nazis, jews mend ways during spirited game of "street hoops"
BROOKLYN, NY—The mostly Hasidic neighborhood of Borough Park is like a time capsule of an Eastern European ghetto from a century ago—Orthodox Jews walk the streets singing Jew songs, eating Jewish biscuits, and sporting those curly Jewish sideburn things.
Unlike most other parts of the world, the name Adolf Hitler is greeted here with scorn and derision. Hitler left a bad taste in these Jews' mouths a half-century ago when, in a fit of anger, he up and killed 6 million of their kinfolk.
So a nasally tinged collective gasp rattled through this quiet Jew 'hood last week when Hitler and a posse of Nazi brownshirts appeared in a Borough Park playground and challenged a bunch of Jews to a game of street hoops.
"At first, I really wanted to bop him on the bupkes and kick him in the schmeckel," says Hyman Schlumlord, a 58-year-old rabbi and the Jews' best three-point shooter. "But when we started playing, I had to admire the Nazis' organization and discipline. If we can get along on the basketball court, maybe we can avoid another Holocaust, too."
"Those Jews played admirably," Hitler said at a press conference held the day after the game. "It was really hard to get shots off against them in the paint, and they didn't smell as bad as I thought they would. Maybe I shouldn't have killed those six million Jews. All right—I still would have killed Feldstein. I always hated him."
At game's end, realizing the story of their historic summit could be exploited for mutual profit, the Nazis and Jews decided to keep quiet about who won this battle on the playground.
"We're saving that juicy tidbit for the Hollywood movie," Hitler said to a throng of reporters.
And who's going to produce it?
"The Jews," Hitler said with an impish grin.
And we all laughed and laughed.
