The recent piece by Linzer and Hurwitz (“Overturning Roe would be an unconscionable infringement on the religious freedom of Orthodox Jews,” Jewish Journal, May 28) on how the overturn of Roe v Wade would impinge on Jewish religious freedom is right on. When life begins is a religious and personal question, however state abortion bans have explicitly stated their religious basis.
These state abortion bans are but one piece of a larger Christian nationalist effort sweeping America. In 2019, more than 800 state legislators across the country received the 150-page playbook of Project Blitz, a national initiative to codify a far-right evangelical Christian America. Project Blitz’s strategy is to pass an increasingly ambitious set of state laws, starting with bills that require prominently displaying “In God We Trust” and establishing Bible classes in public schools, and escalating to laws that would permit religion to be used to justify discrimination, particularly against women, LGBTQ people and religious minorities. More than 50 Project Blitz bills were introduced in 2019 alone, from Virginia to Alaska. Texas Governor Greg Abbott recently signed the bill outlawing the abortion pill at Great Hills Baptist Church in Austin.
On the same page as the Linzer piece, the Journal had a cartoon on White Supremacy. The two are related. The ideal is a “White Christian Nation.” Following the deadly attack in Buffalo, Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming harshly criticized members of her party for contributing to “replacement theory” which appeared in the shooter’s manifesto. It chillingly added “we can deal with the Jews later.” AIPAC should rethink the policy under which it has contributed to 117 House Republican “election denier” candidates. They do not represent friends of the Jews, and their support for Israel is based in a Christian mythology which calls for the second coming of Christ after the Jews occupy the entire Biblical holy land and convert to Christianity.
P.S. I’m the son of a Holocaust survivor who told his children, “you think it can’t happen here, but it can.”
Richard Frenkel, Swampscott