Category Archives: American Politics and Life

What To Think About This Iraqi Mess

22 Sunday Jun 2014

Posted by in American Politics and Life, Ethics

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After the First Gulf War, Saddam Hussein said that if he were ever to be overthrown Iraqis would end up murdering each other.

Indeed, that psychopathic killer was right.

The mess that is Iraq today is beyond tragic for Iraqis most of all, but also for the United States. Five thousand American soldiers are dead and more than 250,000 Americans have been injured (including those who suffer PTSD) in that decade-plus-long war. God knows how many hundreds of thousands of Iraqis are dead and injured. This past week with ISIS taking over much of Iraq, one news item projected that now more than a million Iraqis have become refugees in that ongoing humanitarian catastrophe.

If loss of life, limb and home were not enough, the war cost the United States $1.7 trillion with an additional $490 billion in benefits owed to war veterans, expenses that could grow to more than $6 trillion over the next four decades counting interest (per Reuters). Lest we forget the financial impact of two wars after 9/11 and Bush’s massive tax cut that squandered the Clinton budget surplus, neither of the two wars was paid for by the Bush Administration, setting the stage, at least in part, for the “Great Recession.”

What is maddening on top of all this is that in recent days Americans have been subject to a ridiculous and outrageous blame-game initiated against the Obama Administration policies and President Obama himself mostly by Republicans, the very people who led the way in getting America into that unjustified and immoral Iraqi war in the first place and who were the greatest cheer-leaders when Bush got his massive tax cut bill passed in Congress.

This week, I have heard generals urge the US not to do anything we live to regret in Iraq. They said that even an air war against ISIS insurgents now threatening Baghdad will be ineffective unless accompanied by massive ground troops. President Obama, reflecting the views of the majority of Americans, does not intend to send ground troops back into Iraq – thank heavens!

The Republican blamers are counting on Americans to have no memory at all. Lest we forget, it was Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Libby, Wolfowitz, Powell, Rice, and others (Republicans and Democrats) who, in justifying going to war against Saddam, either cooked, twisted, spun, fabricated, or went along with the fiction that Saddam had WMD that could be used against the United States and our allies.

When no WMD were found, Bush/Cheney and company changed the story. Now the war was about ridding Iraq of a brutal dictator and bringing freedom and democracy to the Iraqi people.

Lest we forget, Saddam Hussein’s fall created a vacuum for Iran which suddenly was regionally unchecked to be able to pursue its hegemonic designs to develop nuclear weapons.

Lest we forget as well, it was Bush in 2008 who signed an order to withdraw ALL American troops from Iraq no later than by 2011. President Obama fulfilled this order, but it is as if Bush’s order never existed in the minds of these Republican blamers. They say it is all Obama’s fault!

Lest we forget as well that it was Iraq’s Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki who said he did not want any American residual forces to remain in Iraq, but one Republican Senator this past week said this was a “lie!” These people default to fiction when history, truth and facts don’t suit their political opportunism and deep-seated animus.

What boggles the mind is that these people seem not to have learned anything from our unjustified, ill-advised, short-sighted, deadly, maiming, destructive, and costly Iraq war. They were wrong about virtually everything, but they are still talking!

Those who think they have answers about what America should do next in Iraq and Syria are fooling themselves. As I listen to experts talk about the complexities inherent in this mess, the only thing that is absolutely clear to me is that there is no good choice for the US at all. Every choice is bad; and there are no good guys to support either, which is why the President has been hesitant to act in Syria and now Iraq.

My heart breaks for all the innocent Iraqis and Syrians who are the real victims of sectarian strife and hate.

My heart also goes out to all American veterans of this war who gave up so much in Iraq and now must witness it all revert to what Saddam Hussein predicted would happen after his fall.

My compassion extends to those families of our veterans killed in action and those who survived but have suffered greatly the effects of their injuries.

Finally, my prayers go to the President and those charged with the responsibility of figuring out how not to make a very bad situation even worse.

 

 

 

The Presbyterian Church (USA) Is At It Again In Its Unfair Criticism of Israel

17 Tuesday Jun 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Jewish-Christian Relations, Social Justice

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Rachel Lerner is the Senior Vice President for Community Relations at J Street and a friend. She attended this week the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) in Detroit in which she spoke on a panel where she urged Presbyterian commissioners to vote against an anti-Israel resolution supporting divestment of church funds from companies doing business in the West Bank (BDS) and called upon the Church to reconsider its support of a two-states for two-peoples resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Her letter appears here with links to all relevant documents. http://jstreet.org/blog/post/my-speech-to-the-presbyterians_1

I wrote about the Presbyterian Church (USA) in July 2012 after a terrorist attack against Jews in Bulgaria. My primary thrust then was to harshly criticize the Church’s insensitivity to Jews and to characterize the Church’s support of BDS as “anti-Israel.”

The following is part of what I wrote then:

“Israel is not a perfect society. No democracy is. Thus, being a critic of Israeli policies does not mean one is automatically anti-Israel. Indeed, Israelis themselves are among the most self-critical citizens of any nation in the world.

However, when individuals and groups consistently criticize one nation and one nation alone, one has to question such people’s deeper motivations and agenda.

After watching for several years the Presbyterian Church USA’s efforts on behalf of the BDS movement, those advocating for it I believe are unfair criticizers and part of the “anti-Israel camp.”

By “anti-Israel camp” I refer to those individuals and organizations whose criticism of Israel goes far beyond what is factual, reasonable and fair. These people rarely if ever voice criticism against Hamas’ or Fatah’s documented human rights violations against their own populations. They rarely if ever criticize human rights violations in other countries against which Israeli policies vis a vis Palestinians in the West Bank (as bad as they can be) pale by comparison. And they ignore the history of this conflict which gives context for current events.”

You can read the entire piece here https://rabbijohnrosove.wordpress.com/2012/07/22/jaccuse-the-presbyterian-church-statement-following-the-massacre-of-israelis-jews-in-bulgaria/

I would hope that good people who are members of that Church and who are not anti-Israel will vote against the aggressive group of anti-Israel Church members who have consistently shown their animus towards the state of Israel and the Jewish people by unfairly attacking her and her alone among all nations in the world.

I conclude by saying in my role as a national co-chair of the Rabbinic Cabinet of J Street that includes 800 rabbis and cantors from all America’s religious streams that I am grateful to Rachel for walking into this den of lions and standing up for the dignity of the Jewish people and best interests of the state of Israel. She deserves the thanks of the American Jewish community and Israel for doing so.

 

 

18-Chai Attributes for Elevated Leadership in a Synagogue Community

15 Sunday Jun 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Jewish Identity

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Before I formally installed my synagogue’s Officers and Trustees to our Board of Trustees this past week ushering in the next term of service to our community, I shared with my congregation a list that I call the “18-Chai Attributes For Leadership in a Synagogue Community.”  The list includes what I believe are essential moral character traits (middot) and behaviors for good, worthy and effective  leadership.

I believe that these same attributes (with certain adjustments) are applicable in any organization and professional group, whether it be in business, politics, government, education, science, the arts, entertainment, or athletics.

No one person, of course, possesses them all in every matter and at all times, but the 18 represent a moral standard against which each of us ought to measure ourselves as servant-leaders.

A good leader ought to…

1. Be able to articulate the mission of the community and excite others’ imagination to manifest the mission in every aspect of the synagogue’s life;

2. Be an intent listener;

3. Show empathy, compassion and kindness towards everyone;

4. Behave ethically as a matter of personal practice, and hold the synagogue’s business and human resources practices to the highest ethical standards;

5. Show patience, control anger and frustration, and never humiliate another human being;

6. Systematically neglect unimportant issues for more important ones;

7. Accept imperfection in oneself, in others and in the community even while striving to address and correct inefficiencies and problems in the synagogue’s functioning in the most transparent way as appropriate;

8. Use intuitive-wisdom to bridge the gap between the actual and the ideal;

9. Use persuasion and good humor rather than coercion and bullying to move the community forward always with the principles in mind of derech eretz (“common decency”), shalom bayit (“peace in the home”), and respect for the opinions of others (or civility) based on Rav Shmuel’s saying: “Eilu v’Eilu divrei Elohim chayim – This and that are the words of the living God”;

10. Sublimate personal needs for the sake of the greater communal good;

11. Appreciate the good works of others and give credit generously;

12. Welcome, include and embrace all Jews and their families, Jews by-birth, Jews by-choice, non-Jews married to Jews, the young and old, healthy and disabled, intermarried, straight and LGBT, American-born and immigrants from other lands, thus reflecting the diversity that is the Jewish people itself;

13. Respect the synagogue’s unique history and traditions, policies and processes of governance;

14. Understand that change according to best-practices is good when necessary, and that for change to be realized successfully everyone (leadership, community members and staff) must be brought along even as the change occurs;

15. Be a serious student of Torah and Jewish tradition and apply tradition’s wisdom and its commitment to tzedek (justice), rachamim (compassion), emet (truth), and shalom (wholeness) to all aspects of one’s personal life and the synagogue’s life;

16. Understand the synagogue’s historic role in our people’s survival as a religion, tradition and faith, and seek to develop one’s own inner life through prayer and learning;

17. Believe in the power of the community to restore individuals to wholeness (tikun hanefesh), to restore the community to wholeness (tikun k’hilah) and to restore the world to wholeness (tikun olam) and to promote the synagogue’s program and activities towards these three purposes;

18. Stand with dignity and integrity before one’s fellows and humbly before God.

 

 

 

 

 

 

On The J Street Summit in San Francisco

13 Friday Jun 2014

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

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Last week, my wife Barbara and I attended the West Coast Summit meeting of J Street in San Francisco. I was honored to be asked, as the co-chair of the national Rabbinic Cabinet of J Street that includes 800 rabbis and cantors from across the religious streams, to be part of the opening night program in which former Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, former United Nations Ambassador from Israel Gabriella Shalev, and former United States Ambassador to Egypt and Israel Daniel Kurtzer were featured.

I was asked to question PM Fayyad after each of the speakers presented opening statements. The conversation was hard-hitting and candid from each of three former major players in American, Israeli and Palestinian leadership about what is necessary for the sake of peace in light of the recent failure of the Kerry Middle East peace talks.

You can access all of the sessions here – https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL4CViXUNRkO6zMLr6JrSKT8nQXGbXEEJW –

The opening night’s program can be found here – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jaXLYv9Hxt0&index=2&list=PL4CViXUNRkO6zMLr6JrSKT8nQXGbXEEJW

On a related matter, a friend asked me this week if I have seen “The J Street Challenge,” a pseudo-documentary that attacks J Street as an anti-Israel political organization.

I have not seen it, as I know it to be a propaganda piece that systematically distorts J Street’s message and accuses the 185,000 supporters of J Street and the 800 rabbis and cantors of being anti-Israel and even anti-Semitic. By extension, it must cast aspersion on the 84 pro-Israel members of Congress who support Israel and have accepted J Street’s support. This hateful propaganda piece is being shown in cities around the country.

If people wish to know the truth about J Street, all you need to do is to go to the J Street website (http://www.jstreet.org) and read our position papers, or watch sessions of this most recent conference.

We are pro-Israel and pro-two state solution advocates. We love Israel and are proud of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people and her manifold accomplishments over the course of the last century of Jewish history. Many Israeli members of Knesset have attended our conferences. The great Israeli writer Amos Oz told us a couple of years ago in Washington, D.C. “I have been waiting for J Street my entire adult life.”

At a time when the Jewish people needs to come together, regardless of our differing opinions, in common cause for the sake of the peace, security and the democratic character of the state of Israel, why some American Jews are spending a fortune to cast unfair and inaccurate aspersions against J Street is, frankly, baffling to me and, I believe, a source of shame that should be checked.

As Rav Shmuel once said – Eilu v’Eilu divrei Elohim chayim – “This and that are words of the living God.” Intolerance, hatred and falsehood do not belong between Jews who love the people and state of Israel.

“People’s Park” – An Enduring Memory After 45 Years

25 Sunday May 2014

Posted by in American Politics and Life, Ethics, Stories

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May 22 and 23, 1969 are days that I will always remember. I was a sophomore at UC Berkeley. The Vietnam War was raging. A third world college strike against the university had shut down classes earlier that year. Tension could be cut with a knife on the Berkeley campus and on campuses across the nation at the end of a tumultuous decade.

Several blocks south of the Berkeley campus and one block east of Telegraph Avenue an empty block of land owned by the University had been taken over by community folks who had created what is still known as “People’s Park.” It was a peaceful place. There was a vegetable garden, and play equipment and swings had been donated. Communal meals were cooked and shared. Some slept on the grounds.

A week earlier, on May 15 just before sunrise, however, University of California police had been ordered to evacuate the park and erect a fence. Word spread quickly and the community erupted. The Berkeley police department called for assistance from the Alameda Sheriff’s department, and Governor Ronald Reagan called up the National Guard. Overnight Berkeley became an occupied city.

Amidst the tumult that day, UC Student Body President Dan Siegel exhorted the crowd in Sproul Plaza to go “take back the park.”

The combined police forces responded by dropping tear-gas from a helicopter over the campus in violation of international law and by firing bird-shot and buckshot into the crowd killing one man, James Rector, who was innocently observing the march from a rooftop, and injuring dozens.

The over-reaction and death enraged the Berkeley community. A week later, on Thursday, May 22, a peaceful march was called and I decided to join it. Our purpose was to politely ask shop-owners in downtown Berkeley to close their stores for the afternoon in memory of the killed man and in protest of the police over-reaction.

As hundreds of UC students and faculty walked quietly and legally on sidewalks, we were directed by police from one street to another and finally into an open parking lot adjacent to the Bank of America. There, 482 students, faculty and (as it happened) one member of the media were surrounded. The police informed us that we were under arrest.

We were loaded into police buses to carry us one hour southeast to the Santa Rita Rehabilitation Center, a minimum security prison, in Pleasanton, California. Once we arrived inside the prison gates, the bus stopped and the door opened. A guard entered and screamed orders at us. He threatened physical harm to anyone who did not do exactly as he commanded. I descended dutifully into a fenced compound where I saw 150 others lying belly-down next to one another, much like a Vietnam War body count, in neat rows. Everyone’s faces were turned to the left and guards were slapping their Billy clubs into their hands while cursing us and screaming threats that should anyone move or lift his head he would be beaten. Some were.

I assumed my place in the body formation and, terrified, dutifully did not move for eight hours, the gravel digging into my face, my bladder bursting, the inmates surrounding the compound taunting us for hours (I would learn much later that the prisoners were promised time off for good behavior if they harassed us), and the guards always screaming threats. No guard ever spoke to us in a normal speaking voice. They screamed incessantly like drill sergeants.

I was booked and finger-printed at one in the morning and was led into a barracks as part of a group that included a reporter from the San Francisco Chronicle who had discarded his press identification when we were herded into the Bank of America parking lot. He was the first to be bailed out, and Saturday morning the Chronicle’s bold-lettered headline read – “I WAS A PRISONER AT SANTA RITA.” He described in detail everything that had happened in my particular barracks.

I was bailed out at two PM on Friday. Charges were eventually dropped for lack of evidence.

The intended impact of the experience, however, had registered. I had never before or since felt as frightened as I did on that day. One guard came within inches of my face and screamed that he was going to kill me. I learned that fear can lead us to feel and behave irrationally and against our own best interests.

Some regard fear as the most effective organizing principle in the building of community. This is a false belief. Rather, kindness, empathy and compassion are the virtues that not only distinguish us as human beings but are the essential building blocks for a community that values each individual as endowed with infinite value and worth by virtue of being created b’tzelem Elohim, in the Divine image.

Setting the Record Straight about J Street – Jeremy Ben Ami

14 Wednesday May 2014

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

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As a follow-up to my blog yesterday entitled “The Truth About J Street,” I include a longer letter written by J Street’s President Jeremy Ben Ami in “Times of Israel” yesterday called “Setting the Record Straight about J Street” in which he responds to many of the false charges against J Street’s positions.

Setting the record straight, Times of Israel – J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami hit back at smears against J Street. http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/setting-the-record-straight-2/

I refer you as well to the J Street website and particularly to its section “Myths and Facts” – http://jstreet.org/page/mythsandfacts/home

Between these two pieces, one should have all the information necessary to make a reasonable and fair judgment about both the truth of the negative campaign against J Street by right-wing Jewish and Israeli groups, as well as the true positions of J Street on all the issues that we in J Street understand to be important for the security, Jewish character and well-being of the democratic state of Israel.

 

 

The Truth About J Street

12 Monday May 2014

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

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At a recently convened Los Angeles J Street meeting with one of the leading candidates running for Congressman Henry Waxman’s 33rd Congressional District seat, the candidate asked us “Why does J Street support BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) against Israel?” He was repeating a charge he had heard from leadership in the Jewish community.

We explained that this charge was wholly untrue and was being spread in order to discredit J Street’s pro-Israel bona fides and to limit debate within the American Jewish community about Israel’s settlement policies and the need for a two-states for two peoples resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The candidate was interested to know, as well, what the difference in approach is between J Street and AIPAC, the two leading pro-Israel lobbying organizations in the nation’s capital. He said he heard that J Street saw itself as the “anti-AIPAC lobby.”

We explained that J Street has never characterized itself as “anti-AIPAC.” That characterization comes from the media that seeks a simplified message in an essentially complex and nuanced Middle East policy debate. To the contrary, we at J Street respect AIPAC’s historically critical role in advocating for Israel’s security interests and have said so publicly.

We told him that J Street was created six years ago to address a significant void in Israel advocacy in Washington, D.C. Whereas AIPAC historically has advocated for whatever the current Israeli government’s policy positions have been, J Street advocates that the American administration do everything possible to bring the Israelis and Palestinians to the negotiating table and reach an agreement on a two-states for two peoples resolution of their conflict. J Street recognizes that the status quo is unsustainable, and that only by means of a two-state solution will Israel maintain its security, democracy and Jewish character. Consequently, J Street is at times openly critical of specific policy decisions taken by Israel’s government, arguably among the most right-wing governments in the history of the state of Israel.

We told the candidate as well that J Street’s positions and policy statements resonate with 70% of the American Jewish community and have inspired hundreds of thousands of pro-Israel American Jews and Jewish college students to get involved for the first time in Israel advocacy work. Hardly outside the mainstream of both American and Israeli opinion, J Street’s positions reflect those of Israeli middle-left political parties including Yesh Atid, Kadima, Avodah, and Meretz.

For the truth about J Street, we recommended that the candidate visit the J Street website and read its policy positions (www.jstreet.org) and in particular, to visit the “Myths and Facts” page where all the charges and criticisms of J Street are addressed fully. http://jstreet.org/page/mythsandfacts/home#policies .

The following includes organizational statements in support of J Street and in opposition to the Conference of Presidents’ vote issued after the vote. https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?shva=1#inbox/145f15de01a4bfb1?projector=1

Here are eleven excellent and thoughtful news reports and opinion pieces published in the United States and Israel on the role of J Street in the American Jewish community and the vote of the Conference on Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations:

Who Speaks for Pro-Israel Americans? – NY Times, by Carol Giacomo, April 28, 2014 – http://takingnote.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/04/28/who-speaks-for-pro-israel-americans/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=1&

Jewish Organization Acts in an Un-Jewish Fashion, Time Magazine, by Joe Klein, May 2, 2014 –  http://time.com/85684/jewish-organization-acts-in-an-un-jewish-fashion/

American Jewry Is Doomed If It Can’t Embrace J Street, New Republic, by Yochai Benkler, May 2, 2014 – http://www.newrepublic.com/article/117628/j-streets-rejection-reveals-israels-dangerous-path

J Street’s Rejection Is a Scandal, New Republic, by Leon Weiseltier, May 7, 2014 – http://www.newrepublic.com/article/117680/presidents-conference-j-street-rejection-disgrace

Jewish Americans ask: What does it mean to be ‘pro-Israel’? – Religion News, by Lauren Markoe, May 7, 2013 – http://www.religionnews.com/2014/05/07/jewish-americans-ask-mean-pro-israel/

Pull Back the Curtain – and Let J Street In – Editorial, The Forward, April 29, 2014 – http://forward.com/articles/197284/pull-back-the-curtain-and-let-j-street-in/

Those Who Reject J Street Are Blind – ‘They Still Don’t Hear Us,’ Says the Next Generation, The Forward, by Leonard Fein, May 3, 2014 – http://forward.com/articles/197545/those-who-reject-j-street-are-blind/

Blackballing J Street: Who Voted How, The Forward, by J.J. Goldberg, May 4, 2014 – http://blogs.forward.com/jj-goldberg/197563/blackballing-j-street-who-voted-how/

J Street is part of the American Jewish family, Haaretz, by Rabbi Eric H. Yoffie, April 28, 2014 – http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.587822

J Street’s rejection is a milestone in the growing polarization of American Jews, Haaretz, by Chemi Shalev, May 1, 2014 – http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/west-of-eden/.premium-1.588326

When Jews hate leftists for loving Israel – Haaretz, by Bradley Burston, May 7, 2014 – http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/a-special-place-in-hell/.premium-1.589381

Why Money Given to Charity by Donald Sterling Can Be Accepted with Conditions

30 Wednesday Apr 2014

Posted by in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Social Justice, Women's Rights

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The sullied moral character of Donald Sterling is clear to anyone with eyes and a conscience.

In the days since his now infamous tapes were leaked we have learned that Sterling has been charitable to Jewish organizations and other groups, such as the NAACP. Why he has given money away, who knows? (PR? Tax deductions? Moments of generosity that remind him of what his mother may have once wished for him?)

In recent days leaders of the Los Angeles Jewish community have sought to distance themselves and their organizations from Sterling’s past gifts and have pledged not to accept anything more from him going forward.

Not so fast!

What does Jewish tradition say about receiving financial gifts from someone of Sterling’s character?

There is much discussion in Halachic literature (Jewish legal literature) concerning the bringing of donations to the synagogue. The Hebrew Bible rules that a sacred object cannot be brought to the Temple in Jerusalem that has immoral origins (Deuteronomy 23:19). Later commentaries come to a consensus that a donation from an individual who acquired the object through immoral or criminal means can be given to the Jewish community.

The 17th century Polish Commentator Rabbi Abraham Abele Gombiner (known as Magen Avraham) refers to a comment of Rabbi Moses Isserles (Shulchan Aruch, Orah Hayyim 153:12) and notes that if the object is first converted into money, and then that money is exchanged for other money, the second set of cash can be given to the synagogue.

Rabbi Solomon Freehoff in his Responsum “Synagogue Contribution from a Criminal” (Contemporary Reform Responsa, CCAR Press, 1969, pp. 52-55) concludes:

“In my judgment you should accept the gift, because it is his [the sinner’s] obligation (a mitzvah) to support the synagogue and we have no right to prevent a sinner from performing a righteous act.”

Tradition, however, conditions the giving of such a gift to its anonymity. No plaque or public mention may be noted about the origin of the gift in order to prevent the donor from enjoying the honor (kavod) of giving the gift. Rabbi Freehoff, however, says that if the sinner/criminal wishes to honor his/her parents, then acknowledgment of his parents may be publicized.

A related matter concerning the public role of a sinner is raised in a Responsum cited in The Holocaust and Halakhah (by Irving J Rosenbaum, Ktav, 1976, p. 154). In this case a particularly brutal and despised Kapo (Jewish policeman) in the Kovno ghetto claimed after the Shoah to have suffered great remorse for the evil he perpetrated on the Jews in the ghetto, and to have sincerely repented from his crimes. He approached the leadership of the Jewish community and requested to act as shaliach tzibur (prayer leader) in the synagogue.

Though acknowledging the great power of repentance, Rabbi Efraim Oshry (a survivor himself) ruled that

“A She’liah tzibur must be fitting; ‘fitting’ means that he must be free from sin and not have had an evil reputation even in his youth.”

This Kapo’s evil reputation, regardless of the t’shuvah he may have undergone that wiped clean his sin, permanently kept him from assuming any public leadership role in the Jewish community.

From these two Responsa, we can draw the following conclusions:

First, Donald Sterling ought to be excluded from any public leadership role in the community (as the NBA has properly done) regardless of whether he ever does t’shuvah in the way, for example, that the former racist Alabama Governor and presidential candidate George Wallace did before his death (Wallace publicly repented of his racism and apologized personally to Reverend Jesse Jackson, representing the African American community), Sterling’s current bad reputation would continue to exclude him.

Second, should Sterling wish to donate money to Jewish causes or other non-profit charitable organizations anonymously, his money need not be rejected. Not only could his donation serve greater community interests, but one day they may be part of the means by which he does sincere t’shuvah.

In this regard, I hope he gives generously and anonymously to all kinds of good causes. While doing so, he ought also to sincerely apologize to and makes amends with all the apartment dwellers he has victimized, to the African American community, to Latinos and peoples of color he has insulted, to women he has exploited, to the Jewish community who by association he has demeaned, and, of course, to the Los Angeles Clippers organization and the NBA.

I wish him courage, the strength and decency to do so.

Gratitude to Reform Movement Institutions That Support J Street’s Inclusion in The President’s Conference

29 Tuesday Apr 2014

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

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As a co-chair of the J Street Rabbinic Cabinet (representing 800 rabbis from across the religious streams and hundreds of American Reform rabbis), as member of the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR – the Reform Rabbinical association) for the past 34 years, as congregational Rabbi serving a Union for Reform Judaism (URJ) synagogue (part of a total of 1.4 million American Reform Jews), I am proud of the  CCAR, the URJ, the Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA), and the Women of Reform Judaism (WRJ) for their support of including J Street as a member of the Presidents Conference of Major American Jewish Organizations to take place this week.

The vote by any of these Reform organizations in favor does NOT mean that each of these groups endorses the viewpoint of J Street. It does signify, however, that our Reform movement organizations understand the importance of being as inclusive as possible of diverse points of view in the American Jewish community vis a vis Israel and American Jewish life.

J Street has earned clear bona fides as a pro-Israel American Zionist organization supporting two-states for two peoples in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and is committed to the two-state solution despite the discontinued negotiations.

I want to thank most especially my friend and colleague, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, the President of the Union for Reform Judaism, who led the way early on in advocating for inclusion of J Street in the Presidents Conference.

The immediate past-President of the URJ, Rabbi Eric Yoffie, has written a compelling rationale for J Street being included in his Haaretz op-ed “J Street is Part of the American Jewish Family.” (http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-1.587822)

I can only hope that other Presidents of Major Organizations will read Rabbi Yoffie’s piece and vote for inclusion whether or not they agree with J Street’s positions.

Rwanda, Bibi, Abbas, and What Comes Next? – Four Articles Worth Reading

27 Sunday Apr 2014

Posted by in American Politics and Life, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Social Justice

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The following New York Times photo essay on reconciliation in Rwanda between Hutus and Tutsis will disturb, challenge and amaze anyone who sees it, who looks into the eyes of the murderers and the relatives of the victims as they pose together, and tries to imagine oneself in either of their places.

Jewish ethics posit that no one other than the actual victim of murder is in a position to forgive the murderer for his evil. This isn’t to say, of course, that the relatives of those murdered have not suffered and been victimized as well. This is what the photo essay is about.

If forgiveness means to “let go” of injury, pain, suffering, hatred, and the thirst for revenge in order to live any kind of normal life (especially in Rwanda where Hutus and Tutsis live amongst each other), I can understand why the relatives of those murdered victims have chosen to forgive and reconcile, as difficult as this is to imagine.

I cite the NYT’s “Portraits of Reconciliation” now, in the wake of the discontinued negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians in order that we might glimpse a model of what is possible despite Israeli and the Palestinian distrust and hatred towards each other.

“Portraits of Reconciliation – 20 years after the genocide in Rwanda, reconciliation still happens one encounter at a time.” Photographs By Pieter Hugo & Text by Susan Dominus – http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/04/06/magazine/06-pieter-hugo-rwanda-portraits.html?src=me&ref=general&_r=0

The second piece was written by Haaretz journalist and author Ari Shavit who recently published “My Promised Land: The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel.” Shavit argues that Palestinian President Machmud Abbas has consistently refused to compromise with Israeli negotiators on anything of substance since the late 1990s, and it should no longer surprise anyone that he has refused to compromise again in these just-halted negotiations. Shavit lays the blame of the failure of the negotiations solely at Abu Mazen’s feet.

“Waiting for the Palestinian Godot – Why are we repeatedly surprised every time Mahmoud Abbas fails to sign a peace agreement with Israel?” – By Ari Shavit, Haaretz Blog, April 24, 2014 – http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/1.586945

The third piece, written by Lisa Goldman of The Weekly Wonk, takes a different view. Reporting from America and reflecting the views of Secretary of State John Kerry, she writes that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is primarily responsible for the breakdown in the negotiations with the Palestinians, though she opens her piece by saying that it is not in either Abbas’ or Bibi’s interest to change the status-quo.

“Why the U.S. should step away from Israel-Palestine Negotiations – for good! It’s time to admit we’ve seen enough” –The Weekly Wonk – By Lisa Goldman, April 16, 2014 – http://theweek.com/article/index/259957/why-the-us-should-step-away-from-israel-palestine-negotiations-mdash-for-good

The fourth and last piece is written by Rabbi Donniel Hartman of the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem (Times of Israel blog), who looks to the future and discusses what is likely to come in light of these recently failed negotiations. He writes:

“The making of peace requires two sides. Whether we did everything in our power, and whether the Palestinians did everything in theirs is a factual question, and as such, paradoxically, unresolvable, for we rarely shape our opinions on the basis of facts, and instead shape our perception of the facts on the basis of our opinions.”

The Day After The Negotiations Fail – by Rabbi Donniel Hartman, The Times of Israel, April 21, 2014 – http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/the-day-after-the-negotiations-fail/

Less we fall into despair, we American Jews, Zionists and Ohavei M’dinat Yisrael (Lovers of the State of Israel) would do well to reflect upon what has taken place in Rwanda over the last twenty years, and remember that once Germany was the Jewish people’s greatest enemy. Today, Germany is the least anti-Semitic country in Europe. Seventy years ago Germany and Japan were bitter foes of the United States, and Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland were killing each other. Today, all these former enemies have laid down their guns and established peace.

In other words, the story of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is far from over!