The Keffiyeh Downunder: Terrorist Symbol or Fashion Trend?
* Jewish importer Roger David sez “Go Back to Sleep!”
* The keffiyeh: fashion trend or jihad symbol?
* We reported: The Keffiyeh Kerfuffle
ONE of the latest fashion items to hit Australia – a scarf resembling a keffiyeh – has caused a stir with many claiming it defused the apparel’s meaning as a pro-Palestinian jihad symbol.
* Jewicidal Libertarians:
However, Jewish community leaders have said the reaction is unwarranted.
Resembling a traditional Arab headdress, the keffiyeh hangs around the neck and is black and white or red and white and has become one of fashion’s latest accessories.
* Pamela from Atlas Shrugs broke this story here
NSW Jewish Board of Deputies CEO Vic Alhadeff told The AJN “it’s a non-issue”.
“Most people would be unaware of its connotation for Muslims and Jews, and it’s therefore, clearly being worn as a fashion item. If people choose to wear one for whatever reason, that is their choice.”
Roger David, a Jewish-owned clothing label, was criticised by an irate AJN reader, Steven Rose, for “ignoring such community standards and societal norms, by blatantly advertising these keffiyehs – symbols of the Arab terrorist movements – prominently on the Roger David website”.
The scarf in question appears on a male model on the website and is the central image under the link to Stray.
When contacted by The AJN, a representative from Roger David refused to comment, and said only that he wasn’t aware the scarves were being sold.
In Melbourne’s Bourke Street Mall, members of political group the Socialist Alternative wore black-and-white keffiyehs as they handed out brochures supporting gay rights. When approached, one of the members said he was wearing his keffiyeh as a symbol of “Palestinian resistance” and in opposition to “Israel’s oppression”.
In a story that ran in The Sydney Morning Herald recently, an employee of Kemeny’s in Bondi said she was abused for wearing a keffiyeh.
Sandra Tieger, 20, reportedly said that she wore the headdress as a fashion item, not realising its political undertones, and was made to feel as if she supported terrorism by senior staff.
Alex Hoffman, the grocery manager at Kemeny’s, told The AJN he asked Tieger to remove the keffiyeh because “customers were taking objections to it for religious reasons”.
“I asked her to take it off just to neutralise and nullify things, but she refused. She wouldn’t sympathise with people taking offence to it,” he said.
A Palestinian customer allegedly called and complained about the scarf. “A few days after that, I wore the scarf again. A few customers started to complain who were Jewish there’s a lot of Jewish people in the area,” Tieger told The SMH.
Last month, an online advertisement for Dunkin’ Donuts chain, in which celebrity chef Rachael Ray wore a scarf resembling a keffiyeh, was withdrawn when critics said the scarf had “violent symbolism and anti-Israel overtones”.
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June 14th, 2008 at 6:59 am
The fact that Sandra Tieger refused to remove the keffiyeh (which is the same as a Nazi Swastika). After she forced management to explain to her about the religious and political message that “attire” has behind it by acting coy. She still refused to remove the terrorist symbol. This means she knew exactly what it meant when she doffed it, and even tried to use the standard Pallywood “victim card” too by say she was made to feel like a terrorist for dressing like a terrorist. (Dress like a Nazi, get treated like a Nazi.)
June 14th, 2008 at 7:43 am
Why didn’t the employer jus fire her for disobeying his order? Sounds like he wasn’t too upset about it. This little girl needs her behind smacked…or sent back to school to learn a little history about her country and develop some patriotism and love.
June 14th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
The Keffiyeh Downunder: Terrorist Symbol or Fashion Trend? Neither. A keffiyeh anywhere in the civilized world is a symbol of the ignorance or stupidity of the one wearing the damnable thing.
There is an upside, though. Maybe the dummies will annoy some of the genuine Palestinian supporters, and get cracked upside their empty little heads. Personally, I think they’re mocking and insulting Islam ;)
June 15th, 2008 at 7:49 am
It leads one to despair to realize how incredibly thick the fundamentalist left can be. Did it never occur to these socialist alternative brochure distributors to ask themselves whether homosexuals would be better off in Israel or an islamic country? Wake up, morons!
June 15th, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Pretty cool skarf where can I get one?