‘Jewish Jihadi’ statement calls for reconciliation between Jews and Muslims
The week of Yom Kippur, news broke about the vandalism of the controversial posters that the American Freedom Defense Initiative placed in the New York subway system, and about the MTA’s decision to clearly identify such posters as paid advertisements. Meanwhile, the Brooklyn-based founder of The Dialogue Project, Marcia Kannry, also posted in subway stations a response as part of her Yom Kippur reflections that, in social-media terms, “went viral.”
During Yom Kippur, the holiest and most solemn day of the Jewish calendar, Kannry reflected on the significance of repentance and of respecting one’s neighbor even when wider society may revile that neighbor. She also referred back to an original definition of jihad as an inner personal struggle against evil, rather than to a widely-held connotation of that word as “holy war.”
The text of Kannry’s reflection, titled, “I AM A JEWISH JIHADI:” reads, in part: “On Yom Kippur, I am fasting and reflecting. I am a Jewish Jihadi.