I am posting this 10-minute clip from Israeli television – though it’s in Hebrew – so you can “feel” the anger, fear, and frustration of the Arab Israeli community through Meretz Knesset Member Issawi Frej who expresses eloquently and passionately his raw emotions and worries – watch it all as Issawi’s raw emotions build to a crescendo.

Frej was involved with Peace Now and the Geneva Accord. I have met him, and he represents the hope of Israeli Jewish and Arab-Israeli coexistence.

What is most dangerous right now is not only a war with Hamas, but another Intifada sparked by thugs in both the Israeli Jewish and Palestinian Israeli communities. Given that there is no government of Israel that is functioning at present, and that this violence serves Netanyahu’s interests to distract the public from the negotiations for a new government led by Yair Lapid of Yesh Atid and reminds everyone that Netanyahu can be a “strong man,” that the complete lack of leadership in Israel (regardless of Hamas’ true intentions and willingness to call for a cease fire) can lead Israel and the Palestinians off a cliff. If that should happen, it will be impossible to calculate the consequences.

This moment reminds us that though there has been quiet since 2014, that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict must be resolved in a two states for two peoples diplomatic resolution that assures Israelis security and democracy and Palestinian national rights, justice, and security. There is no other solution to this conflict.

watch this – https://youtu.be/bvCMeqJHiuE

As violence spreads like a wild fire throughout Israel and the Palestinian lands, as complex as the underlying causes are, we can still look to Jerusalem as metaphor and as a dream for what might be. Here are my thoughts today with prayers that violence may cease, that Palestinian and Israeli may begin talking again leading to two states for two peoples, security and peace for each other.

4 Quarters of Jerusalem

Jewish – Muslim – Christian – Armenian

Is a beating heart

All must be healthy and safe

For the whole to live and thrive

And if one is suppressed – or two – or three

The fourth isn’t safe or whole

All must beat alongside the others

Equal and engaged with each other

In dignity and with respect for the other

In deference and concern for all

That Shalom may be also Salaam

Whole!

Note: The following is the complete text of an inspired speech delivered by Reform Rabbi Gilad Kariv as a new Member of the Israeli Knesset in the Labor Party. This is an historic first, and Rabbi Kariv not only offers a review of his own life that led him to become a Rabbi and the leader of the Israel Movement for Reform and Progressive Judaism, but led him to become the first Reform Rabbi ever to serve in that august parliamentary body. I salute my friend Gilad, and wish him and those who share his outlook and values courage, stamina, and success in this coming term.   

“Speaker of the Knesset, my dear friends in the Labor faction: Omer, Emily, Efrat, Ram and Ibtisam; my inspirational – and dare I say faithful – friend MK Meirav Michaeli; and all members of the Knesset:

Before I begin, I must pay my respects to the memory of all who have perished in the great tragedy in Meron last week, and I pray for the speedy recovery of those who were injured in the terrorist attack in the Shomron.

With great excitement, I stand here before you today, and I am reminded of the first verses of Parashat Netzavim in Deuteronomy:

“You stand this day, all of you, before the Lord your G-d […] and I make this covenant […]not with you alone, but both with those who are standing here with us this day before the Lord our God and with those who are not with us here.”

I have immense gratitude first and foremost for those who are here with us today – my parents Avital and Shlomo, my partner Noa, my three children Amalia, Avigail and Amos, my sister Lihi and her son Amitai, my aunt Yali and my in-laws Tzvika and Dalia.

As Rabbi Akiva said of his love Rachel – all that is mine is theirs. I am also grateful for those who are not here with us today, in particular my four grandparents, who I was blessed by their good influence for many years. Many happy hours of my childhood were spent visiting my grandparents in Tel Aviv. Their homes were both Israeli, Zionist and very secular, bursting with love for the land of Israel. One of the homes belonged to Savta Elka and Saba Shimon – who was injured during his military service in the Haganah in Kibbutz Ramat Hakovesh and years later joined the Lechi.

The second home belonged to Savta Chana – who had left her Haredi family at age 16 without severing their loving relationship – and Saba Emanuel, who had made aliyah as a child in 1921, with his widowed mother and young siblings. When he was 33, he was called upon by Ben Gurion to help establish the IDF’s engineering corps, on the eve of the Independence War. Later, he worked as the CEO of the Dead Sea factories, in the days before our precious natural resources had been carelessly privatized.

It was near this home that I discovered the neighborhood synagogue, as a strictly secular young child who was always attracted to Jewish tradition, prayer and literature. This moderate religious-Zionist synagogue was my home throughout my youth. These were years filled with studying, scouting, political activism and friendship. Later on, as I neared the end of high-school, I embarked upon yet another spiritual journey from the Orthodox synagogue of my youth to the Reform community in Tel Aviv, and the many endeavors of the Reform movement in Israel and all over the Jewish world. Throughout this journey I was well aware that Jewish tradition and culture are a central part of my identity, alongside the belief in equality between men and women, and the recognition that dignity for humankind, love of the stranger and the pursuit of justice and peace are values inseparable from my Judaism. Even then I was adamant that in 4000 years of Jewish thought, one can find both inspiring human sensitivity as well as fundamentalism, outbursts of creativity alongside deep conservatism. The question that always guided me was not “What is Judaism?”, but rather “Which interpretation of Judaism will I choose?”

In the Beit Daniel community in Tel Aviv I met many committed partners who shared with me a longing for an Israeli egalitarian Judaism. This is the community where I met my life partner – Noa; the community where I became a rabbi; where both my daughters read the Torah at their Bat-Mitzvah; and where they continue to lead prayer to this day. It is in this community, during the Shavuot holiday of 1996 that Lea Rabin carried a Torah scroll dedicated to her late husband Yitzchak Rabin of blessed memory. In this community, I was honored to read the Torah with special needs youth.

In this community hangs to this day a rainbow tapestry in honor of Shira Banki, of blessed memory, who was taken from us in the Jerusalem Pride Parade by those who had violently distorted the Torah of Israel. I share this story with you today not only as a personal biography. I want to suggest that there are a growing number of Israelis who seek to deepen their knowledge of Judaism and make it a meaningful part of their lives, without giving up on liberal values. These Jews are standing up for their right to navigate both Western democratic liberal culture as well as the richly diverse world of Jewish thought.

For these people, there is no contradiction between these two worlds. There is a third path, through which we can together balance both our private and communal spiritual lives; accept social and political responsibility as well as tikkun olam; and combine creative religious innovation with a deep respect for our intergenerational roots. There is no contradiction between Zionism, Jewish solidarity, and a universal, humanitarian worldview.

The growth of the Jewish pluralist renewal movement, which I have had the honor to be among its leaders over the last two decades, is the explicit expression of this important process. This movement has raised several important ideological flags – tolerance, equality and most importantly, the recognition that there is more than one way to be a Jew.

This movement is not just directed externally, but internally as well. It is a broad and diverse Israeli movement that includes a wide range of communities: orthodox, conservative, Reform and secular, as well as batei-midrash of all types, educational institutions, pre-army seminars and youth movements, adult communities and educators, cultural institutions and civil society organizations; and most importantly, we are a diverse community with many different lifestyles but we are all Israeli – secular, traditional and religious as one. As is the way of any young ideological movement, the Jewish renewal movement is finding its path step by step, navigating many obstacles. The biggest obstacle, not surprisingly, is the monopoly over Israeli Judaism that has been given to one particular denomination and institution, in a gross breach of the core values of the Israeli Declaration of Independence. This grim reality of monopoly, coercion and discrimination in the name of religion, continuously violates the basic rights of millions of Israeli citizens: women, hundreds of thousands of immigrants and their children, members of the LGBTQ community, liberal citizens as well as Jewish renewal communities, Israeli citizens of other religious affiliations and many others. This violation in turn severely undermines Israel’s commitment to democratic values, equality and freedom of religion and belief. No less important, are the severe consequences these policies have for Israel’s basic identity as a homeland for the Jewish nation, and for the relationship millions of Israelis have with their own Jewish culture. These policies deepen feelings of alienation and anger, and cause a

very broad part of the public to view the state religious establishments as a source of corruption and power struggles rather than as an inspiration and moral, social and unifying power.

I believe these harsh words tell the story of the upsetting processes Israeli society is experiencing, but they are also true of Israel’s relationship with world Jewry. In the last few years, the Israeli government has explicitly turned its back on millions of diaspora Jews, because of their communal and religious identity, and often because of their political views—as if the Zionist tent has enough room only for those who support the current incumbent government.

Mending Israel’s relationship with the liberal Jews of the world on the basis of mutual respect and recognition are worthy Israeli and Zionist goals. I am happy to be standing here today and to speak the voice of my brothers and sisters in the Diaspora, whose love of Israel is genuine but sadly, they rightly feel all too often that this love is one-sided. The distortion I’m talking about in the relationship between religion and state, which I worked on as a civil activist, does not only entail the freedom of religion and the freedom from religion of the citizens of Israel – which they are supposed to be granted naturally. It also relates to the complicated relationship between the Jewish state and the Jews of the Diaspora. Regarding this relationship, in the eighth decade of the country’s existence, Israelis are standing at a profound crossroad.

In the lively political and civil debate that the Israeli society holds on its path and values, there are great forces that search to take advantage of the Jewish tradition and the Zionist vision in order to justify nationalism and racism. Others do so in order to deny the legitimization of their political opponent’s opinion, to denounce any appeals against the government’s actions, whether by individuals or organizations, and constantly measure the absolute loyalty of citizens. They do so while totally ignoring the ancient holy prophets of Israel, whose vision was mentioned in the Declaration of Independence. They were the first to stand bravely opposite the king and ruling authority. The leaders of these maneuvers do not hesitate to quote any slogan, reference or Zionist saying. But truth be told, more often than not, their rhetoric is merely pseudo-Zionist. This rhetoric seeks to reestablish the public and political discourse of a pre-sovereign era.

According to these forces, we are not dealing with leading a mature country, but rather with the continuation of the pre-mandate Jewish struggle against forces of darkness from within and without. This tactic does not derive from any sentimental feelings. It is entirely a dry political calculation to attempt to excuse Israel and Israeli society from the burden of challenges that are upon its shoulders, as a country that is modern, civilized and advanced, that seeks at once to be both a national home for the Jewish people and all of its inhabitants, and a democratic state of all its citizens regardless of religion, ethnic origin, language and gender. Amongst these challenges – is the promise of equality and opportunity to each and every citizen; the protection of human rights; the reduction of economic inequalities; the reparation of the relationship between the Jewish majority and the Arab minority and encouraging coexistence; the prioritizing of the public interest over individual preferences; the promotion of social mobility and equal access to resources; the cultivation of a pluralist and tolerant society; the deep concern for the environment; and of course the striving for apolitical agreements and peace – not only with the Gulf state, but more importantly with those with whom we share the promised land.

As the continuation of the Israeli Labor movement, these challenges of creating a just, tolerant and peaceful society are exactly the weight we are willing to carry. For us these are not only political assignments, but also a deep expression of the way we understand the essence of our Jewish and democratic state and the great challenges of the Jews in Israel. The way we see it, if there is someone who forgot how to be Jewish, then he or she are turning their back to these challenges, or even worse – sees them as an expression of national weakness, or of distancing from the Zionist vision whilst blurring the lines of Jewish identity. From this Israeli, Zionist and Jewish position, derives our decisive refusal to give any institution or religious denomination ownership and exclusive monopoly on Judaism and Zionism.

Naturally, this refusal incites a strong argument, which echoes in this political house at all times. As always, achieving compromises and approval are worthy and important goals. But the basic condition of these goals is that around the negotiation table no-one will shout and demand: “It’s all mine”, whilst the other side is constantly forced into a defensive mode. The two sides must hold the prayer shawl and be willing to share it. Only in this kind of discussion, we can build bridges wide enough that will allow more than one to cross them at once.

Speaker of the Knesset, my friends: In the last 20 years as a Reform Rabbi in Israel I was able to accompany thousands of individuals, couples and families in moments of sorrow, but mostly in moments of joy and new beginnings. The happiest of these moments were the thousands of weddings I ordained from all the spectrum of the Israeli society. Couples who could not get married through the Orthodox institutions, and many more who consciously chose a Jewish egalitarian Chupah. Couples born in Israel raised by Olim; couples in which one partner was Jewish by birth, and the other – by choice. Couples of a bride and groom, and also couples of two grooms or two brides.

At the end of the seven blessings, after we bless the couples with “love, comradeship, in peace and in deep friendship,” and after we ask that only voices of happiness and joy will be heard in the “cities of Judaea and outskirts of Jerusalem,” I would always read a song of prayer by Lea Goldberg, that is included in many new Hebrew and Israeli prayer books for the Reform Jewish communities in Israel, alongside the traditional prayers.

“Oh Lord my God – please teach me how to bless and pray. / The truth of falling leaves. / And fruits of summers day. / The freedom that it brings – / to see to feel to breathe to know to yearn and even fail. / Teach my lips a song that tells us how to praise. / The morning and the nights the secrets of your ways. / Guide my mind to find the truth, / see through the haze / ’cause I don’t want no ordinary days.”

With the beginning of a new officiation that I hope will be the beginning of a long term and that makes a positive difference, I pray that I will continue carrying blessings every day and a song of grace for the great privilege of being a public servant in this institution – alongside both partners and challenging rivals, and that this mission will never become habit for me.

Blessed are You God, who created me in Your image.

Blessed are You God, who created me free.

Blessed are you God, who created me Israel.”

On May 1, 1921, exactly 100 years ago this week, massive Arab rioting broke out in Jaffa against the Jews of Palestine. Many were murdered including Yosef Chaim Brenner, a pioneer of Hebrew literature known as a moral conscience of the Yishuv. New immigrants, who had recently disembarked from a ship in the harbor, were killed by Arab rioters who raged unhindered under the eyes of the British mandatory authority. From Jaffa, Arab unrest spread throughout the region including the small agricultural settlement of Petach Tikvah that was first established by a group of religious Jewish families from Jerusalem in 1878.

Word came to the leadership of Petach Tikvah that it was about to be attacked, and Abraham Shapira (1870-1965), the head of the town’s Jewish guards (shomrim), organized the settlement’s defense. He tried to keep the peace first by meeting with Arab leadership in the region with whom he had shared friendship and who respected him as a man of honor and dignity, but these Arab leaders stood aside and allowed the storm to rage.

First, K’far Saba and Ein Hai, two small villages fell. Their Jewish residents were evacuated to the larger town of Petach Tikvah.

Then, on May 5 thousands of rioters marched towards Petach Tikvah, attacked from the north, and set fire to the Moshav. The front, approximately two kilometers long, was guarded by a handful of Jewish defenders. The campaign intensified, a number of young Jews were killed, and replaced by their elders who with sticks and pitchforks fought ferociously. In the end, miraculously, Petach Tikvah’s Jews were victorious in the defense of the settlement.

Word circulated throughout the Land of Israel that the courageous few defending Petach Tikvah had held the rioters at bay, and news of their heroism spread throughout the greater Jewish world.

When British soldiers met with Shapira after the battle, they expressed their amazement that he, as the commander of the shomrim, had never been formally trained in tactical warfare. That aside, the British arrested him, allegedly due to his carrying a weapon, but in fact as leverage to justify their imprisonment of the head of the rioters against Petach Tikvah, the Sheikh of the Bedouin village of Abu Kishk, two kilometers from Petach Tikvah. It was not, according to the British, possible to imprison an Arab without also imprisoning a Jew, and so that fate fell upon Shapira. After interrogation, he was released. However, Shapira then led a second front in the battle against the release of the Sheikh until he paid a penalty for the damage he inflicted on the Moshavah. He was sentenced to more than fifteen years in prison. He was released on condition that he forge a peace treaty with Petach Tikvah.

Despite the heavy causalities and deep resentments, over time Shapira and the Sheikh stabilized their relationship and the relationship between the Arabs of Abu Kishk and the Jews of Petach Tikvah for years to come. Theirs was a relationship based upon strength and respect on the one hand and cooperation and mutuality of interest on the other. They knew one another well personally, and those relationships were critical to the maintenance of a stable peace. Shapira was so well respected that Arabs and Bedouin came to him to settle disputes between themselves.

Shapira is known in Israeli history as “The shomer of Petach Tikvah.” He came to be respected throughout the Land of Israel by Jew and Arab alike. As the foremost guard of the Yishuv, he guided Lord Edmond Baron de Rothschild (the great benefactor of the early Jewish settlements in the country), Chaim Weizmann (the first president of the State of Israel), and many dignitaries from around the world whenever they visited Palestine. Chaim Weizmann wrote of Abraham Shapira in his autobiography Trial and Error (New York: Schocken, 1949, pages 252-253):

“Abraham Shapira was in himself a symbol of the whole process of Jewish readaptation. He accompanied me on most of my trips up and down Palestine, partly as guide, partly as guard, and all the while I listened to his epic stories of the old-time colonists. He was a primitive person, spoke better Arabic than Hebrew, and seemed so much a part of the rocks and stony hillsides of the country that it was difficult to believe that he had been born in Lithuania. Here was a man who in his own lifetime had bridged a gap of thousands of years; who, once in Palestine, had shed his Galuth environment like an old coat.”

Abraham Shapira was my great-grand-uncle. My maternal grandmother was his niece. He and his family left Lithuania in 1878 for Palestine, lived in Jerusalem for two years and then joined the few families in Petach Tikvah. My branch of the family left for North America twenty years later, entered the new world through Nova Scotia, journeyed to Winnipeg, Manitoba, and then, in 1932, moved to Los Angeles.

My maternal aunt and uncle visited Israel in 1953, and for the first time in 75 years the two branches of our family reunited. Uncle Avram (as we all called him because that was how my grandmother called him) visited our family in Los Angeles in 1956 when I was six years old. My mother told me on our way to the gathering to welcome him: “Uncle Avram is a very great Israeli.”

Though I was only six years old, I remember Uncle Avram clearly. He was a large man who sat quietly in my aunt’s family room and spoke Yiddish and Russian to my grandmother who translated for the rest of us. I sensed his dignity and simple nobility, and then when I lived in Israel from 1973 to 1974 as a young rabbinic student, I visited his niece and nephew in Petach Tikvah over numerous weekends. They told me many stories about him.

When my aunt died in the mid-1990s, she left me a two-volume Hebrew biography of Uncle Avram written by Yehuda Eidelshtein in 1939 as well as a smaller Hebrew volume written by Gezel Kressel in 1955. These volumes sat on my bookshelf for all these years and at last, after I retired as a congregational rabbi in 2019, I read them. I was stunned by the dramatic significance of his life as the founding shomer of one of the first settlements established by early Zionists at the end of the 19^th century. I realized that though many Israelis over a certain age know about him, non-Hebrew speaking Jews in the Diaspora likely have never heard of Abraham Shapira. It was then, for the sake of my family most of all, that I decided to translate the smaller volume.

As I read the story of the Arab attack on Petach Tikvah on May 5, 1921, I realized that we are fast approaching the 100^th anniversary of that fateful battle – hence, this blog.

Many Petach Tikvah Jews were lost on that day, among them Avshalom Gisin, Chaim Tzvi Greenshtein, Natan Rapaport, and Ze’ev Orlov. They were young, and they gave their lives for the safety and well-being of others. For many decades Abraham Shapira and the people of Petach Tikvah mourned them on the 27^th of Nisan – Zichronam livracha.

Israeli, Palestinian and U.S. figures virtually addressed about 5,000 activists, signaling a new willingness from mainstream figures to apply pressure to influence Israeli policy

WASHINGTON – J Street concluded their 12th annual conference on Monday, virtually hosting nearly 5,000 activists who listened to lawmakers, experts and activists discuss the current respective political moments in Israel and the United States, as well as the current state of the U.S.-Israel relationship.

Note: For those of my readers who do not follow closely the ins and outs of politics in DC vis a vis Israel, this piece in Haaretz by Ben Samuels (April 20, 2021) offers a fine review of what happened at the just-completed J Street National Conference.

In addition to what is noted here, the Jerusalem Youth Choir including Israeli Jewish and Palestinian singers were highlighted. Their music, spirit, and efforts to join together above the fray of politics was inspirational, and their music was uplifting and beautiful. Also, there was presented a fine medley of work by Israel Jewish and Palestinian artists. One artist said that the way for Israeli Jews and Palestinians to understand each other is through the arts.

As I have noted many times over the years, to understand what is happening in Israel and Palestine, a subscription to Haaretz is most helpful. It is the NY Times of Israel. Why not take this opportunity to take out a subscription? I get no kick-back except the knowledge that more people are reading what’s important in Israel.

https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium.HIGHLIGHT-j-street-conference-marks-a-new-day-in-washington-for-u-s-israel-relations-1.9730515?utm_source=mailchimp&utm_medium=content&utm_campaign=daily-brief&utm_content=0d3e7a03b2

Israel News | Israel Election 2021

[Note: The Reform movement in Israel, the United States, and around the world is thrilled that our Israeli leader, Rabbi Gilad Kariv, is now a Member of the Israeli Knesset from the Labor Party. Gilad represents and advocates – as this article by Judy Maltz in Haaretz indicates – the best values and policies of progressive Reform Judaism that advances the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state. I wish Gilad and Labor success that will mean growth and prosperity for Israel and Israelis as a whole and will stand as a source of continuing pride of the vast majority of the American Jewish community that loves Israel.]

In an interview with Haaretz, Kariv, past leader of the Israeli Reform movement, talks about relations with ultra-Orthodox lawmakers, what he aims to achieve as a lawmaker, and Israel’s relations with the U.S.

Judy Maltz

Apr. 11, 2021 10:13 PM

Israel Eichler, a veteran parliamentarian for the Haredi party United Torah Judaism, wasn’t going to waste any time. He chose the day the Knesset was sworn in last week to issue a frantic warning about the dangers posed by one of the legislature’s newest members.

When asked in an interview with a Haredi news site if he would greet Gilad Kariv, the first Reform rabbi ever to serve in the Knesset, when they crossed paths in the building, Eichler responded: “God forbid. You don’t greet wicked people.”

Reform Jews, Eichler went on to explain, “falsify Judaism like Christians.” In fact, he said, they are even worse than Christians “because they lie and don’t observe any of the mitzvahs.”

With these remarks, Kariv received a taste of what he can expect in his new career as a lawmaker. But they came as no surprise. After all, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ultra-Orthodox allies have already let it be known they would prefer a coalition with an Islamist party – if that’s what it takes to keep the religious right in power – to a government that includes a proud representative of the Reform movement.

The campaign to delegitimize Kariv did not begin with his recent election to the Knesset. The new Labor Party lawmaker spent the past 12 years serving as executive director of the Reform movement in Israel. Whenever he showed up to a Knesset committee session – and that happened quite regularly – the Haredi lawmakers in attendance would, as a matter of practice, walk out in protest.

In an interview last week in his new Knesset office, Kariv said he would not stoop to their level. “Orthodoxy is definitely not my Jewish choice, but I don’t delegitimize it,” he told Haaretz. “Boycotting someone because of their religious practices and beliefs is just not something I do. In fact, I hope that through our joint work in the Knesset, through the public debates and the small talk in the corridors, perhaps these Haredi lawmakers will come to realize that we have many things in common.”

Whatever could you have in common with ultra-Orthodox lawmakers?

“Well, I hope that they’re as disturbed by the poverty rate in Israel as I am, for example, and I hope that they are as troubled by the living conditions of thousands of Holocaust survivors in this country as I am. That doesn’t mean, though, that I plan to make special efforts to reach out to them.”

Where his tolerance ends is with the far-right Religious Zionism party, known for its anti-Arab and anti-LGBTQ platform.

“That’s where I draw the red line,” says Kariv. “While I’m not going to leave the Knesset hall every time the Kahanists get up to make a speech, I will do whatever I can to block their policies and their philosophy, and I will never ever sign my name onto any bills that carry their names, even if it’s something I believe in, because I cannot fathom any cooperation with them whatsoever.”

Fifth time’s a charm

This was Kariv’s fifth try at getting elected to the Knesset – he ran four times with Labor and once with the more left-wing Meretz. Thanks to an impressive showing in the primary, he placed high enough on the slate this time to finally get in. Labor, under the new leadership of Merav Michaeli, won seven Knesset seats in the March 23 election.

Kariv’s introduction to Reform Judaism was not very typical. He grew up in Tel Aviv in a very secular family, but as a young boy in grade school he found himself drawn to the synagogue experience and began attending services on his own at the neighborhood congregation, which was Modern Orthodox. These visits sparked a broader interest in Judaism, and he began studying Jewish texts on his own. 

As a teenager, he spent a summer in Memphis, Tennessee, as a delegate of the Israeli Scouts movement, and it was there he got his first taste of non-Orthodox Judaism and learned, as he likes to put it, that “there is more than one way of being an active Jew.”

Kariv was one of the original members of Tel Aviv’s Beit Daniel — the flagship congregation of the Reform movement in Israel – when it opened in the early 1990s. He began his rabbinical studies at the Jerusalem branch of Hebrew Union College while studying law. He was eventually able to use his legal expertise when he served as director of the Israel Religious Action Center, the advocacy arm of the Reform movement in Israel.

But he certainly doesn’t see Reform Jews as his only constituents. “I’m here in order to represent a large Israeli audience that I believe is the vast majority of Israeli Jews who embrace the concept that there is more than one way to be Jewish,” he says. “That is how I see my main role.”

But it is not only the obvious issues of religion and state that will concern him in this role, he says. “The way we in the Reform movement understand and experience Judaism is relevant to many other issues, whether it be immigration policy, relations between the Jewish majority and Arab minority in this country or the question of our claim to the territories. I see my role as presenting a progressive, inclusive and egalitarian Jewish perspective to all these core issues that concern Israeli society.”

The Labor Party drew criticism in certain leftist circles in the recent election campaign for steering clear of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and avoiding the fraught issue of the settlements. “I don’t think Labor set these issues aside,” says Kariv, coming to his party’s defense. “We identify as a center-left Zionist party, and in this regard we are deeply committed both to national security and to finding a reasonable and sustainable solution to the conflict.”

While he strongly supports a two-state solution (“I think it’s a catastrophe that there haven’t been any real negotiations with the Palestinians in recent years”), Kariv doesn’t delude himself into believing that any real progress will be made in the near future. “But in the meantime, we have to avoid creating obstacles, such as expanding the settlements and recognizing illegal outposts, that could prevent a future solution,” he says.

As past leader of the Israeli Reform movement, Kariv served as the chief representative in Israel of the largest Jewish denomination in the United States. It was a denomination that increasingly found itself at odds with the governments headed by Netanyahu, especially during the Trump years. But he doesn’t believe relations will necessarily improve under the new Democratic administration. “That’s because the ultranationalists and ultra-Orthodox in Israel have Netanyahu by the throat,” he says. “He can’t move without them, and world Jewry needs to understand that if there is another Netanyahu government, things will only get worse. One of the first things that Netanyahu will do – because there won’t be anyone standing in his way now – is to pass a law that will overturn the recent [Israeli] Supreme Court decision to recognize non-Orthodox conversions. That will be a precondition of the Haredim” for joining the government.

Busy first days in office

His first days in office have been incredibly busy, he says. Kariv has already submitted formal requests to establish two new Knesset caucuses: one devoted to promoting religious freedom and Jewish pluralism and the other devoted to promoting the triangular relationship among Israel, the United States and American Jewry.

“There’s always been a tendency on the right to separate Israel’s relations with the U.S. from Israel’s relations with American Jewry,” he says. “The message of this new caucus will be that this is a trilateral, rather than a bilateral, issue. You can’t talk about cultivating relations with American Jewry but close your eyes to the fact that 70 percent of these Jews support a progressive administration that wants to see something new when it comes to relations with the Palestinians.”

Since the new Knesset was sworn in last week, the Labor Party has already submitted 17 legislative proposals. They include bills to legalize civil marriage and divorce, to permit public transportation to operate on Shabbat and to prohibit the Chief Rabbinate from invalidating conversions.

“I know that there’s little chance of passing such bills into law without a center-left coalition in power, but at the same time it’s important to put out the message that there is, indeed, an alternative Zionist vision for this country,” Kariv says.

https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/elections/.premium-where-the-first-reform-rabbi-to-serve-in-the-knesset-gilad-kariv-draws-the-line-1.9702299?utm_source=mailchimp&utm_medium=content&utm_campaign=daily-brief&utm_content=31344b4a71

“Israel and the U.S. are trying to define anew what it means to be a pluralistic democracy.” April 6, 2021

Tom Friedman’s op-ed is an important read for anyone who cares about Israel, its future as a Jewish and democratic state, the nature of Judaism in the Jewish State, and the intense polarization between the “tribes” (as President Ruvi Rivlin called them).

I also recommend highly Micah Goodman’s new book that he calls The Wondering Jew – Israel and the Search for Jewish Identity published by Yale University Press in 2020 (190 pages). Goodman looks at the origins and trajectory of religious identity, secularism, Zionism, and Judaism in Israel from Theodor Herzl and Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook to the present. It’s smart, deeply thoughtful, and inspiring.

Listening to Dr. Deborah Birx and the other former officials of the CDC on CNN this past Sunday evening (March 28), their failure of leadership vis a vis the Coronavirus was stunning.

There were a number of justifications they might have considered in their staying in their positions when they knew the serious nature of the virus, as Trump knew in March as he revealed in his confessions to The Washington Post’s Bob Woodward. They may have thought they could do good in an administration concerned only about its political survival and well-being; or, they may have thought that by challenging wrong-headed and dangerous policies internally but staying quiet while Trump and his spokespeople deliberately, consistently, and relentlessly lied to the public about the true nature of the crisis; or, they may have wanted to keep their jobs and hold onto power thereby avoiding angering a mob-boss President who valued loyalty to him and everything he said above all else. None of these reasons, however, rises to the level of ethical justifiability.

Yes, at last they acknowledged publicly the failure of the Trump administration’s policies. Dr. Birx admitted that beyond the first 100,000 American deaths (that were unavoidable, she said), every one of the next 450,000 deaths was unnecessary had Trump and his administration taken the lead, as President Biden is now doing, to set and advocate national emergency health standards, invoke and activate the War Powers Act to release government funds and retool American government and industry to do what is necessary to fight the virus, and then to lead a campaign to persuade the entire nation to join together on behalf of everyone’s best interests and thereby limit the death, pain and suffering.

Their staying quiet, refusing to speak out, not rallying responsible parties in government and health-care to do what was right on behalf of the American people, not resisting the bullying President and his henchmen, and failing to resign their positions if necessary, were contrary to everything I know about Judeo-Christian moral tradition.

The Talmud (circa 500 CE) set the ethical standard of how to cope with obvious wrong-doing this way: “One who is able to protest against a wrong that is being done in his/her family, his/her city, his/her nation or the world and doesn’t do so is held accountable for that wrong being done.” (Talmud Bavli, Shabbat 54b)

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel echoed that position when he said famously: “…morally speaking, there is no limit to the concern one must feel for the suffering of human beings, that indifference to evil is worse than evil itself, that in a free society, some are guilty, but all are responsible.”

Former President Trump, Trump administration officials, Republican politicians (congressional leaders, governors, mayors, and city council members), and some Democrats too, and former CDC officials who followed Trump’s lead all are guilty of “standing by while others bleed” (Leviticus 19:16).

We so obviously lacked courageous moral leadership this past year. Thankfully, we have a new President, responsible leadership in Congress and many states and cities, health-care officials throughout the country, and many religious and civic leaders who are our modern examples of “profiles in courage.” They deserve our thanks.

In most of our lifetimes, we’ve never had a year like the one that just passed. Some of us sadly and tragically lost loved ones and friends. All of us, if we’re conscious, feared that we’d become sick ourselves. We’ve empathized with the pain of others, acquaintances and strangers alike. And we’ve worried about the political, cultural, psychological, and spiritual threats to American society, Israeli society, and nations around the world.

Despite all that, Pesach comes each spring to augur renewal and remind us of Judaism’s core values, ideals, and activist thrusts, that we aren’t passive to fate and that we can choose to chart our lives anew.

As we prepare to sit down (arguably in smaller gatherings this year as we did last year) to celebrate the most observed of all Jewish holidays, we’ll perform the rituals, read the Haggadah, eat the Seder foods, tell the Exodus story, contemplate the readings and Midrashim, be uplifted by poetry, and open our hearts in song. The Seder is also an opportunity for us all to talk with each other and ask hard questions about the meaning of the events we’ve suffered this past year as we place them into the larger context not only of our lives but of Jewish and human history. That’s what we Jews have always done, year after year, generation after generation.

When people are asked what brings us the most meaning in our lives, so often we begin with our family and friends. The lucky among us include also our work and avocations. And then there’s Jewish tradition and faith that have the capacity to ground us as individuals and as a people, as activists for human dignity and agents for change in an imperfect world.

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks wrote what I believe ought to be asked by every Jew especially this year during this season of questioning:

“We should not ask ourselves what we want from life. We should ask ourselves, what does life want from us? There is a difference between the call from within and the call from outside: it is the difference between ambitions and vocation. The former comes from the self, the latter from something outside and larger than the self. Victor Frankl explained it, ‘Being human is always directed, and pointing, to something or someone other than oneself: to a meaning to fulfill or another human being to encounter, a cause to serve or a person to love.’ He called this self-transcendence and said that one achieves this ‘not by concerning him/herself with self-actualization, but by forgetting oneself and giving oneself, overlooking oneself and focusing outward.’ … The relentless first-person singular, the ‘I,’ falls silent and we become aware that we are not the center of the universe. There is a reality outside. That is a moment of transformation … seeing a situation from outside the distortion field of our own wants and desires. … That ability to step back and see oneself from the outside is what makes us moral agents, capable of understanding that we have duties, obligations, and responsibilities to others. Morality is the capacity to care for others. It is a journey beyond the self.”

May this Passover season be for you and those you love, for our people here, around the world and in Israel, and for all humankind, a year of peace and wholeness, justice and compassion, healing, transcendence, and joy.

Hag Pesach Sameach – Happy Passover.

This past week, a poll published by the Geneva Institute indicated that a majority of Israelis support a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (representing 65 or 66 Knesset mandates) but many of these Israeli voters have chosen parties against a two-state solution because they want so badly to defeat PM Netanyahu.

For more, see my blog at The Times of Israel – https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/the-clash-of-narratives-and-rights-thoughts-before-the-israeli-election/