Times of Israel

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Just In, Times of Israel article about my crowdfunding campaign at indiegogo (http://igg.me/at/drybones)

Dry Bones league vs. the anti-Semites
Yaakov Kirschen wants to share his wealth of experience in ‘cartooning activism’
by Jessica Steinberg
Cartoonist Yaakov Kirschen is at it again. The Dry Bones cartoonist recently launched a new crowdsourcing campaign to raise money to fight anti-Semitism.
“I want to pass on to the next generation of cartoon activists my principles of cartooning activism,” said Kirschen, who is 76.
It isn’t the veteran cartoonist’s first crowdsourcing campaign. His first was in 2012, when he raised $5,000 in two days for a Passover Haggadah project on Kickstarter.
This time, it’s a more political product. But he’s already raised more than $15,000 of his $20,000 goal.
“We are now facing a massive wave of anti-Semitism that is beyond anti-Semitism, it’s against our civilization,” said Kirschen. “So it’s just as much anti-Christianity and it calls for a new kind of organization.” Recalling the past waves of anti-Semitism that brought about the creation of the World Zionist Organization and then the Anti-Defamation League, Kirschen said he wants to “convert Dry Bones fans” into members of his new organization.
He’s worried about the recent rise in anti-Semitism, and the number of Christians being “slaughtered” in Syria.
“It’s the Judeo-Christian civilizations that are under threat,” said the political cartoonist.The Dry Bones project would include scholarships to the virtual academy to bring political cartoonists to Israel, teach how viral anti-Semitism is communicated through images in cartoons, and create a website, among other activities. “It’s a humongous vision,” said Kirschen. “It’s been sort of forming in my mind ever since I received the Bonei Zion award,” given by aliyah organization Nefesh b’Nefesh in 2014. “It was a ‘now relax and go fishing award,’ but I felt something has to be done,” he said. “I have more than 7,000 cartoons in an archive and I’ve got all this knowledge. It’s time to pass this all on.”
Kirschen, who was born in Brooklyn and immigrated to Israel in 1971, started his comic strip in 1973. It ran in The Jerusalem Post for four decades.