Introductory notes: In a J Street Leadership call last week, former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was blunt – American Jews must speak out against the policies of the anti-democratic government of Israel. Echoing his call, J Street’s Israel Executive Director, a former Israeli Consul General to New England, and an aid to former Prime Minister Shimon Peres, Nadav Tamir, said: “Only America can save Israel from its own government.”

In all my years as a liberal Zionist activist I have never heard Israelis speak so candidly and with such worry about their own government’s direction and the future of Israeli democracy as I have heard in recent weeks since this most extreme right-wing-ultra-Orthodox-nationalist government in the history of the State of Israel assumed power.

Israelis have taken to the streets in huge numbers to protest this government’s threatened actions. On Monday, as the Knesset was meeting to pass (in the first round in committee) a radical re-visioning of Israel’s judicial system, estimates of between 80,000 and 300,000 Israelis came to Jerusalem by car, train, and bus from Haifa, Tel Aviv, and everywhere else (many taking their children with them and out of school for the day) because of the shock that the Knesset’s Constitution and Law Committee and Justice Department are having on the country as a whole. Polls indicate that a clear majority of Israelis oppose this legislation that would place all power in the hands of the ruling coalition government and, therefore, in the hands of the Prime Minister without any check or balance from the government’s judicial branch.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog has asked the Netanyahu government to pause its legislation and come together with the opposition, leading jurists, and academics to reach a reasonable compromise in which some legitimate reform can be instituted that would gain widespread approval from the Israeli public. The two leading figures in the government, however, Justice Minister Yariv Levin (from the Likud Party) and Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee chairman MK Simcha Rothman (from the extreme nationalist Religious Zionist Party) are doggedly pushing these so-called “reforms” (but really a radical restructuring of Israel’s judiciary system) forward and refuse to compromise. Yair Lapid, the former Prime Minister and opposition leader, said he was willing to meet immediately according to the terms of President Herzog’s invitation and 5-point plan, but only if the reforms are put on pause.

Israel is in crisis, and adding these domestic issues to what the government is doing in the West Bank – preparing the ground in Area C to be annexed de facto against international law – Israel needs the United States and American Jewry to at once continue our support of the Jewish state and its security but also demand that this government cease its radical policies. What Israel does affects us here, our pride in being Jews, our security against antisemitism, and our future as integrated American-Jewish citizens. Polls suggest that young American Jews, in particular, are turning away from Israel in increasingly large numbers. (If you have not read Tom Friedman’s opinion piece that I posted yesterday, I urge you to do so now.)

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, in Israel’s daily newspaper Ha’aretz (Israel’s newspaper of record much like the NYT in America) on Monday harshly condemned the Israeli security cabinet’s steps to legalize nine West Bank outposts, construct thousands of new settlement housing units, and connect outposts to water and electricity – all despite previous explicit opposition from the Biden administration.

In the last several weeks, at least two letters signed by hundreds of American Jewish leaders were sent to the leadership of Israel and the United States urging the Israeli government to step back from the brink. We are making our views known, but in the end, the decisions of the Israeli government are in the hands of the Knesset and Israelis – and Israelis by a clear majority are opposed to what this government is doing.

What follows is a J STREET ACTION MEMO for the Biden Administration and United States Congress concerning West Bank policies and the increasing violence between Jewish settlers, the Israeli West Bank military administration and Palestinians living under occupation as well as the above mentioned judicial “reforms.” It was written by Dylan Williams, J Street’s Senior Vice President for Policy and Strategy, and Dr. Debra Shushan, J Street’s Director of Policy, yesterday (February 13, 2023):

“Amid an escalation in deadly violence in the West Bank and East Jerusalem — including recent terror attacks that killed Israeli civilians, including two young children, as well as Israeli raids against militants that killed Palestinian civilians — Israel’s new ultra-right-wing government decided this week to move forward with a series of provocative and consequential steps toward West Bank annexation and removal of judicial restraints on its executive power.

The government decided to take the following major steps toward annexation, which intentionally preempt prospects for a peaceful two-state outcome to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by converting significant West Bank land into territory functionally attached to Israel, while further shrinking and isolating the small pockets of disjointed land left for Palestinians living under military occupation:

● “Regularizing” or “legalizing” nine outposts in the occupied West Bank that are illegal under both Israeli and international law, turning them into new, authorized settlements;

● Connecting dozens of other still-illegal outposts to Israeli state-provided infrastructure like water and electricity; and

● Convening the planning and zoning committees of Israel’s Civil Administration in the occupied West Bank to approve the planning and building of thousands of new housing units in existing settlements — possibly the largest ever single approval of such units.

The government also moved to neutralize the judiciary and eliminate checks on its power by advancing through Knesset two bills that are integral parts of the Netanyahu government’s plan to subvert Israel’s judicial system, serving Netanyahu’s personal interest in evading conviction on corruption charges and his government’s goal of removing the Supreme Court as an obstacle to the radical reforms contained in its coalition agreements, including those regarding annexation:

● Moving a bill to functionally terminate the Supreme Court’s power of judicial review on foundational issues by preventing the Court from considering the validity of Israel’s Basic Laws – which stipulate civil rights and the powers and functions of Israel’s governing bodies, in the absence of a formal Constitution – or amendments to them; and

● Advancing a second bill that would allow the governing coalition to pack the judiciary with judges of its own choosing, in contrast to the current system which requires judges and politicians to achieve a consensus upon the appointments of new judges to Israel’s Supreme Court and all other civil courts. According to the proposed law, five of nine members of the selection committee would be members of the coalition government, and a bare majority of five votes would be required to appoint judges.

Taking Action: Recommendations for the Biden Administration and Congress

The Biden Administration has reportedly been weighing in privately against such moves with top Israeli officials for several weeks. In response to the Israeli government’s decision to move forward with the West Bank steps this week, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States was “deeply troubled” and “strongly oppose[s] such unilateral measures, which exacerbate tensions and undermine the prospects for a negotiated two-state solution.”

Just days before, President Biden himself cautioned against the moves to undermine Israel’s judiciary with a measured 46-word warning that: “The genius of American democracy and Israeli democracy is that they are both built on strong institutions, on checks and balances, on an independent judiciary. Building consensus for fundamental changes is really important to ensure that the people buy into them so they can be sustained.”

The magnitude of the Israeli government’s provocative moves toward annexation and against the democratic rule of law at this volatile moment merit an urgent and more forceful US government response. At a minimum, the Biden administration and US lawmakers should take the following steps:

● Publicly and consistently make clear that there is a distinction in international law and US policy between the State of Israel and the territory it controls in the West Bank, and that the United States does not regard West Bank settlements as consistent with international law or as part of Israel;

● Reinforce US and international differentiation between Israel and the West Bank through steps like restoring the longstanding bipartisan customs guidance on accurate labeling of West Bank goods;

● Indicate that use of US-origin military equipment or aid in connection with acts toward annexation like evictions, demolitions, forced relocations and the construction of civilian infrastructure designed to benefit settlers could trigger investigations into whether such use constituted a violation of existing US arms export control or aid law;

● Make clear to Israeli officials that the United States will not block accurate, appropriate criticism of acts toward annexation like evictions, demolitions and forced relocations in international fora, including in the United Nations Security Council;

● State that the shared values upon which a strong, crucial US-Israel relationship rests are premised upon democratic systems underpinned by an independent judiciary that acts as a check upon executive power and protects civil liberties — and that an erosion in Israeli democracy would negatively impact the bilateral relationship; and

● Remind Israeli officials that compromising judicial independence can impact the decisions of international bodies like the International Criminal Court as to the adequacy of domestic remedies, making review of Israeli actions by such bodies more likely.”

I woke up on Saturday morning, read the news from Israel that at least 50,000 Israelis had just demonstrated once more against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plans to strip the Israeli Supreme Court of its independence and put it instead under Netanyahu’s thumb — at a time when Netanyahu himself is facing corruption charges — and I asked myself a simple question: “What does President Biden think of this?”

Biden is as pro-Israel in his gut as any president I have ever covered. He has also had a long and mutually respectful relationship with Netanyahu. So I can tell you that whatever Biden has to say about Israel comes from a place of real concern. It’s a concern that the radical transformation of Israel’s judicial system that Netanyahu’s ultranationalist, ultrareligious coalition is trying to slam through the Knesset could seriously damage Israel’s democracy and therefore its close ties to America and democracies everywhere.

Here is the statement that Biden sent me on Saturday afternoon when I asked for comment: “The genius of American democracy and Israeli democracy is that they are both built on strong institutions, on checks and balances, on an independent judiciary. Building consensus for fundamental changes is really important to ensure that the people buy into them so they can be sustained.”

This is the first time I can recall a U.S. president has ever weighed in on an internal Israeli debate about the very character of the country’s democracy. And although it’s only 46 words, Biden’s statement comes at a crucial time in this wrenching Israeli internal discussion and could well energize and expand the already significant opposition to what Netanyahu’s opponents are calling a legal coup that would move Israel into the camp of countries that have been drifting away from democracy, like Turkey, Hungary and Poland.

Here’s why Biden’s 46 words are so important: First, it puts him squarely behind the compromise approach called for by President Isaac Herzog of Israel — and behind keeping Israel’s widely respected judiciary independent. Although Israel’s presidency is largely a symbolic job, the office carries moral weight. Herzog is a good man who has been trying to head off what he fears could be the most serious civil strife ever within Israeli society if such a big change in the judicial system, inspired in part by a far-right Israeli think tank, is rammed through.

Herzog has pleaded with Netanyahu and his coalition to step back and organize some kind of bipartisan, national dialogue that can patiently study what kind of judicial changes might be healthy for Israel but do it with legal experts, in a nonpartisan fashion and in a way that preserves the integrity of the judicial system that has existed since Israel’s founding.

Unfortunately, Netanyahu rebuffed the Israeli president, which prompted Herzog to declare on Jan. 24 about the so-called judicial reform: “The democratic foundations of Israel, including the justice system, and human rights and freedoms, are sacred, and we must protect them and the values expressed in the Declaration of Independence. The dramatic reform, when done quickly without negotiation, rouses opposition and deep concerns among the public.” He added, “The absence of dialogue is tearing us apart from within, and I’m telling you loud and clear: This powder keg is about to explode. This is an emergency.”

With Biden’s 46 words, Netanyahu now finds himself in a situation where, if he just keeps plowing ahead, he won’t just be snubbing the Israeli president; he will be snubbing the American president as well. That’s no small deal. I also suspect that Biden taking a stand on this issue in this measured but unmistakable fashion will encourage other Western democratic leaders, business leaders and U.S. senators and representatives to do so, too, which will also energize the opposition.

The second reason Biden’s words matter is their timing — it could not be more important. As The Times of Israel reported Saturday, the first reading for some of the most controversial aspects of Netanyahu’s judicial overhaul “is set for Monday; a bill must pass three readings to become law, and the coalition has indicated it seeks to blitz the legislation through the Knesset by April.”

Those leading the opposition have called for a nationwide workers’ strike on Monday and a mass rally outside the Knesset to coincide with the first rounds of voting on the legislation. You can bet more than a few Israeli protesters will be quoting Biden’s words as they take to the streets.

Third, Biden has put himself and America squarely on the side of the Israeli majority opposing Netanyahu’s just shoving his “reform” through — in what increasingly looks like a judicial putsch.

A poll published Friday “indicated that over 60 percent of the public wants the government to halt or delay its legislative efforts to dramatically weaken the High Court of Justice and secure political control over judicial appointments,” The Times of Israel reported.

It also puts America squarely behind Netanyahu’s own attorney general from his last time in office, Avichai Mandelblit — the man who indicted Netanyahu in 2020 on charges of fraud, bribery and breach of trust and who has denounced Netanyahu’s judicial changes as just a disguised effort to quash his own trial and avoid jail.

Speaking to the Israeli TV program “Uvda,” Mandelblit said Netanyahu’s sweeping proposed changes to the judiciary are “not a reform” but rather “regime change.”

Because Israel does not have a constitution and the executive branch always controls the Knesset, Mandelblit explained, the only separation of powers — the only check on the executive branch — is the independent Israeli judiciary and Supreme Court. And what Netanyahu is proposing is that a bare majority of the Knesset — 61 out of 120 seats — become empowered to override any Supreme Court decision. With the narrowest of majorities, the government could put through any laws it likes.

Netanyahu’s plan also would give the government control over the selection of judges, which has long been in the hands of an independent selection panel, and it would also remove the independent legal advisers — the internal legal watchdogs — in each ministry. Currently, they are appointed by the Civil Service Commission and can be removed only by the attorney general. Netanyahu wants them instead appointed by and loyal to each minister.

Put it all together, and you would have a government that won by 30,000 votes out of 4.7 million having total control over the Supreme Court, judicial selection and each ministry’s legal advisers.

“I can’t be silent,” Mandelblit concluded. “If there is no independent judiciary, it’s over. It’s a different system of government.” The ruler “will decide,” he added. “He’ll have prosecutors of his own, legal counsels of his own, judges of his own. And if these people have personal loyalty to him, there is no supremacy of the law. This is a sinkhole. We’ll all be swallowed up by this.”

Finally, what Biden has done will add credibility to America’s voice in support of democracy globally. It says that America speaks up not just when China crushes democracy in Hong Kong. We speak up when we see democracy threatened anywhere. America has often taken issue with Israeli human rights abuses in its treatment of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. But no American president in my memory had ever spoken out against proposed changes in the democratic character of the Israeli state — because, up until a few weeks ago, none ever had to.

If Biden’s message is not clear to the Netanyahu coalition, let me try to put it as simply as I can: America has supported Israel militarily and diplomatically and with billions of dollars in aid since its foundation, but not because it shares our interests. It does not always. Israel has stayed neutral between Ukraine and Russia, it is indifferent to human rights abuses in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and Israeli businesses sometimes sell defense technologies to China that are very worrying to the Pentagon. We have given Israel so much support since its founding because we believe Israel shares our values.

And even when Israel behaves in ways in the West Bank or Gaza that are not consistent with our values, Israelis often fall back on them anyway. They tell us: “Hey, cut us some, slack. We live in a constant, violent struggle with the Palestinians. We live in a crazy neighborhood. And yet we’ve still managed to maintain judicial oversight of our armed forces, robust democratic institutions, as well as an independent judiciary and a free press.”

That argument is seriously threatened by what Netanyahu is pushing. And without it, what’s left? Shared interests won’t be enough, because they come and go.

That’s why Biden’s 46 words are so crucial. With those 46 words, Biden is telling Israel our relationship has never truly rested on shared interests. It’s always been built up from our shared values. That is why it has endured so long — even when we disagree on interests. With his simple statement, Biden is signaling that whatever Israel does, it must not fundamentally depart from those shared values. Otherwise, we are in a totally new world.

“At the outset of the founding of the state, the triumphant Zionists understood what they were doing as building a liberal political movement. Liberalism was baked into the political Zionism that ultimately led to the building of the state. Liberalism was not a loose or discrete set of ideas meant to live alongside the project of Jewish self-determination; it was part of a theory—shared by other liberal nationalists in other parts of the world—that it was only through national self-determination that a state could guarantee the values and ends of liberal society.  The state was an expression of political liberalism, and thus, should continue to be guided by the tenets of liberalism.”

The evidence of the Zionist commitment to this idea is easily found in the preamble of Israel’s Declaration of Independence:

THE STATE OF ISRAEL will be open for Jewish immigration and for the Ingathering of the Exiles; it will foster the development of the country for the benefit of all its inhabitants; it will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel; it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions; and it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations. “

So writes Yehuda Kurtzer, president of the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America. His essay, called “Liberal Zionism & the Idea of the Idea – Why Israel Now?,” is a sweepingly compelling argument that explains why our reclaiming the dream of political Zionism is so important for those who hope to understand why it is still relevant today despite Israel’s imperfections.

I recommend reading this 5000-word essay if you wish to gain more clarity about why progressive and liberal Zionists remain committed to the idea of Israel as a liberal, democratic, and Jewish state.

READ >

Postscript – On February 1, 2024, Pearl passed away after 114 years 123 days of life since the day of her birth on the first day of Sukkot, the 15th day of Tishre, 5670 corresponding to Thursday, October 1, 1909. At the time of her death, Pearl was the 9th oldest living human being in the world, the 3rd oldest American and the oldest living Jew in the world. Zichrona livracha.

I have written about Pearl Berg several times over the years. She is a long-time member of my congregation, Temple Israel of Hollywood in Los Angeles. She was born on October 1, 1909 and is now, at 113 years, according to all information available, the 15^th oldest living person in the world and the oldest living Jewish person in the world. Pearl was born in the state of Indiana to Archie Synenberg and Anna Gerson Synenberg.

I first met Pearl 35 years ago when she was a spry 79 years-old. Pearl is still sharp, though “slowing down a bit,” according to her son Dr. Robert Berg of Washington, D.C. Either Robert (age 83) or his older brother, Dr. Allan Berg of Philadelphia (age 86), come to visit their mother regularly.

Pearl is a marvel not only because of her age, but because she remains a positive clear-thinking kind woman whose wit and sense of humor are constant, who welcomes graciously all visitors, who reads every day, and plays gin rummy remembering the cards her opponent picks up – most of the time.

My connection with Pearl and her family precedes my birth. Pearl’s husband Mark (z’l) employed my mother in the early 1940s as an office worker in his Los Angeles scrap metal business when my mother was 25 years-old. When Mark died 35 years ago and I prepared my eulogy, my mother told me that Mark was the kindest of bosses. When she departed from his business to volunteer at an army base in San Luis Obispo, California during World War II, Mark gave her a going-away office party. She never forgot it. My mother died 8 years ago at age of 98, and I thought she was old – a youngster compared with Pearl.

See https://www.grg-supercentenarians.org/world-supercentenarian-ranking-list/ for the list of the oldest people in the world according to the Gerontology Research Group.

This blog is also posted at The Times of Israel – https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/pearl-berg-oldest-living-jewish-person-in-the-world-born-october-1-1909/ .

Those who care about Israel are hearing a great deal about the new most extreme nationalistic and ultra-Orthodox right-wing government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel’s 75-year history, its efforts to gut the powers of the Supreme Court, and to promote its agenda in the Occupied territories to claim land de facto (leading to de jure) annexation in Area C (at least) while denying Palestinians civil and human rights.

Hundreds of thousands of Israelis have been demonstrating in the streets (many for the first time) on successive Saturday nights in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and Haifa, and in Diaspora communities there have been several letters addressed to Netanyahu and to the Biden Administration calling upon them to stop this march towards anti-democratic authoritarianism.

The issues involved are complicated, as are the politics. Micah Goodman, a leading Israeli public intellectual and a senior fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, this past week joined with host Amanda Borschel-Dan on the inaugural episode of the Times of Israel’s new podcast called What Matters Now to talk about the Israeli government’s challenges and why Israelis are pouring out into the streets in protest.

The Podcast is 40 minutes long, but well worth listening as Micah Goodman unpacks the issues and concludes with a degree of optimism that something new and better might emerge from the current crisis. He argues for a national commission led by the President of Israel Isaac Herzog to cope with the reality that Israel has no Constitution (only a series of Basic Laws) and that this crisis affords Israelis the chance to address a serious weakness in its democracy that need not continue.

LISTEN >

Introductory note: A total of 169 Jewish leaders – including 89 rabbis – signed the statement below. We represent a broad swath of Jewish American leaders, coming from synagogues, organizations, and universities in over 70 cities across the country. The following remarks are necessary to clarify where we stand:

1. The statement lays out parameters for respectful and principled debate about Israeli policies – especially as they apply to Palestinians within Israel and in the occupied territories – and delineates guidelines for determining when debate involves legitimate policy-based criticism versus when it crosses the line into antisemitism.

2. We don’t take lightly the responsibility of making this statement at a time of escalating violence.
   • We stand in solidarity with Israelis grieving their loved ones after the deadliest terror attack Israel has seen in years and mourn all innocent Israeli and Palestinian victims of the conflict.
   • At the same time, we share the concerns of tens of thousands of Israelis determined to protect their democracy and the prospects of Israeli-Palestinian peace.

3. As this government’s policies unfold, conditions in Israel and the territories are bound to worsen.
   • There will almost certainly be settlement expansion, land expropriations, settler violence, police/army action against Palestinian protesters, etc.  Gaza may explode. 
   • Indeed, Netanyahu has already announced that decisions will be made said “to strengthen settlement in Judea and Samaria in order to make it clear to the terrorists who seek to uproot us from our land that we are here to stay.”

4. Criticism of Israel is bound to intensify.
   • Defenders of Israeli policies will use false accusations of antisemitism to tarnish Israel’s critics and create political divisions.
   • This will hurt Israel by stifling the inevitable debate about critical issues.
   • It will detract from addressing real instances of antisemitism and bigotry.
   • We have seen this before – when politicians respond to criticisms with false accusations of antisemitism.  Critics are accused of applying a double standard or making overly harsh accusations about Israeli policies.

5. By identifying parameters for when criticism is legitimate and when it crosses the line into antisemitism, our statement proactively frames the debate and serves as a tool for preventing the use of antisemitism as a political wedge issue.

6. As the statement concludes: There is no contradiction between combating antisemitism and criticizing the deeply troubling policies of the new Israeli government. Those who employ accusations of antisemitism as a political weapon poison the debate, and they weaken our ability to fight real antisemitism and effectively advocate for a strong U.S.-Israel relationship.

Here is the statement that was released:

“It Is Profoundly Irresponsible to Conflate Charges of Antisemitism With Criticism of Israeli Policies”

February 1, 2023

Since the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, Israel has had no greater ally than the United States, and the two countries have formed enduring unbreakable ties based on deeply held shared values.

At this pivotal moment in Israel’s history — and with the beginning of a new Congress — we take this opportunity, as leaders in the American Jewish community, to affirm the importance of maintaining those bonds and upholding the strength of the U.S.-Israel relationship.

As the 118th Congress begins its work, we believe it is important to state our concerns — which are widely shared by supporters of Israel here and around the world and by a significant number of Israelis — regarding some of the policies proposed by members of Israel’s new government.

Our criticisms emanate from a love for Israel and a steadfast support for its security and well-being. Some will try to dismiss their validity by labeling them antisemitic. We want to be clear that, whether or not one agrees with a particular criticism, such critiques of Israeli policy are not antisemitic. Indeed, they reflect a real concern that the new government’s direction mirrors anti-democratic trends that we see arising elsewhere—in other nations and here in the U.S., rather than reinforcing the shared democratic values that are foundational to the U.S.-Israel relationship.

We are, for example, concerned about the Israeli Justice Minister’s plan to limit the Supreme Court’s power, proposed modifications to the Law of Return to change the status quo on conversions to Judaism, and calls by ultra-Orthodox coalition members to outlaw non-Orthodox prayer at the Western Wall. We are also concerned about provocative actions that seek to open the Temple Mount to Jewish prayer in defiance of long-standing international norms and coalition agreements, legitimize settlement outposts retroactively, and expand Israeli sovereignty in the West Bank.

Let us be clear: when antisemitism shows up in debates about the situation in Israel and the occupied territories, it must be called out. It is antisemitic to advocate the destruction of Israel or to deny the right of the Jewish people to self-determination. It is antisemitic to condemn Israel by using antisemitic tropes or singling out Israel because of its Jewish character. It is antisemitic to use Israel or Zionism as a surrogate for Jews, to hold Jews collectively responsible for Israel’s policies or conduct, or to suggest that American Jews are more loyal to Israel than to the U.S.

Accusations of antisemitism, however, must not be abused or misused. Indeed, it is profoundly irresponsible to conflate charges of antisemitism with criticism of Israeli policies, especially when antisemitism is on the rise in our country and elsewhere around the world.

Promoting equal rights and justice for all peoples, including Palestinians within Israel and in the occupied territories, is neither anti-Israel nor antisemitic. Indeed, the two-state solution, which is critical for Israel’s survival, provides both Israelis and Palestinians with national rights, individual human rights, safety, and security. It is not antisemitic to hold Israel to the standards that guide the U.S. commitment to human rights across the globe and reflect our commitment to democracy. And while we do not support the BDS movement, we recognize that non-violent actions that press for changes in Israeli policies are not ipso facto antisemitic.

Turning political disputes about the policies of the Israeli government into an argument about antisemitism interferes with the critical and necessary debate about these policies. It also makes it harder to fight antisemitism by diverting attention away from genuine occurrences of anti-Jewish bigotry and hate.

The bottom line is this: There is no contradiction between combating antisemitism and criticizing the deeply troubling policies of the new Israeli government. Those who employ accusations of antisemitism as a political weapon poison the debate, and they weaken our ability to fight real antisemitism and effectively advocate for a strong U.S.-Israel relationship.

View The Signatories

It is difficult for individuals to break away from tribal thinking, to separate themselves from all they have ever known, and to challenge the power of tradition over their lives when that tradition so clearly does not serve their best interests. It is far easier to ‘go along and get along,’ to settle quietly and without resistance into lives defined by established custom and loyalty. The need to belong and be at peace is strong for everyone. This is true in politics, religion, and national life.

Much has been written about the lives of the British Royal family and especially about the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s dramatic decision in 2020 to leave the service of the Monarchy, though they were also expelled by the Royal family itself.

In reading Prince Harry – Spare and despite everything I already knew about the British Monarchy and its dysfunctional and disturbed relationship with the British tabloids, Harry’s painstaking memoir tells a far more intimate story about his growing up in that rarefied environment of privilege, wealth, celebrity, and notoriety than I expected to learn. His memoir showed how trapped he was, as are all members of the Royal family, in a self-perpetuating system that squashes compassion for one another and seems to care little for the mental, emotional, psychological, and spiritual well-being of its members. Appearances, clearly established standards of behavior, remaining silent about matters large and small, and Royal rank are everything, and the bullying threats of an insatiable British tabloid media and its immoral and intrusive paparazzi are permitted to stop at nothing in their intrusive, terrorizing, destructive, and dishonest practices against a family that has made a dystopian agreement with the devil.

Yes – this memoir is one-sided. We learn from Harry’s perspective only how the media and the Palace failed him and Meghan, how his brother, sister in-law, father and step-mother (victims themselves of the same media and palace treachery) in turn victimized H and M constantly, wittingly or not.

Harry’s story is a deeply sad one, but at least to this point in time, his has been a courageous and redemptive effort at self-liberation and self-realization away from the tentacles of the Royal-media complex. As I read one incident after another in his life starting with the tragic killing of his mother at the hands of the paparazzi in Paris in August, 1997, and his subsequent efforts to discover who he is and what is his purpose in life as an increasingly distant heir to the throne, one has to feel sympathy for him and wonder what is next for him and Meghan.

Harry and Meghan are, though exceptionally wealthy by any standard, also sympathetic and compelling a couple. They are charismatic, socially conscious, loving partners to one another, and adoring parents of their children.

On a personal level, I identify with Harry’s most important experience as a 12 year-old – the sudden loss of his mother. I lost my father suddenly as well when I was 9 years-old, and though I never engaged in the magical thinking about my dad that Harry did about his mother, believing that she wasn’t really dead at all, I understand how great a loss it is for a child to lose a parent. Everything that happens subsequently is somehow related to that early trauma. In discussions I have had over the years with friends and congregants who lost their parents when they were children, most confess that so much of what they did and became grew from their loss. Their yearning for the deceased parent never ends, though it recedes in time and is integrated into their lives. Yet, the hole of yearning doesn’t really go away. Many of us spent years seeking comfort, in both appropriate and inappropriate ways, in order to understand who that parent was and how we are like and unlike them.

For Harry, his mother was among the most famous people in the world, the “People’s Princess,” an idealized woman from Harry’s perspective, the loving font out of which his early life flowed and was nurtured. Fortunately for him, eventually he found love and meaning with Meghan who, contrary to the awful and false portrait of her created and disseminated constantly by the British media and promoted by the Palace Royal family and staff, is an intelligent, educated, talented, kind-hearted, loving, socially conscious, modern, and self-realized woman. Clearly, H and M love each other dearly and adore their children. In this, they are a model of what celebrities can do to preserve their sanity and dignity and thrive as a family despite the demands the public places upon them.   

Many are asking – why should we Americans care so much about this family, and why should we spend time and ink writing about them? My simple answer is that the British Royal family is 1000 years-old, and so from a historical point of view, their history of Kings and Queens is fascinating. Shakespeare thought they were so compelling that many of his plays are based upon them and their subjects. As Americans who broke away from England in a violent revolution 250 years ago to create a new nation, the British Royal tradition is part of American history and experience. We wonder, however, who the Royals really are today and what their anachronistic institution means in the modern world.

Other questions are left unanswered with regards to H and M and their children. Is there a way back for Harry to his family that is meaningful and healthy for him? Can H and M establish their lives and careers in America? What kind of a life will little Archie and Lilibet have in the United States given the likely tenacity and intrusion of the British paparazzi following their every step? Will these kids have a relationship with their British cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandfather? How will these children be educated, find normality, and remain secure given theirs and their parents’ fame? Will any of them be able to trust anyone new that they meet, or must they rely only upon long-held relationships for anything that approximates real friendship? What does fame of the kind that H and M have do to people over the years?

Time will tell about all of this. In the interim, I wish them well. They are entitled to happiness and fulfillment, just as are the rest of us.

Introductory Note:

Many of you read the NY Times and Tom Friedman’s Op-eds. If you do, you can ignore this post. But, if you don’t, please read on.

I am posting Friedman’s most recent Op-ed (January 17, 2023) because he states clearly what is at stake in Israel today with the government’s proposed policies via a vis the role of the Israeli Supreme Court in relationship with the Knesset and the government’s de facto annexation of the West Bank and its settlement expansion policies.

His op-ed is a letter to President Biden to not sit idly by while this new extremist Israeli government changes the nature of Israel’s democracy. Those of us in the progressive and liberal American Jewish community who love Israel recognize that though Prime Minister Netanyahu ignores our community here and the Israeli opposition, he likely would NOT ignore anything President Biden says about these extremist anti-liberal policies that seriously compromise Israeli democracy and the future of the American-Israeli partnership.

I add that Netanyahu’s coalition government of the most extremist right-wing ultra-Orthodox Religious parties do NOT represent the majority of Israelis on matters of the separation of powers between the Supreme Court and the legislative body of the Knesset, nor of the rights of minorities and religious pluralism in the state (according to recent surveys).

Finally, in the 75 years of Israeli statehood no Israeli government has ever sought to change the nature of Israeli democracy as this government is seeking to do. Netanyahu can say whatever he likes to quell his own population and ignore the protests (80,000 in Tel Aviv in the rain this past Saturday night as well as protests in Jerusalem and Haifa) and the worldwide liberal Jewish community, but actions speak louder than words, and his government’s proposed actions are inconsistent with Israel’s democratic and liberal Jewish character.

Here is Tom Friedman’s Memo to President Biden:

“If I could get a memo onto President Biden’s desk about the new Israeli government, I know exactly how it would start:

Dear Mr. President, I don’t know if you are interested in Jewish history, but Jewish history is certainly interested in you today. Israel is on the verge of a historic transformation — from a full-fledged democracy to something less, and from a stabilizing force in the region to a destabilizing one. You may be the only one able to stop Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his extremist coalition from turning Israel into an illiberal bastion of zealotry.

I’d also tell Biden that I fear that Israel is approaching some serious internal civil strife. Civil conflicts are rarely about one policy. They tend to be about power. For years, the fierce debates in Israel about the Oslo Accords were about policy. But today, this simmering clash is about power — who can tell whom how to live in a highly diverse society.

The short story: An ultra-nationalist, ultra-Orthodox government, formed after the Netanyahu camp won election by the tiniest sliver of votes (roughly 30,000 out of some 4.7 million), is driving a power grab that the other half of voters view not only as corrupt but also as threatening their own civil rights. That’s why a 5,000-person anti-government demonstration grew to 80,000 over the weekend.

The Israel Joe Biden knew is vanishing and a new Israel is emerging. Many ministers in this government are hostile to American values, and nearly all are hostile to the Democratic Party. Netanyahu and his minister of strategic affairs, Ron Dermer, had plotted with Republicans to engineer Netanyahu’s 2015 speech in Congress against Biden’s and President Barack Obama’s wishes and policies. They would like to see a Republican in the White House and prefer the support of evangelical Christians over liberal Jews and that of M.B.S. over A.O.C.

Have no doubts about this. The president should not be misled by their “our old friend Joe” pablum.

The current crisis in Israel may be presented to Biden as an internal constitutional matter that he should stay out of. To the contrary. Biden should wade right in (just as Netanyahu did) because the outcome has direct implications for U.S. national security interests. I have no illusions that Biden can reverse the most extreme trends emerging in Israel today, but he can nudge things onto a healthier path, and maybe prevent the worst, with some tough love in a way that no other outsider can.

The most pressing crisis is this: Israel’s courts, led by its Supreme Court, have largely been ferocious protectors of human rights, and particularly the rights of minorities. These minorities include Arab citizens, L.G.B.T.Q. citizens and even reform and conservative Jews who want the same freedom and rights of religious practice as Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox Jews enjoy. In addition, because Israel’s Supreme Court reviews the actions of all executive branches, including the military, it has often protected the rights of Palestinians, including providing protection from abuses by Israeli settlers and illegal expropriation of their private property.

But this Netanyahu government seeks to radically alter the situation in the West Bank, effectively annexing it without officially declaring to do so. And the plan has just one big obstacle: Israel’s Supreme Court and legal institutions.

As The Times of Israel summarized, the judicial overhaul that Netanyahu intends to ram through the Knesset would “grant the government total control over the appointment of judges, including to the high court,” replacing a much less partisan and professional judicial appointment process. The overhaul would also severely limit “the high court’s ability to strike down legislation” — especially legislation that might curb the rights of Israel’s minorities — “and enable the Knesset,” now controlled by Netanyahu, “to re-legislate” laws that the court strikes down.

The overhaul would also diminish the independence of the legal watchdogs at each government ministry: Instead of reporting to the attorney general, they would become appointees of each minister.

In short, Israel’s executive branch would assume control of its judiciary. This is right out of the Turkey-Hungary majoritarian playbook, especially when you consider one more thing: This is all being done at a time when Netanyahu himself is being tried on charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust in three cases brought by his own attorney general.

Early this month, a former Netanyahu right-wing defense minister and former chief of staff of the Israeli Army, Moshe Ya’alon, tweeted that Netanyahu’s judicial “reforms” revealed “the true intentions of a criminal defendant” who is “ready to burn down the country and its values … in order to escape the dock. … Who would have believed that less than 80 years after the Holocaust that befell our people, a criminal, messianic, fascist and corrupt government would be established in Israel, whose goal is to rescue an accused criminal.”

Netanyahu, of course, says this is the furthest thing from his mind — God forbid.

Israel, because it does not have a formal constitution, is governed by a very complex set of legal checks and balances that have evolved over decades. Legal experts tell me that there is an argument for some changes to the judiciary. But to do so in Netanyahu’s way — not by a nonpartisan national convention, but with the Supreme Court being stripped of powers by the most radical government in Israeli history and knowing Netanyahu’s criminal case could end up before the high court — stinks to high heaven.

To put it in American terms, it would be as if Richard Nixon tried to expand the U.S. Supreme Court with pro-Nixon justices during the Watergate criminal investigation.

The current president of Israel’s Supreme Court, Esther Hayut, declared last week that Netanyahu’s proposed overhaul “will shatter the judicial system and is in fact an unrestrained attack.” In addition, groups of retired air force pilots, high-tech executives, lawyers and retired judges from the left and the right, including some retired Supreme Court justices, have all signed letters saying basically the same thing.

The U.S. has given Israel extraordinary amounts of economic assistance, sensitive intelligence, our most advanced weapons and virtually automatic backing against biased resolutions in the U.N. I support that. We also have long opposed any legal action by international institutions, based on the argument that Israel has an independent judicial system that — not all the time, but plenty of times — credibly enforced accepted norms of international law on Israel’s government and army, even when it meant protecting the rights of Palestinians.

Before Netanyahu succeeds in putting Israel’s Supreme Court under his thumb, Biden needs to tell him in no uncertain terms:

Bibi, you are riding roughshod over American interests and values. I need to know some things from you right now — and you need to know some things from me. I need to know: Is Israel’s control of the West Bank a matter of temporary occupation or of an emerging annexation, as members of your coalition advocate? Because I will not be a patsy for that. I need to know if you really are going to put your courts under your political authority in a way that makes Israel more like Turkey and Hungary, because I will not be a patsy for that. I need to know if your extremist ministers will change the status quo on the Temple Mount. Because that could destabilize Jordan, the Palestinian Authority and the Abraham Accords — which would really damage U.S. interests. I will not be a patsy for that.

Here is my guess of how Netanyahu would respond:

Joe, Joey, my old friend, don’t press me on this stuff now. I am the only one restraining these crazies. You and I, Joe, we can make history together. Let’s join our forces not to simply deter Iran’s nuclear capabilities, but to help — in any way possible — the Iranian protesters trying to topple the clerical regime in Tehran. And let’s, you and me, forge a peace agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia. M.B.S. is ready if I can persuade you to give Saudi Arabia security guarantees and advanced weapons. Let’s do that and then I’ll dump these crazies.

I applaud both foreign policy goals, but I would not pay for them with a U.S. blind eye to Netanyahu’s judicial putsch. If we do that, we’ll sow the wind and reap the whirlwind.

Israel and the U.S. are friends. But today, one party in this friendship — Israel — is changing its fundamental character. President Biden, in the most caring but clear way possible, needs to declare that these changes violate America’s interests and values and that we are not going to be Netanyahu’s useful idiots and just sit in silence.”

On January 3, I wrote about my love for the early morning and posted images that I photographed as I walked in my neighborhood over the course of 2022. With the rain these past two weeks, the mornings have given forth more lovely images that I offer you along with three poems that elicit the glory of morning.

Composed upon Westminster Bridge – William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

“Earth has not anything to show more fair: / Dull would he be of soul who could pass by / A sight so touching in its majesty: / This City now doth, like a garment, wear / The beauty of the morning …”

Dawn – Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919)

“Day’s sweetest moments are at dawn; / Refreshed by his long sleep, the Light / Kisses the languid lips of Night, / Ere she can rise and hasten on …”

Morning – Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906)

“The mist has left the greening plain, / The dew-drops shine like fairy rain, / The coquette rose awakes again / Her lovely self adorning.

The Wind is hiding in the trees, / A sighing, soothing, laughing tease, / Until the rose says ‘Kiss me, please,’ / ‘Tis morning, ’tis morning.

With staff in hand and careless-free, / The wanderer fares right jauntily, / For towns and houses are, thinks he, / For scorning,  for scorning. / My soul is swift upon the wing, / And in its deeps a song I bring; / Come, Love, and we together sing, / ‘Tis morning, ’tis morning.”

Dr. Martin Luther King spoke from the bimah of Temple Israel of Hollywood in Los Angeles on Shabbat evening, February 26, 1965, five days after the assassination of Malcolm X. Security was tight around the synagogue on that evening. Sharpshooters were placed on the apartment building across the street on Hollywood Boulevard. The Sanctuary was filled to capacity with 1400+ congregants.

Rabbi Max Nussbaum (1908-1974) was the Senior Rabbi of Temple Israel of Hollywood from 1942 to his death in 1974. He was born in Romania, graduated with a doctoral degree from the University of Wurzburg, and was ordained by the liberal German rabbinic seminary in Breslau, Germany (on the Polish border east of Berlin) in 1936. He served as a community rabbi in Berlin until 1940 under Rabbi Leo Baeck, the titular leader of German Jewry before World War II.

Rabbi Nussbaum and his wife Ruth were married in Berlin in 1938 by Rabbi Baeck under the watchful eye of the Gestapo. They remained in Berlin in order to give comfort and solace to the Berlin Jewish community as the Nazis escalated their persecution of the Jewish people. When Max and Ruth learned that the Gestapo was planning to arrest him, they fled to Amsterdam in the middle of the night, then to Portugal, bought passage on a ship, and finally arrived in the United States. They met with The New York Times to describe the dire situation of German Jewry and then with the German Jewish Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau in Washington, D.C. Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, a leading American Zionist and Max’s mentor and friend, had arranged for him to enter the United States with the promise of a rabbinic position serving a small congregation in Muskogee, Oklahoma in 1940 where Max learned English (Ruth was already a fluent English speaker). In 1942, he was elected Senior Rabbi of Temple Israel of Hollywood in Los Angeles.

Max was a strong labor Zionist and an articulate liberal social justice activist, and it was as a consequence of his national and international prominence that he met and befriended Dr. King leading to the invitation of Dr. King to speak at Temple Israel in February of 1965.

Rabbi Nussbaum reminded the congregation that evening that since it was Shabbat, following custom and consistent with Rabbi Nussbaum’s German Jewish respect for decorum, that applause following Dr. King’s remarks would be inappropriate. In his introduction of Dr. King, Rabbi Nussbaum instructed the filled sanctuary: “You will wish to applaud, and you will not do so!”

The existence of Dr. King’s recorded speech, a part of the Temple Israel of Hollywood archives, was discovered by the wider Los Angeles Jewish community in 2006. The Los Angeles Jewish Journal contacted me, as the then Senior Rabbi of the congregation (1988-2019), before the Martin Luther King Holiday weekend to request permission to write a story about it. National Public Radio learned of the speech’s recording from the LAJJ article and requested permission to air it nationally. I happily agreed and the speech was broadcast on the MLK holiday weekend in both 2007 and 2008. The recording is now part of Temple Israel’s annual Martin Luther King Holiday celebration.

The sound quality of the recording is exceptionally clear. The speech borrows from many addresses that Dr. King delivered over the course of his career. He was only 35 years-old when he spoke that night in February 1965.

This blog also appears at the Times of Israel – https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/dr-martin-luther-kings-sermon-temple-israel-of-hollywood-february-26-1965/

You can listen to and read a transcript of his remarks here – http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlktempleisraelhollywood.htm