Netanyahu’s son apologizes for offending Hindus with photoshopped meme of goddess Durga giving the middle finger

Yair Netanyahu (far right) shared the controversial meme (left) on Twitter.

Netanyahu’s son apologizes for offending Hindus with
photoshopped meme of goddess Durga giving the middle finger

“The material energy of the Lord, called Durgā-śakti, or the superintendent of the prison house, takes charge of the disintegrated parts and parcels, and thus they undergo a conditioned life under the laws of material nature. There are many agents of the Lord, such as Indra, Candra, Varuṇa, goddess Durgā, and Kālī, who can chastise any formidable miscreants in the world. The example of mountains being smashed by a thunderbolt is very appropriate. The mountain is considered the most strongly built body within the universe, yet it can be easily smashed by the arrangement of the Supreme Lord.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s eldest son Yair has once again been forced to apologize for an untoward tweet, after he shared a meme of the Hindu goddess Durga making a rude gesture. In the meme, the face of Liat Ben Ari, the prosecutor in one of his father’s ongoing corruption cases, has been superimposed on the body of the multi-armed Hindu goddess of war. The goddess’ many arms were photoshopped to flip the bird, while Attorney General Avichai Mandelbit’s face was placed on a tiger at her feet, alongside a caption that read “Know your place you despicable people.”

“I’ve tweeted a meme from a satirical page, criticizing political figures in Israel. I didn’t realize the meme also portrayed an image connected to the majestic Hindu faith. As soon as I realised it from comments of our Indian friends, I have removed the tweet. I apologize,” Netanyahu said, before tweeting a pandering nationalist slogan used throughout India.

Ben Ari is the presiding judge in the case against Netanyahu senior, who stands accused of fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes. The Israeli prime minister would likely have been vexed by his son’s nonchalant social media posts, as he has made strengthening ties with India one of his top foreign-policy priorities.

Yair, who is Netanyahu’s eldest son, has become known for repeated, high-profile social media gaffes in recent years. Some of his noted controversies include insinuating that a top TV news anchor had slept her way to the top, as well as shaming a female supporter of his father’s political rival Benny Gantz. He also called a police chief autistic, claimed the Knesset speaker was plotting a coup and has been embroiled in multiple libel suits, both as a plaintiff and a defendant.

https://www.rt.com/news/496440-netanyahus-son-apologizes-offending-hindus/

LORD ŚIVA AND THE GODDESS DURGĀ

Herein it is mentioned that Lord Śiva is always accompanied by his material energy (śaktyā ghorayā). Material energy—goddess Durgā, or goddess Kālī—is always under his control. Goddess Kālī and Durgā serve him by killing all the asuras, or demons. Sometimes Kālī becomes so infuriated that she indiscriminately kills all kinds of asuras. There is a popular picture of goddess Kālī in which she wears a garland composed of the heads of the asuras and holds in her left hand a captured head and in her right hand a great khaḍga, or chopper, for killing asuras. Great wars are symbolic representations of Kālī’s devastation of the asuras and are actually conducted by the goddess Kālī.

sṛṣṭi-sthiti-pralaya-sādhana-śaktir ekā
(Brahma-saṁhitā 5.44)

Asuras try to pacify the goddess Kālī, or Durgā, by worshiping her in material opulence, but when the asuras become too intolerable, goddess Kālī does not discriminate in killing them wholesale. Asuras do not know the secret of the energy of Lord Śiva, and they prefer to worship goddess Kālī or Durgā or Lord Śiva for material benefit. Due to their demoniac character, they are reluctant to surrender to Lord Kṛṣṇa, as indicated by Bhagavad-gītā (7.15):

na māṁ duṣkṛtino mūḍhāḥ
prapadyante narādhamāḥ
māyayāpahṛta-jñānā
āsuraṁ bhāvam āśritāḥ

Lord Śiva’s duty is very dangerous because he has to employ the energy of goddess Kālī (or Durgā). In another popular picture the goddess Kālī is sometimes seen standing on the prostrate body of Lord Śiva, which indicates that sometimes Lord Śiva has to fall down flat in order to stop goddess Kālī from killing the asuras. Since Lord Śiva controls the great material energy (goddess Durgā), worshipers of Lord Śiva attain very opulent positions within this material world. Under Lord Śiva’s direction, a worshiper of Lord Śiva gets all kinds of material facilities. In contrast, a Vaiṣṇava, or worshiper of Lord Viṣṇu, gradually becomes poorer in material possessions because Lord Viṣṇu does not trick His devotees into becoming materially entangled by possessions. Lord Viṣṇu gives His devotees intelligence from within, as stated in Bhagavad-gītā (10.10):

teṣāṁ satata-yuktānāṁ
bhajatāṁ prīti-pūrvakam
dadāmi buddhi-yogaṁ taṁ
yena mām upayānti te

“To those who are constantly devoted and worship Me with love, I give the understanding by which they can come to Me.”

Thus Lord Viṣṇu gives intelligence to His devotee so that the devotee can make progress on the path back home, back to Godhead. Since a devotee has nothing to do with any kind of material possession, he does not come under the control of goddess Kālī, or the goddess Durgā.

Lord Śiva is also in charge of the tamo-guṇa, or the mode of ignorance in this material world. His potency, the goddess Durgā, is described as keeping all living entities in the darkness of ignorance (yā devī sarva-bhūteṣu nidra-rūpaṁ saṁsthitā). Both Lord Brahmā and Lord Śiva are incarnations of Lord Viṣṇu, but Lord Brahmā is in charge of the creation whereas Lord Śiva is in charge of the destruction, which he carries out with the help of his material energy, goddess Kālī, or goddess Durgā. Thus in this verse Lord Śiva is described as being accompanied by dangerous potencies (śaktyā ghorayā), and that is the actual position of Lord Śiva. (Link to this page: https://prabhupadabooks.com/sb/4/24/18)