The recent death of the remarkable anthropologist, primatologist, ethologist, climate activist, humanitarian, and author Dr. Jane Goodall (1934-2025) is a huge loss to the world and to all those who have respected, admired and loved her for her foundational work with chimpanzees in Tanzania and her teachings about the relationship between the primate species and how we humans ought to regard who we are in relationship to the natural world. In recent years, she spoke in a series of interviews about aging and what was important to her that enabled her to live a life of meaning and significance that sustained her until the day she died this month. The following is a list of what she strove to do every day:
Learn new things;
Avoid stress by accepting whatever happened to her as a part of the natural process of living;
Accept death as the next great experience;
Spend substantial time in nature;
Clarify her sense of purpose and strive to make a difference in the world;
Walk and exercise;
Eat a plant-based diet;
Surround her life with animals thereby enhancing her joy, empathy and comfort (she loved dogs most of all);
Take time to “step back, recalibrate, and maintain balance in my life”;
Build strong relationships with the people she loved and trusted – family, colleagues and young activists in her Roots & Shoots youth program;
Travel (she was on the road 300 days a year);
Live simply without acquiring unnecessary things that cluttered her life;
Feel gratitude for what she had without focusing on what she lacked;
Be hopeful, optimistic and think positively. She once said: “Hope is what enables us to keep going in the face of adversity. It is what we desire to happen, but we must be prepared to work hard to make it so.”
As the “Baby-Boom” generation (those of us born between 1946 and 1964) enters our senior years (73 million Americans) along with those of older living generations, I offer the following quotations of writers, thinkers, and religious figures on the theme of aging. Taken together, I hope they are as meaningful and inspiring to you as they are to me:
“There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of the people you love.” -Sophia Loren (b. 1934)
“In youth we learn; in age we understand.” -Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach (1830-1916)
“Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been.” -Mark Twain (1835-1910)
“One day, you will look back and see that all along, you were blooming.” -Morgan Harper Nichols (b. 1990)
“The great thing about getting older is that you don’t lose all the other ages you’ve been.” -Madeleine L’Engle (1918-2007)
“No one is as old as those who have outlived enthusiasm.” -Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)
“Know that you are the perfect age. Each year is special and precious, for you shall only live it once.” –Louise Hay (1926-2017)
“The more the bodily faculties weaken and the fire of the passions subsides, the intellect is strengthened, its lights extend outward, its apprehension is purified, and [the soul] rejoices in what it apprehends. [This continues] until the…individual is advanced in years…[and] grows very powerful, and the joy in that apprehension and an ardent love for that which is apprehended grows [with it]...” -Rabbi Moses ben Maimon (AKA Maimonides or RAMBAM) (12th-13th century C.E.)
“Nothing is inherently and invincibly young except spirit. And spirit can enter a human being perhaps better in the quiet of old age and dwell there more undisturbed than in the turmoil of adventure.” -George Santayana (1863-1962)
Maria Branyas Morera believed her longevity stemmed from “order, tranquility, good connection with family and friends, contact with nature, emotional stability, no worries, no regrets, lots of positivity and staying away from toxic people.” –Maria Branyas died at the age of 117 (1907-2024). She was at the time of her death the oldest person in the world.
“A person is not old until his/her regrets take the place of dreams.” -Yiddish proverb
“You are only as old as you feel.” –President Jimmy Carter (1924-2024)
“One who greets an elder is as though s/he has greeted the face of the Shechinah [the face of the Divine].” –Midrash, Genesis Rabbah 63.6 (400-500 CE)
“Accept her counsel and do not despise her on account of her old age, for she has experienced many things and knows well how to dispense proper counsel. On this account, the sages of blessed memory have said: ‘An old woman in the house bodes well for the house.’” –Israel ibn al-Nakawa (14th century CE)
“Scholars, at the time of their old age, decrepitude,and bodily deterioration, grow in knowledge, strengthen in intellect, and increase in perfection, as it says, ‘Wisdom is with elders and understanding comes with length of days.’” –Maimonides (12-13th century CE)
“Beautiful young people are accidents of nature, but beautiful old people are works of art.” -Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962)
Introductory Note: I delivered this sermon on Kol Nidre at Temple Israel of Hollywood where I served as Senior Rabbi from 1988 to 2019. The YouTube above is available to watch or the written text below.
Shanah tovah.
It’s so good to look out from this bimah once again and see so many friendly faces. I’ve missed you.
I thank our Board of Trustees and my clergy colleagues for extending to me the invitation to speak with you on this holiest of nights. I’m honored to have this privilege. The adage that you can’t go home again doesn’t apply to me here. Temple Israel was and remains a home away from home for my family and me. Our sons were educated here, and now our two grandchildren are enrolled in our schools. L’dor va-dor.
Since I became Rabbi Emeritus six-plus years ago so much has happened in each of our lives and our families, in the life of this community, in our country, Israel and the Middle East, and around the world.
And here we are, together again at this annual reunion, as we begin Yom Kippur and Temple Israel’s 100th anniversary year.
Tonight commences our day of fasting, reflection, self-criticism, and renewal, and is an opportunity to count our blessings too, to cherish each other, to remember those who have passed on who have been dear to us, and those who built this community and left it to us as part of their legacy.
Particularly in these soul-crushing and heart-breaking times in which we’re trying to make moral sense in this new era that began on October 7th two years ago, it’s important to remind ourselves who we are and who we’ve been as Jews over our long history.
Judaism includes many things, a moral and legal tradition founded upon the principle of tikun olam (repairing the world), a religion and faith, a culture, history, languages, a Homeland, literature, art and music.
Though twice we were forcibly exiled from the Land of Israel, we’ve kept the Holy City of Jerusalem in our hearts. In exile we’ve suffered persecutions, but we survived as Jews despite all those who sought to destroy us.
Our liturgies, philosophies, theologies, and ideologies evolved as we’ve lived and adapted in lands throughout the world.
We are therefore not a religious and faith community alone. We’re a people and civilization distinguished by our moral values, ideas, and sense of community, lived experience and history no less significant than the Greek, Roman, Ottoman, and British empires, though we’ve never occupied as much territory as any of them.
I was asked to speak tonight about Israel, the war, Zionism, and our relationship as American Jews to the Jewish State, and I confess that after accepting the invitation, I asked myself how I ought to speak about this most horrific inflection moment in modern Jewish history and in the history of Israel.
To start, the 20-point peace plan unveiled on Monday at the White House, has many good things in it, including an end to the war, the immediate return of the hostages, a plan for the day after in Gaza, the surrender of Hamas, a surge of humanitarian aid, no forced displacement of Palestinians from Gaza, an eventual Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, a recognition of the Palestinian aspiration of self-determination and a “credible pathway” toward statehood, and the support of the Arab world, not a small thing at all.
The proposal needs Hamas to support it and we’ll know soon enough if it does. Word is that it intends to reject it, but even if Hamas accepts the plan, it’s likely that Prime Minister Netanyahu and Hamas’ leadership will, for their own domestic political reasons, drag their feet and put obstacles in the way, or even derail the initiative altogether.
A significant weakness of the plan is that no Palestinians were involved in developing the agreement and there was no mention of the future of the West Bank. For true peace and a two-state solution ever to emerge, Israelis and the Palestinians must work face-to-face, from the ground up, not top down with one of the parties excluded, as Trump’s plan does.
After the press conference, PM Netanyahu, speaking in Hebrew, rejected Palestinian statehood as he has done throughout his political career.
I fear, therefore, that the status quo before Monday’s announcement hasn’t really changed, though I would love to be wrong.
My initial intent in speaking with you tonight was not to talk policy; rather, to reflect about who we are as Jews, and what impact the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023 and these two years of war have had on our identity as liberal American Jews, our Jewish values, and our relationship with the people and State of Israel.
Since October 7th, like so many of you, I have continually felt despondent, outraged, grief-stricken, vengeful, and deeply worried about the families of those murdered on that day, the well-being of our hostages and young soldiers and their families, and about the thousands of innocent Gazans who have lost their loved ones, homes, and communities.
I’ve been a Zionist since my earliest years. My family was among the earliest pioneers to Palestine starting in 1880, and I have many dear Israeli friends. I’ve studied, taught and written about Zionism, the State of Israel, and Jewish history, about Jewish texts, literature and values. But, nothing has pierced my heart and soul like what we have experienced during these past two years. Consequently, no sermon I have ever given has been more difficult and painful for me to write than this one.
The founding of the State of Israel only three years after the greatest tragedy ever to befall our people, transformed who we were to become as Jews in this era. The new state returned us to our ancient Homeland and to history. Israel gave us confidence and agency. It restored our pride as a people. It offered us protection from antisemitic hate and violence. And it became a laboratory in which our people’s ethical tradition could be tested in the context of our attaining power and sovereignty for the first time in two thousand years.
But, what happened on October 7th represented the greatest existential threat in most of our lifetimes to everything we have been as a people in the modern era.
Israeli commanders feared in the initial days after the attack not only that Hamas would continue its savage rampage going north killing Jews with the ultimate goal of destroying the Jewish state, but that Israel’s enemies on all sides would join the war in a coordinated attack. Such a combined assault would have overwhelmed Israel’s defensive capacity.
Even before that awful day, Zionism and the State of Israel had come to be regarded by many in the United States and around the world cynically, with derision and in the most pejorative terms. That downward trend intensified and metastasized almost immediately as Israel began fighting back. Those hostile to Israel have for years sought to re-frame Israel’s narrative as discriminatory, racist, colonialist, and as a cancerous foreign element in the heart of the Islamic Middle East that had no legitimate right to exist.
An increasing number of progressive left-wing Americans, people many of us thought were our friends and social justice allies, agreed openly with the harshest Israel critics, justifying morally what Hamas did and some even celebrating Hamas by calling its brutal and savage terrorists, inexplicably, “freedom fighters.”
Every people has the right of self-definition, and we liberal American Jews and Zionists who support and love the State of Israel have that right as well. Especially now after two years of war, a dramatic rise in antisemitism around the world, and Israel being labeled a pariah nation, we Jews cannot allow Israel haters, antisemites and right-wing extremist Jews to define us or to determine the inner life of the Jewish people. We need to be able to restate our liberal Jewish narrative and lead with it whenever we discuss with those who know much or little about the history of the Jewish people, Judaism, Zionism, and the State of Israel.
I want to express to you tonight as clearly as I can, from the deepest place in my being, in an effort to reclaim our narrative, why I remain a liberal American Jew, a liberal Zionist and a supporter of the people and State of Israel despite my very strong protest against the policies of the most extremist, anti-democratic, right-wing, messianic, and myopic ruling coalition government in the history of the Jewish state.
As a liberal American Jew, I believe in the right of the Jewish people to a state of our own in our historic Homeland and in the right of Israel militarily to defend itself whenever it’s attacked by terrorists and hostile states set on its destruction.
As a liberal American Jew, I affirm that the universal humanitarian values advocated by the ancient prophets of Israel, developed by rabbinic tradition over the past two millennia, and included in Israel’s Declaration of Independence, including equality, justice, compassion, empathy, human rights, and peace – all foundational virtues in Judaism – must be the core values guiding all of the Israeli government’s policies and reforms, its military and civil society.
As an American Jew, I acknowledge that I am not an Israeli citizen. I do not pay Israeli taxes nor do I send my children and grandchildren to the Israeli military. Nor do many of us American Jews know people who were murdered on October 7, though two of the young people killed at the Supernova music festival, Norelle and Roya Manzuri (aleihen b’shalom), grew up here in our own Briskin Elementary School.
Few American Jews have family members who were taken as hostages, and few among us have been subjected to missile attacks forcing us to run quickly with our children and babies in our arms into shelters with only seconds to spare before the explosions and the walls of our home shake.
Only Israeli citizens have the right to take the hard decisions that impact their lives and well-being. However, as an American Jew who loves Israel and who cares deeply about Israel’s citizens and future, I insist that I do have the right to share my ideas and criticism of Israeli government policies and trends that I believe are harmful to Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, that threaten our security and well-being as Diaspora Jews, and are contrary to our liberal Jewish and democratic values.
I had little doubt that Israel had to respond militarily in order dramatically to reduce Hamas as a military threat to enable Israelis safely to return to their homes in southern Israel, just as Israel had to defang Hezbollah in Lebanon to allow Israelis to return safely to their homes in the north.
However, I’ve been haunted ever since I read words written soon after the war began by a dear Israeli friend, Nadav Tamir, who wrote:
“After October 7th, I understood the anger and desire for revenge, but I feared Hamas would win the battle for our souls if they succeeded in making us as murderous and vengeful as they are…” (1)
I knew Hamas couldn’t win this war on the battlefield. Thankfully, Israel is too strong and strategic a military power, but like my friend, I worried too that Hamas would succeed in corrupting the heart and soul of the Jewish people.
This war began as a just war of self-defense against a cruel and vicious enemy that committed massive war crimes against our people. Israel’s initial war goals were to bring the hostages home and to degrade Hamas’ ability ever to attack Israel again as it did on that day.
Like many Israelis and American Jews, I too have felt the need for revenge, but I’ve asked myself at what cost to my heart and soul and to the soul of the Jewish people should I or any of us continue to harbor such self-destructive emotions? And at what moral cost to our people have these two years of violence and killing had upon Israelis and the Jewish people around the world?
Earlier this year, 600 retired Israeli security military and intelligence officials wrote to President Trump to urge him to apply pressure on Israel to end the war because they believed that Hamas was no longer a military or strategic threat to Israel and that there was nothing more to be gained in continuing the battle, that the war was harming Israel’s international legitimacy, causing immense suffering for Gazan civilians, and that the war was no longer a “just war.”
But, despite their advice and expertise, the fighting has gone on and on. Though Trump has now tried to end this war, over the past two years, Israeli bombers, missiles and tanks have utterly destroyed Gaza, house after house, apartment building after apartment building. Water, electricity and sewage infrastructure no longer exist. It’s estimated that 90 percent of all homes, 436,000 residences, are either destroyed or damaged beyond repair with tens of thousands of innocent Palestinian civilians dead – men, women, children, babies, the elderly, entire families wiped from the face of the earth. They and so many of our own Israeli soldiers and hostages that have been killed could have been saved had the war ended long ago.
If all of this isn’t awful enough, from March to May of this year, the Israeli government withheld all humanitarian aid from Gaza allegedly to force Hamas to release the hostages and to surrender. But that tactic backfired. We’ve seen the images of starving children. Even if Hamas doctored some of the photographs for its corrupt propaganda purposes, is there really any doubt that thousands of children were starving because Israel used humanitarian aid as a weapon of war? This tactic was not only immoral and un-Jewish, but according to international law, a war crime.
After heavy criticism from the United States, Israel opened the gates and aid began flowing again on hundreds of trucks daily into Gaza, but far more is needed to address the horrific long-term effects of famine.
It is American policy that Israel and all recipients of United States’ weapons must adhere by law to standards concerning humanitarian aid and the use of force. As painful as it is for me to say this because I have always supported American military aid to Israel throughout my life, I support those 27 Democratic Party Senators who in July voted to block the sale of U.S.-made heavy bombs, guidance kits for bombs, and assault rifles to stem Israel’s use of these offensive weapons to harm civilians, block humanitarian aid, and contribute to mass starvation in Gaza. Though the bill didn’t pass in the Senate, the intent of those Senators was to put maximum pressure on President Trump, Prime Minister Netanyahu and his extremist government to end this war.
Those 27 Senators are friends of Israel. In their vote to withhold offensive weapons they carefully distinguished between those weapons and the defensive weapon systems of Iron Dome, Arrow, and David’s Sling that save Israeli lives. These Senators should not be accused of being anti-Israel as some in the American Jewish community have done. They are not that. They instead should be praised for acting on behalf of the best interests of Israel and the Palestinian civilians of Gaza and for applying necessary pressure on the Israeli government to do what is just and compassionate.
Many of us are aware also of the organized right-wing extremist settler violence and murder of Palestinian civilians in the West Bank, the demolition and burning of their homes, orchards and fields with impunity and often with the participation of uniformed Israeli soldiers. The intent of these violent settlers, with the backing of this extremist Israeli government, is to drive Palestinians out of the West Bank altogether, from their homes and villages in which they have lived for generations, to make way for more Jewish settlements and the eventual annexation of the West Bank into a Greater Israel, also contrary to international law.
Several weeks ago, I was stunned when Prime Minister Netanyahu arrogantly boasted that Israel will become “Super Sparta” – a reference to the ancient hyper-militaristic, self-reliant society that was isolated from the rest of the world. The “Super Sparta” vision prizes armed-force prowess above all else and is not a vision for Israel’s future that most of us would recognize or of what early Zionists hoped for Israel to become as a nation amongst nations. It’s a road-map to deepen Israel’s pariah status around the world and to accelerate Israel’s moral and political decline.
It ought to be clear by now that given the massive destruction and killing that continues day after day that Israel has crossed red lines and committed war crimes. War crimes are committed in every war, and in this war, it’s likely that rogue commanders and rogue soldiers have shot civilians without provocation, and missiles and bombs have destroyed buildings inhabited by Hamas commanders without nearly enough concern for the number of civilians who would certainly be killed. Those commanders and soldiers should be held accountable when the war is over.
We Jews know better. Our own people have been the victims of war crimes throughout our history. Judaism gave the world a system of justice and a moral tradition of compassion based upon the principle that every human being is created b’tzelem Elohim, in the divine image, and therefore is of infinite value and worth.
Israeli soldiers have long been trained in what’s called Tohar HaNeshek, purity of arms, meaning that every means and every effort must be taken at all times by every commander and soldier to preserve innocent human life. (2)
To their great moral credit, hundreds of Israeli reserve soldiers are now refusing to report for military duty because they know that Israel is now fighting a cruel and unjust war. The vast majority of Israelis too, according to polls, are demanding that the war, killing and suffering end, and the remaining hostages be returned home.
This war has shaken Israelis and world Jewry to our core. The wounds of each of our peoples, of Israel and Palestine, are going to be difficult to heal or overcome for generations.
In the United States and around the world, we Jews are dealing also with a rise of antisemitism – much of it exacerbated by this war – that most Jews alive today have never seen, experienced or imagined before.
The Palestinian-Israeli struggle is amongst the oldest unresolved conflicts in the world. The Israeli historian and writer Fania Oz-Salzberger put it exactly right when she wrote a month ago:
“Here’s a truth to reckon with: neither Israelis nor Palestinians are going to disappear any time soon. No one can destroy their respective claims to a sovereign state in their ancestral homeland, which happens to be the same land. Barring a cataclysmic event, there will be no river-to-sea Palestine and no Greater Israel. This is a conflict that can only be solved by territorial and political compromise.” (3)
There are serious ideas, in addition to what we heard on Monday, that have been developed over the last number of years between Palestinians and Israelis working together, from the bottom-up, who recognize and accept each other’s legitimate national aspirations, needs and rights. Despite whatever despondency I have felt, there are two related ideas that I actually find hopeful and visionary.
One is called “Eretz L’kulam – A Land for All: Two States, One Homeland”, a political vision developed by Israeli Jews and Israeli Palestinian Arab citizens. The proponents of the idea envision two democratic and sovereign states alongside each other – Israel and Palestine – linked together in a confederation much the way the European Union functions. (4)
The second idea is a “23-State Solution” that includes all the western Arab states and Israel in coalition with each other, complete recognition of Israel for the first time in Israel’s history by most of the Arab and Muslim world, and the creation of a demilitarized Palestinian state, perhaps as part of the confederal model. (5)
This isn’t the time or place to discuss the details of these ideas, but it’s important to know that there are creative and pragmatic ideas that can offer hope and a way forward. After the holidays, this sermon will be posted on our synagogue’s website and on my personal blog (6), and I will include links to both of these proposals that spell out the details, if you are interested.
All ideas about how to resolve this conflict are, of course, not risk-free, but the status quo is unsustainable. Violent rejectionist Jewish Israelis and violent rejectionist Palestinian Arabs will have to be controlled harshly by each state’s respective police forces in any future negotiated agreement.
To be Jewish, especially in these times, means, in part, to lift ourselves up out of the morass of confusion and despair, to reclaim our virtue as critical and creative thinkers who raise moral questions and seek practical solutions, and who can argue with one another without withdrawing from the fight or being intimidated by Israeli zealots or their supporters in the United States who slander us as self-hating Jews, antisemites, Kapos, and traitors because we dare to be critical of Israeli policies and actions as a matter of conscience and moral outrage about this war that long ago should have ended.
We Jews have always viewed our purpose through an aspirational lens. We have striven as a people to be better than we are, that we do not ever settle for the status quo, and that we stay committed to correct moral wrongs and move forward as best we can.
Some of our own young liberal and progressive American Jews, however, are decoupling the State of Israel from their Jewish identity, and others are closing the door behind them and disavowing being Jewish altogether. Many are walking away from the American Jewish community because they believe that we rabbis and teachers, Jewish leaders of synagogues, national Jewish organizations and Jewish summer camps, who taught them Judaism’s moral principles emphasizing compassion and empathy, justice, human rights, and peace are, in their minds, hypocrites because we have not been nearly critical enough, or critical at all, of Israel’s bad behavior in this never-ending war.
I want to speak now to you, our young generation of Jews.
I understand how many of you feel and why you feel as you do. But, I believe that this is not the time to turn your backs on our people, on Judaism, on liberal Zionism, or on the State of Israel.
Our Jewish moral and ethical principles transcend any specific point in time or series of events. Judaism is not what we see in war or as a consequence of our having to cope with antisemitism, though both can teach us much about ourselves as Jews.
Judaism is what we rabbis, teachers, synagogues and Jewish summer camps tried to impart to you, our young people, about the vitality in living an enriched Jewish life, about the multitude of ways to be spiritual beings within Jewish community, about the wisdom our sages, mystics, and great thinkers have left for us, about ways to live the rhythms of our holidays and life cycles, and about the meaning of the establishment of the State of Israel as the greatest single accomplishment of the Jewish people in two thousand years.
Though you may wish to turn away, I hope you will decide to stay engaged in whatever way is meaningful to you because we need you, your way of thinking, and your critical moral voice.
Another thing about us Jews – our struggles are nothing new. We are, after all, Yisrael – a people who wrestles with God and with the moral challenges and complexities we face every day as individuals and as a people.
We Jews have always recognized the wide chasm between what is and what ought to be. The best of us, however, have not sat on the side-lines nor given up without entering the fight on behalf of our people and for human rights, justice and peace for all peoples and nations, including the Palestinians.
We live in a violent and corrupt world. It’s understandable that so many of us want to turn away from the news out of the Middle East and throw up our hands and shout “enough already!”
But, once we do that and we’ve had a chance to breathe and restore our moral and emotional equilibrium, it’s better for us to draw close to one another again and reaffirm our Jewish identity, our age-old principles and values, and our faith that eventually there will be a better day for Israelis and the Palestinians.
I keep reminding myself that history swings like a pendulum, from the death of the spirit to renewed life, from division to unity, from war to peace, from despair to hope, and that we Jews have lived this swinging back and forth over and over again throughout our history.
I remind myself that every human-made problem has a human solution if we apply critical and creative thinking, our understanding of the needs and truths of the “other,” and the will to compromise in order to solve the seemingly unsolvable.
As a Jewish community, each of us has the right to think what we want and to feel what we feel – as I have shared with you my thoughts and feelings here tonight – and the Jewish community ought to be a safe space for everyone to find their place and their voice, to argue with one another passionately but respectfully, to disagree without becoming disagreeable, and where even our harshly contrasting ideas and perspectives, our many different life experiences, and our generational distinctions can live alongside each other with humility as we engage in discussion, argument, criticism, and self-criticism.
Our people’s safety valve is that we talk and discuss and argue, and hopefully that we also listen to each other, especially to those with whom we disagree the most.
Our challenge as American Jews in these days is to find ways to come together and to affirm our foundational Jewish values as we struggle to cope in these painful and disturbing times and not to become numb to the barrage of terrible events that are all around us.
And it’s our challenge as well to look to the future with fortitude and hope. Our history of survival as a people teaches us to do so.
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks wrote:
“To be a Jew is to be an agent of hope in a world serially threatened by despair …No Jew knowing Jewish history can be an optimist, but no Jew worthy of the name abandons hope.” (7)
This new era in Jewish history begins with a darkly written chapter, but this is not the last chapter. It’s upon us, all of us, to write what comes next.
I wish us all the strength, perseverance, thoughtfulness, and moral courage necessary in this New Year.
I often sign-off my emails to my Israeli friends saying:
“Stay safe and sane. With love – John.”
And I say to you too, my beloved congregation:
Stay safe, sane and strong. And most importantly, hold those whom you cherish very close. We need each other.
With love – John.
G’mar chatimah tovah.
Notes:
Nadav Tamir, “Never Again”, The Times of Israel, August 22, 2025.
Soren Kierkegaard said: “It is perfectly true, as philosophers say, that life must be understood backwards. But they forget the other proposition, that it must be lived forwards.”
Though we’re always living forward, the life lessons we learn can help to shape our future. Since this is the season of self-examination leading to the High Holidays, I offer a list of 32 life lessons I’ve learned – there are others, but the number 32 is significant in Jewish mystical tradition. It equals the 22 letters of the Hebrew א-ב (aleph-bet) plus the 10 “words” of the covenant (aka 10 Commandments), and is the number equivalent for the Hebrew word לב (heart – lev: lamed – bet) which the mystics teach are the number of pathways to God.
I offer the following as a hedge against the toxicity in today’s American political environment, the Hamas-Israel war, and the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza in these days leading to the High Holidays. Some of the following I borrowed 15-20 years ago, gratefully, from a then 90 year-old lady named Regina Brett that were published in the Plain Dealer from Cleveland, Ohio (hers are in italics).
They’re not necessarily a way to God, but a means to a healthier, wiser, and more sacred way of living, at least as I’ve come to believe in them.
God gave us life and our natural abilities only – everything else is either up to us or a result of dumb luck.
Life isn’t always fair, but it’s still good.
Life is short, so cut your losses early.
Begin planning for retirement as a teen by developing your passions and interests, for they will sustain you when you get old.
Make peace with your past so it won’t screw up your present.
You don’t have to win every argument, so at a certain point stop arguing.
Love your spouse/partner, children and grandchildren above all other people and things. If you aren’t married or do not have children, nurture the special friendships in your life.
Don’t compare your life to anyone else’s as you have no idea what their journey has been all about.
If you can’t publish what you want to say or do on the front page of The New York Times because doing so would be slanderous of someone else or less than dignified, don’t say or do or post it anywhere, including on social media.
Try not to speak ill of anyone, but if you must, do so only with trusted family and friends and then only so as to understand better how to cope with people like that.
Don’t procrastinate to see doctors. It may save your life (note: it saved mine).
Carpe diem. Take pleasure in this day and do what inspires you for we don’t know what tomorrow will bring.
When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.
Breathe deeply as it calms the body, mind, heart, and soul.
Take your shoes off whenever possible as studies indicate that doing so will prolong your life.
Too much alcohol and drugs (in fact – any amount of alcohol and drugs) dull the mind and loosen the lips compelling us to say things we may mean but don’t want said and to say things we may not mean at all.
Get a dog or a cat for the love for and from such a creature is unlike anything else we will ever know.
Over prepare, and then go with the flow.
It’s not what you say; it’s how you say it.
Speak the truth but only when you know you can be effective and only if it doesn’t cause another person unnecessary harm or hurt. Otherwise, be quiet.
Stand up to bullies wherever they are and whenever you encounter them, personally and in work, organizational and political life.
Time does heal almost everything.
Don’t fear or resist change for it is natural, necessary, and an opportunity for growth.
Don’t envy other people’s talent, job, wealth, circumstances or life – you likely already have everything you need.
Love isn’t just a matter of the heart – it requires concrete acts of altruism (no quid pro quo) in support of others.
Learn Torah, read great literature, view great art, and listen to great music as often as you can – they will enrich, change, and enhance your life and will inspire you (hopefully) to do what you might never choose to do otherwise.
Support the State of Israel as the democracy and Jewish State that it is regardless of its imperfections and corruptions, for Israel remains the best hope for the Jewish people to create a utopia worthy of the ethics of the Biblical prophets, the compassionate teachings in rabbinic and modern writings, and the vision as articulated in Israel’s Declaration of Independence (see https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/israel.asp).
This Hebrew month of Elul is the “get ready” month before the High Holidays commence, this year on the evening of September 23. It can be a period of corrective generally and specifically in these challenging times. The more we do in advance of the holidays, the more we can benefit during that most intensive period of introspection that the upcoming “Days of Awe” offer us.
A number of years ago, ala David Letterman, I offered to my congregation 10 suggestions in descending order (but not necessarily in importance) to help us in our Elul process of teshuvah (loosely translated “repentance”) leading up to the High Holydays. I reread them this week, and thought to offer them again, with adjustments.
#10 – Break your daily routine in some small way. Identify one bad habit you want to break in this next year (don’t try and do more than one because habits are hard to break, and if we’re successful in doing one, we will feel satisfied and a true sense of agency). If you find yourself, for example, being critical of everyone around you, stop yourself, at least some of the time and think of their good qualities. If you are holding onto anger, resentment, and hurt because of something someone did to you once upon a time, work hard to just let it go. If your words are overly coarse and you find yourself too often resorting to explosions of expletives, language you would never say in front of a child or your mother, strive to stop using it.
#9 – Take your shoes off the first chance you get and at every opportunity. Remember what God told Moses? “Remove your sandals from your feet for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” (Exodus 3:5) A study reported years ago in USA Today revealed that those who habitually kick off their shoes under the dining-room table, desk or pew tend to live three years longer than the average American. Think of the feet as a metaphor for the soul. Feet bound for too long begin to stink. Cloistered souls not allowed the light of consciousness pick up spiritual sludge and keep the divine light from shining.
#8 – Meditate – According to the American Institute on Stress, 75-90% of all visits to primary care physicians are for stress-related complaints. Meditation is nothing more than a means to become more aware and conscious of ourselves and our environment. A meditative state can be achieved at any time during the day, when listening to or making music, looking at or creating fine art, reading or writing a book or poetry, exercising, taking a walk, or sitting still. Meditation trains us in how to listen better to what is happening within and around us, how to be present and less distracted with our loved ones, to identify our deeper truths and thereby be more honest, straightforward and, hopefully, more kind.
#7 – Exercise each day – Impose upon yourself the discipline to walk, swim, ride a bicycle, do a workout, Tai-chi, Yoga, or Pilates, and keep your body toned. Whenever possible, don’t take elevators or escalators. Walk the stairs. When looking for a place to park, don’t take the closest space to your destination. Park at the far end of a parking lot and force yourself to walk the extra distance. The number of calories we burn in these simple acts will result in the loss of pounds over the course of a year (assuming you eat less too). It will also lower your heart rate, reduce your blood pressure, create a healthier physique, and enable us to feel a greater sense of well-being.
#6 – Do one “wild” thing each day, such as:
Eat ice cream instead of frozen yogurt.
Don’t hesitate to eat chocolate anything.
Leave your checking account un-reconciled – but after a couple of weeks, reconcile it or you’ll get into trouble.
Buy a loved one a gift for no good reason at unexpected times.
Laugh more.
Stretch every morning, at your desk and everywhere in the middle of the day.
Sing in the shower.
Scream in your car.
Talk to yourself in public and don’t worry that someone may tag you as deranged.
Say hello and smile at a stranger.
Be kind for no reason.
Let the guy cut in front of you in traffic, and if you are walking and a driver let’s you pass in front of their car, wave a thank you as you pass by.
Pet a dog (or cat) and look into its eyes – it is as sweet a sight as you are ever likely to see.
Ride a horse.
Play golf, tennis anything!
Take a wave or walk into a beautiful natural setting.
#5 – Learn to say “No” more often, especially when you are feeling overtaxed and exhausted. As Thoreau said – “Simplify, simplify, simplify” your life and spend more time doing the things that feed your soul, give you spiritual strength and help you feel closer to the people you love. Read great literature. Find the great teachers who open the soul and heart. Do more mitzvot that require pure motives and accentuate kindness, and do not do anything thinking that you will benefit by something in return. Do it lishma – for its own sake.
#4 – Give tzedakahand do acts of gemilut chassadim (Loving Kindness) to every beggar on the street or at freeway off-ramps and don’t question their motives or worthiness. Visit or call someone who is ill or alone. Physically touch and hug an elderly person who might not have been touched in a very long while. Be kind and generous at all times.
#3 – Strengthen a friendship with someone you’ve been meaning to get to know better – don’t stop yourself from expressing your gratitude to the people you care about – say it to them out loud and often whenever you feel so moved.
#2 – Make a commitment to challenge your mind, especially if you are older – learn a language, do puzzles, fill out cross-word puzzles, learn to play a musical instrument, read about something you have wanted to learn and understand but never had the time before.
#1 – Read great Jewish literature and deepen your understanding of at least one great Jewish book, writer or scholar, such as: The Hebrew Bible; Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel; Lord Rabbi Jonathan Sacks. While you are at it, avoid social media as much as is reasonable.
I wish you well in fulfilling one or more of the above. May it be time well spent as together we enter the New Year with the goal of bringing greater kindness and wholeness (Heb: shleimut) into the world.
Introductory Note: I am not a New Yorker, but I have been waiting for someone to express the truth about NY’s Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani’s true positions about Israel and why his hostility to the State of Israel is so upsetting to me.
My friend and the former President of the Union for Reform Judaism, Rabbi Eric Yoffie, is as astute an observer and moral voice of American Jewish life and Israel as there is in the American Jewish community. He writes semi-frequently on pressing issues facing world Jewry in Israel’s newspaper Haaretz. The following piece appeared today, and I thank Eric for writing it. It ought to be read by every Jewish New Yorker before the election. If you have Jewish friends in New York, please share this with them.
Sept. 4, 2025
Before and after the election, my plea to the Jewish citizens of New York City is: Use mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani’s Democratic Party primary victory to educate people about Israel.
Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee for New York City mayor, is charming, attractive, bright and a natural politician. Energetic, enormously talented and only thirty-three years old, in the Democratic primary he ran a brilliant campaign.
Is Mamdani too good to be true? Unfortunately, he is.
Despite his many virtues, this attractive, articulate man, with the popular touch and Trumpian feel for politics, is a virulent, relentless anti-Zionist.
Like most New Yorkers, I was profoundly impressed by Mamdani and by his remarkable ability to reach voters of different age groups and ethnicities. I was impressed too by his message: He did not offer platitudes or complicated position papers, but hammered home the point that the cost of living is killing ordinary people. Former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and his other establishment rivals never had a chance; coming across as stodgy and out-of-touch, they lost to their dynamic younger rival by double digits.
But his beliefs about Israel are clear. Mamdani has expressed them repeatedly, and without equivocation. From his earliest days as a political activist as a student at Bowdoin College, he has declined to say that Israel has a right to exist as a Jewish state. He held this view on the day of the deadly massacres of October 7, and held it just as strongly on October 8.
When he became a candidate for mayor of New York, a city with 1.5 million Jews, Mamdani was obligated to spell out specifically how he would deal with Israel issues. His refusal during the Democratic primary to condemn the use of the phrase “globalize the intifada” drew the most attention. He claimed that the term did no more than express solidarity with the Palestinians, but many Democrats and others, and certainly many Jews, rightly insisted that what it meant was “kill the Jews.”
Responding to the pressure, Mamdani said that he would discourage the use of the phrase but would not denounce it, a tweak that satisfied few of his critics. If the phrase was offensive, why not condemn it outright?
His hostility to Israel was expressed in many other ways as well. He indicated that as mayor, he would implement some form of boycott against Israel, and has advocated an academic boycott of Israel’s universities, consistent with his support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. He promised not to visit Israel if elected mayor, breaking a longstanding precedent.
To the surprise of many, most have not seemed overly concerned, or at least less concerned than one might expect. The reasons for this are not entirely clear.
One possibility is that most of New York’s 700,000 Jewish voters, like most other New Yorkers, think it is a foregone conclusion that Mamdani will win, and therefore a “wait-and-see” approach may make sense. After all, his major competitors are New York’s corrupt current mayor, a no-name Republican and a former Democratic governor of New York who has lots of baggage and barely seems to want the job. It would take a near miracle for any of them to beat Mamdani.
Another possibility is that the majority of Jewish New Yorkers – myself included – tend to be left-leaning in their politics, and therefore are sympathetic to Mamdani’s progressive views on domestic politics. It is these issues that have dominated the public discussion until now.
To be sure, attempts have been made to draw away Jewish support from Mamdani by painting him as a domestic radical, if not a raving socialist lunatic. Most Jews are not radicals, and would not support Mamdani if they saw him as the dangerous extremist that his opponents claim he is. Despite what Republicans say, New Yorkers are not clamoring for Lenin; in an economy made unstable by Trump’s tariffs, what they want is to get ahead and support their families, and Mamdani is promising to move them in that direction.
In short, Mamdani is an attractive candidate with an attractive platform. And while Jewish leaders have tried to raise the alarm about his Israel views, it has been difficult, in the quiet summer months to generate interest and concern among the broader Jewish community about this candidate’s relationship to Israel.
This issue is even more fraught in the current moment, as it appeals strongly to young Jews in particular, many of whom are justifiably furious at Israel’s actions in Gaza. These same young Jews often argue that as mayor Mamdani will have no foreign policy role. They therefore resent any effort to criticize their candidate for his Israel views. “Why are we even talking about this?” is a question that is often heard. “This race is about New York, not Israel.”
Are we to conclude from all of this that Mamdani will pay no price for his opposition to a Jewish state?
It is hard to say. There is no denying that Jewish support for Israel has declined as the war in Gaza drags on and the death toll of innocents grows. New York Jews are angry at Israel, furious about Gaza and sickened by the Kahanists who sit in Israel’s cabinet. And we should remember that despite his outspokenness on Israel, Mamdani won a decisive victory in the Democratic primary.
Nonetheless, I believe that in the two months that remain before the general election, as the election heats up and Mamdani’s views are subjected to far more intensive scrutiny, the dynamics of the race will change.
Support for Israel has declined, but it has hardly disappeared, and Jewish voters who have not been paying attention to the mayoral race – and that is the majority – will begin listening to what the candidates have to say. And I am betting that when they do, they will not like at all what they hear from Mamdani.
Mamdani, in my view, is playing an ugly little game with Jewish voters. In the Gaza era, presided over by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, it is not a problem to be a critic of Israel. Critics are everywhere, particularly in the Democratic Party, and even Israel’s most stalwart supporters are calling for more “balance” in America’s approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Some of Mamdani’s supporters, taking advantage of the growing debate, are slyly suggesting that he is simply another critic among many amid the ongoing war.
If this were true, of course, there would be little or no controversy. If Mamdani were promoting some form of a two-state solution, I would be voting for him myself.
But Mamdani is not a critic of Israel, he is a hater of Israel. Despite some very minor rhetorical adjustments, he remains what he has always been, an opponent of a Jewish state. His toxic disdain for Israel puts him so far out of the mainstream of the Jewish community that it will not be easy for Jews with even minimal attachment to Israel to support him. And while some will, given the alternatives, they will do so with reluctance and concern.
It is also true that Mamdani has said not a word about Islam’s miserable record in promoting both democracy and religious pluralism. Israel, where 20 percent of its citizens are non-Jews has a better than average record in that regard. Since Mamdani opposes the Jewish character of Israel, he should have the decency to speak up about Pakistan and other countries in the Muslim world that are neither democratic nor pluralistic.
What should Jews do in this election? I don’t tell people how to vote, and as I have indicated, I believe it is almost certain that Mamdani will be elected.
But both before and after the election, my plea to the Jewish citizens of New York City is: educate, educate, educate. Use Mr. Mamdani’s primary victory as an occasion to educate the people of New York about Israel.
This means making it clear that thoughtful criticism of Israel at this difficult moment is both welcome and necessary, and will be encouraged from all candidates. This means offering our own criticism, and calling for a resumption of diplomacy and an end to the war in Gaza. This means demanding that Mamdani stop the word games and be honest, finally, about what he really expects Israel to be and do.
And this means saying to the citizens of New York and the people of the world that there must be a Jewish state, and that saying there should not be a Jewish state is an act of hostility against the Jewish community and Jews everywhere.
I am posting what the historian Heather Cox Richardson reported on August 26 in her Substack (worth subscribing) from a powerful speech delivered by Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker on August 25 in Chicago that everyone ought to read, assuming you had not heard or read it already:
Calling Chicago, Illinois, a “a disaster” and “a killing field,” Trump referred to Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker as “a slob.” Trump complained that Pritzker had said Trump was infringing on American freedom and called Trump a dictator. Trump went on: “A lot of people are saying maybe we like a dictator. I don’t like a dictator. I’m not a dictator. I’m a man with great common sense and a smart person. And when I see what’s happening to our cities, and then you send in troops instead of being praised, they’re saying you’re trying to take over the Republic. These people are sick.”
This afternoon, standing flanked by leaders from business, law enforcement, faith communities, education, local communities, and politics at the Chicago waterfront near the Trump Tower there, Governor Pritzker responded to the news that Trump is planning to send troops to Chicago.
He began by saying: “I want to speak plainly about the moment that we are in and the actual crisis, not the manufactured one, that we are facing in the city and as a state and as a country. If it sounds to you like I am alarmist, that is because I am ringing an alarm, one that I hope every person listening will heed, both here in Illinois and across the country.”
He acknowledged that “[o]ver the weekend, we learned from the media that Donald Trump has been planning for quite a while now to deploy armed military personnel to the streets of Chicago. This is exactly the type of overreach that our country’s founders warned against. And it’s the reason that they established a federal system with a separation of powers built on checks and balances. What President Trump is doing is unprecedented and unwarranted. It is illegal, it is unconstitutional. It is un-American.”
Pritzker noted that neither his office nor that of Chicago’s mayor had received any communications from the White House. “We found out what Donald Trump was planning the same way that all of you did. We read a story in the Washington Post. If this was really about fighting crime and making the streets safe, what possible justification could the White House have for planning such an exceptional action without any conversations or consultations with the governor, the mayor or the police?”
“Let me answer that question,” he said. “This is not about fighting crime. This is about Donald Trump searching for any justification to deploy the military in a blue city in a blue state to try and intimidate his political rivals. This is about the president of the United States and his complicit lackey Stephen Miller searching for ways to lay the groundwork to circumvent our democracy, militarize our cities, and end elections. There is no emergency in Chicago that calls for armed military intervention. There is no insurrection.”
Pritzker noted that every major American city deals with crime, but that the rate of violent crime is actually higher in Republican-dominated states and cities than in those run by Democrats. Illinois, he said, had “hired more police and given them more funding. We banned assault weapons, ghost guns, bump stops, and high-capacity magazines” and “invested historic amounts into community violence intervention programs.” Those actions have cut violent crime down dramatically. Pritzker pointed out that “thirteen of the top twenty cities in homicide rates have Republican governors. None of these cities is Chicago. Eight of the top ten states with the highest homicide rates are led by Republicans. None of those states is Illinois.”
If Trump were serious about combatting crime, Pritzker asked, why did he, along with congressional Republicans, cut more than $800 million in public safety and crime prevention grants? “Trump,” Pritzker said, “is defunding the police.”
Then Pritzker turned to the larger national story. “To the members of the press who are assembled here today and listening across the country,” he said, “I am asking for your courage to tell it like it is. This is not a time to pretend here that there are two sides to this story. This is not a time to fall back into the reflexive crouch that I so often see where the authoritarian creep by this administration is ignored in favor of some horse race piece on who will be helped politically by the president’s actions. Donald Trump wants to use the military to occupy a U.S. city, punish his dissidents, and score political points. If this were happening in any other country, we would have no trouble calling it what it is: a dangerous power grab.”
Pritzker continued: “Earlier today in the Oval Office, Donald Trump looked at the assembled cameras and asked for me personally to say, ‘Mr. President, can you do us the honor of protecting our city?’ Instead, I say, ‘Mr. President, do not come to Chicago. You are neither wanted here nor needed here. Your remarks about this effort over the last several weeks have betrayed a continuing slip in your mental faculties and are not fit for the auspicious office that you occupy.’”
The governor called out the president for his willingness to drag National Guard personnel from their homes and communities to be used as political props. They are not trained to serve as law enforcement, he said, and did not “sign up for the National Guard to fight crime.” “It is insulting to their integrity and to the extraordinary sacrifices that they make to serve in the guard, to use them as a political prop, where they could be put in situations where they will be at odds with their local communities, the ones that they seek to serve.”
Pritzker said he hoped that Trump would “reconsider this dangerous and misguided encroachment upon our state and our city’s sovereignty” and that “rational voices, if there are any left inside the White House or the Pentagon, will prevail in the coming days.”
But if not, he urged Chicagoans to protest peacefully and to remember that most members of the military and the National Guard stationed in Chicago would be there unwillingly. He asked protesters to “remember that they can be court martialed, and their lives ruined, if they resist deployment.” He suggested protesters should look to members of the faith community for guidance on how to mobilize.
Then Pritzker turned to a warning. “To my fellow governors across the nation who would consider pulling your national guards from their duties at home to come into my state against the wishes of its elected representatives and its people,” he said, “cooperation and coordination between our states is vital to the fabric of our nation, and it benefits us all. Any action undercutting that and violating the sacred sovereignty of our state to cater to the ego of a dictator will be responded to.”
He went on: “The state of Illinois is ready to stand against this military deployment with every peaceful tool we have. We will see the Trump administration in court. We will use every lever in our disposal to protect the people of Illinois and their rights.”
“Finally,” he said, “to the Trump administration officials who are complicit in this scheme, to the public servants who have forsaken their oath to the Constitution to serve the petty whims of an arrogant little man, to any federal official who would come to Chicago and try to incite my people into violence as a pretext for something darker and more dangerous, we are watching, and we are taking names. This country has survived darker periods than the one that we are going through right now. And eventually, the pendulum will swing back, maybe even next year. Donald Trump has already shown himself to have little regard for the many acolytes that he has encouraged to commit crimes on his behalf. You can delay justice for a time, but history shows you cannot prevent it from finding you eventually.
“If you hurt my people, nothing will stop me, not time or political circumstance, from making sure that you face justice under our constitutional rule of law. As Dr. King once said, the arc of the moral Universe is long, but it bends toward justice. Humbly, I would add, it doesn’t bend on its own. History tells us we often have to apply force needed to make sure that the arc gets where it needs to go. This is one of those times.”
My Hebrew teacher, Tamar Kfir, who lives in the German Colony in Jerusalem, has just published a wonderful user-friendly Hebrew language book she calls The Handy Book of Hebrew Verbs.
[A disclaimer – I was one of the book’s editors and do not profit from the sale of the book.]
This book is not just another Hebrew language book. It focuses on 97 of the most commonly used verbs, their infinitives, the preposition that follows each verb, the verb’s gender forms and tenses, and 5 sample Hebrew sentences (transliterated and translated) that show how the verb is used in every-day Israeli speech. Tamar includes also a list of many commonly used Israeli slang expressions and their meaning.
Each verb has a dedicated page, its 3-letter root set inside a circle, and other words based on that root spraying out like the spokes of a bicycle wheel.
Tamar’s website (www.HebrewWithTamar.com) offers an opportunity to see sample pages and other offerings, how to order a copy or multiple copies, and her direct contact information. The book is available on Amazon.
This book ought to be on the bookshelf of anyone who loves the Hebrew language and aspires to become a proficient Hebrew reader, writer and speaker.
This is my third consecutive post in a series of three concerning the meaning and importance of liberal Zionism and the State of Israel.
In this torturous, confusing and challenging era for Jews since October 7, 2023, I believe it’s worthwhile to read or re-read books that can help focus our moral, Jewish and liberal Zionist compasses. To that end, I recommend 4 volumes:
Gil Troy, The Zionist Ideas – Visions for the Jewish Homeland – Then, Now, Tomorrow with a Foreword by Natan Sharansky(New York: JPS Press, 2018)
“The Zionist Ideas is a must-read, a comprehensive Zionist Bible for the twenty-first century. The outstanding scholar and community leader Gil Troy presents an impressive range of thinkers, from yesterday to today, from left to right, illuminated by his extraordinary commentary, all of which affirm the enduring moral character of the Zionist idea: that Zionism, beyond safeguarding the Jewish state, is anchored in a humanistic ideology of universal resonance.” –Irwin Cotler, former minister of justice and attorney general of Canada and human rights activist.
Yossi Klein Halevi, Letters to My Palestinian Neighbor – with an Extensive Epilogue of Palestinian Responses(New York: Harper Perennial, 2018)
“The most insightful description of this deep-rooted conflict–from the Israeli perspective–which I have ever read . . . A master linguist, Yossi Klein Halevi has voiced the hopes and feats of many Israelis, as well as many Zionists in the diaspora.” –London Jewish Chronicle.
Ari Shavit,My Promised Land – The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel(New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2013)
“With the heart of a storyteller and the mind of a historian, Ari Shavit has written a powerful and compelling book about the making of modern Israel. No country is more emotionally connected to the United States, and no country’s fate matters more to many Americans. And yet until Shavit’s My Promised Land, it has been growing more difficult to sense the character of Israel through all the caricatures. This book is vital reading for Americans who care about the future, not only of the United States but of the world.” –Jon Meacham, American presidential historian and author of Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power.
Rabbi John L. Rosove, Why Israel and its Future Matters – Letters of a Liberal Rabbi to the Next Generation(New Jersey: Ben Yehuda Press, 2019; reissued after October 7, 2023)
“Rabbi Rosove shares 11 compelling letters directed at his two sons, but this fascinating work is in fact aimed at an entire generation of perplexed young Jews. He delineates the just case for Israel with precision and delicacy, sans fluff or pandering. This is a book which strives to combat Israel haters and bashers and gives real tools and answers to those liberal Jews who feel somewhat frustrated and confused about Israel. A must-read!” – Isaac Herzog, President of the State of Israel.
All 4 books are available from their publishers or on Amazon.com.
Despite the rightward turn of the Israeli government, we continue to believe in the Zionist enterprise and the viability of the State of Israel, write four leaders of progressive Zionism.
AUGUST 3, 2016
[Introductory notes: Simultaneously with my posting of my blog on August 6, 2025 – “What does it Mean to be a Liberal American Zionist?” – the British-born former Director of Policy Analysis at AIPAC, Michael Lewis, posted the following article on LinkedIn that was originally published by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) 9 years ago, almost to the day, that I co-wrote along with my colleagues (see names below). I thank Michael for posting this. I had forgotten about it. Little has changed, however, in my thinking about what it means to be a liberal Zionist except today, because so many “progressive” Jews no longer identify as Zionists, I prefer to be called a “liberal” Zionist. One more thing. Though the vast majority of Israelis today believe, after October 7, that a two-state solution is unlikely ever to happen, there is still no alternative if Israel is to remain both Jewish and democratic. When I think of the current relationships between the United States and Germany and Japan, no one would have thought such alliances would have been possible in 1945. Perhaps, once this horrendous war ends, there might be a new light showing the way along with the will amongst our two peoples to chart a course that will enable Israel and the Palestinian people to live next to each other in security and peace.]
NEW YORK (JTA) — As progressive American Zionists, we take seriously the critique of Israel and Zionism by professors Hasia Diner and Marjorie N. Feld, contained in their Aug. 1 Haaretz article, “We’re American Jewish Historians. This is why we’ve left Zionism behind.”
However, unlike them, we affirm progressive Zionist values. And those values mandate activism in order to ensure that Israel is both a democracy and the national home of the Jewish people.
The difference between us and professors Diner and Feld is that we continue to believe in the Zionist enterprise and the viability of the State of Israel, despite troubling trends: the rightward turn of the Israeli government; the corrupting influence of the nearly 50-year Israeli occupation of the Palestinian people in the West Bank; the growing messianic nationalism of the settler movement; the ultra-Orthodox influence on the Israeli government and its control over Jewish religious life; the second-class status of Palestinian Israeli citizens. We have a duty as Diaspora Zionists to critique Israeli policies whenever we believe that the State of Israel violates Jewish and democratic values as articulated in Israel’s Declaration of Independence.
For us, Jewish “nationalism” cannot be the sole objective of Zionism. Rather, Zionism and the Jewish nation is a means towards the perfection of the Jewish people and the world (tikkun olam).
Since its establishment, Israel has meant many things to many people: a haven from persecution, a catalyst for Jewish renewal and a place where the rhythms of civic life are Jewish rhythms. We regard the State of Israel as the Jewish people’s laboratory of Jewish ethical living, one that has seen unparalleled achievements and successes, as well as considerable deficiencies and failures. We regard the founding of the state as a consummate historic opportunity, to test the efficacy of Jewish ethical values, institutions and the diversity of Jewish peoplehood all while holding onto political power as a sovereign state.
Sadly, the professors base their argument on the highly reductionist notion of Judaism as simply a religion, and they even seem to breathe life into the 40-year-old defamatory attempt to label Zionism as racism. They suggest that it was Israeli homogenization that led to the demise of Jewish communities around the world, as if the great holy communities of Warsaw, Vilna and Krakow would somehow be intact today if it weren’t for…Zionism.
They also deeply oversimplify the reality here in the U.S., with its religiously neutral environment. America, and American Jews, have championed the “Goldene Medinah” — the Golden Land — as the great melting pot and exalted land of assimilation and acculturation. But today, Jews throughout the U.S. struggle with the challenge of balancing the benefits of American religious freedom while responding to communal trends in which Jews struggle to find connections, meaning and relevance in being Jewish.
As Zionists, Israel is the center of global Jewish life, and, it is important to recognize, it has managed to create a vibrant and creative Jewish society with a rich and incredibly ethnically diverse Judaism. Yet, Diaspora Jewry is a partner in assuring Israel’s viability as a democracy and a Jewish state, and its security as a sovereign nation. Our role in the Diaspora is different than that of Israeli citizens, but it is no less important. Indeed, our two centers need each other’s wisdom and support.
Professors Diner and Feld seem to have been defeated by their mythic understanding of Zionism and Israel. Though there is merit to their legitimate concerns about the “other” and what Jewish nationalism must do to include non-Jews as equal citizens in the state, it is unfortunate that they are turning away from Zionism altogether. Their relationship with Israel seems to be conditional. We would like to suggest an unconditional relationship to Israel. That means, like family, when we see troubling trends and abhorrent behavior, rather than disavow the entire enterprise, we prefer to roll up our sleeves and get more involved.
They are right that the Palestinians are entitled to empathy, justice and redress. Israel cannot continue to occupy another people and remain true to its democratic and Jewish values. The only way to preserve Israel as a Jewish state and a democracy is for Israel and the Palestinians to enter into negotiations leading to two states for two peoples.
Similarly, Israeli Jews and Diaspora Zionists must actively engage non-Jewish Israelis to address the real tensions within Israel’s identity as a Jewish and democratic state. Making Israel both more democratic and more Jewish is a serious challenge, but it is the essential struggle of Zionism. And as we reject Professors Diner and Feld when they give up on Israel as a Jewish state, we oppose Israelis and other Jews who take actions that threaten Israel’s essential nature as a democracy.
Ultimately, our vision of progressive Zionism — which is embodied in the Israeli Declaration of Independence and the Zionist movement’s Jerusalem Program — is one grounded in hope and action. And we will continue to strive to fulfill this vision to ensure a just, secure and peaceful future for all Israelis, and an Israel that can be a dynamic inspiration to Jews around the world.
(Rabbi Josh Weinberg and Rabbi John Rosove are the President and Chair of ARZA, the Association of Reform Zionists of America. Gideon Aronoff and Ken Bob are the CEO and National President of Ameinu.)
Even before Hamas’ attack against Israel on October 7, 2023, the definition and meaning of “Zionism” had increasingly come to be understood in far-left-progressive circles in the United States and around the world in strongly cynical and pejorative terms. Zionism became even more so understood negatively once Israel began its morally just counterattack against Hamas beginning on October 8th and later against Hezbollah, the Houthis and Iran. Those who were in league with the world-wide anti-Israel movement before October 7 and who had sought for years to re-frame the Zionist narrative as discriminatory, racist, colonialist, and a product of European imperialism discovered that they were gaining increasing support among many politically progressive left-wing Americans who claimed the humanitarian mantle against what they believed was Israel’s military over-reaction to what Hamas did to Israelis on that bloodiest day in the history of the State of Israel.
Every people has the right of self-definition, and we Zionists – and especially we liberal American Zionists – have that right as well.
I believe that this is the time for us to take back our liberal American Zionist narrative and lead with it whenever we discuss with those who know much or little about the history of the Zionist movement and the State of Israel. That is what I want to do in this blog post, to express why I am a proud liberal American Zionist despite my deep protest against the policies of this most extremist Israeli right-wing messianic government in the history of Israel.
I am a proud liberal American Zionist and as such I believe in the right of the Jewish people to a state of our own in our historic Homeland and in the right of the Jewish State militarily to defend itself when attacked by terrorists and hostile states.
As a liberal American Zionist I affirm that the universal humanitarian values advocated by the ancient prophets of Israel, developed by rabbinic tradition over the past two millennia, and included in Israel’s Declaration of Independence, namely that justice, equality, human rights, compassion, and peace must be core values guiding every Israeli government’s policies, its military and civil society.
As a liberal American Zionist I am proud of what the Zionist movement and the people and State of Israel have accomplished in virtually every arena of human endeavor including immigration and the absorption of refugees, agriculture, education, the sciences, medicine, bio-technology, cyber, culture, the arts, diplomacy, human rights, civil society, and self-defense.
As a liberal American Zionist I understand that the intent of Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iran is to destroy the State of Israel and murder as many Jews as possible in their messianic zeal to establish an extremist caliphate over all of historic Palestine “from the river to the sea.” As one example of this murderous intent, Hamas’ leadership said early on in the war that 100,000 Palestinian martyrs were not too many to fulfill its extremist mission to murder Jews and destroy the Jewish state.
As a liberal American Zionist I am proud and grateful that the United States historically has been Israel’s most important and generous ally and that Israel’s security needs have enjoyed bi-partisan American political support.
As a student of Israeli and Middle East history, I know that Israel has tried many times to resolve diplomatically the Israeli-Arab and the Israeli-Palestinian conflicts resulting in two-states for two-peoples as a matter of justice for the Palestinians and enlightened self-interest for Israel, but that extremist and uncompromising Palestinian leadership has walked away every time.
As a liberal American Zionist I acknowledge that I am not an Israeli citizen, that I do not pay Israeli taxes nor do I send my children and grandchildren to the Israeli military to fight in Israel’s wars. Only Israeli citizens have the right to take the decisions that directly impact their lives and well-being. However, as an American Jew and liberal Zionist who loves Israel I believe that I have the right to share my ideas and criticism of Israeli government policies that I believe are harmful not only to Israel’s own best interests as a Jewish and democratic state but to my security and well-being as a Diaspora Jew and my liberal Jewish and democratic values.
As a liberal American Zionist, for months I have felt the anguish, grief and rage of what Hamas did on October 7th. I continue to worry daily about the survival of the remaining hostages and the well-being of their families and the families of the Israeli soldiers killed and injured in this war. I have worried as well since this war began about the suffering of the two million Palestinian civilians in Gaza.
As a liberal American Zionist I believe that Israel, in fighting this just war has not always fought the war justly. It ought to be clear that Israel has crossed many red-lines despite all the challenges and difficulties in fighting a war against a non-state actor that deliberately hides behind and uses its own people as human shields. Israel’s massive killing of tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians and its use of humanitarian aid as a weapon of war are immoral and un-Jewish.
It is American policy that Israel and all recipients of U.S. weapons must adhere by law to standards concerning humanitarian aid and the use of force. As painful as it is for me to say this because I have always supported American military aid to Israel throughout my life, I support those 27 Democratic Party Senators who voted recently to halt the sale of offensive weapons to Israel as a way to put pressure on PM Netanyahu and his extremist government to end this war now, to stop the suffering, the starvation, the killing of civilians, and the deaths of Israeli soldiers and hostages.
These 27 Senators are friends of Israel, every one of them. They have always supported Israel’s true security needs. In their vote to withhold offensive weapons now after all these months of war they carefully distinguished between those weapons and the defensive weapon systems of Iron Dome, Arrow, and David’s Sling, which save Israeli lives. These Senators should not be criticized for their vote or accused of being anti-Israel. They are not that. They instead should be praised for acting on behalf of the best interests of Israel and the Palestinians and for applying necessary pressure on this extremist Israeli government to do what is just and compassionate – to end this war now, to bring home the hostages immediately, to pour massive humanitarian aid into Gaza, and to stop the killing and injury of Israeli soldiers and Palestinian civilians.
The vast majority of Israelis themselves and the vast majority of the American Jewish community agree that the war must end now, the hostages returned home, and humanitarian aid be provided in quantities that can stop the hunger and starvation.
I say all of these things as a committed liberal American Zionist and as a lover of the people and State of Israel.
Rabbi John Rosove's Blog 