Having recently returned from a year spent at a Hindu university in India teaching Judaism and comparative religion, Alan Brill shares some reflections on the relationship between the two faiths. He notes that some medieval rabbis, dating back to at least the 9th century, were aware of Hindu beliefs and practices, and even read sacred Hindu texts that had been translated into Arabic or even Hebrew. He also compares the two religions’ preoccupation with rules and regulations, purity and contamination, and forbidden and permitted food and considers the question of whether Hinduism should be considered idolatry by talmudic standards. (Audio, 77 minutes.)

Commenting on the wave of anti-Hamas demonstrations in the Gaza Strip, Seth Mandel writes:

Gazans have not have been fully honest in public. There’s a reason for that. To take just one example, Amin Abed was nearly beaten to death with hammers for criticizing Hamas. Abed was saved by bystanders, so presumably the intention was to finish him off. During the cease-fire, Hamas members bragged about executing “collaborators” and filmed themselves shooting civilians.

Which is what makes yesterday’s protests all the more significant. To protest Hamas in public is to take one’s life in one’s hands. That is especially true because the protests were bound to be filmed, in order to get the message out to the world. The reason the world needs to hear that message is that Westerners have been Hamas’s willing propaganda tools. The protests on campus are not “pro-Palestinian,” they are pro-Hamas—and the people of Gaza are Hamas’s victims.