June 04, 2010

This being my first service as rabbi of this community, and this moment my first to address you in that capacity, I find myself facing an unpleasant reality.  There is no way I can responsibly avoid discussing the events surrounding the the disastrous raid by Israeli naval commandos on a blockade running ship-full of political activists this week. I’d really rather talk about Tzitzit, the fringes on our Talis.  We learn about those this week in Torah. 

But no, lucky me, I get to introduce myself to you in the midst of a full-scale diplomatic and military crisis facing Israel. You know what? No. I’m going home. Honey, get the kids.   Shabbat Shalom.

I am understandably hesitant to take on such a charged issue, not because I do not support Israel unequivocally, but because there may well be serious disagreements about what it means to support Israel.

To be clear, when I speak of Israel, I speak of the Jewish State, a national home for our people and the best, though not the only place for our civilization to evolve.  A land dreamt of for millenia by exiles and refugees, by generation after generation of Jews forced to live under the hand and often the boot-heel of other nations.

At last, we have tasted national liberation.  But that liberation is not yet secure.  In fact, since the proclamation of Jewish independence in 1948, Israel has been in a state of perpetual war.

If you have spent any length of time in Israel, as I have, you will understand what that means.  I have had it explained to me by people who know that it is similar to what policemen or combat veterans sometimes experience.  Only for Israelis it isn’t a tour of duty, it’s a childhood, and for some, an entire lifetime.  Your entire life under siege and waiting for the next explosion.  Years when you wonder if a cup of coffee at your local cafe will be your last.  Braving life anyway.

It makes you tough.  And callous. And often hateful.  Hateful of the people who have brought this upon you.   Arafat and his ilk were just extensions of the Nazis, and the Nazi mindset.  There is real evil in the world.

The average Gazan, however, isn’t evil.  They’re victims. Ignorant, mislead, manipulated, hateful, hopeless, desperate and fearful. It’s not an excuse, and we must defend ourselves vigorously nonetheless. The situation stinks.  It’s demoralizing. It’s infuriating and it’s easy to turn that anger into more hate. 

Our anger is best reserved for the so-called peace activists who claim to be humanitarians.  Our true enemies are those who are so cynical, so blood-drunk and wicked that they are willing to resort to the lowest forms of warfare.  I don’t remember Martin Luther King or Gandhi pulling out iron pipes, chains, knives and ball bearing sling shots. 

If they were truly humanitarians, they would have insisted on delivering aid and comfort to Gilad Shalit, now held captive for four years by Hamas.  And while I am not prepared to say that the dead were Hamas, or even supporters of Hamas, they were the pawns of Hamas, and many of them were thugs looking for trouble not out of love for Gazans but out of hatred for Jews.

Our anger must also be directed at those that sent Israel’s finest, bravest, best trained and most professional naval special warfare operators into a no-win police action.  And our anger must primarily be focused on those who will not allow any sort of nuanced or comprehensive discussion of Israel’s policy, actions or failings.  Frankly, it’s not treasonous for a Jew to criticize Israel.  It’s politically unwise, perhaps, but not treasonous.  And we need to start having some very frank discussions. 

I do not wish to discuss this further from the pulpit, I really don’t,  but where Israel is concerned, I am personally concerned, as I feel all of us should be personally concerned, and this has been a bad week for Israel.

Ironically, it’s a pretty bad week for the Israelites and Moses, as well.  This week, Moses sends his equivalent of a military reconassaince force into the land of Israel to get the lay of the land.  The spies come back and report that the land is indeed beautiful and fertile, but it is inhabited by mighty warriors and giants. Only two of the spies, Caleb and Joshua are confident that they will be able to conquer and reclaim their ancestral home. 

“We were like grasshoppers” say the others “To ourselves--and to them as well”, and the people hear this and lose their heart. 

Because of this lack of confidence, God decides that the entire generation must die out in the wilderness.   Only Caleb and Joshua are able to enter the promised land as the leaders of a new generation, ready and able to take on the challenge before them.

The day this decision was made is to this day mourned and observed as a fast day, the ninth of av--or Tisha’ B’av.

We’re mourning this week, too.  Again Israel finds itself in a horrible situation, and like the Israelites, the news isn’t good.  But we must be like Joshua and Caleb and stay strong.  We will prevail.  We will because we must.

I’d like to talk for a few minutes about what we read tonight.

“For in this community there is one law for you and for the foreigner that lives with you, to the last of your generations, you and the alien shall be equal before God.  One set of laws will you have, one set of rules for you and for the foreigner that lives among you.”

There are many ways to interpret this, to be sure.  First of all, the foreigner in question is in reality a ‘resident alien’ or a convert. Someone who wants to be part of the community.  This is about living together with people who may not be from your part of the world but who come to live among you.

If only the Arabs had understood this Torah.  If only those men generations ago who slaughtered and rioted and fought by any means necessary the immigration of Jews to our ancestral home had instead greeted us with the hospitality and warmth I know they are capable of. 

If only they were not poisoned by propaganda and the worst evils of European Antisemitism. 

But they didn’t and they were.  And for generations we watched Arab and Jew kill each other.  And blame each other.

This conflict is going nowhere and yet, the resolution is found in this weeks Torah portion, as it is in most weeks.  One law. One rule: We are equal in the eyes of God.  There is enough room even in the crowded land of Israel, Palestine, Canaan or whatever you want to call it, for two nations to live in peace.  King Hussein of Jordan said “You don’t make peace with your friends”.  At some point, that’s the bottom line. 

I don’t know how to stop the madness. Israel must defend itself, and must not allow people, well intentioned or not, to run a military blockade.  How it goes about stopping these things is another matter. How to deal with Hamas is another matter.  And I’m lucky. I get to preach for a living, not jump from helicopters into the middle of angry mobs. 

All I can do is pray that soon, and in our days, God will open the eyes of all concerned and we will recognize each other as brothers and sisters.  That we will find even more patience and mercy even for those who show us none, lest we become like them.  That those who hate us will realize they can not and will not ever destroy us and they will tire of burying their sons and daughters. 

We know war, our people, we have known it all our days, and yet all we long for is peace.  May we know a taste of it this Shabbat.