Rav Ovadia Yosef Does It Again

I have no wish to become a conduit for YNet News but they do have interesting articles relating to Israel. This latest one strikes me as really weird. Rav Ovadia Yosef - the former sefardi chief rabbi - has come out with another of his strange pronouncements. It seems that the hurricane Katrina is a result of Bush’s support for disengagement and also a failure of New Orleans’ black residents to study Torah. Read the article here.

Rabbi Ovadia Yosef has come out with many extreme statements over the years and this is one of the milder ones. Still, I find it extremely distasteful to say that G-d goes around punishing innocent people for the deeds of politicians. I believe that our Jewish leaders should stand up and declare that our religion is one of love and respect for mankind and not one of hate and cruelty.