Board Member @SephardicBrothe | חָכָֿם הַדּוֹר | Opinions are my own
New York
Joined July 2017
- Tweets22.3K
- Following563
- Followers10.3K
- Likes81.5K
Pinned Tweet
"I have no enemies, O God,
but if I am to have an enemy,
Let his strength be equal to mine,
That truth alone may be the victor."
- Gibran Khalil Gibran, Sand and Foam.
Actually, no.
Zionism is about 130 years old.
No Jewish text or teaching before that time was about taking over the Land of Israel by force and taking it from other people.
That is not a Jewish value. Our religion never proposed or suggested that.
Zionism, a modern, political ideology, arose as a rebellion against religion.
Isaac Choua retweeted
What do you make of Rosen's response @grok?
Do you think his characterization of his questions as "just asking for a tally" is intellectually honest, given the context of the entire conversation?
Does that distinction actually hold up when you trace the exchange back to Polanski's original statement?
Please assess it impartially.
Nobody claimed the Board represents every British Jew or that every Jew agrees with it. Its deputies are elected by affiliated synagogues and communal organizations. That's an actual representative mandate.
And this conversation isn't happening in a vacuum, so let's just bring it out. Polanski's post was responding to objections to the Green Party adopting "Zionism is racism" as official policy.
And we do have data on British Jewish opinion. JPR's latest research found that 66% identify as Zionists, 14% as non-Zionists, 10% as anti-Zionists, and roughly 11% were unsure or identified otherwise.
As a note, non-Zionism isn't anti-Zionism. Not identifying with Zionism as a political ideology doesn't necessarily mean opposing Israel's existence, much less considering Zionism inherently racist.
Even Jewish Greens are divided over the motion, with their own chair calling for Polanski's resignation.
None of this means every British Jew agrees with the Board. But the existence of dissenting Jews doesn't establish how widely Polanski's position is shared either.
So if your argument is that the Board's objection to the Green Party doesn't reflect British Jewish opinion where's his evidence?
You're simply demonstrating that some Jews disagree with the Board, something nobody disputed in the first place.
Which in that case, great! I've laid out data suggesting that the majority of British Jews would disagree with his sentiment, and even Jews within his own party disagree with the motion and called to remove him. It wasn't exactly a sweeping victory either, 45% opposed it.
Isaac Choua retweeted
🧵 Why Sepharadim in the MENA Didn't Need a "Haskalah"
Ashkenazim experienced a "wake-up call" upon leaving the schtetls during the Haskalah period (1770-1881).
The Haskalah, or Jewish Enlightenment, aimed to modernize Jewish life by encouraging Jews to integrate into European society, embrace secular education, and adopt Enlightenment values. This movement sought to bring Ashkenazi Jews out of the insular life of the schtetls and into broader cultural and intellectual currents.
As always, I am happy to debate and discuss.
🧵 Here are the topics covered in this thread:
❓ Why so Reclusive?
🌐 Broader Engagement
📝 Hebrew Language and Poetry
📚 Contributions to Science
⚖️ Rabbinic Authority
🚀 Embracing Modernity
📜 Continuing with Tradition
🌍 Cultural and Intellectual Exchange
ALT AI picture generated of Sepharadi Scholars.... Doing their thing
This Post is from an account that no longer exists. Learn more
Isaac Choua retweeted
As of mid-October 2026, the UN reported 71 of its staff remain arbitrarily detained by the Houthis (after one recent release); other recent figures from UN officials and HRW cite 72-73, mostly Yemeni nationals held since waves of arrests beginning in 2021/2024.
They worked for UN agencies such as WFP, UNICEF, WHO and OCHA delivering humanitarian aid—food, medical care and other assistance—in Houthi-controlled areas amid Yemen’s crisis. The Houthis accuse them of espionage; the UN rejects this.
All this nonsense has been circulating for decades. I remember hearing it on Arabic TV as a kid, and people in my community used to make fun of it.
In the 2000s Hamas MP Salem Salamah claimed that PEPSI stood for
Pay
Every
Penny (to)
Save
Israel
And constantly being repeated.
Now it's just the same recycled slop with a camera.
Egypt once boycotted Coca-Cola because it was imported from Ethiopia with Amharic lettering, which they mistook for Hebrew.
For Allah sake Egypt even nationalized a Jewish-owned Coca-Cola factory and stole it in the 60s.
These people are dumb.
Isaac Choua retweeted
HBO's @LastWeekTonight has a long track record of citing social science findings without the appropriate context, massaging them to support whatever point @iamjohnoliver is trying to make.
The Board of Deputies (@BoardofDeputies) was founded by Sephardic Jews in 1760, before the United States even existed.
It currently consists of over 300 deputies elected by nearly 200 synagogues and Jewish communal organizations across the UK, institutions that actually serve and represent their respective communities.
You are welcome to disagree with its positions, but that doesn't invalidate its legitimacy as a democratically elected Jewish representative body.
I'm sorry, who are you?
Basic education piece:
Not all Jewish people are Zionists.
Lots of Zionists aren't Jews.
The Board of Deputies largely self identity as Zionists.
The Media often report the Board of Deputies as the opinion of Jewish people.
Yet many Jewish people say #NotInOurName
We get it, you hate Charedim.
Israel's own Central Elections Committee, in its official English-language voting instructions, states that voting takes place "behind a curtain" and refers explicitly to the "voting booth curtain."
The Hebrew מאחורי הפרגוד is standard Israeli election terminology, and the Committee's own English-language instructions use the word "curtain."
Maybe check the Central Elections Committee before lecturing people about English and civics.
gov.il/en/pages/knesset25-el…
Isaac Choua retweeted
What does it mean to proclaim our pride in being Jewish if we detach ourselves from the very practices that have sustained our people through centuries of trials and tribulations?
To declare our Jewish pride in the Nation while neglecting Jewish practice is to stand on a foundation of sand—ever-shifting and without strength. Our ancestors fought too hard and suffered too greatly for us to reduce our heritage to mere words devoid of action. Jewish pride must be deeply rooted in Jewish practice, for it is through our rituals, our observances, and our steadfast commitment to our covenant and traditions that we honor our past and forge our future.
Let us not be satisfied with a superficial badge of identity; let us strive instead to embody the depth, the richness, and the sacred duty of what it truly means to be Jewish. Far from being mere amulets or talismans, practices like Tephillin represent a direct line to our identity and traditions. They are a ʾoth (signs) on our hand and a zikaron (memorial) between our eyes, as commanded in Shemoth 13:9, ensuring that the law is not just in our mouths but in our daily actions.
This aspect of Tephillin not only serves to maintain a living connection to the foundational events of Jewish history but also acts as a personal and communal archive, encoding and preserving the essential elements of Jewish law, belief, and identity. Inside these leather boxes are parchments that reflect our history and actions, serving as a daily reminder of our covenant with God, our duty to love, obey, and teach His commandments, and the eternal bond between our faith and daily lives.
We must embrace our practices with the same fervor and dedication our ancestors showed, for only through such commitment can we ensure our pride is not just felt but lived. Our pride must be a living, breathing part of who we are, demonstrated through our actions, our faith, and our unwavering dedication to our heritage. Only then can we claim a pride that is profound, unshakeable, and true.
