A Pre-Pesach Rant!

07 Friday Apr 2017

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Politics and Life, Ethics, Holidays, Social Justice

We are headed into Shabbat Hagadol (the “Great Shabbat”), the Sabbath that always precedes Pesach. It is called “Great” because of the second to last verse in the Haftarah portion Malachi (3:23) where it is written: “Lo, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before the coming of the ‘great’ and awe-inspiring day of God.”

On this eve before Pesach, I know I am not alone in my increasing distress and anxiety about President Trump’s and his administration’s utter lack of respect for our democratic institutions, our intelligence agencies, the judicial branch, the fifth estate, the social safety net, the nation’s health care, public education, science, and climate change.

And now there’s more about which to worry in the wake of Trump’s knee-jerk military response yesterday to Assad’s nerve gas attack without informing Congress in advance or seeking its counsel while continuing to refuse to welcome desperate Syrian refugees into America or to provide humanitarian aid to the beleaguered Syrian population.

I keep waiting to hear what Trump’s foreign policy is other than a transactional exercise in which “winning” is the end game. There doesn’t seem to be anything cogent, strategic or visionary about it. His utter disrespect for diplomacy and the nurturing of international alliances, his maddening disregard for facts, his self-centered manipulation of the news cycle to distract the country from the congressional investigation of his campaign’s collusion with Russia, and his massive and obsessive blaming everyone else for everything while never taking responsibility for anything, worries and sickens me about where this country is going, what is happening to our democracy, and what moral standing America will be able to claim when Trump’s term is over or he ends up impeached.

The irony on this Shabbat Hagadol is that Trump has no idea what ‘greatness’ really means. His dominant message has nothing to do with the exceptionalism of America. Rather, it’s about how much better he is than all his predecessors and political adversaries.

Many worry how Trump will handle his first significant crisis. I have comforted myself with the knowledge that he appointed some substantial, seasoned, reasoned, and knowledgeable people to lead the nation’s security and defense establishments. I have taken comfort in the strength of our democratic institutions as well as in many of our political leaders who are as deeply worried as are the rest of us. And I take comfort in the fact that most voters did not vote for Trump so I can’t be in the minority about my worries and concerns. I want to believe, as well, that millions of Trump voters have awoken to how badly they chose on election day, which must be true given his historically low approval ratings.

What makes this holiday of Pesach “great” is its moral and religious vision, the universalism of its message, and its acknowledgment of how inspired leadership and the actions of morally based communities can actually change history for the better.

Shabbat shalom and Hag Pesach Sameach

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

26 Sunday Mar 2017

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

≈ 4 Comments

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.

“No human being is illegal!” – Elie Wiesel

08 Wednesday Mar 2017

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

≈ 2 Comments

In 1987 my wife Barbara was a member of the Board of CARECEN, the Central American Refugee Center in Washington, D.C. CARECEN was a significant activist organization helping to change American foreign policy vis a vis political asylum requests from El Salvadoran refugees fleeing the “Death Squads.” This band of murderers was killing leftists, labor union leaders, intellectuals, and Catholics (recall the murder of the four American nuns found on a road by US Ambassador Bob White under President Jimmy Carter).

President Reagan’s first act upon assuming office was to fire Ambassador White who had called Roberto D’Aubuisson a “pathological killer.” D’Aubuisson was an El Salvadoran soldier, an extreme right-wing politician and the leader of the death-squads. He was named by the UN-created Truth Commission for El Salvador as having ordered the assassination of Archbishop Óscar Romero in 1980.

Reagan’s firing of Bob White was not one of Reagan’s most shining moments. Those who remember, Reagan didn’t realize that every country in Central and South America was different!

The Reagan Administration had close ties with the El Salvadoran government and was not interested in publicly acknowledging that massive human rights abuses were being committed and countenanced.

Barbara was asked by the Director of CARECEN (she was the only Jew on the national board) to make contact with Elie Wiesel and try and engage him in this effort on behalf of El Salvadoran asylum seekers. Barbara succeeded in doing so and Wiesel made this now famous statement in the context of the El Salvadoran controversy – “No human being is illegal!”

The saying became the brand of CARACEN’s campaign on behalf of these refugees.

Given Trump’s immigrant ban and antipathy to Muslims, Elie Wiesel’s comment is as current as ever.

The “Silver Lining” of Donald Trump

05 Sunday Mar 2017

Posted by rabbijohnrosove 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:

Trump has made people aware just how fragile and vulnerable America’s constitutional freedoms can be. ..

Trump has injected new life into the American left…

Trump has shaken the Jewish community to its core …

Trump is a catalyzer for solidarity and brotherhood/sisterhood among Jews from the right and the left….

Trump has been a miracle worker for the free press and the journalistic profession, …

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…

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…

Trump has exposed the American right wing’s most significant feature: rank hypocrisy…

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…

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

Why I Signed onto an Amicus Brief Suing the President of the United States

19 Sunday Feb 2017

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

≈ 2 Comments

Last week I accepted an invitation to join with eight others as signatories in an interfaith amicus brief in support of two Iraqi refugee petitioners. They charge that President Donald Trump’s Executive Order Travel Ban violates the equal protection component of the Due Process clause of the US Constitution because it discriminates against refugees based on their religion.

Darweesh et al.v. Trump et. Al was filed in the Eastern District of New York on Thursday, February 16 by the legal firm of Covington & Burling LLP, Washington, DC. The firm is representing the two plaintiffs pro bono.

Here is the unconstitutional passage of the Travel Ban Executive Order:

“…the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security may jointly determine to admit individuals to the United States as refugees on a case-by-case basis, in their discretion, but only so long as they determine that the admission of such individuals as refugees is in the national interest – including when the person is a religious minority in his country of nationality facing religious persecution…” (“Executive Order: Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States” – January 27, 2017 – Section 5e)

Trump’s specific designation of seven Middle East nations to which this Travel Ban applies (Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen) are majority-Muslim countries. The Executive Order gives preference to minority religious communities in those countries (i.e. Christians). That is a clear violation of the equal protection component of the Constitution’s Due Process clause because Muslims as a religious community are discriminated against.

The two plaintiffs are both Iraqi. One served as a translator for the American military in Iraq and feared for his life should he remain in his native country. He was promised political asylum by his American military handlers, but when he arrived at JFK he was refused entry because of Trump’s Travel Ban.

The other plaintiff is an Iraqi refugee who came to America in order to join his family. They had been thoroughly vetted and were cleared and granted visas. He too was refused entry and held at JFK until the Ninth Circuit Court stayed the ban. Both plaintiffs are now safely in the United States.

We Jews, if nothing else, know the heart of the stranger. The Torah instructs us frequently to remember that we were slaves in the land of Egypt. Tradition instructs us to welcome the stranger at all times with dignity, courtesy, and active support.

In times of crisis such as these in which millions of refugees are fleeing violence in their native countries, the exceptionalism of America combined with the ethical and moral impulse in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam call upon us to do everything possible to provide safe haven for the “tempest-tost.” (see Emma Lazarus, “The Great Colossus” inscribed on the Statue of Liberty)

Altruism is the noblest of moral motivations, but enlightened self-interest is also efficacious in our doing what is just and compassionate. The German Lutheran Pastor Martin Niemöller reminds us of real-world consequences if we don’t act on behalf of others:

“First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”

The interfaith amicus brief signatories include:

Bana Alabed, a seven-year-old Syrian refugee from Aleppo who wrote to Donald Trump not to forget the children of Syria. Syrian President Assad called Bana’s posts “terrorist propaganda”
The Auburn Seminary, New York, NY
Congregation B’nai Jeshurun, New York, NY
The Muslim Public Affairs Council
Rabbi James Ponet, Retired Director of The Joseph Slifka Center for Jewish Life, Yale University, New Haven, CT
Rabbi John Rosove, Senior Rabbi, Temple Israel of Hollywood, Los Angeles, CA
Rabbi Keith Stern, Senior Rabbi, Temple Beth Avodah, Newton Center, MA
The Union Theological Seminary, New York, NY
Suhaib Webb, the imam of the Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center

I will report back as this case moves through the courts.

Though so many in my congregation have expressed their moral outrage at this Travel Ban, I am a signatory as an individual and do not claim to represent my synagogue or any other organization.

Reform Jewish Movement Opposes David Friedman’s Nomination for U.S. Ambassador to Israel

17 Friday Feb 2017

Posted by rabbijohnrosove in American Jewish Life, American Politics and Life, Ethics, Israel and Palestine, Israel/Zionism, Jewish History, Jewish Identity, Jewish-Christian Relations, Jewish-Islamic Relations, Social Justice, Women's Rights

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This is the first time that all the organizations of the American Reform Jewish movement have ever weighed in on a nomination by a President of the United States. However, we have done so because David Friedman’s qualifications, lack of diplomatic experience, erratic temperament, outrageous rhetoric and attacks on large sections of the American Jewish community, and his policy positions vis a vis Israel are not in the best interests of the American-Israel relationship and do not represent our Reform Jewish values in relationship to the democratic and Jewish State of Israel.

As the national Chair of the Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA), on behalf of ARZA’s President Rabbi Josh Weinberg, and with the unanimous support of the national ARZA Officers and Board, I express my own gratitude that our movement of 1.5 million American Reform Jews has made such a clear and strong statement.

Please read the attached statement and note the expansive support of our movement’s national leadership.

http://www.urj.org/blog/2017/02/17/reform-jewish-movement-opposes-david-friedmans-nomination-us-ambassador-israel

Why Trump is so dangerous and what we Americans and Jews ought to do about it

05 Sunday Feb 2017

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

≈ 4 Comments

Why is President Donald Trump so dangerous to our democracy and the world? Because he lies, insists upon the truth of his lies, doubles down on them, and then mercilessly demeans and attacks his critics.

There is a method to what Trump does. Here are some of the specifics that are necessary for the achievement of his ends:

He personally attacks his opponents by labeling them with demeaning name-calling, thereby belittling them and discrediting them;
He mocks anyone who shows a disability or publicly displays emotion that he regards as a sign of weakness in order to prop himself up and establish himself as the big winner and therefore the embodiment of power and truth;
He dismisses provable facts when they do not conform to his end-game agenda;
He attacks the press, threatens journalists and networks, and denies them access to the White House;
He fires staff that disagree with him and prohibits dissent by government officials;
He threatens cities and universities by withdrawing financial aid when they challenge him;
He challenges the last election as fraudulent so he can claim to have won the popular vote as well as the electoral college;
He shuts down the White House switchboard to protect itself against negative public opinion.

Taken together these things (which are not exhaustive) are reminiscent of the methods described in Mein Kampf to subjugate a population to the power and will of the leader. As was the case in the 1930s in Nazi Germany, everything for Trump depends upon establishing the Big Lie as truth.

Robert Reich posted on his Facebook page ten specific steps Trump has used from the beginning of his campaign to promote the Big Lie as a means of establishing himself as the Savior of the nation:

Step 1: Trump lies.

Step 2: Experts contradict him, saying his claim is baseless and false. The media report that the claim is false.

Step 3: Trump blasts the experts and condemns the media for being “dishonest.”

Step 4: Trump repeats the lie in tweets and speeches. He asserts that “many people” say he’s right.

Step 5: The mainstream media start to describe the lie as a “disputed fact.”

Step 6: Trump repeats the lie in tweets, interviews, and speeches. His surrogates repeat it on Fox News and in the right-wing blogosphere.

Step 7: The mainstream media begin to describe Trump’s lie as a “controversy.”

Step 8: Polls show a growing number of Americans (including most Republicans) believe Trump’s lie to be true.

Step 9: The media start describing Trump’s lie as “a claim that reflects a partisan divide in America,” and is “found to be true by many.”

Step 10: The public is confused and disoriented about what the facts are. Trump wins.

What ought we to do in response?

Call/email your congressional representatives protesting Trump’s appointments and actions when they are based on the Big Lie or when they run counter to his campaign promises;
Organize for the mid-term elections to take back the House and the Senate;
Run for political office yourself and/or encourage able people you know to do so especially against current office-holders and candidates who support Trump’s demagoguery and/or who have failed to speak out against his lies and policies;
Actively support progressive causes (e.g. climate change, public education, affordable college education, civil rights, women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, criminal justice reform, universal health care, scientific research, economic justice, immigration reform, diplomacy in international affairs, etc. etc);
Organize demonstrations against Trump wherever and whenever he appears, at the White House and at his retreats to get under his skin;
Educate your children and grandchildren about American democracy, our democratic institutions, the US Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the built-in checks and balances of the three branches of our government;
Remember that critical thinking is our nation’s greatest protection against Trump’s and his surrogates’ demagoguery and distortions of the truth;
Challenge all outrageous and demeaning statements Trump makes;
Support the media that call his lies what they are – lies – and who the Trump administration criticizes for reporting and/or speaking the truth;
Defend everyone Trump attacks regardless of whether you agree with the speaker’s views.

Finally – because so much is being thrown up by the Trump administration every day, it is only human to want to stop listening to the news and, out of a sense of disgust and powerlessness, to turn away and disengage. That, however, is the opposite of what we ought to be doing. Deferring to Trump is exactly what dictators want from their subjects. Denial of what is happening in the body politic and moral character of our nation is not an option; neither is despair.

We Jews and we Americans are people of hope, and hope comes from engagement and the belief that we can effect change and heal the world of its pain and imperfections.

Chazak v’ematz – Be strong and courageous!

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