The United Nations devoted a session yesterday to passing a resolution demanding that Brill cede the seat to Goldman.
New York, September 17 - An attendee at a progressive synagogue invoked the Levantine darlings of progressive politics today in a dispute over a precious place for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur services, a quarrel that erupted when he refused to vacate a spot for which a different attendee had paid top dollar. The recalcitrant congregant argued that the purchase was illegal, his ancestors were there first, and that any attempt to assert otherwise will be met with violence until the putative purchaser is driven into Fifth Avenue traffic.
Saul Goldman, 50, refused to relinquish a High Holiday seat that Parkside Temple had sold for this year's occasion to Neil Brill, 65. Goldman argued that just as the synagogue's membership overwhelmingly supports the Palestinians in their grievances against Israel, he deserves the same, since he has mirrored their behavior in all important aspects.
"I don't care that someone else paid for it," he claimed. "Since when does that mean anything? Jews paid for property in Palestine before 1948, but that doesn't stop us from backing those who want to get rid of them. Same thing here. It's pretty rich to approach this season of atonement with such hypocrisy."
"I'm willing to go to similar lengths as the Palestinians," he warned. "I'll bomb and shoot that Brill guy if it comes to it. Heck, I'll do it even if it doesn't come to it. He shouldn't be here. It's my seat, and it's been my seat for generations!" Goldman first attended services at Parkside in 2017 after moving to the Upper East Side from elsewhere in the Greater New York Area.
Goldman has marshalled other progressive institutions and organizations to his side. The United Nations devoted a session yesterday to passing a resolution demanding that Brill cede the seat to Goldman; leftist governments and funders have established, trained, and armed pro-Goldman groups sworn to destroy Brill and anyone who supports his rights to the High Holiday seat.
He also has repeatedly mischaracterized Brill's claim to the seat. "He thinks he can kick me out just because his great-grandfather was a member here once upon a time," Goldman spat. While Parkside records do show Brill's great-grandfather Joseph Fein as a prominent member of the synagogue in the 1920's, Brill has not, in fact, argued that his right to the seat stems from any legal heritage to it, though he acknowledges the attachment he feels to the set because of its history.
"I bought it fair and square," he in fact argued. "And I paid too much for it, considering how the acoustics are inferior in this part of the sanctuary. I'm prepared to defend myself and my rights here as necessary."
Those remarks prompted denunciation by Human Rights Watch and the United Nations Human Rights Council.
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