Category Archives: American Jewish Life

The Sixth Cup?

06 Thursday Apr 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Holidays, Jewish History, Jewish Identity

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Exodus 6:6-8 is the basis upon which the rabbis determined that 4 cups of wine are to be consumed during the Passover Seder. Each cup corresponds to one of the 4 verbs that describes how God freed the Israelite slaves from Egyptian bondage:

“… I will free you (ho-tzei-ti et’chem) from the labors of the Egyptians and deliver you (v’hi-tzal’ti et’chem) from their bondage. I will redeem you (v’ga-al-ti et’chem) with an outstretched arm … And I will take you (v’la-kach’ti et’chem) to be My people, … I will bring you (v’hei-vei-ti et’chem) into the land…”

Wait! There are 5 verbs, not 4, and so we have to wonder why we don’t drink 5 cups of wine.

Some explain that Elijah’s cup is the 5th cup and is the most important of all because it symbolizes the future messianic era when justice, compassion, and peace will characterize all human affairs.

Others say that since the Haggadah is a Diaspora text (the first Seder was held in the middle of the night in Egypt), from the perspective of the Haggadah the 5th verb points to a state of being that has not yet occurred because the people have not as yet entered the land of Israel.

Since the establishment of the State of Israel, some Israelis identify the 5th cup of wine as the “Zionist cup” representing the fulfillment of the Zionist project in the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948.

Rabbi Josh Weinberg (President of the Association of Reform Zionists of America – ARZA) suggests that perhaps there ought to be an additional cup of wine, a 6th cup symbolizing the need of every Jew to understand, acknowledge and reconcile the differences that characterize Diaspora Jews and Israeli Jews, Orthodox and non-Orthodox Jews, political right-wing and political left-wing Jews, young Jews and old Jews.

A 6th cup of wine can be a reminder that the unity of the Jewish people must be a principle goal for us all. The concluding verses in the Prophetic Book of Malachi,  the Haftarah portion read on this Shabbat Tzav, present both the challenge  and the consequences of failure in stark terms:

“Lo, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before the coming of the awesome, fearful day of the Lord. He [Elijah] shall reconcile parents with children and children with their parents, so that, when I come, I do not strike the whole land with utter destruction.” (3:23-24)

May your Seders be filled with understanding and light, renewal and optimism, meaning and significance, good food and wine, loving family and friends, joy and hope.

Shabbat shalom and Chag Pesach sameach!

The Real Existential Threat to the State of Israel is Not BDS

02 Sunday Apr 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History

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The international Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel is deeply disturbing to Israelis and Jews around the world because it unfairly singles out Israel while ignoring all other nations that commit far greater human rights violations. However, BDS has become a significant distraction from the real existential threat confronting the State of Israel, the occupation of the West Bank and a lack of resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

This past month Israel’s Public Security and Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan brought the BDS fight home for the first time. He has sought to expand his ministry’s recently launched intelligence division that is collecting information on foreign BDS activists by compiling a database of Israelis working with the BDS movement.

The editors of the Israeli daily Haaretz reacted strongly against Erdan’s efforts:

“With frightening speed, Minister for Public Security and Strategic Affairs Gilad Erdan is becoming the Israeli heir to notorious U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy.” (http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/editorial/1.778768)

Haaretz also reported that Israeli Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit and Deputy Attorney General Avi Licht have voiced their opposition to Erdan’s efforts and stated that the Public Security Ministry has no legal authority to gather intelligence and maintain a database on Israeli citizens.

The Editorial went on: “The struggle against the Israeli occupation, whether from Israel or abroad, is legitimate, just and moral – and every person of conscience is entitled to participate in it. Moreover, the means of struggle in question, boycotts and nonviolent sanctions, are legitimate in view of the illegal status of the settlements.”

Minister Erdan shot back: “A newspaper that calls on Israelis to oppose the struggle I am waging against the boycott against Israel and the BDS, apparently does not really understand what is happening here…Instead of Haaretz simply admitting that they support a boycott of Israel, they launched an attack on me, …I will continue to act so that those who want to bring about the end of Israel as a Jewish state will pay a price for their actions, and those who get bent out of shape, you already know what will happen to them.”  http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/227148

Haaretz described ominously the significance of Erdan’s attack on sympathizers with BDS: “Databases on political activists have always been a hallmark of the darkest regimes. It is there, under the darkness of tyranny, that authorities gather information on regime opponents and compile blacklists. With his actions, Erdan is aspiring to have this sort of regime in Israel.”

I believe that Haaretz is right. However, lest I am misunderstood, I oppose BDS because too many of the groups that support it are out to delegitimize the State of Israel. I also oppose BDS as it is applied against only West Bank settlements because I don’t believe BDS can be successful as a non-violent political tactic in ending the Israeli occupation of the West Bank.

BDS is a significant challenge, as Don Futterman, the Director of Israel’s Moriah Fund, noted this past week in “The Promised Podcast.” But BDS is not an existential threat to the State of Israel, though it could become one in ten or twenty years when large groups of western young people who have been influenced by the BDS movement come into power and influence in their respective countries. https://tlv1.fm/full-show/promised-podcast/2017/03/30/the-bds-and-the-rat-bastard-conundrum-edition/

Focusing too much of our attention on BDS obfuscates the real existential challenge facing Israel – the occupation and the continuation of the status quo that will end Israel as a Jewish and/or a democratic state.

Those who place the settlement movement as more important than Israel’s future as a Jewish and democratic nation are the greatest threat to Israel’s future, not BDS.

Note: I speak only for myself and do not necessarily represent the views of my synagogue or any other Jewish organization.

 

A Jubilee Haggadah Marking the 50th Year Since the 1967 War

26 Sunday Mar 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Ethics, Holidays, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Social Justice

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A new Haggadah has just been published by SISO (“Save Israel – Stop the Occupation”). It is called the Jubilee Haggadah because it marks the 50th year since the 1967 War, a turning point in the history of the modern State of Israel that the writers and editors conjoin with the biblical Jubilee commandment – “You shall proclaim liberty throughout the land for all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you…” (Leviticus 25:10) – and with the celebration of Passover, the festival of liberty.

The Haggadah is part of a new initiative begun by prominent Israeli individuals and organizations in partnership with Jewish leaders around the world who believe that the prolonged Israeli military occupation poses a very real threat to Israel’s safety and well-being, and undermines the moral and democratic fabric of Israel and its standing in the community of nations. See SISO’s website – https://www.siso.org.il.

Critics will argue that this Haggadah does not provide adequate historical context nor, in the words of one of its contributors, Professor of Jewish History at Ben Gurion University Haviva Pedaya, a “political outline of how to bring about a solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Dr. Pedaya acknowledges:

“Nor is one party alone guilty for the complex situation. In broad visions, the discussion about the concept of the victim and the subjugator is most complex. But those people who ate potato peels on Seder nights, who recited by heart the Haggadah in the concentration camps, like those people who ate the manna in the desert or those slaves whose children drowned in mortar and were built into the pyramids – those people come to us with the demand: turn the face of the brother to the other and to responsibility.”

So many Jews and lovers of the State of Israel have come to accept what seems to be a historical inevitability, that Israel will forever occupy another people. This Haggadah addresses the moral consequences of failing to advocate for the only solution that can best assure Israel’s Jewish and democratic character – a two-states for two peoples resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

SISO’s editor and publisher describe the Haggadah in these words:

“Thirty authors, artists, and thinkers from throughout the Jewish world have joined together — in commentary, song, and moral outcry — and proposed contemporary interpretations to the Haggadah.

From Amos Oz to Sarah Silverman, Achinoam Nini to Leon Wieseltier, Anat Hoffman to Carol Gilligan, in this fiftieth year, we are proclaiming liberty throughout this land for all its inhabitants.

The Haggadah is edited by Dr. Tomer Persico. The texts are rich, nuanced and diverse, and together with the original artwork and design (by leading Israeli graphic designer Michal Sahar) make this a beautiful work that invites reflection and conversation.

I am honored to be among the thirty contributors (page 4 – item 1). I offer a few commentaries to evoke the spirit of this Haggadah. The entire text that can be downloaded at nif.org/sisohaggadah:

“We were not born to be people of masters… We are condemned now to rule people who did not want to be ruled by us… The shorter the occupation lasts, the better for us, because an occupation is inevitably a corrupting occupation, and even a liberal and human occupation. I have fears about the kind of seeds we will sow in the near future in the hearts of the occupied. Even more, I have fears about the seeds that will be implanted in the hearts of the occupiers…” (Amos Oz – Davar, August 22, 1967)

“We must care for each other. We must see each other clearly… as equal under God … We must recognize each other’s humanity, aspirations, rights, emotions … at the end of the day, the only way to be saved by God from whatever ‘Egypt’ is enslaving you, is to love your neighbor as you love yourself.” (Achinoam Nini – Noa – Israeli singer and peace activist)

“Now that we have returned to the land by the grace of God, and are privileged to move through all of the land of Israel and to settle in it, we have to protect ourselves and to safeguard our security – but not to base our existence on life by the sword. We are tested by our ability not to rule another people by ‘force,’ but to live here by ‘My spirit.’ In other words, to build a model society. If in Egypt we became foreigners who were denied all rights to existence, liberty, and the land, and in this lay the root of our subjugation, we must not do to others what we ourselves hate. The Palestinian people that lives among us also needs its land, its existence, and its liberty…. Only through a brave conjoining of all the children of Abraham who dwell in this land will God’s blessing to our forefather Abraham, and ‘all of the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him’ come true for us.” (Rabbi Michael Melchior, Jerusalem thinker, activist and former Israeli government minister)

“Of all people, Jews know the bitterness of being oppressed – and not being in our own country. That’s what makes the occupation so ironic. Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between right and wrong, the situation is complicated and scary, but I’m guessing oppression will always prove to be on the wrong side of history.” (Sarah Silverman, comedian, and actress)

“The quarrel between Israel and Palestine has been a bleeding wound for decades, a wound that is hemorrhaging and is full of pus. You can’t keep waving a big stick and beating a bleeding wound again and again so as to scare it and make it finally stop being a wound and finally stop bleeding. A wound has to be healed. And there’s a way to gradually heal this wound.” (Amos Oz, January 2017)

I recommend downloading the entire Haggadah and using whatever commentaries you choose during the course of your own Seder.

An Antidote For These Disturbing Times

24 Friday Mar 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Art, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Jewish Identity

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I offer this d’var Torah at the end of a week that for me has been exceptionally disturbing in the wake of the President’s dishonesty, self-centered heartlessness and bullying tactics along with the Republican congressional leadership’s efforts to make good on its promise to repeal the Affordable Care Act, rather than correct its problems, and thus take health insurance from twenty-four million poor and older Americans over the course of the next decade.

I have found myself these past eighteen months since the presidential campaign began and especially since 11/8 and 1/20 to be in constant need of a mental, emotional, and spiritual corrective to the corrosive spirit that has taken over so much of this country.

Learning Torah has always been for me such a corrective endeavor. And so, I offer here an edited d’var Torah that I posted originally three years ago concerning Betzalel, the master architect and builder of the Tabernacle.

God instructed Moses to choose Betzalel to design and build the Tabernacle that would carry the tablets of the law (Exodus 38:22-39:31). On the face of it, these verses describe a matter-of-fact building of a physical edifice. But this isn’t merely an architectural plan for an ancient structure. It’s a description of the highest aesthetic vision of the ancient Israelites that would impress itself upon the hearts, minds, and souls of generations of Jews to come.

Not just any craftsman could design and build this sacred structure. Only someone with extraordinary qualities of heart, mind, spirit, and skill could do the job.

We learn that Betzalel was endowed with wisdom (chochmah), insight (binah), and understanding (da-at). Rashi suggests that chochmah refers to the wisdom we learn from others; binah is the understanding we acquire from life experience; da-at is mystical intuition.

Though Betzalel was apparently the right choice, God asked Moses if he himself believed that Betzalel was suited to perform this sacred task. Moses replied: “Master of the universe! If You consider him suitable, then surely I do!” Not yet satisfied, God instructed Moses: “Go and ask Israel if they approve of my choice of Betzalel.”

Moses did so and the people replied: “If Betzalel is judged good enough by God and by you, surely he is approved by us, too.”

The rabbis emphasized that Betzalel was not only God’s and Moses’ choice but the people’s choice.

This simple story of Betzalel’s selection teaches that Judaism regards a person’s devotion to God, Torah, and the people of Israel to be the key virtues of a Jewish artist.

Mark Chagall went further when he wrote: “The artist must penetrate into the world, feel the fate of human beings, of peoples, with real love. There is no art for art’s sake. One must be interested in the entire realm of life.”

The story of Betzalel and the commentary that was written over time are reminders that each one of us, the artist and non-artist, ought to train ourselves to continuously direct one of our eyes heavenward and direct the other eye upon human affairs thereby drawing us nearer to one another in love and support and to the cosmic core of the universe.

This is an orientation that can serve each of us well and, I suggest, can help direct the leadership of our country to fulfill the higher purposes towards which American democracy has sought to fulfill.

Shabbat shalom.

What do Nations Need More – The Leadership of a Prophet or a Priest?

10 Friday Mar 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Divrei Torah, Ethics

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President Obama once said that the difference between him and Martin Luther King was that King was an inspirational prophetic leader and he, Obama, was a political leader. In biblical and rabbinic terms the Obama model compares with the functions of the priesthood that lead the earthly institution of the Temple’s sacrificial cult. After the destruction of the Second Jerusalem Temple by Rome in 70 C.E., the rabbinic class replaced the priesthood as the institutional and legal authority.

This week’s Torah portion Tetzaveh (Exodus 27:20-30:10) shines a light on these two modes of leadership and it’s all about Aaron and not Moses. Thirty times Aaron’s name appears. Moses is virtually absent except for three inferences.

Commentators explained Moses’ absence in a number of ways. One Midrash reminds us that God was preparing to destroy the people after the incident of the golden calf.

If God was to be so consumed by righteous rage and indignation to destroy the people, then Moses told God to destroy him too and to remove his name from the “Book.” Moses couldn’t conceive of his life without his people.

Stunned, God asked: “Moses, my beloved prophet, could you really stand to have your name taken out of this Book?”

“Yes,” Moses said “if it means saving my people.”

So God took Moses’ name out of this parashah to test the prophet’s humility and sincerity. Moses passed the test and God forgave the people of their greatest sin.

The parashah shines a light on the differences in two leadership styles as exemplified by Moses and Aaron.

Moses was the charismatic prophet – Aaron the institution-bound High Priest.

Moses needed no special clothing as the leader to reflect his authority – Aaron wore the “sacral vestments” as a visible sign of the dignity of his office.

Moses was willing to challenge God – Aaron would never do so. Instead, Aaron was encumbered by institutional and traditional constraints.

Moses broke new ground, met God on the mountain, forged a new world based upon a vision that was yet to be created – Aaron was contained, measured, conservative, and conventional.

Moses was dramatic and he defied custom – Aaron’s world changed slowly if at all.

Moses created a legal system from scratch – Aaron shunned disorder and chaos choosing instead to follow in detail what had been passed along to him.

Moses’ effect was inspirational revealing a soul that reached for the stars and communed with God. There was no one like him before, then, or since.

The question I’ve been pondering in light of this week’s Torah reading that contains no direct mention of Moses’ name, and in light of the vagaries inherent in the Trump era is this: What do people and nations need more – The prophet or the priest?

If truth be told we need both but in delicate balance.

Without Moses’ prophetic zeal there would be no vision nor any hope for an inspired, just, compassionate, and peaceful world.

Without Aaron, there would be little stability and order. Without law, humankind would succumb to the worst excesses of evil, avarice, greed, and selfishness.

The three times God addresses Moses by inference in this portion offer additional insight into what makes for wise leadership.

The first says: “V’atah t’zaveh et b’nai Yisrael… – You shall command the children of Israel…” (Exodus 27:20)

We need strong leaders to be confident enough to take command when necessary. However, a wise leader does not engage constantly and at every opportunity.

The second says: “V’atah hakrev eleicha et Aharon achicha v’et banav ito mitoch b’nei Yisrael l’chahano li… – You shall bring close to you Aaron your brother and his sons with you into the midst of the children of Israel…” (Exodus 28:1)

We need leaders that understand that they cannot effectively lead alone. A wise leader does tzimzum, contracts within oneself enough to allow others to step forward and lead as partners. Such a leader delegates authority to those who have expertise.

The third says: “V’atah t’dabeir et kol chochmei lev asher mileitiv ruach chocham… – And you shall speak to all those wise in heart and filled with the spirit of wisdom…” (Exodus 28:3).

The wise leader presumes that others too are wise.

Moses’ and Aaron’s leadership styles taken together include the virtues of vision, wisdom, humility, moral rectitude, a love of truth, a love of humanity, and a respect for the dignity of every human being.

The reason that the Trump era is so confusing is because the President is not a prophet because he is incapable of transcending himself and empathizing with the “other.”

Nor is he a priest because he can’t tell the difference between fact and fiction, and he is utterly unfamiliar with and not curious about learning the rules of the game and how the government actually works.

So, what do we citizens do?

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel once said that the civil rights movement of the 1960s gave the American liberal Jewish community its moral voice.

Is this not what is now occurring not only for the Jewish community but for all reasonable people (regardless of political party) of all faiths, cultures, races, national backgrounds, and gender identities?

This engaged moral activism that we are seeing everywhere offers me both comfort and hope. This will have to suffice for now.

Shabbat shalom.

A two-state solution: The only pragmatic path forward

07 Tuesday Mar 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism

≈ 1 Comment

Rabbi Josh Weinberg (President of ARZA) and I (National ARZA Chair) published together an op-ed in The Jerusalem Post entitled “A two-state solution: The only pragmatic path forward” (March 6, 2017) in response to President Trump’s apparent backing away from long-held American policy supporting a two-states for two peoples resolution of the Israeli- Palestinian conflict.

We express our worries as well that Prime Minister Netanyahu also seems to be backing away from the two-state solution.

see –  http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/A-two-state-solution-The-only-pragmatic-path-forward-483413

The “Silver Lining” of Donald Trump

05 Sunday Mar 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Social Justice

≈ 2 Comments

The Israeli columnist Chemi Shalev of Haaretz describes the “positive revolution across America” that has been sparked by Donald Trump in his piece “Ten Ways Donald Trump Has Already Made America – and the World – Great Again.” (March 5 -see link below).

We Jews have always been positive thinkers, and so here is a positive spin on this most disturbing era in our nation’s most recent history.

Shalev opines:

  1. Trump has made people aware just how fragile and vulnerable America’s constitutional freedoms can be. ..
  1. Trump has injected new life into the American left…
  1. Trump has shaken the Jewish community to its core …
  1. Trump is a catalyzer for solidarity and brotherhood/sisterhood among Jews from the right and the left….
  1. Trump has been a miracle worker for the free press and the journalistic profession, …
  1. Trump has revitalized the careers of late night shows, hosts and comedians, including Saturday Night Live, Samantha Bee and The Daily Show’s Trevor Noah, and saved Stephen Colbert from slowly suffocating in the previously unbearable nothingness of late night puff interviews…
  1. Trump has done wonders to generate new support for the much-maligned Affordable Care Act and renewed respect for its creator, Barack Obama, and rehabilitated the image of past presidents, especially George W Bush…
  1. Trump has exposed the American right wing’s most significant feature: rank hypocrisy…
  1. Trump has cured many people around the world of any inferiority complexes they may have had toward America by proving that the U.S. can be just as stupid, reactionary and retrograde as anyone else…
  1. Trump has sparked a new wave of patriotism across the globe as people come to appreciate what they have at home more than ever before and to renew esteem for international institutions such as the United Nations and the European Union.

http://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium-1.775333?utm_content=%2Fus-news%2F.premium-1.775333&utm_medium=email&utm_source=smartfocus&utm_campaign=newsletter-daily&utm_term=20170305-13%3A03

An Arab lawmaker imagines a utopian Israeli-Palestinian state and himself as Prime Minister

03 Friday Mar 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Uncategorized

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There are increasingly more people who are giving up on a two states for two peoples resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and are, instead, supporting a one state democracy that stretches from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.

In my view, this represents for the Jewish people a defeat of historic proportions.

The State of Israel was founded on the basis of it being a Jewish state that is democratic in character and affirms the principles of justice and equality for all its citizens, Jews and non-Jews alike.

As time passes and the Jewish settlement enterprise continues and as the status quo is maintained a one-state reality becomes more probable. If that is the end result, the question remains as to what kind of state it will become.

The Arab and Jewish populations between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea including Gaza are nearly equivalent (5.5 million Israeli Jews and 5.5 million Arabs of which only 1.5 million are Israeli citizens and the remainder live under occupation in the West Bank or are ruled by Hamas in the Gaza Strip).

There are essentially three options:

  1. Two states for two peoples (Israel and Palestine) with established borders, Jerusalem as a shared capital, Palestinian refugees enjoying the right of return to Palestine and not Israel, Palestinian acceptance of the legitimacy of the Jewish state of Israel and Israeli acceptance of the legitimacy of the State of Palestinian, and assured security;
  2. A one-state democracy in which all citizens share equal rights including the right to vote in national elections and to serve at the highest levels of government;
  3. A one-state undemocratic Jewish State of Israel in which Arab citizens do not share equal rights with Israeli Jews.

The first option preserves the Jewish and the democratic State of Israel.

The second represents the end of Zionism.

The third ushers in a new form of Apartheid in which Israel ceases to be a democracy and risks further international isolation, the weakening of the American-Israeli relationship, and the alienation of large segments of world Jewry from Israel.

Yesterday (March 2, 2017) in the Israeli daily Haaretz there appeared an interview with Member of the Knesset Ahmed Tibi (of the Arab List). The interview offers a realistic glimpse into what a one-state non-Jewish democracy might look like (see link to article below)

A few highlights of Mr. Tibi’s comments:

“I belong to those who support the two-state vision, have fought for it and continue to fight for it. I think it’s the optimal solution for the existing situation. The international community wants it and the majority on both sides wants it, even though that majority is diminishing according to the surveys I see, among both Palestinians and Israelis. And with 620,000 settlers in the West Bank and Jerusalem, and two separate judicial systems, there’s a reality today of one state with rolling apartheid.” …

“[In a one-state solution] We will annul the [Israeli] Declaration of Independence and in its place write a civil declaration that represents all citizens: Jews, Muslims, Christians, Druze. The entire public. It’s untenable for a democratic state to have a declaration of independence that is fundamentally Jewish.” …

“That [the Jewish right of return] would automatically be annulled because the country would no longer be a Jewish state as it is today. The single state will not resemble the present-day State of Israel. It will be something different. Why should Jews be able to return here and Palestinians not?” …

“…With one, equal state, the State of Israel in its present format will not exist. All its symbols will change, and the narrative will be different. The unifying element in one state will be different from what it is today because it will be a state of everyone, not a state of the Jewish collectivity in which there is a tolerated minority that is thrown a bone in the form of gestures like new roads and the establishment of well-baby clinics. In an equal, single state, equality is a supreme value.”

Those who support the status quo in effect are supporting option #3.

According to  American Middle East envoy Martin Indyk who spoke at the recent J Street National Conference in Washington, D.C., the status quo might seem to be sustainable in the short term, but in the long term “there will be an explosion.”

If that happens, the dream of the founding generation of the State of Israel will be lost.

http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.774936)

 

 

 

Friedman’s ‘kapo’ comment should disqualify him as ambassador to Israel” – Dr. Charles Gati

01 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish Identity

≈ 3 Comments

Earlier this week, I was asked to participate with two others in a press conference in Washington, D.C. on behalf of J Street which was convening in its 6th Annual National Conference.

I joined Dr. Charles Gati, Senior Research Professor of European and Eurasian Studies of Johns Hopkins SAI, a former state department consultant and Holocaust survivor, and Dylan Williams, Vice President of Government Affairs for J Street. I was asked as a former co-chair of the Rabbinic Cabinet of J Street and now as the national chair of the Association of Reform Zionists of America.

We were being questioned about President Trump’s nomination of David Friedman to be the next United States Ambassador to Israel. All three of us were strongly opposed to the nomination.

We oppose Friedman because of his long-standing support of the settlement enterprise, his public opposition to the two-state solution, and his assaults against large segments of the American Jewish community that support the two states for two people’s resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

We said that Friedman’s policy positions run counter to the long-held positions of every American President in the last 25 years who have supported the two-state solution, his slander of J Street supporters as “worse than kapos,” his charge that the ADL is led by a bunch of “morons,” and that President Obama and Secretary Kerry are anti-Israel and anti-Semites.

These positions and statements ought to disqualify Friedman’s appointment to any position in the government, let alone as the chief American diplomat in one of the most sensitive regions in the world.

I was asked by Al Jazeera English whether or not I accepted Friedman’s statements at his Senate hearing in which he recanted virtually every position he ever held and every statement he ever made vis a vis Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I said that I do not accept anything he said in the hearings as reflective of his true beliefs and as an indication of how he would conduct himself should he be confirmed by the Senate in the next few days.

In particular, I was moved by Dr. Charles Gati. He was ten years old when the Nazis invaded Budapest in 1944 and ordered the expulsion and murder of all that city’s Jews. Charles was spared being shot and thrown into the Danube River due to pure luck.

His opposition to Friedman was based not only on his policy positions and ill-temperament but because Friedman showed how woefully ignorant he is of Jewish history and the history of the Holocaust when he callously used the word “kapo” to describe J Street supporters.

After hearing Dr. Gati, I told him and Dylan Williams that meetings ought to be arranged this week one-on-one between Charles and every reasonable Republican Senator. I am certain that Charles would persuade any reasonable leader to oppose this nomination.

Read:  Friedman’s ‘kapo’ comment should disqualify him as ambassador to Israel, The Hill

http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/international/321633-friedmans-kapo-comment-should-disqualify-him-as-ambassador

Bibi’s Failure to Relate to the Fears of American Jews

24 Friday Feb 2017

Posted by in American Jewish Life, Jewish Identity

≈ 2 Comments

As anti-Semitic incidents have increased dramatically since the election of Donald Trump as President, not only has Trump failed (until this week) to address the escalation of anti-Semitic hatred in the alt-right wing of his political base but so too has Prime Minister Netanyahu failed to relate to American Jewish fears.

In his recent visit to the White House, the Prime Minister tried to reassure  American Jews that because Donald Trump is his old friend and he knows that he is not an anti-Semite  that we American Jews have nothing to worry about.

It seems to me that Bibi has had a choice and that he picked wrong. Either as the Israeli Prime Minister, he could take the position that anti-Semitism in the United States is an internal American affair and that he’d be wise to give no response to it in order not to offend the thin-skinned President by calling him out to speak against the haters who helped elect him. Or, as the Prime Minister of Israel, he has the responsibility to be concerned about the safety of the Jewish people everywhere in the world.

The truth is that at almost every opportunity in the past, Bibi has called out anti-Semitism everywhere it occurs, especially when it’s committed by Muslims. He has utterly failed to do so here in the United States.

Yes – we American Jews can take care of ourselves, but the Prime Minister ought to be saying publicly that he’s concerned about us and the rise in anti-Semitic attacks against Jewish community centers, synagogues, and cemeteries. Netanyahu’s refusal to do so has had the effect of white-washing Trump’s support of the alt-right’s extremism, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, racism, misogyny, and homophobia.

I am worried that the Prime Minister has so dramatically failed to publicly relate to the fears of American Jews. Mr. Netanyahu seems only to be concerned about right-wing American Jews and the evangelical Christian community while ignoring the 70% of American Jews who supported Hillary Clinton.

Just as the American Jewish community needs to maintain its non-partisan support of the State of Israel, so too ought the Israeli Prime Minister support the needs and fears of all American Jews.

Note: I speak as an individual and do not claim to represent my synagogue or any other organization.