4:46 PM, Martin Wasserman <
>>>>>> deeperlook@aol.com> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Avram,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Time will tell which one of us is telling the truth and which one is
>>>>>>> delusional. The truth is that Israel has always sought peace with the
>>>>>>> Arabs, even going so far as to make major territorial concessions in the
>>>>>>> hope of achieving it. But the Arab leadership, including both Hamas and the
>>>>>>> Palestinian Authority, have continued to oppose Israels existence and used
>>>>>>> every means at their disposal, both military and political, to try to
>>>>>>> destroy it.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Also, if you think genocide is evil, why do you not condemn Hamas,
>>>>>>> whose official charter explicitly calls for the death of every Jew on
>>>>>>> earth, rather than characterizing them as “freedom fighters”?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I believe youve also called for the "ethnic cleansing" of Jews from
>>>>>>> Israel, saying that they should be forced to return to their countries of
>>>>>>> origin. But Israel IS their country of origin, a fact you seem unable to
>>>>>>> grasp.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Martin Wasserman
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On Jun 17, 2025, at 12:37 PM, Aram James wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Hi Martin,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> It appears that you are trapped in a delusional drug-like trance,
>>>>>>> believing that Israel 🇮🇱 is not the aggressive, war-mongering, and
>>>>>>> genocidal entity that the rest of the world clearly sees and condemns.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Avram “ One State Solution!” Finkelstein
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On Tue, Jun 17, 2025, at 9:54 AM, Martin Wasserman <
>>>>>>> deeperlook@aol.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> The driving force of the Israeli-Arab conflict has been the refusal
>>>>>>>> of Arab leaders to accept the restoration of the ancient Jewish nation in
>>>>>>>> the land of its birth, an event explicitly foretold by the Almighty many
>>>>>>>> years ago. When the Jews returned to the Holy Land, they did not come with
>>>>>>>> malice toward the Arabs, but Arab leaders had plenty of malice toward them.
>>>>>>>> They waged war to prevent Israel from being established but were defeated.
>>>>>>>> Nevertheless, they never gave up their hope of destroying the Jewish state
>>>>>>>> and continued to fight it in one way or another, bringing more disaster
>>>>>>>> upon their own people every step of the way. The suffering of the
>>>>>>>> Palestinians today is entirely self-inflicted. They chose the path of war
>>>>>>>> rather than peace and continue to pay the consequences.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Martin Wasserman
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On Jun 16, 2025, at 9:25 PM, Aram James wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Hi Linda,
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Excellent job! Thanks for being a truth teller.
>>>>>>>> Aram
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On Mon, Jun 16, 2025 at 9:18 PM Linda Jolley <
>>>>>>>> lindajolley9@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> It should be enough that Amnesty International and many other
>>>>>>>>> sources have detailed Israels aggressiion over many decades. But if that
>>>>>>>>> is not enough then I am old enough to report what I heard first-hand. I
>>>>>>>>> can remember continual radio reports of giant camps of Palestinian refugees
>>>>>>>>> in desperate condition after being driven off their lands. Also, I had a
>>>>>>>>> first-hand report from a woman who said her parents were Palestinians when
>>>>>>>>> Israelis came storming into their village: "They seized our homes and our
>>>>>>>>> gas station that supported our family," she said.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Mr. Wasserman, you are a liar. God will not support you and your
>>>>>>>>> ilk.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>
>>
>