50th Anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King at Temple Israel of Hollywood

21 Wednesday Jan 2015

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Holidays, Jewish History, Jewish-Christian Relations, Jewish-Islamic Relations, Social Justice, Tributes, Women's Rights

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On February 25, 1965, only seventy-five days after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. received the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, only four days after Malcolm X was assassinated in New York, and two months before his march from Selma to Montgomery, Dr. King spoke in the Sanctuary of my synagogue, Temple Israel of Hollywood under very tight security before fifteen hundred congregants about the state of race relations in America, the struggle for freedom, for equal rights and voting rights, and the need for partnership among all peoples of faith and good will to attain the goals promised to all Americans as declared the Declaration of Independence and the Preamble to the United States Constitution.

Dr. King was introduced by my esteemed predecessor, Rabbi Max Nussbaum, a refugee from Berlin who had fled in the middle of the night in 1940 to Amsterdam and then to the US with his wife Ruth to avoid arrest the following morning by the Nazi SS.

Rabbi Nussbaum was one of our g’dolei dor (the great rabbinic leaders of his generation), a brilliant scholar, activist and orator as was Dr. King, and they had much in common reflecting the common struggle of African Americans and the Jewish people in history.

This past Sunday evening, January 18, our synagogue joined with the diverse interfaith and inter-ethnic community of Los Angeles including Christians, Muslims, African Americans, Koreans, Latinos, and peoples from the Middle East to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of Dr. King’s appearance at Temple Israel as well as his work, spirit and legacy.

I shared with the assembled 1400 people that just as Dr. King and Rabbi Nussbaum met at a difficult time in American history, we too were meeting at a difficult time filled still with so much injustice and poverty, alienation and insecurity, war and violence here and around the world, and that despite the passage of a half-century since Dr. King spoke to our community, and despite the many achievements made in promoting greater justice and human rights for Americans and peoples around the world, that we are in dire need still of the courageous and loving spirit of Dr. King, that it may penetrate our hearts, minds, and souls and stir us and all people to action that we may bend the arc of justice even further on behalf of others.

Dr. King understood that a people that fought for its rights was only as honorable as was its concern for the rights of all people, which is why we joined together earlier this week – to act on behalf of the rights of all people in America and around the world.

We were graced on Sunday evening with the presence of many distinguished clergy, community leaders and public officials including Father Ian Davies, Canon, of St Thomas Episcopal Church in Hollywood, Imam Sheikh Asim Buyuksoy of the Islamic Center of Los Angeles, the Reverend Dr. Ignacio Castuera of the United Methodist Church, Dr. John B. Cobb Jr., Professor Emeritus at the Claremont School of Theology and at Claremont Graduate University, Pastor Alan Wright of the Word Center Church in South LA, Pastor Sam Koh of Hillside Ministry of the Los Angeles Christian Presbyterian Church, Pastor Greg Bellamy of One Church International in mid-Los Angeles, Hyepin Im, President and CEO of Korean Churches for Community Development, West Hollywood Mayor John D’Amica, Cameron Onumah representing Senator Dianne Feinstein, and the Mayor of the City of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti, who greeted us with special eloquence. NPR talk show host and author Tavis Smiley delivered the keynote address.

The evening was filled with music led by 86 voices of the Temple Israel of Hollywood Choir, the Leimert Park Choir and the Life Choir. We listened to the ethnic music of the Persian Lian Ensemble, a Mozart Mass performed by the Luminai String quartet and two sopranos, and the music of the Mexican ensemble Cambalache. We were treated to traditional Korean dance by beautifully costumed women and young girls from the Jung Im Lee Dance Academy.

All conceived, directed and produced by our synagogue’s Vice President of the Arts, Michael Skloff, a composer of Broadway and television music (e.g. the theme song for NBCs long-running hit “Friends”) and a video montage of the participating clergy overlaid with photographs and film footage from the civil rights movement and other American and worldwide human rights struggles as filmed and edited by documentary film-makers and Temple Israel members Roberta Grossman and Sophie Sartain.

The highlight of the evening was a tape-recording of Dr. King’s speech delivered fifty years ago in our Sanctuary (made possible then by Leo Wainschul who also captured the iconic image of Rabbi Nussbaum and Dr. King shaking hands together). I have transcribed Dr. King’s entire speech and it can be heard at this link – http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlktempleisraelhollywood.htm.

For those wishing to watch the program itself, click https://new.livestream.com/tioh.

The event was covered in The Los Angeles Times – see http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-temple-israel-martin-luther-king-jr-20150118-story.html

and The Los Angeles Jewish Journal – http://www.jewishjournal.com/los_angeles/article/50_years_after_his_visit_a_multicultural_homage_to_mlk

We partnered on this King Holiday with “Big Sunday,” conceived and born at Temple Israel. Each Martin Luther King Holiday Big Sunday, led by founder David Levinson, hosts a breakfast and clothing drive at its offices on Melrose Avenue attended on Monday by 400 volunteers who provided clothing to nearly 6000 individuals.

It was a memorable day, punctuated by love and calling us all to renewed action on behalf of others.

Confronting Radical Jihadist Islam

16 Friday Jan 2015

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Jewish-Christian Relations, Jewish-Islamic Relations, Social Justice

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The more things change the more they remain the same.

As Jews read the story of the Exodus in synagogue during these weeks, our people living in France, Britain, Turkey, Belgium, and elsewhere find themselves confronting rising anti-Semitic passions stoked by radical Islamists and classic under the radar Jew-haters.

How ought we Jews to respond?

I am not one who believes that there is an anti-Semite lurking under every bed, nor do I believe that the world wants all us Jews dead. We have lots of friends and I believe that we are ill-advised to over-react. France’s Prime Minister Manuel Valls said last Saturday: “France without Jews is no longer France.”

Yes, there has been an increase in aliyah to Israel in the French Jewish community in the last two years, and it is likely that more will do so this next year, but most French Jews are staying put and have no intention of leaving.

European anti-Semitism, of course, is nothing new, though this year’s spike since the Gaza War and Israel’s growing isolation internationally is of increasing concern. At the same time, we can’t delude ourselves into thinking that anti-Semitism in Europe today is anything like it was in the 1930s when anti-Jewish riots were government sponsored and backed. They aren’t today.

What is new is the spread of Islamic fanaticism around the world. Here too we have to be careful not to over-react. The truth is this – the vast majority of the 1.6 billion Muslims in the world are peaceful, non-violent and want what all people want: employment, a decent living, education for their young, healthcare, and safety.

I have heard it said that since Judaism, Christianity and Islam all have sacred texts justifying killing, we can’t judge Islam differently than we would judge Judaism and Christianity. Though there are indeed such texts in all three religions, to ignore each religion’s separate and distinct historical and religious development is not only willful ignorance but dishonest.

Judaism’s most violent era occurred between two and three thousand years ago (1200 BCE to 70 CE) during the conquest of Canaan, the period of the Judges and Israelite kings, and foreign rule over the land of Israel culminating in the destruction of the Temple by Rome. From then on, Jews were victims until the establishment of the state of Israel which has been forced to defend itself against those who have sought its destruction. Though many harshly criticize Israel, wars of self-defense are morally justifiable in Jewish tradition and everywhere in the world.

Christianity too has a long and violent history beginning in the time of Constantine (3rd-4th century CE) and stretching through the period of the Church Fathers, the Crusades, Spanish Inquisition, medieval Europe, and into the twentieth century.

Islam after Mohammed (7th century CE) conquered with dizzying speed at the edge of the sword most of the peoples of the Middle East, North Africa and Spain killing anyone who didn’t convert. In the last half of the 20th century, some estimate that 10 million Muslims have been killed at the hands of other Muslims throughout the world.

Indeed, facts cannot be ignored. Since 9/11 more than 24,000 terrorist acts have been committed around the world in the name of Islam. In the past twenty years, there has arisen a fanatic, extremist, fundamentalist interpretation of Islam that has inspired thousands of cult-like loyalists to kill anyone they regard as infidels and strive to undermine and crush western democracies that they consider morally corrupt.

Though the vast majority of the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims are themselves not violent, Tom Friedman of The New York Times wrote this week that there seems to be ambivalence among too many “moderate” Muslims who may be partially sympathetic with the jihadists thus accounting for their silence in the face of so much terrorism.

What is needed now, Friedman wrote, is not a million person march of French citizens in support of tolerance, free speech and basic freedoms, but a one billion Muslim person march in protest against Muslim jihadist murderers.

I don’t know much about Islam, but a world religion that spawns so much violence has to be questioned.

Whereas both Judaism and Christianity have undergone religious reformations, Islam has not, and that fact combined with despotic rule over Muslims by oppressive regimes, a preponderance of poverty, illiteracy, and unemployment in many Islamic nations, make for a dangerous cocktail.

Ahmed Vanya, a courageous American Muslim and a fellow with the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, has written:

“Classical Islamic law…is definitely not peaceful or benign, and …not suited for this age; neither are its violent and grotesque progeny … Islamism and jihadism … it is the duty of us Muslims, using reason and common sense, to reinterpret the scriptures to bring about an Islam that affirms and promotes universally accepted human rights and values. It is our duty to cleanse the traditional, literalist, classical Islam and purify it to make it an Islam that is worthy to be called a beautiful religion.”

This weekend we celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King’s legacy and we read our story of the Exodus in synagogue. I welcome Ahmed Vanya’s voice and those like him in the Muslim world who speak in the true spirit of the prophetic tradition that is basic to all three great religions, for Vanya is clear as a true moderate and unafraid to stand up to the jihadists while affirming that the future need not be like either the present or the past.

The Difference Between an Optimist and a Pessimist – D’var Torah Vayechi

01 Thursday Jan 2015

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, Divrei Torah, Ethics, Israel and Palestine, Jewish Identity, Jewish-Christian Relations, Jewish-Islamic Relations, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life, Tributes

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The optimist says, “This is the best of all worlds.”

The pessimist says, “You’re right!”

As we enter 2015 there is much for which we can be thankful: our lives, our health (hopefully), our families, friends, and community, the people of Israel, and our friendships with peoples of all faith, ethnic and national traditions.

Of course, there’s much about which to worry as well: hard-heartedness, selfishness, alienation, polarization, poverty, inequality, injustice, violence, and war.

A thousand mourners filled the Sanctuary of Leo Baeck Temple in Los Angeles last Sunday to memorialize the congregation’s founding Rabbi Leonard I. Beerman, which they did with uncommon love and respect for his brilliance, wisdom, kindness, love for Jews, the state of Israel, all people, and a higher moral order.

Throughout his life, Leonard’s dogged determination to keep the fires of love, compassion and justice burning elevated the rest of us by virtue of the nobility of his spirit. So many people from a variety of religious communities depended upon Leonard to help them set the direction of their moral compass. He was a spiritual and moral “north star” that pointed his community in the direction he thought it ought to be traveling.

Surely, Rabbi Leonard Beerman was a unique human being and an exceptional rabbi, and I for one feel lonelier in our world now that he is gone. As I indicated in my remembrance last week, I didn’t see Leonard all that frequently (much more in recent years than before), but I knew he was there holding a moral and spiritual torch high for so many of his chassidim, who may not always have agreed with him on this position or that, or who thought about ethics a bit differently than he did, but who took him and what he once called his “notions” very seriously indeed.

Leonard was laid to rest during this week in which we are reading Parashat Vayechi, the final portion in the book of Genesis when Jacob blessed his sons and grandsons.

The portion opens while Jacob’s family is in Egypt, a constricted place defined by injustice, slavery, brutality, insensitivity, and exile. Among the darkest of Torah portions, it begins unlike any other portion in all of Torah.

Rashi asked, “Why is this section completely closed? Why isn’t there a space of nine letters between the end of the preceding parashah and the beginning of this one, as it is in every other Torah portion?”

Rashi says: “When Jacob our father died, the eyes and hearts of Israel were closed because of the affliction of the bondage with which the Egyptians began to enslave them.”

The Midrash explains that “Jacob desired to reveal the end (i.e. the time of the final redemption) to his sons, but it was closed from him.” (B’reishit Rabba)

This suggests that the hardship, distress and violence of Egypt (or any constricted life) blind the eye, harden the heart and oppress the soul. Torah reminds us that we can never become resigned to a world of dog-eat-dog. Rather, because we were created “b’tzelem Elohim – in the divine image” every human being is infused with infinite value and worth. As such, we are meant to dream big dreams, to climb Jacob’s stairway to heaven, to reclaim our best angels, and to remember who we are and what is our purpose on earth as Jews – namely, to sanctify life, to walk humbly before God, and to care with compassion for all of God’s creatures.

Parshat Veyechi is a story about opposites – impending hardship vs blessing, despair vs hope, hard-heartedness vs elevated dreams. Tradition teaches us Jews to embrace both extremes, but to reach higher than what circumstances seem to allow.

Such was the nature of Jacob’s times. Such is the nature of our times. Such was the nature of Rabbi Leonard Beerman’s life.

Jacob wanted so badly to reveal the end of days to his children, but “nistam mimenu – it was closed to him.” Sadly, It remains closed to us as well.

“Lamrot hakol – despite everything” Leonard sought the light as we Jews seek the light, and he prayed for the peace of Jerusalem and for justice and security for Israel and the Palestinians, for common decency for all humankind, as we Jews must also pray.

Next week begins the reading of the book of Exodus when we witness the beginnings of the spiritual nationhood of the Jewish people at Mount Sinai as we entered into a sacred covenant with God.

Because we see reflected sparks of divinity in the human condition, we Jews are essentially optimists who regard the half-full glass and seek to fill that which is empty.

May this secular New Year 2015 be a time when we continue the work to help facilitate greater kindness, compassion, justice, healing, and peace for us in our own lives, families and communities, for the Jewish people and for all of God’s children.

President Ruvi Rivlin’s Remarkable Speech to the Israeli Arabs of Kafr Qasim

11 Tuesday Nov 2014

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in Ethics, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish-Christian Relations, Jewish-Islamic Relations

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The new President of the State of Israel, Ruvi Rivlin (my cousin), makes me enormously proud of him and his Presidency, now just several months old. He was invited to visit an Israeli Palestinian village that had suffered a massacre on October 26th, 1956, perpetrated by Israeli Border Police.

My colleague, Rabbi Ron Kronish, the Director of the Interreligious Coordinating Council of Israel, recently wrote in The Huffington Post of both the Israeli crime and the invitation given to President by the village’s mayor to speak there (see http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ron-kronish/the-president-of-israel-r_b_6120054.html). Recalling the crime Ron wrote that Israeli police

“…killed 48 Arab civilians who had violated a curfew (that they had not heard about in time). The border policemen who were involved in the shooting were brought to trial and found guilty and sentenced to prison terms (but all received pardons and were released within a year)”

President Rivlin’s speech may go down in Israeli history as one of the most important speeches ever delivered by a sitting Israeli President promoting mutual respect between Israeli Jews and Israeli Palestinians. He delivered it at the Israeli Arab town of Kafr Qasim in the Israeli “Triangle” in central Israel near the “green line” where the massacre took place.

Ruvi notes that his visit is not the first time in our family when efforts were made to make peace between Arabs and Jews in that location. His uncle, and my great-great uncle, Avram Shapira, came to Kafr Qasim in 1957 after the massacre to try and restore peace between its town’s Israeli Arabs and Israelis Jews.

President Shimon Peres had already apologized on behalf of the people and State of Israel for this crime against the Kafr Qasim population, and this past month President Rivlin went further still in this speech.

You can read the entirety of the speech – see link below. Though Ruvi is against a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he has based his presidency in part on promoting democracy and equal rights for all Israeli citizens, including the 20% (1.5 million Israeli citizens) that is Arab Palestinian. He acknowledges in this speech that Arab Israelis have and continue to suffer second class citizenship status and that this must change.

President Rivlin’s outreach to the Arab community of Israel, which began last month in a video in which he sat silently with a ten-year old Arab boy from Jaffa calling out for an end to bullying, racism and discrimination. (see http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4577276,00.html) have had in this short time a profound impact upon the Arab citizens of Israel and Israelis who are fearful of the rise of racism and intolerance in Israeli society.

It is a travesty that Ruvi’s open-hearted and supportive outreach to Israeli Arab citizens is not being repeated by some members of the Israeli government of PM Netanyahu, who are calling instead for Israeli Arab citizens who don’t like current Israeli policies towards their communities to be transferred to the West Bank and to live under the Palestinian Authority (e.g. PM Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman).

And it is a calumny that Israeli right-wing fanatics have branded President Ruvy Rivlin a traitor to Israel. In the last two months, like the assassinated Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin before him who sought an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, these right-wing fanatic Jews have dressed Ruvi in a kafiya and sent it streaming everywhere over the internet.

I pray for Ruvi’s good health and for his success. He represents the very best of Israel. Like President Shimon Peres before him, President Ruvi Rivlin is lifting the nation beyond politics that the state of Israel may fulfill its destiny as a democratic society for all its citizens.

He said in his speech:

“We have to find a path. This path it seems will not be laid on the foundations of love, but it can and must be built with an objective perspective, and with mutual respect and commitment.”

President Rivlin’s speech at Kfar Qasim – http://mfa.gov.il/MFA/PressRoom/2014/Pages/President-Rivlin-addresses-Kafr-Qasim-memorial-ceremony-26-Oct-2014.aspx

Beware Pundits Who Make Sweeping Ignorant Statements About Islam

07 Tuesday Oct 2014

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Jewish History, Jewish-Christian Relations, Jewish-Islamic Relations

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People with microphones and computers who think they are experts as they cherry-pick scriptural verse from the Hebrew Bible, New Testament or Quran, observe evil behavior of those who claim their respective religious text as authority, and then make outrageous claims about the nature of the other’s religion ought to pause before saying or writing anything. We who listen should change the channel immediately or delete such drivel from our computer screens.

The rise of ISIS, Al Qaida, the threats of a nuclear Iran, Hamas’ brutality, and the brutality and extremism in many African and Middle Eastern countries have given rise to pontifications and pronouncements by people who don’t know what they are talking about when it comes to the interplay of history, religion, politics, power, and human avarice. Their generalizations and cherry-picking of facts feed fear of the “other”, do harm to the good name of vast numbers of Muslims, Jews and Christians, destroy civil discourse, polarize people who otherwise would have much in common, and represent an assault on the truth.

“Fox News” is perhaps the most serious offender, but so are other media outlets whose “commentators” obsessively focus on religion as a principle culprit in world violence instead of more complex historical forces and simple greed and avarice.

I am attaching two articles by my friend and colleague, Rabbi Reuven Firestone, Professor of Medieval Judaism and Islam at HUC-JIR in Los Angeles (from the “Forward” and “Jewish Journal”), who I trust as a bona fide scholar of Islam and Judaism. I know enough about Judaism and Christianity (I am not a scholar of the latter) to know that the general points he makes in these two articles are true and important for all of us when thinking about the rise of radical Islamic groups around the world.

http://blogs.forward.com/forward-thinking/206518/no-pamela-geller-the-quran-is-not-anti-semitic/

http://www.jewishjournal.com/opinion/article/bennett_and_weston_the_politics_of_scapegoating

My Brother – The Universe – Henry Miller – And New Year Hopes

22 Monday Sep 2014

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, Beauty in Nature, Ethics, Health and Well-Being, Holidays, Inuyim - Prayer reflections and ruminations, Israel and Palestine, Jewish Identity, Jewish-Christian Relations, Jewish-Islamic Relations, Musings about God/Faith/Religious life

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My brother, Michael, is a scientist (i.e. hematologist-oncologist on faculty at UCLA Medical Center). He accepts truth when empirical evidence is clear. However, he also knows that no matter how much we may think we know, we never have all the information necessary to make categorical statements about objective truth.

He recently wrote the following to me:

“I often marvel at how improbable we all are as humans. There had to be the creation of the universe, then the stars and planets. There had to be an Earth with perfect conditions ripe for life, then enough time for natural selection to create the diversity of life we know. As humankind, we are merely one invention of this process. And as individuals, who are so dependent on both nature and nurture for who we are, each of us is the improbable union of one particular egg and one particular sperm raised in a particular environment by two particular parents. How improbable and unique can you get? Mind boggling!”

Henry Miller wrote the following relative to the truth my brother articulated above:

“Let each one turn his gaze inward and regard himself with awe and wonder, with mystery and reverence; let each one work her own influence, her own havoc, her own miracles.”

This is the nature of this High Holiday season. We are dynamic beings, just as the natural world is dynamic, and we are capable of changing and climbing out of and moving from the holes into which we’ve fallen and become stuck, if only we have the will and the clarity of mind, heart, and spirit to do so.

May it be such for each of us in this New Year 5775.

May Israel and the Palestinians strive to find a better way to live side by side in mutual respect, in peace and in security.

May the forces for good destroy ISIS and defeat all those who would destroy innocent human life and thereby save human lives (I pray specifically in these days for the well-being of Kurdish Muslims of Syria).

These are my most fervent New Year’s hopes. To attain them, it will take us all, decent people who regard every human being as the infinite embodiment of God’s creative and loving will.

L’shanah tovah u-m’tu-kah u-v’ri-yah l’chul’chem u-l’mish’patch’chem u-l’chol y’di-dei-chem!

Negotiating with the “Devil” – 4 Book Recommendations

03 Sunday Aug 2014

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Book Recommendations, Ethics, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Jewish-Christian Relations

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I recommend four books that are helpful in probing, analyzing and addressing the stresses and tensions that develop in all kinds of relationships, within marriages and families, between siblings and friends, in the work place and community, between ethnic, racial, and religious groups, amongst nations and peoples, and in relationship to terrorist organizations.

At a time when crises increasingly define what transpires between nations, when polarization escalates in American partisan politics, when many media sources report biased and non fact-based reports in the service of partisan agendas, when so many interpersonal relationships remain dysfunctional and destructive, we individuals and our society need thoughtful guidance about how to effectively restore sanity, stability and integrity to our relationships and effectively reduce stress, tension, harm, and suffering to all concerned.

Difficult Conversations – How to Discuss What Matters Most, by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton and Sheila Heen, Penguin, 2010 – A NY Times business bestseller that reflects fifteen years of research. The authors offer a step-by-step approach to reduce stress when tough conversations are inevitable, and to reach successfully new understanding and compromise in all kinds of relationships. This is a practical guide that analyzes the impact of what happens when conflict occurs and how to move through it productively and in one piece.

The Righteous Mind – Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion, by Jonathan Haidt, Vintage, 2012 – A superb work that analyzes the moral presumptions (based on people’s genetic and psychological makeup, religious, national and cultural backgrounds) upon which we respond to events and form our relationships. The author explores how and why we do not understand others, judge and demonize them. Dr. Haidt is a Professor of Ethical Leadership at NYU’s Stern School of Business and earned his doctorate in social psychology from the University of Pennsylvania. He employs the metaphor of a rider (representing reason and logic) and an elephant (representing intuition and non-rational responses) and why the choice of the elephant is almost always determinative while the rider acts as a kind of adviser and “press agent” for the elephant and rationalizes whatever the elephant chooses to do. Haidt is persuasive in showing that in order to understand who we and others really are (friends and foes), we need to be able recognize what the elephant intuitively wants and how the rider rationalizes the elephant’s choices.

From Enemy to Friend – Jewish Wisdom and the Pursuit of Peace, by Rabbi Amy Eilberg, Orbis, 2014 – Rabbi Eilberg is the first woman ordained as a Conservative rabbi by the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. She spent many years working in pastoral care, hospice and spiritual direction, and is a seasoned peace activist. (A personal note – Amy is a friend and a significant voice in the J Street Rabbinic Cabinet that I co-chair nationally. I would recommend highly this book even if I did not know her personally). Amy brings to her work high emotional intelligence and psychological sophistication. She non self righteously advocates for kindness, compassion, generosity, curiosity, and the softening and opening of the heart in all tough and contentious interactions with individuals and groups even as she advocates for courage, clarity, determination, and boldness in speaking and acting upon one’s own truth. Amy’s voice is deeply Jewish, and she utilizes a wide array of classic Jewish texts with sensitivity and skill as she lays out the necessary ground-work of peace-making, to which she has devoted her life. Taken together, these four books represent a mini-course on conflict resolution.This work ought to be translated into both Hebrew and Arabic so that it can be available for Israelis and Palestinians seeking ways to make peace with each other with mutual respect and a spirit of necessary compromise.

Bargaining with the Devil – When to Negotiate, When to Fight, by Robert Mnookin, Simon and Schuster, 2010 – Dr. Mnookin is chair of the program on negotiation at the Harvard Law School and has practiced and analyzed the art and science of negotiation in a wide variety of settings. He considers in depth seven polarized situations and the choices that were made. The seven include the Hungarian Jew Rudolf Kasztner’s choice to bargain for Jewish lives with the high Nazi official Adolph Eichmann, Winston Churchill’s decision not to negotiate with Adolph Hitler and instead to go to war, Nelson Mandela’s negotiations from prison with the Apartheid regime, a 1980s software war that challenged the budding industry’s understanding of intellectual property rights as it played out between an American and Japanese firm, contract negotiations between the San Francisco Symphony’s management and the musician’s union, a contentious divorce proceeding, and a sibling struggle over a father’s estate. Dr. Mnookin takes us through all the ethical, moral and practical choices involved in each case including the interpersonal dynamics involved and a cost-benefit analysis, and he explains how each incident resolved.

None of these four works argues that every hostile, tense and polarized conflict is able to be resolved in compromise. Yet, there are times when even bargaining with the “devil” (as Robert Mnookin described Rudolf Kasztner’s choice) is better than not doing so. Mnookin also demonstrates why refusing to bargain with the devil, as Winston Churchill did relative to Hitler, was the right choice.

Taken together, these four books represent a mini-course on conflict resolution.

True Friends Do Not Stab Each Other in the Back – Presbyterian Church (USA)

26 Thursday Jun 2014

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

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A battle for the soul of the Presbyterian Church (USA) is raging, and the good guys are losing. The Church’s recent vote to divest from three companies doing business with Israel who they say support the Israeli occupation of the West Bank has sent a hurtful message to the Jewish people and state of Israel.

While the resolution to divest passed only by a very small margin of 310 yay to 303 nay, it included disclaimers that Church members hoped would soften the blow. Moderates in the Church were careful not to signal an ultimate split with the state of Israel, nor did the Church align with the international BDS movement (Boycott, Divestiture and Sanctions) which does not grant Israel the right to exist as a sovereign nation (the resolution did affirm that right).

After the vote one Church leader reaffirmed Presbyterian love for Jews. However, most Jews weren’t buying it, even if we didn’t say so out loud. Many of us believe that anti-Semites in the Church won the day. I would not go so far as to say that all the 310 yay votes are necessarily anti-Semitic or anti-Israel, but I believe many are whether they think of themselves that way or not.

This resolution was unfair, biased, shameful, ignorant, and a misguided slander of the Jewish people and state of Israel, pure and simple.

Bel Air Presbyterian Church Reverend Drew Sams agreed and expressed his embarrassment:

“It doesn’t represent who we are. To develop policy that would convey the message that we are turning our backs on our brothers and sisters in Israel is just very, very disappointing.” (LA Jewish Journal)

What makes this resolution so toxic to Jews is that it comes on the heels of the publication of a screed called “Zionism Unsettled,” a pseudo-historical propaganda piece that so distorts the state of Israel and Zionism that it is unrecognizable to those who have visited and know anything about modern Jewish history.

There is nothing positive in “Zionism Unsettled” about Israel. There is no affirmation of the Jewish people’s right to a national home in the land of Israel. It accuses Zionism of ethnic cleansing, racial and religious superiority. It obsessively critiques Israel and gives no historical context to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It says nothing about Arab terrorism and violence, or why Israel spent a fortune building a security fence to prevent suicide bombers from blowing up school buses, pizza parlors and shopping centers. It only critiques Israel as if there are not two parties to the conflict and as if the Palestinians are wholly innocent victims. It reflects no appreciation or understanding of the context in which Israel finds itself, as if the violence and turmoil of the region doesn’t exist and has no spill-over relevance to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It doesn’t note that Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East, the only nation with an independent judiciary and free press, the only country that protects gay and lesbian citizens and safeguards Christians and their holy places. It is as if there is one nation alone on earth that requires rebuke, Israel.

Jane Eisner, the editor of the Jewish Daily Forward summed it all up this way:

“When Jewish treatment of Palestinians is judged worse than the way any other dominant group treats a minority, when it is deemed worthy of unique sanction, when other horrors around the world are ignored – how can I believe that this isn’t about the Jews? And that, my Presbyterian friends, is anti-Semitism.”

I am often critical of specific policies of the Israeli government when those policies are undemocratic, violate human rights or work against the creation of a two-state resolution of the Israel-Palestinian conflict because I love Israel, believe in her, am inspired by her remarkable contributions to the world in so many areas of human endeavor, and want to see her thrive in safety as a democracy and the homeland of the Jewish people alongside a peaceful and secure Palestine.

This Church resolution does not forward those goals in any way. Not only does the vast majority of the Jewish people oppose BDS as a tactic because it is inherently unfair, but divestiture will not be effective in helping to bring about a two-state resolution of the conflict.

True friends of the Jewish people would not have passed such a resolution. True friends would have come to Israel to learn first-hand about the reality in which Israelis live. True friends would have toured other countries in the region to understand context. True friends would not have permitted the publication of that propagandist anti-Israel and anti-Semitic screed and would remove it immediately from its website. True friends would have joined with the American Jewish community to support efforts to help Israel and the Palestinians resolve their conflict. True friends do not stab each other in the back.

That is what the Presbyterian Church (USA) did, all disclaimers aside – and it hurts!

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

17 Tuesday Jun 2014

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

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.

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