As you may have heard, last week I traveled with a group of T’ruah rabbis and Israeli and international volunteers who accompanied Palestinian farmers in the olive harvest. This effort, known as protective presence, is based on the hope that the presence of Israeli and international volunteers will deter settlers from carrying out violent attacks or the IDF from preventing access to the fields.

Our trip ended up getting a lot of attention because the IDF, on our third day, decided to detain a group of some 80 or so volunteers, half Israelis (including rabbis) and half internationals (including our group of American rabbis). So you may already have heard pieces of the story from the news, or from the substack live I posted with future member of Congress Brad Lander who joined the rabbinic delegation. But here’s the story from the beginning, including my reflections on the impact of this event.

Why were we there?

The olive harvest, which lasts only a few weeks in October and November, has historically been a celebratory time for Palestinians, when families gather to pick olives and eat festive meals together. The olive harvest is also economically crucial, as the olive oil and olives produced from the crop can sustain families for months. Unfortunately, it has become harder and harder for the olive harvest to be a time of celebration, as the IDF increasingly blocks farmers from reaching their fields, and as settlers assault harvesters and vandalize fields. According to Yesh Din, an Israeli human rights organization, this has been the most violent olive harvest season in history, with at least 659 violent incidents across 190 communities—an average of more than 26 incidents a day. One extremist rabbi even issued a legal position permitting the theft of olives, while more liberal groups of Israeli Orthodox rabbis issued positions forbidding such theft. The fact that there is even a debate on this point is a moral failure. Jewish law (like most law codes) clearly forbids theft and imposes heavy monetary penalties on those who steal, and even declares stealing from non-Jews to be worse than stealing from Jews, since this act encompasses both theft and hillul Hashem—the desecration of God’s name. (Tosefta Bava Kamma 10:8)

Nearly every single day, Israeli volunteers from groups like Rabbis for Human Rights, Standing Together, B’nei Avraham, and others travel to the West Bank to assist Palestinian farmers in the olive harvest, as well as to sleep in Palestinian villages that are targeted for violence, and to accompany shepherds grazing their animals. On virtually every trip I’ve taken to Israel over the past few years, I’ve joined these Israeli volunteers, sometimes by myself and sometimes with other T’ruah rabbis. Contrary to discourse in the United States that seeks to establish a strict dichotomy between being “pro-Israel” and “pro-Palestine,” on the ground in the region, there are real partnerships and real friendships between Israelis and Palestinians, albeit in the context of a serious power differential. But on the ground, most people understand that neither Israeli Jews nor Palestinians are going anywhere, and that we need a solution that will ensure the safety and dignity of everyone there.

This year, because of the escalating violence, Israeli, Palestinian, and American Jewish organizations (including T'ruah) teamed up for a major effort to create the Protect the Harvest coalition, whose work includes bringing some 250 internationals to volunteer over the course of five weeks of the harvest (we are currently in week two). During the first week of this effort, T’ruah brought a group of American rabbis and friends (including Lander) to spend a week picking olives. (A number of other T’ruah rabbis are bringing their own congregational delegations as well, are there now, or are joining in future weeks).

Ok so what actually happened?

Last Monday and Tuesday, we spent two beautiful days picking olives. It was quiet, the weather was lovely (though way too hot for October in Israel), and we spent hours in trees, on ladders, and on the ground picking many large sacks of olives, chatting with international and Israeli volunteers and our Palestinian hosts, and drinking way too many cups of strong coffee, sometimes handed to us by our hosts even as we balanced on tree branches.

Here are some rabbis picking olives. (Not sure who took these pictures, so apologies that there’s no credit.)

It felt very anticlimactic, especially as we were prepared for settler violence or for the IDF to kick us out. Personally, I was emotionally preparing for a repeat of last year, when settlers dropped a drone on my Israeli rabbinic colleague and shot over the heads of our American/Israeli rabbi group. Instead, we had two perfect days—though our Palestinian hosts told us that they would not have dared come to their fields that day without our presence.

On Wednesday, we traveled with members of Rabbis for Human Rights (an Israeli rabbinic organization) to olive groves belonging to the residents of Nahalin, a village only a few kilometers from Beitar Illit, a Haredi settlement in the West Bank. We knew that the proximity to the settlement meant that there would be a higher chance of violence or of the army closing down the area. We also knew that the owners of this grove had not been able to reach their olive trees since October 7, and that the economic loss weighed heavily on them. The area, untouched for three years, was covered in thorns and weeds, but we made our way through and began another beautiful morning of olive picking.

Before long, we noticed a drone above, presumably sent by the security team at the nearby settlement. Soon, police showed up, followed by the army.

As expected, the army proceeded to request and receive a “closed military zone” order, and instructed us to leave. We were prepared for this, and began to gather our equipment and the olives and to make our way out of the area, with a plan then to move to a different field and to spend the rest of the day harvesting there. This is all pretty normal (within an abnormal situation). I can’t even count the number of times I’ve been with Israeli activists visiting (or trying to visit) Palestinian residents of the West Bank, only to be told that the area where we are standing, or where we are heading is suddenly a closed military zone.

Of course, the definition of “closed military zone” isn’t fixed, or applicable to everyone. It’s more like Eeyore’s rain cloud, often hovering just over Israeli activists, but not settlers. In May, I traveled with a group of Israeli activists to try to visit Janata, a village subject to significant settler violence, and the police—who had been tracking one of our vehicles since Tel Aviv—stopped us on the highway just outside of Efrat, a major Israeli settlement, and told us that we were in a closed military zone, and that Janata was also closed. This was, of course, absurd, as cars with Israeli plates whizzed by us in every direction. And soon after the police accompanied us to an exit from the West Bank, we received photos of settlers, accompanied by soldiers, at that very moment invading the village we had intended to visit.

In any case, we expected that this would be how our time in Nahalin ended: agreeing to leave quietly, loading the olives into trucks, and reorganizing ourselves to move to another field. The IDF had different plans. They took our passport numbers, then, as we arrived at the road where our minibuses were to pick us up, they instead told us that we were being detained, and loaded us onto buses. Those who couldn’t fit on the buses were instead put on our own minibus, with our own drivers, who were told to drive to the police station where we were headed. Some of the Israelis were even instructed to drive their own cars there.

We arrived at the Beitar Illit police station, where we proceeded to wait for many hours—ultimately, we were there for about 7 or 8 hours, with the Israelis and the internationals kept separately. (there have been some reports that the internationals were taken to an army base, but this is not true—though I believe that some people may have been told that that’s where we were heading.) One older Palestinian woman, among the owners of the trees, was also brought along, and spent hours in detention with us as anyone with some rudimentary Arabic tried to tend to her. Thankfully, she was released with the rest of us.

We have a tradition at T’ruah that whenever rabbis are detained or arrested for civil disobedience, we spend our time in the bus and in jail speaking words of Torah and singing religious songs—marking these moments as holy moments in which we are living out our religious commitments to fight for justice. So that’s what we did in the first moments of detention—we shared divrei Torah and sang tefillot (prayers). Though I want to emphasize that in this case, we were not actually carrying out civil disobedience, nor were we looking to be detained. Nothing about our actions that day was illegal—we were invited to harvest olives with Palestinian farmers in an area where it was 100% legal for us and them to be. We would have been thrilled if Wednesday had ended as Monday and Tuesday did—with our loading huge bags of olives into the vehicles of our Palestinian hosts, and returning home to try to wash the olive tree dust out of our hair.

We knew from the very beginning of our detention that the risk of deportation was high. And when our extraordinary lawyer, from the Human Rights Defenders Fund, arrived, he told us that it was almost certain that we would be deported and thus barred from Israel for ten years. This was heartbreaking news for a group of rabbis and other committed Jews who have spent significant time in Israel, and had come that week out of love for the land and its people and with a desire to ensure the safety of both Jews and Palestinians for the long term. Personally, this was my fourth time in Israel just in the past twelve months, and probably my tenth time in three years, and the thought of not being able to return for a decade was impossible to digest.

The police began to pull individuals out for interrogation, seemingly at random, and charge them with disturbing the peace, failure to follow orders, and being in a closed military zone. Of course, these charges were ridiculous. We were harvesting peacefully before the army arrived, we followed their orders immediately, and the area became a closed military zone after the army decided to make it so. (Despite the IDF’s claim, the area where we were did not appear on their maps of places where Palestinians are supposed to coordinate with the army before harvesting—there were no restrictions on our presence. Though I must also note that even if we had been in an area that requires coordination—which we were not— it is an unjust system that requires Palestinians to coordinate with the IDF in order to enter their own fields.)

And then something incredible happened: The American Jewish community, Members of Congress, and government officials in the United States and Israel stepped up. I want to give particular credit to the Reform, Conservative, and Reconstructing Judaism Movements, which represent more American Jews than any other organizations, which put out an extraordinarily strong statement immediately. I’m just going to go ahead and quote it in its entirety because it was so important:

We are outraged that at least nine of our fellow Israeli and North American rabbis and dozens of others were detained while assisting a Palestinian family harvesting olives, and we call upon Israeli authorities to follow due process, immediately release all those detained, and protect Palestinians who peacefully work their land from harassment and violence.

That farmers need to have others serve as a protective presence from violent settlers is itself a betrayal of Jewish values. Yet recent settler attacks on Palestinian harvesters and those working alongside them - and authorities’ failure or refusal to stop such attacks - have made that protective presence necessary.

Our global memberships span the political and ideological spectrum. Yet we are united in opposing all forms of terrorism across the region and in our conviction that detaining rabbis working for justice undermines Israel’s democratic values.

We are in close contact with our members and others on the scene and are reviewing all the details as they emerge. As we gather information about this detention, we call on the Israeli government to release the detainees immediately, enable the productive harvesting of land, and turn its law enforcement efforts toward the violent settlers who have long been attacking Palestinian farmers and, more recently, journalists and diplomats.

I can’t overstate the importance of this moment. Mainstream American Jewish organizations have sometimes been hesitant to criticize Israel, particularly on occupation policies. But this statement is unequivocal—condemning both the detention of rabbis and others, and crucially the very fact that our presence was even needed to deter settler violence. And behind the scenes, the movements, other Jewish organizations, Members of Congress, and other authorities worked to persuade the Israeli government to release us from detention with no restrictions. Our Israeli friends, on the other hand, were banned from the West Bank for 15 or 30 days each, though thankfully, they went to court earlier this week and got the charges dropped, and many of them are already back harvesting olives. And a few members of our group, including one of our rabbis, were interrogated further, and charged—without any basis—of supporting terrorism. Thankfully, they were also ultimately released without restrictions, and the details of their interrogation is their story to tell, though I can say that it was a terrifying, intimidating, and painful experience.

And so, the next morning, we woke up and went back out to harvest olives—just as we had planned to do every day of this visit. (the photo above of Brad Lander and me in a tree was taken on Thursday morning, after our release from detention. Despite claims by the Israeli government, we didn’t come for a photo op, but rather to harvest olives, which we continued to do as long as we could.)

Something is shifting in the American Jewish community, as more and more American Jews wake up to the realities of the occupation, of the fact that the settler agenda directs the Netanyahu government (still, of course, waiting to see what the next government looks like), and that Israel has adopted policies of cruelty and violence toward Palestinians and even toward Israeli activists and progressive Jews from around the world. Opposing occupation, violence, and endless war is not an anti-Zionist position, but rather a position based in a commitment to the flourishing of the State of Israel, God (and elected officials) willing next to a State of Palestine, such that both Jews and Palestinians can live in dignity and safety and with self determination, each realizing their national aspirations.

The promise of the olive tree

“But I am like a vibrant olive tree in the house of God; I trust in the faithfulness of God, forever and ever. (Psalms 52:10)

For Jews, the olive tree has long been a symbol of divine protection. God compares the Jewish people to an olive tree. The menorah in the Temple is lit with pure olive oil. And Noah’s dove, of course, returns with an olive branch to indicate that God has ended the flood and committed to rebuilding the world. And the light produced by olive oil is compared to words of Torah, which illuminate a person’s way in the world. (Shmot Rabbah 36:3)

On the flip side, the destruction of olive trees is equated with divine punishment:

“You will have olive trees throughout all your boundaries, but you will not anoint yourself with oil, for your olive tree will drop its fruit before it ripens.” (Deuteronomy 28:40)

“God named you ‘vibrant olive tree, fair with choice fruit.’ But with a great roaring sound, God has set it on fire. And its boughs were broken. GOD of Hosts, who planted you, has decreed disaster for you, because of the evil wrought by the House of Israel and the House of Judah, who angered Me by sacrificing to Baal. (Jeremiah 11:16-17)

Today, it is not God destroying trees as a means of punishing the Jewish people, but violent settlers destroying trees as a means of asserting control over the whole land of Israel. On Monday morning, I landed back in New York to photos sent by an Israeli partner of olive trees chopped down by settlers in a grove just west of where we had been on Wednesday. In discussing prohibitions against cutting down trees bearing certain amounts of fruit, the rabbis of the Talmud insist that “olive trees are different because they are significant,” and thus the presence of even a small amount of fruit precludes cutting down an olive tree. (Bava Kamma 91b). Of course the rabbis are talking about cutting down one’s own tree! There is no question that destroying another person’s tree, or stealing their fruit is always prohibited. But the ancient wisdom about the significance of olive trees and the disaster caused by destroying them still resonates.

Of course, the army spends its time chasing down peaceful volunteers who are simply picking olives at the invitation of Palestinian landowners, not the violent settlers who are rampaging through fields and villages every single day, destroying trees and other property, assaulting residents, and driving families from their homes—all with the backing of the government and the army, and in accordance with this government’s policy of ethnic cleansing Palestinians from Area C of the West Bank and pushing them into major cities and towns, which are disconnected from one another and from which one generally cannot access one’s agricultural land.

It was olive oil that illuminated the Beit HaMikdash (Temple) in Jerusalem, and specifically the pure oil from the first pressing, as this oil generates the purest light, and because “olive oil is the symbol of light in the world.” (Midrash Tanchuma, Tetzaveh, 6:3)

The rabbis elaborate on the purity of the light in the Temple. It was not God, they say, who needed the light produced by the olive oil, rather:

Rabbi Avin haLevi B'eRabbi said: You find that anyone who wishes to construct windows for oneself makes them wide on the inside and narrow on the outside. Why? So that they will draw in the light (from the outside and spread it inside). But the windows in the Temple were wide on the outside and narrow on the inside. Why? So that the light would go out from the Temple and illuminate the world. (ibid 6:6)

In an ideal world, olive trees are a symbol of peace, resilience, and love of Torah, and a sign of God’s presence. The light produced by their oil has the potential to radiate out from the Land of Israel and illuminate the entire world. Unfortunately, today, the violence being perpetuated by settlers, aided and abetted by Netanyahu’s extremist government, is instead transforming olive groves into sites of hatred, suffering, and displacement. But what we showed last week is that powerful things that can happen when enough of us show up. If you are frustrated or angered by the status quo, I invite you to join us in the olive groves if you can, or to support the organizations bringing volunteers there if you can't.

I’ve written a bit already about the experience of standing with Israelis for Peace, who are long-time friends and colleagues, at a vigil to honor the memories of Israelis and foreign nationals brutally murdered on October 7 or in captivity, along with the memories of Palestinians killed in Israel’s retaliatory war. There is truly nowhere I would rather have been that night—standing alongside Israelis and American Jews, including bereaved family members, not protesting, but only reading testimonies and eulogies about those tragically killed on October 7 or in the three years that followed.

Unfortunately, our planned quiet vigil was rudely interrupted by a large group of pro-Palestine protesters carrying signs that included justifications of violent “resistance,” Hamas and Hezbollah flags, and pictures of Yahya Sinwar, the architect of the October 7 attack. As we read testimonials about Israeli and Palestinian deaths, and even as a Muslim leader recited a prayer for peace, they chanted, “say it loud, say it clear; Zionists not welcome here,” “Intifada revolution,” “Settlers out of Palestine,” “We don’t want two states, we want ‘48,” and other chants that I couldn’t make out. As Mayor Mamdani stood with the vigil participants, silently for an hour or more, they called him a traitor and accused him of genocide. I could go on. Just so it’s clear: calling for the expulsion of Israeli Jews from their homes, or of “Zionist” New Yorkers from theirs, or for violence against Jews in Israel or elsewhere is antisemitism.

Online discourse about this event, and about October 7, was no better. I won’t include links to hateful comments, but you’ve probably seen these too— claims that mourning Israeli civilians is like mourning Nazis; that Israelis, including children, are just “settlers” who deserve to be killed in the name of resistance. That “nobody cares about October 7” because of what Israel did in the aftermath. There are conspiracy theories painting October 7 as a false flag operation, or otherwise denying the murders, sexual assaults, and kidnappings of that day. And there is no end to the dehumanization of Israelis online. This was abundantly clear after a group of heroic passengers prevented the deaths of nearly 180 people in an attempted hijacking of a FlyDubai flight. Online discourse, including from influencers with tens of thousands of followers, promoted the conspiracy theory that this was a false flag operation, or alternatively argued that such a hijacking would have been justified. Over the past three years, I’ve seen mocking of the appearance of Israeli hostages, justification of violence against Israelis and “Zionist” Jews and institutions anywhere in the world, and celebration of the tragic death (in New York) of an Israeli influencer. And, of course, Hamas’s very actions on October 7 and their treatment of hostages included profound dehumanization of Israelis—not only through murder and sexual assault, but in the videos and photos they uploaded to social media, their macabre phone calls to family members of their victims, keeping hostages in cages or tied up, and much more.

There is also, of course, widespread dehumanization of Palestinians from the other side. In the days after October 7, Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant declared, “We are fighting human animals.” In the film Naza, interviewees who served in intelligence units speak of calculating the number of “naza” (a Hebrew acronym for nezek agavi, collateral damage)—as in “20 naza” rather than “20 people,” and of dropping bombs on homes while knowing that children were inside. Too much online and off-line supposedly pro-Israel discourse also reflects this dehumanization. When news broke of an impending hunger crisis in Gaza two summers ago, the right-wing outlet The Free Press rushed to claim that the children featured in news reports were suffering from pre-existing illnesses (as though such illnesses wouldn’t make these children even more vulnerable to starvation), and much of the mainstream Jewish world amplified this claim, rather than show any sympathy for starving children. Photos of Palestinians who have been killed or wounded are often met with accusations of “Pallywood”—that is, conspiracy theories that these are staged photos or videos. And even mainstream Jewish organizations and leaders blame Palestinians for their own suffering, either dismissing everyone in Gaza as Hamas, or arguing that Palestinians deserve their fate because they voted for Hamas 20 years ago (before most people in Gaza were even born) and haven’t gotten rid of them since (ask Israelis or Russians or for that matter Americans how easy it is to get rid of an authoritarian government.)

This week, we start reading the Torah again from the beginning, starting with the creation of the world. It’s a beautiful sight: the sun, moon, stars, oceans, trees, flowers, birds, beasts, fish, all being created and filling the world with their glory. And then, finally, the first human being is created b’tzelem elohim. This description of humanity as created in the image of God means that human beings are due infinite dignity, and that the death of even a single human being diminishes the divine presence:

How were the Ten Commandments arranged? Five on one tablet and five on the other. On the one tablet it was written, “I am the ETERNAL your God,” and opposite to it, on the other tablet, was written: “You shall not murder.” This tells you that if one sheds blood it is considered as though this person has diminished the image of God.” (Mechilta d’Rabbi Yishmael, Tractate BaChodesh)

Being created in the image of God also means that human beings, like God, have agency—including the ability to act to ensure the protection of other human beings. That’s why immediately after creating the first human being, God begins to give that human a series of commands about how to act—and why so much of Torah is concerned with concretizing laws that aim to ensure the dignity of everyone.

So it’s quite a surprise that the first Torah portion also includes the story of the very first murder! One might think that it would take more than a generation before human beings forgot the story of our creation and started killing each other. No such luck. Cain and Abel, the sons of Adam and Eve, get into a dispute, seemingly because Cain is upset that God did not favor his offering. God apparently sees that Cain is about to act rashly and warns him, “If you do not do right, Sin crouches at the door;
Its urge is toward you, yet you can be its master.” (Genesis 4:7)

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On this the midrash declares: “Happy is the person who stands above their transgression, and their transgression does not stand above them, as it is stated, ‘Sin crouches at the door.’” (B’reishit Rabbah 22:6)

Through a bit of wordplay, the same midrash then suggests that the sin described starts off weak, but becomes stronger over time. The text offers a few metaphors for its growth:

Rabbi Akiva said: At first it is like a spider web, but in the end it becomes like the rope of a ship. This is what is written, “Woe to those who pull iniquity with flimsy cords, and sin like the rope of a wagon.” (Isaiah 5:18)

Rabbi Yitzchak said: At first, it becomes a guest, and afterwards, it becomes the master of the house.

Cain may have a legitimate resentment against Abel. According to midrash, they may have been arguing. Or, Abel may even have attacked him first, then ultimately had mercy. (ibid 22:8) But, like a spider web that becomes a thick rope, Cain’s initial resentment grows and grows until he commits the ultimate sin against his brother. When hatred moves in, it may seem like a guest that can come and go, but ultimately, it takes over and becomes the master of the house.

(In what seems to be the second murder in the Torah, in which Lamech, a descendant of Cain kills an unnamed man, midrash suggests that it was actually Cain whom Lamech killed, and that he did so because he literally mistook Cain for an animal. [Aggadah B’reishit 4:23])

Those who care about Israelis and those who care about Palestinians have reason to be fearful and resentful of the other. Israelis (who include both Jewish and Palestinian citizens) and Jews across the world are still living with the trauma of October 7 and still mourning friends and relatives killed on that day. Thousands of Israelis are still living with physical injuries sustained on October 7 or in the war that followed, as well as serious psychological injury. And Palestinians in Gaza are still living under fire and being killed on a near daily basis. Most residents of Gaza are displaced from their homes, mourning friends and family killed over the past three years, and many are seriously injured, without critical health or other infrastructure. The same goes for Palestinians in the West Bank who are experiencing daily violence at the hands of the state, while also mourning friends and family who have been killed in Gaza or the West Bank. So too the many Palestinians across the world who have lost relatives and loved ones.

Activists have a choice about whether to turn anger into a hatred that can overpower us, or to assert control over it. One can protest and advocate for the safety and rights of Israelis and Palestinians, support legislation aimed at ending the bloodshed, and argue for one’s ideal political solution without dehumanizing the other side. (These do not need to be the two sides—there can also be the side of humanity and coexistence vs. the side of endless war and degradation—but I’m speaking to the reality of how this discourse goes down.)

The midrash prescribes a remedy against the evil inclination, which seeks to overpower us:

Rabbi Hanina bar Papa said: If your evil inclination comes to make a fool of you, push it away with words of Torah. If you do so, I (God) will ascribe to you as though you created peace, as it says, “If the inclination is near, protect yourself with peace (shalom shalom).” (Isaiah 26:3). . . “shalom” is not written here, but “shalom shalom.” (that is: the first shalom refers to engaging in Torah and the second shalom refers to the peace that one creates by pushing away the evil inclination). And if you say that it is not under your control, the verse adds, “because you can rely on yourself.” (ibid.) And I already wrote for you in the Torah, “Its urge is toward you, yet you can be its master.” (Genesis 4:7) (ibid)

As God warns Cain, anger can quickly become an overpowering force that leads one to dehumanize and, in the most extreme cases, commit acts of violence and even murder toward another person. But part of being created in the image of God is to have true agency and free will: the ability to choose to master our lowest urges and rise instead toward peace.

Photo credit: Gili Getz. Picture from September 24, 2026 Jewish/Israeli protest against Netanyahu at UN

In advance of tomorrow’s anniversary of October 7 on the Jewish calendar (Shemini Atzeret outside of Israel, Shemini Atzeret/Simchat Torah in Israel), and the secular anniversary next week, I want to return to an article I wrote for Ha’aretz nearly a year ago about how the current state of discourse around Israel/Palestine is like one in which everyone chooses a team and refuses to see any merit in the other team, or any fault in their own.

I think about this dynamic all the time, but a few events over the last few weeks have reminded me that it’s still alive and well:

1. When Prime Minister Netanyahu came to the U.N., I was glad that T’ruah and many of our partners sponsored a rally (picture above) protesting him for his actions both toward Israelis and Palestinians. But most of the organized Jewish community didn’t co-sponsor that rally, but rather focused on protesting antisemitism, both at the UN, or in the case of a few Jewish schools, outside of Gracie Mansion. On the other hand, some pro-Palestine groups did protest Netanyahu, but without any mention of the deaths of Israelis on his watch.

2. I got to see Naza earlier this week. I may write more about it later when it’s not erev chag/erev Shabbat, but the film is a painful indictment of a system in which technology allows for those making life/death decisions to feel removed from the consequences of their actions. But the response of much of the Jewish and Israeli establishment has been denial, or casting the filmmakers as traitors (to the point that there are serious threats against their lives), rather than pausing to even consider the serious charges.

3. As soon as news broke about the miraculous rescue of nearly 180 people on the FlyDubai flight, thanks to the heroic efforts of a handful of passengers, an injured pilot, and two off-duty pilots, some popular social media accounts began promoting the conspiracy that this was a false flag operation, or justifying what seems to have been an attempted hijacking and murder of a planeload of Israelis. (I’m not actually sure which is worse: to assume that because it made Israelis look good that the event couldn’t have happened, or to wish that the hijacker had succeeded in his murder/suicide mission).

It’s actually not that hard to care about both Israelis and Palestinians, and to affirm the humanity of both. One can desperately want the killing of Palestinians in Gaza to end, while also desperately wanting Israeli families to stop losing their children to war. One can believe in Palestinian freedom without justifying the attempted murder of 180 Israeli civilians. And one can support the freedom and self-determination of Israelis and want the same for Palestinians. This is actually the human approach.

More of my thoughts are below, and the entire article is linked here, but here are some excerpts:

Over the past two years, the loudest and most amplified voices have been the most extreme. As the brutal war between Israel and Hamas dragged on for nearly two years, many pro-Israel and pro-Palestine partisans doubled down in their insistence on the total justness of their own camp, and the pure evil of the other.

On one side, this included the dehumanization of Israeli Jews and the justification, minimization and even denial of the October 7 Hamas attack.

On the other side, this included the dehumanization of Palestinians, the refusal to hold Israel responsible for any of the death and destruction in Gaza, and the denial of reports of starvation in Gaza.

Each side passed around its own tragic photos – Israeli children killed on October 7, or Palestinian children killed in subsequent airstrikes – while trying to debunk or explain away the others. Each camp ignored or refuted any evidence that might challenge their own positions or cast blame on their own side. . .

A surprising Talmudic text pushes back against the tendency to commit to the orthodoxies of one’s own camp, to pressure others into unanimity, and to refuse even to consider contradictory information.

A person who is accused of a serious crime, according to the Talmud, appears before a court of 23 judges, who question witnesses, consider evidence and ultimately issue a verdict. Ordinarily, a majority of only two or more judges is necessary to convict. For example, if 13 vote to convict and 10 vote to acquit, the defendant is judged guilty and sentenced accordingly. However, “if all the judges saw fit to convict, then they acquit.” (Sanhedrin 17a). . .

Talmudic jurisprudence goes to great lengths to ensure that an innocent person will not be convicted – often to the point of allowing for the acquittal even of those who have indeed committed crimes. The trial begins with an argument for the defense. The judges actively seek out testimony that would favor acquittal. When the time comes to render the decision, the least distinguished judges speak first, lest they be swayed by the opinions of more prominent judges. . .

Crucially, after issuing a guilty verdict, the trial is suspended overnight, forcing the judges to sleep on the decision, on the chance that new evidence may emerge, or that some of those who voted to convict might, overnight, come around to the opinions of colleagues who voted for acquittal. (Mishnah Sanhedrin 4:1-2)

But when every single member of the court has voted to convict, there is no colleague who has argued for acquittal, so there is no chance of a judge waking up in the morning to realize that their colleague was right. Without any possibility for overturning a conviction, the court instead lets the person go free. . .

The Talmud demands that instead, we ask where we can find merit in the other side, and whether our understanding of the truth is mistaken even in part, because mistaken certainty has such severe consequences for the accused, as well as for the judges. It asks us to reject the comfort of unanimity within our own camp, and to reach for dissenting voices – not as a procedural technicality, but as a moral necessity. . .

The rabbis of the Talmud built safeguards into the justice system precisely because they understood that even learned, well-intentioned judges could shut out dissenting voices or feel social pressure to agree with one another. They realized that unanimity of thought is not evidence that one has arrived at the correct conclusion, but rather a warning signal that one has ignored evidence that could lead to a more robust picture of reality. . .

Shabbat shalom & chag sameach to those who are celebrating the holidays this weekend.

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“How dare you sit in your comfortable living room in New York and tell Israel what to do when your children don't have to serve in the army?”

I cannot count the number of times this complaint has been lobbed at me by American or Israeli Jews in the center or right who are angry that a progressive rabbi (or worse! An organization of progressive rabbis!) would draw public attention to ongoing occupation, Israeli war crimes in Gaza, or the fascist/Kahanist direction of the current Israeli government. Or even worse, highlight and host Israeli human rights defenders who are fighting for their own government to comply with basic human rights law-- often being tagged as traitors, incited against by the government, and barred from speaking in supposedly Zionist/pro-Israel institutions in the United States.

Unfortunately, many Jews in the center/mainstream have bought this line of thinking. I’ve had so many conversations over the years with otherwise progressive/liberal Jews who say “I am ok with criticizing Israel on gender/religion/social issues, but don’t think I have the right to criticize when it comes to security.”

This criticism has always been profoundly hypocritical. U.S. donors, both Jewish and Christian, have invested billions of dollars in constructing settlements, supporting Netanyahu and his cronies, and building the right wing infrastructure that laid the ground for the assault on the judiciary, that helped drive the ideological shift to the right, and that promotes forever war. If anyone is sitting in their comfortable living rooms and endangering Israelis, it's these donors who are perfectly happy to sacrifice other people's children to forever wars and to administering an occupation over another people. Most of these donors likely have much nicer living rooms than I do, and no compunction endangering Israelis and Palestinians from their sofas. (Note that the photo above is from a random furniture store whose photos are in the public domain--one of the few non-AI public pictures available. I can't say anything about the giving habits of anyone with this particular sofa).

None of this is new. But today, Haaretz released a new investigation showing how the US-based Tikvah fund has invested millions in placing a settler elite in charge of Israel's military and pushing the country toward forever war, even making explicit that peace is not the goal.

This is the same Tikvah fund that publishes Tablet Magazine and Mosaic, two publications read by lots of mainstream Jews who may or may not be aware of its ideological pedigree; that sponsors the many fellowships that a high school, middle school, or college student in your orbit may have taken part in (or a Jewish studies teacher or grad student or many others); and that is promoting Jewish “classical education,” drawn straight from Catholic classical education. (It's telling that at Emet Academy, the first such Jewish school, Latin is mandatory and Greek is offered, but Talmud is not even mentioned on their website (when the school first opened, it was at least listed as an elective! Maybe it still is offered, just not advertised. ) Anyone who has opened the Talmud knows that the ancient rabbis would have something to say about that!)

(Tikvah was also the recipient of a massive NEH grant even as virtually all other Jewish and most other cultural grants were cut.)

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In 2018, Yediot Achronot, a middle-of-the-road Israel newspaper, published an investigation of how Tikvah was using its funding to push U.S. style libertarian policies on Israel. At the time, this article produced a mild stir, with even centrist Israelis angry about this meddling. It turns out that Tikvah’s actions then were nothing compared to what was to come.

Tikvah also contributed to the plan to destroy the judiciary—the move that brought tens of thousands of Israelis to the streets in 2023—though a different set of U.S. billionaires were the primary movers and shakers behind that scheme, via the Kohelet Forum. The Kohelet Forum also provided the legal framework for the argument that the first Trump administration should recognize the settlements, and crafted the Nation-State law which downgraded the status of Palestinian citizens of Israel and of Arabic.

I could keep going with more and more examples of U.S. billionaires (& non-billionaires) investing millions and millions of dollars in creating the Israel of their dystopian fantasies—a fortress and a pariah state with a permanent occupation, engaged in forever wars with its neighbors, and a refuge only for Jews who are politically right wing and Orthodox/Orthodox adjacent.

I’ve written a lot more about this over the years. You can read more in this Washington Post article and this Forward article, and elsewhere.

But here’s my point: those who are committed to creating this dystopian Israel are not giving up. They are putting more and more money into enacting their vision, all while yelling at progressive Jews for supposedly “telling Israel what to do” by protesting Netanyahu, volunteering for protective presence in the West Bank, platforming Israeli and Palestinian human rights and peace activists, and supporting U.S. legislation aimed at compelling Israel to follow the same laws as other countries when it comes to U.S. weapons sales.

Many progressive Jews have responded by walking away from Israel—deciding that they want nothing to do with the country, or declaring themselves to be “diasporist,” and building a Jewish life divorced from Israel and the half of the Jewish people who live there. Instead, progressive Jews should take a page from the Tikvah/Kohelet/right wing donor playbook and invest in the Israel (and Palestine) we want to build for the future—including investing in human rights and civil society, pressing the U.S. government (or the government of whatever country you live in) to take real steps to implement a two-state solution (which, despite the fantasies of some western leftists, remains the only solution with a chance of working, and the least unpopular one among both Israelis and Palestinians)

U.S. billionaire donors have spent decades investing in destroying any shred of democracy in Israel, perpetuating occupation, and trying to ensure a future of endless war. This is not the time to walk away, but rather to re-invest in the future of both Israelis and Palestinians, God willing soon each with a sovereign state that ensures the dignity and safety of its inhabitants. And next time someone yells at you for criticizing Israel from the confines of your comfortable living room, tell them to talk to the people implementing their dangerous messianic fascist vision from their even fancier comfortable living rooms.

Can a state be an ox? Or its owner?

One of the first pieces of Talmud many students learn concerns a goring ox. The discussion is very long and complicated, but in short: if an ox gores another animal, the owner pays “half damages”-- half of the monetary loss to the owner of the gored animal. However, once the ox becomes known to be dangerous (mu'ad), which generally happens after it has gored three times, the owner must pay full damages. (As with just about everything in the Talmud, the specifics are much more complicated and beyond the scope of this post. Also, the penalties for goring and killing a human being are much more serious.)

The rabbis debate whether the half damages imposed on the owner of the goring ox constitute an actual assessment of damages or a fine (kanas). This may seem like an academic point--regardless of the reasoning, the cost to the owner remains the same. But conceptually, these principles are different. Damages are meant to compensate for losses, whereas a fine is intended to deter bad behavior. As one rabbi argues, “God penalized him so that he would guard his ox” (Bava Kamma 15a)

The goring ox came to mind when I read the Senate Bill introduced last week that would impose sanctions on anyone involved in the construction of settlements in E1, the area of the West Bank considered the “two-state killer,” as settlement there would cut off the possibility of a contiguous Palestinian state. For years, Israel has threatened to build settlements there, but has backed down in the face of international pressure. But Israel has now published tenders for thousands of housing units in E1 (one bid, for 1234 units, opened in August and a second, for 2167 units, was scheduled to open in October but now may open post election per below.)

Jewish legacy organizations and their leaders have long opposed any legislation that holds Israel responsible for its violations of international law. I haven’t seen much response to this bill so far (though may have missed some statements), but we can safely assume that many prominent legacy organizations and their leaders will decry this bill as antisemitic, or as holding Israel to a different standard than other countries.

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The senators who introduced this bill, including Chris Coons, Elizabeth Warren, Ron Wyden, and Ruben Gallego cannot be dismissed as haters of Israel. All have supported funding for Iron Dome, Israel’s critical system of defense against rocket fire. As the announcement of this new bill made clear, these senators decided to act because Prime Minister Netanyahu crossed what has long been a red line for the United States, and because they are committed to preserving the possibility of a two-state solution—still the only reasonable solution to ensure the safety, dignity, and achievement of national rights for both Israelis and Palestinians.

Like the rabbis assigning penalties for the owner of a goring ox, these senators are trying to prod Israel to do the right thing. In the case of an ox, one pays a small penalty the first few times the animal does harm. In the best case scenario, this penalty inspires the owner to take additional precautions. But in the worst case scenario, the ox proves itself to be an ongoing danger. An owner who doesn’t take responsibility at that point faces much more serious consequences.

An ox that gores once or twice does not need to be a perpetual gorer. An animal that proves that it has become more gentle can regain its designation as tam—an ox not considered to be dangerous. With each new red line the Netanyahu government crosses, it becomes more and more clearly mu’ad--presupposed to be dangerous. And it becomes clearer and clearer that change will only come when the U.S. and other international actors impose meaningful consequences. But all hope isn't lost--an Israeli government, whether led by Netanyahu or someone else, has the chance to change course, follow international law, and regain the trust of the international community.

This metaphor isn't perfect-- Israel here is both the mu'ad ox that has a record of doing damage, and the owner, who is the human being responsible for preventing the damage. (I can't really comment on the intelligence of oxen, but it's people, not animals, who have legal responsibility in Jewish law).

Words are not enough. Only real penalties will dissuade Israel from this new construction and force them to change course. Indeed, the international condemnation may have had an impact, as the attorney general this week instructed the government to delay the publication of the tenders for E1 until after the election. Those who love and care about the future of Israel and Israelis have long had a knee-jerk reaction to any talk of sanctions or other penalties, in part born of trauma from previous boycotts of Jews, especially in Nazi Germany. But states, including Israel, have responsibilities under international law and can face consequences for violating those laws. The best case is that sanctions such as these prod Israel to do what is right, including halting the settlements that are blocking a future peace agreement that will allow both Israel and Palestine to flourish, and both Israelis and Palestinians to live in freedom and safety.

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I originally wrote this piece in September 2024 for the Z3 blog. I’ve updated it based on the events of the past two years, but the Torah (Jewish teaching) remains the same. If you’re interested in what I was thinking a year after October 7, you can read the original here.

A young rabbi steps onto a train traveling through Poland. It’s the middle of World War I, and soldiers pack every car. He squeezes down the length of the train, searching for a seat, terrified by the obviousness of his Jewishness. Finally, another passenger guides him to a car that is nearly empty--save for a single dying soldier slumped on a bench, bleeding profusely. The soldier’s moans grow louder and louder, and the rabbi can’t take it anymore. He flees from the car, back into the throngs of presumably hostile soldiers, and spends the rest of the ride nearly suspended mid-air in the overcrowded train.

Decades later, Rabbi Moshe Avigdor Amiel (1882-1945)had become the Chief Rabbi of pre-state Tel Aviv. He reflected on this story about himself while searching for answers to a perplexing theological question: Why does Jonah, the prophet who runs away from God, merit a book of his own? [1] And, we might add, why is this book, in its entirety, read on Yom Kippur afternoon, as we prepare to re-enter the world following an intense day of soul searching?

Amiel recognized that his escape from the unbearable face of the dying soldier mirrored Jonah’s flight from God. “I should have sat by his side, and maybe I could have eased his pain,” he writes. “It is clear that it was not from the eyes of this unfortunate soldier that I fled. Rather, it was from the eyes of God.”

Jonah was unique, Amiel continues, in that he fled from God only once. “For him,” Amiel explains, “this fleeing is considered a great ‘innovation’ such that he found it appropriate to write it in a book for the ages.”

In contrast, though, “all people who are not prophets are constantly fleeing from God. They are engaged in fleeing from the day of their birth until the day of their death... for behold, I myself, who do not consider myself to be such a terrible person, behold I am surrendering myself by standing among these rowdy soldiers, who at every moment are ready to tear my beard and threaten my life, as long as I do not see the dying soldier who reminds and awakens the God within me, and my duty to the world.”

Amiel’s fear of the soldier is not due only to squeamishness about blood. He describes this man—and the other soldiers on the train—as having “the hands of Esau” and “the feet of Esau.” Esau, of course, is the biblical character who who threatens to kill his brother Jacob after being tricked out of his birthright. But in Jewish thought, Esau also represents Christianity, the Roman Empire, and even warfare in general.[2] Amiel recoils from the soldier in part because he understands that if it weren’t for his compromised state, this man could easily harm him. And yet, Amiel is able to look at this soldier and see in his fading eyes the eyes of God imploring him to stay.

For the past three years—and for decades before that—much of the Jewish community has chosen to look away from the suffering of Palestinians, whether the civilians killed by Israeli bombings in Gaza, those driven from their villages by violent settlers in the West Bank, or those tortured in military prisons. In the course of the Gaza war, the ongoing violence taking place during the ceasefire, and the daily violent attacks by extremist settlers (aided and abetted by the government and the army), major Jewish organizations and leaders have often simply ignored the unbearable suffering of Palestinians, accused human rights organizations of misrepresenting the reality, disparaged the entire population of Gaza as Hamas supporters, and paid outsized attention to the pro-Palestine activism of pop stars and college students rather than grappling with the horrific reality of what Israel has done in Gaza and the West Bank.

For much of the Jewish community, it is still October 7. Even three years later, many of us are still reeling from our shock and grief, both from the events of that horrible day, from the lingering trauma of the two-year hostage crisis, from the fact that too much of the world showed little sympathy for Israelis killed, injured, or taken captive that day, and from the growing antisemitism targeting many of our synagogues and Jewish communities—including violent hate crimes that have claimed lives in the U.S., Canada, the UK and beyond. Many of us continue to fear for the safety of loved ones serving in the IDF, displaced from their homes in northern or southern Israel, or still shaking from the years of rocket fire and drone attacks from Gaza, Lebanon, Iran, and Yemen. Israel is a country mired in trauma, where stickers bearing the faces of dead teenagers stare at you from every wall, every park bench, and every lamp post. Many of these include the favorite sayings of the person being memorialized—one that broke my heart this year showed a photo of a young man with the quote, “I don’t want a sticker.”

I understand the impulse to flee from the images of dead Palestinian children, to insist that the majority of those killed are Hamas terrorists, and to lay full blame for any suffering at the hands of Hamas. Some Jews worry that any acknowledgment of Israel’s war crimes, or of the overwhelming suffering of Palestinians, may somehow detract from attention to the atrocities of October 7 or lead to more antisemitism. Indeed, when I recently posted an announcement about an upcoming Jewish/Israeli-American protest of Prime Minister Netanyahu at the UN, many commentors accused me of fomenting antisemitism by publicly criticizing the elected leader of the State of Israel. For some members of the Jewish community, acknowledging the brutal death toll in Gaza requires letting go of platitudes about “the most moral army in the world” and coming face-to-face with the realities of more than half a century of Israeli control over a stateless people.

Indeed, the political climate of the past year has made many people feel compelled to take one side or the other—Israelis or Palestinians. It has been shocking to see some pro-Palestinian protesters align themselves with Hamas and Hezbollah, justify violence against Israeli Jews as “decolonization,” or cheer for Houthi attacks on U.S. ships. The recent uproar about Adidas featuring an Israeli soldier amputee in an ad for its “single shoe” program is but one example of the inability of some to consider the humanity of Israelis and the trauma they also have endured. (The soldier in question was wounded in 2021 not during the current war, but regardless—one can hardly imagine a similar response to an ad featuring an American “wounded warrior,” regardless of one’s extremely justified criticism of the wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan, or Iraq. It has been similarly shocking to watch some members of the Jewish community calling to flatten Gaza, excusing violence by settlers, promoting charges of “Pallywood”—that Palestinians are faking their suffering for the camera, denying the scope of starvation and medical crisis in Gaza, and simply looking away.

But those of us who care about Israel and Israelis need not fall into this either/or trap. We must not allow our fear and trauma to block out the fear and trauma of Palestinians. There is no contradiction in crying over the deaths of both Israelis and Palestinians, condemning war crimes by either side, or in calling for an end to the war to protect both. Indeed, this is what seeing the “eyes of God” in every single person demands.

The same totalizing either/or thinking also characterizes the discourse around Zionism today. Many pro-Palestine activists have promoted the message that Zionism is inherently anti-Palestinian—that to be a Zionist is to support atrocities in Gaza, to promote settlement growth and the expulsion of Palestinians from their homes, and to advocate for genocide. And some supposedly pro-Israel voices, both in the American Jewish community and in the Israeli government, act and speak in such a way as to confirm these beliefs.

But I refuse to allow extremists on either side to define Zionism. I think often about Vivian Silver, the peace activist murdered on October 7, who described herself as a “conditional Zionist”—that is, her own commitment to the national liberation of Jews required the national liberation of Palestinians as well. Since her death, her sons have recommitted to fulfilling that condition, to furthering her commitment “to build a world where we are not invested in distrust and dehumanizing of the other, but where peace is a reality,” as her son Yonatan Zeigen has written.

When Jonah finally arrives in Nineveh, he delivers his prophecy. And then, the unexpected happens—the people of Nineveh repent, and God forgives them. But Jonah is distraught, angrily telling God “this is why I fled beforehand to Tarshish!”

God responds by providing Jonah with a kikayon, a plant that provides him shelter from the scorching sun. And then God sends a worm to destroy the plant. Jonah is again furious. God reprimands him, “You cared about the plant, which you did not work for and which you did not grow. . . and should I not care about Nineveh, the great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons. . . “ (Jonah 4:10-11) God has infinite empathy for every single one of God’s creations, all of whom are created in the divine image. And here, God reminds Jonah—and all of us—that our responsibility is to mirror and channel God’s own empathy, care, and commitment to saving lives.

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The young Rabbi Amiel, too, disembarking from his train, ends up in a large city. As he makes his way through the crowds there, he watches people “running and fleeing, as if hidden forces were chasing them,” and pretending not to see “men and women of all kinds, elderly men and women, those in labor and nursing babies wrapped in rags, shivering from the intense cold, their hands outstretched for help, and their mouths asking for bread from all the passers-by.”

Newly enlightened by his revelation on the train, he reflects, “we always treat with respect the attacker, and not the attacked; the strong and not the weak; the pursuer and not the pursued. All of this is because we are busy morning, evening, and afternoon fleeing from God. Everything that reminds us of God and the image of God, is hateful to us, we distance ourselves from it a bowshot’s distance, and even beyond this, because “God seeks the persecuted.” (Ecclesiastes 3:15), and in the case of everyone who is persecuted, God is persecuted with them.

God is again demanding that we look in the eyes of the people of great cities, of small villages, and of refugee camps, in the eyes of both Israelis and Palestinians, and see them all as creations of God. The question for us, as for Rav Amiel and the prophet Jonah before us, is: will we recognize God’s eyes looking back out at us, or will we yet again flee?

[1] R’ Moshe Avigdor Amiel, Le-Nevukhei HaTekufah, 1:14 (1943), cf. Drashot el Ami Yamim Nora’im 34 (1936). Translations mine

[2] See, for example, Talmud Gittin 57b

On September 11, twenty-five years ago, I woke up early to vote in the New York City mayoral primary, then walked across Central Park to Hunter College—knowing that I wanted to devote my rabbinate to social justice, I was working on a masters in urban affairs while also in rabbinical school at the Jewish Theological Seminary (twenty-somethings sleep less anyway).

We were supposed to have a guest speaker in my 8AM class that morning. Just as my professor was starting to get irritated that the speaker hadn’t shown up, someone burst into the classroom to let us know that a plane had hit one of the Twin Towers. My classmates and I crowded into our professor’s office, peering out the window at the smoke rising from downtown.

Over the next few days, in between desperately rewriting the Rosh Hashanah sermons I was due to deliver at a college campus a few days later, I volunteered at a major New York hospital, answering phone calls from family members desperately hoping that their loved one was hospitalized there, somehow unable to call home. We had the inpatient lists of all of the New York hospitals, and when a call came in, we would slowly thumb through all of the lists, looking for a name that we knew would not be there. I remember one call in particular, from a mother looking for her twenty-five year old son. I was so excited when I actually found his name—not a common one—listed as a patient. “We were already there,” she told me. “It wasn’t him—it was an old man.” Later, I saw her son’s name and thumbnail photo in the New York Times’s daily listing of those confirmed dead.

Nobody who was in New York on that horrible day will ever forget the missing posters that papered the city, the sickening smell of death, and the toxic dust that enveloped the city for weeks—dust that we now know was much more carcinogenic than the government let on at the time. And nobody who is old enough to remember that day will forget the fear, the anger, and the growing awareness that we were about to go to war. Few people could have predicted that the response to September 11 would come to include two decades of war, and a weakening of our basic civil liberties.

I had spent the 2000-2001 academic year in Israel, during the first year of the Second Intifada, which began after Ariel Sharon, then the Knesset opposition leader, made a provocative visit to the Temple Mount (on Sept 28, 2000—that anniversary is coming up as well). Every day that year involved an internal negotiation—was it safe to take a bus? To have dinner with friends? The café where my friends and I spent much of our time, believing it was too out of the way to be targeted, was bombed only months after we left. I was glad to return to the United States where I was sure everything would be quieter.

Today, we are still living in the shadows of both September 11 and the Second Intifada. The war on terror, and the two decades of war in Afghanistan and Iraq (the latter of course begun under false pretenses) have defined much of the past twenty-five years, and the Trump administration continues to make use of Bush-era assaults on civil liberties to attack immigrants, non-profits, and the rule of law. The trauma of the Second Intifada helped to destroy any chance of peace for Israelis and Palestinians. Many Israelis continue to invoke that horrific period—which included both suicide attacks on Israelis and military brutality toward Palestinians—as well as the more recent trauma of October 7 to justify almost any use of force against Palestinians, and to reject any suggestions of ending the occupation and of working toward peace.

Moments of fear are good for autocrats. Trump, Netanyahu, and autocrats across the world manipulate fear in order to justify stripping civil liberties from minorities (and ultimately from everyone), and to justify a state of perpetual war. These autocrats, of course, don’t actually care about the safety of their citizens—as clear from the bombshell report that Netanyahu ignored intelligence warnings in the days leading up to October 7, and in Trump’s willingness to send Americans to war without even trying to explain the rationale. (George W. Bush also ignored security warnings prior to September 11).

Praying to end autocratic rule

So now let’s talk about Rosh Hashanah, and particularly a specific line that jumps out from the liturgy of these days. With the rise of autocracy across the world, including in the United States and Israel, I’ve prayed harder than ever when reaching the line in the Rosh Hashanah liturgy imagining that God will someday eliminate the memshelet zadon—the rule of arrogance or the arrogant government.

This prayer appears in a three-part insertion to the Rosh Hashanah Amidah, each line beginning with uv’khen (And so):

Uv’khen, Hashem our God, instill Your awe in all You have made. . . For we know that true sovereignty is Yours. . .

Uv’khen, bestow honor to your people, Hashem, praise to those who revere You. . . May the light of David, Your servant, dawn, and the lamp of the son of Jesse, Your anointed, be kindled speedily in our day. . .

Uv’khen, The righteous, beholding this, will rejoice, the upright will be glad, the pious will celebrate with song, injustice will close its mouth, and all wickedness will disappear like smoke, when You remove memshelet zadon from the earth.

And you, Hashem, will rule alone over all Your works. . . ^[1]

This passage, which appeared in most versions of the Rosh Hashanah liturgy at least by early medieval times, may be a remnant of a talmudic debate about where to place malchuyot, the series of verses proclaiming God’s majesty, that ended up in the Musaf Amidah. ^[2] Or it may parallel the three sections of the Musaf Amidah—malchuyot (sovereignty), zichronot (remembrance), shofarot (the future redemption.”^[3] It also echoes Birkat Minim, the blessing in the weekday Amidah, which in s ome versions prays for the uprooting and subduing of “hazedim” “the arrogant” and in some versions directs this prayer toward “malchut zadon” “the kingdom of arrogance” or “the rule of arrogance.”^[4]

The unusual opening, “uv’chen” echoes Esther’s approach to King Ahasueros in the Purim story: “Then I shall go to the king, though it is contrary to the law; and if I am to perish, I shall perish!” (Esther 4:16) Like Esther, Rosh Hashanah petitioners understand full well the presumptuousness of daring to approach the sovereign—in this case, the divine Sovereign—with demands.^[5] In contrast to the arrogance of the memshelet zadon, the petitioner approaches God with fear and humility.

The Kingdom of Arrogance

The word zadon itself indicates arrogance or insolence. A person who sins b’mezid understands full well the impropriety of their actions, and actively chooses the wrong path.

In the Bible, the prophet Ovadiah voices God’s anger toward the tribe of Edom for their betrayal of Israel: “The arrogance of your heart (zadon lib’kha) has led you astray. . . You think in your heart, who can pull me down to earth?” (Ovadiah 1:3). From their perch high in the mountains, Edom has come to view itself as invincible. The fact that this tribe descends from Esau, the brother of Jacob, renders its participation in Israel’s destruction even harder to bear.

The Book of Proverbs, too, offers sharp words for those who display this sort of arrogance:

When arrogance (zadon) appears, disgrace follows, but wisdom is with the modest.(Proverbs 11:2).

The proud insolent (zed) man, scoffer is his name, acts in a frenzy of insolence (zadon). (Proverbs 21:24).

This person, one commentator explains, is “one who challenges God and the ways of the Torah intentionally (b’mezid) and publicly. . . and if excessive pride is joined with it, this person mocks wisdom and the wise.”^[6] An arrogant person, says another commentator, “is a person wicked in their opinions, who rushes to judge matters without proper examination—then disgrace and shame follow this person, for reality will not conform to what they judged about it.”^[7]

Arrogance can sometimes turn out to be a virtue, as in the case of a young David, who arrives at the scene of a battle with the Philistines, curious to observe his older brothers and the other soldiers on the battlefield. His oldest brother, Eliav, scolds him, “I know you, your impudence and the evil of your heart—you came down to watch the fighting!” In the end, of course, David defeats Goliath, and eventually becomes king. But his arrogance follows him throughout his life, leading him to be scolded and punished again and again for violating divine law. Ultimately, God forbids him from building the Temple in Jerusalem because he has so much blood on his hands.

What are we asking for?

I have already noted the variety of ways to translate “memshelet zadon,” and specifically the question of whether this prayer refers to an actual government, or to an unjust mode of governing. To take just a sampling of contemporary siddurim:

“dominion of arrogance” (Adler, 1959)

“tyranny of arrogance” (Rabbinical Assembly, Lev Shalem, 2010)

“arrogance of rulers” (Hillel, On Wings of Awe, 1985)

“the power of injustice” (Reconstructionist Press, Kol HaNeshama, 1999)

“the rule of arrogance” (Koren Sacks, 2011)

“the stunning sight of arrogance gone from the earth” (CCAR Press, Mishkan HaNefesh, 2015)

In contemporary Jewish and Israeli political speech, memshelet zadon can refer to any government one opposes, from the right wing factions of the nineties using this term to refer to the Rabin government or more recently to the “change government” of 2021, to anti-government protesters in Israel today applying it to the Netanyahu government, to me sitting in shul praying for the downfall of autocracy in both the United States and Israel.

Modern protesters are hardly the first to apply this phrase to an actual government, rather than to the more ephemeral “arrogance” or “wickedness.” David Aboudraham (Seville, 14^th century), who composed one of the most influential commentaries on the siddur and on prayer customs, wrote:

This is the Roman Empire. . . for when the arrogant empire (malchut zadon) is uprooted, there will no longer be subjugation to kingdoms (shi’abud malchiyot) in the future. (Tefillot Rosh Hashanah).

In a parallel comment on the weekday amidah, he identified “malchut zadon” with “the kingdom of Amalek” that the Talmud “calls a guilty kingdom.”: “It shall devour the whole earth and tread upon it and break it into pieces” (Daniel 7:23), and Rabbi Yoḥanan says: This is the guilty empire of Rome whose coin circulates throughout the entire world.” (Shavuot 6b) “For this reason,” Aboudraham continued, “the sages decreed to curse them morning and night, as it says in a verse in relation to Amalek, ‘Moses’ hands grew heavy, so they took a stone and put it under him. . . thus his hands remained steady until the sun set.’ (Exodus 17:12). All of the other kingdoms only wage war until the sixth hour of the day, but a guilty kingdom makes war day and night. And Amalek is from the seed of Esau.” (Aboudraham, of course, lived well after the fall of the actual Roman Empire, but Rome was hardly the last government to do evil.)

The question of whether we are praying for specific governments to fall, or for evil in general to disappear echoes a famous talmudic passage in which Rabbi Meir is praying for the death of a group of thugs in his neighborhood. His wife, Beruriah corrects him, citing a verse that reads “Let sin depart from the earth,” (Psalms 104:35) not “let sinners depart from the earth.” The end of the verse, she tells him, reads “the wicked will be no more,” meaning that once the evildoers repent, there will be no more wicked. Rabbi Meir adapts his prayers accordingly and the thugs repent.

During the Obama and Biden presidencies, I often had the opportunity to visit the White House for the annual Chanukah party, or for a Jewish Heritage Day event or a Jewish communal briefing. Being inside could be intoxicating. I often imagined the reaction that my great grandparents would have had to eating kosher sushi and tahini brownies at the home of the President of the United States, while a U.S. army band played Chanukah tunes. And, I often reminded myself of the rabbinic adage, “Be careful about the ruling authorities for they do not befriend a person except for their own needs; they seem like friends when it is to their own interest, but they do not stand by a man in one’s hour of distress.” (Pirkei Avot 2:3) I couldn’t let the delight of eating avocado sushi in the East Room (z”l) distract me from the day-to-day work of fighting for justice, whether supporting legislators to pass just laws or fighting the passage of unjust laws.

People often look to elections to save us from corrupt and evil governments. And elections are certainly crucial! Imagine often how different the past decade would have been if any number of elections had gone differently. We will never know how many deaths could have been avoided if Hillary Clinton had been presiding over the beginning of the Covid pandemic, if Netanyahu had not pursued a judicial coup and never ending war, or if Trump had not dismantled USAID or gone to war with Iran or made any number of other monumental decisions. And yet, not even the best of governments has its people’s best interests in mind all of the time, and not even the best of governments can wipe out arrogance and evil.

Our ancestors prayed for the fall of Rome, which the Talmud describes as an evil empire that persecuted Jews, abandoned the poor, and served the whims of its wealthy and pampered leaders. Today, we might pray for new governments in the United States, Israel, Russia, North Korea, Sudan, China, Venezuela, or any number of other countries that have succumbed to authoritarian rule. The collapse of autocratic governments is a necessary, but insufficient step toward the ultimate goal—a righteous world living under divine sovereignty.

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Praying for the fall of memshelet zadon inspired one nineteenth century rabbi to imagine a future world with no need for government at all. Rabbi Mordechai Leiner, known as the Ishbitzer Rebbe (Poland 1801-1854), commented “That is, even after there are no more evil governments anywhere, God will be sovereign, for in this world, the king must avert the evil of the evildoer, but if the entire world were righteous, there would be no need for a king, but rather the sovereignty of God, for after all will cease, the Awesome one will reign alone.” (Mei HaShiloach, Vol II, Rosh Hashana prayers)

The role of the king, the Ishbitzer says, is to preserve the rule of law, and to prevent evil. This reflects the Bible’s notion of the king’s duties: “David executed true justice (mishpat u’tzedakah) among all his people.” (II Samuel 8:15) “O God, endow the king with Your judgments (b’tzedek), the king’s son with Your righteousness (b’mishpat) that he may judge Your people rightly, Your lowly ones justly.” (Psalms 72:1-2) The Ishbitzer seems to suggest that the fall of evil governments will allow for the realization of God’s sovereignty, under which the entire world will be righteous, thus eliminating the need for even the best of human governments. That is, redemption will come not when evil governments are replaced with just ones, but when evil governments fall in order to be replaced with divine sovereignty alone.

When God takes the Israelites out of slavery, God does not declare them now to be free people, but rather to be God’s servants. “For the Children of Israel are my servants.” (Leviticus 25:55). “That is, the Israelites do not trade in servitude for anarchy, but rather trade servitude to human beings for servitude to God. There can be no freedom without Torah, a new series of laws that will form the basis for a sacred community in relationship with God.

The insistence on servitude to God alone comes with a deep cynicism about human governments, and specifically kings. In preparing the people to establish sovereignty in the Land of Israel, the Torah warns them that if, in the future, they decide to appoint a king, this king must not amass horses, wives, or gold and silver. Rather, this king is to have a Torah written for him in order that “he may learn to revere his God, to observe faithfully every word of this teaching as well as these laws. Thus, he will not act haughtily toward his fellows or deviate from the instruction.” (Deuteronomy 17:15-20) This king is effectively one of the people—neither richer than others, nor permitted to lord it over them, and obligated in the same laws and the same obligations to God as everyone else. Indeed, the king’s only special role appears to be studying Torah and taking special care to follow its precepts.

Later, when the people do, in fact, ask for a king “like all other nations,” the prophet Samuel is distraught. God instructs him to give in to their wishes, saying “For it is not you that they have rejected; it is Me they have rejected as their king.” (I Samuel 8:7) If the people had accepted God’s sovereignty, they would have no need for a human king. Samuel dutifully warns them of the dangers of a king, who is likely to seize both property and people, force the people into servitude, and care only for his own needs. Nevertheless, the people reiterate their demand for a king. As expected, the series of kings who rule over Israel from this point forward in the Bible include some who generally try to act justly, and others who act with utter malice. Some attempt to enact just laws and practices, and others promote idol worship and disregard for basic morality. And even the best of the kings also accumulate wealth and multiple wives for themselves, just as God warned.

The opposite of memshelet zadon is not a righteous government or anarchy, but rather the sovereignty of God. Granted, this is not an easy ask! Governments aren’t going to disappear anytime soon, and if they did, little about our current world suggests that everyone would suddenly submit to God’s ideal of justice.

Rome must fall. It’s crucial to work for, and to pray for, the cruelest, most corrupt governments and leaders to lose power. So yes, this Rosh Hashanah, I’ll be praying for the end of the memshelet zadon. And following Rosh Hashanah, I will be joining other T’ruah rabbis in working to protect the election, including by acting as poll chaplains at key polling sites across the country. But it’s not enough.

Even the most well-meaning and just governments and leaders are prone to arrogance, and to prioritize maintaining their own power. We can certainly breathe more easily when a better government takes over, but can never stop working toward the ultimate vision of divine sovereignty, including insisting that even our favorite elected officials live up to the standard that the Torah demands of the king—that he be an exemplar of obedience to divine law. Nor can we ever get so swept up in passion for a particular political figure or government that we forget that we are “God’s servants and not servants to servants.” Transforming or replacing autocratic governments with more just ones is essential. But freedom will come only when we upend the arrogance that infects even the best governments, and remember that we are ultimately servants to God alone, not to even the most powerful of leaders.

^[1] Translation adapted from Machzor Lev Shalem, Rabbinical Assembly, 2010.

^[2] See for example Sefer Aboudraham on Rosh Hashanah

^[3] See for example, Elbogen, Ismar, Jewish Liturgy: A Comprehensive History, Trans. Raymond P. Scheindlin (Jewish Publication Society, 1993). 118-119 and summary of positions in Eliyahu Munk, Olam Hatefilot (Mosad Harav Kook, Sixth Edition 1994) 189-191

^[4] The Yemenite text of the Siddur reads “U’Malchut Zadon ta’akor v’tishbor m’heira b’yameinu” “Uproot and break the kingdom/rule of arrogance speedily in our days.” Nusach Sefarad has “U’malchut harasha m’heira t’aker ut’shaber.” “Uproot and break the kingdom/rule of evil speedily.” The Ashkenazi nusach skips any mention of kingdoms or governments and prays, “v’hazedim m’hera t’aker ut’shber ut’mager, v’tachnia bimheira v’yameinu.” “Uproot and break and subdue and humble the arrogant, speedily in our days.” The version that Rambam (Maimonides) includes in the Mishneh Torah is nearly identical to that of the Yemenite liturgy. (Order of Prayers 2:13) For a more extensive discussion of Birkat Minim, see Elie Kaunfer’s forthcoming book, Come Closer: Interpreting Jewish Prayer, Hadar Press (with thanks to Rabbi Kaunfer for sharing a draft chapter) and Ruth Langer, Cursing the Christians (Oxford University, 2011)

^[5] See Sefer Aboudraham, Rosh Hashanah 14

^[6] Malbim Beur Hamilot on Proverbs 11:2

^[7] Ralbag on Proverbs 11:2

For the past thirty years, I have not stopped thinking about Rav Aharon Lichtenstein’s words to his students at Yeshivat Har Etzion following the assassination of Prime Minister Rabin in November 1995. I first read these words that fall as former students of his began circulating a copy of his talk around my college campus, and I have re-read his speech over and over through the years. If you haven’t seen it, here it is in English and in Hebrew. It’s worth reading in full. But in the meantime, here’s a taste:

For to the extent that we feel any sense of unity within Am Yisrael, to the extent that we feel like a single body, then the entire body should feel shamed and pained no matter which limb is responsible for this tragedy. We should feel deep shame that this method of supposedly solving conflicts has become part of our culture. But naturally, this shame should be felt by our camp, the National Religious camp, more than any other. Here was a man who grew up in the best of our institutions. A day before the murder, he could have been cited as a shining example of success and achievement, and a source of communal pride. Coming from a "deprived" background, he studied in a Yeshiva High School, attended a great Yeshivat Hesder, and was accepted to the most prestigious division of Bar-Ilan University. Today, we hide behind the phrases, "a wild weed," (esev shoteh) "from the outskirts of our society." But if a day before the murder we would have said proudly, "See what we have produced," we must say it now as well: "See what we have produced!" It is indefensible that one who is willing to take credit when the sun is shining should shrug off responsibility when it begins to rain. Let us face our responsibility.

I think about this text every time I hear Prime Minister Netanyahu describe the settlers carrying out violent attacks in the West Bank as “handful of rioters,” or hear Israeli and Jewish leaders describe those carrying out the near daily assaults on Palestinian villages as wayward teenagers, or as a few extremists, rather than facing the reality that these violent settlers are acting with the full backing of the state and the army, and are doing the Netanyahu government’s dirty work, expelling Palestinians from Area C and increasingly Area B of the West Bank in order to make more room for settlements and to destroy any possibility of a Palestinian state.

(Rav Lichtenstein died in 2015, but his son Rabbi Mosheh Lichtenstein has recently spoken out strongly against settler violence).

“We hide behind the phrases, “a wild weed,” “from the outskirts of our society,”. . . “See what we have produced.”

Our parasha this week, too, warns about wild weeds, albeit using different agricultural language than Lichtenstein did:

פֶּן־יֵ֣שׁ בָּ֠כֶ֠ם אִ֣ישׁ אֽוֹ־אִשָּׁ֞ה א֧וֹ מִשְׁפָּחָ֣ה אוֹ־שֵׁ֗בֶט אֲשֶׁר֩ לְבָב֨וֹ פֹנֶ֤ה הַיּוֹם֙ מֵעִם֙ יְהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֵ֔ינוּ לָלֶ֣כֶת לַעֲבֹ֔ד אֶת־אֱלֹהֵ֖י הַגּוֹיִ֣ם הָהֵ֑ם פֶּן־יֵ֣שׁ בָּכֶ֗ם שֹׁ֛רֶשׁ פֹּרֶ֥ה רֹ֖אשׁ וְלַעֲנָֽה׃

Perchance there is among you some man or woman, or some clan or tribe, whose heart is even now turning away from the ETERNAL our God to go and worship the gods of those nations—perchance there is among you a root sprouting poison weed and wormwood.

וְהָיָ֡ה בְּשׇׁמְעוֹ֩ אֶת־דִּבְרֵ֨י הָאָלָ֜ה הַזֹּ֗את וְהִתְבָּרֵ֨ךְ בִּלְבָב֤וֹ לֵאמֹר֙ שָׁל֣וֹם יִֽהְיֶה־לִּ֔י כִּ֛י בִּשְׁרִר֥וּת לִבִּ֖י אֵלֵ֑ךְ לְמַ֛עַן סְפ֥וֹת הָרָוָ֖ה אֶת־הַצְּמֵאָֽה׃

When hearing the words of these sanctions, they may imagine a special immunity, thinking, “I shall be safe, though I follow my own willful heart”—to the utter ruin of moist and dry alike. (Deuteronomy 29:18-19

God is not subtle about warning the people of the dangers of sovereignty. Throughout the book of Deuteronomy, as the Israelites stand on the banks of the Jordan River, God reminds them again and again that the land ultimately belongs to God, not to them, and that God is the one who bestows sovereignty, and who takes it away. “The land is Mine; you are but sojourners resident with me.” (Leviticus 25:23). “[If] you say to yourselves, ‘My own power and the might of my own hand have won this wealth for me. . . if you do forget the Eternal your God. . . you shall certainly perish like the nations that God will cause to perish before you.” (Deuteronomy 8:17-20) The Jewish mission in the Land of Israel is to worship God and to bring the divine presence to dwell there, not to pursue power, wealth, and might.

Wormwood, the Netziv (Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Berlin, 1816-1893) is more pernicious than poison weed, as it doesn’t taste so terrible at the beginning, but slowly becomes more and more bitter. This herb, he says, refers to the person who seemingly upholds Torah, but without actually submitting to divine service. This person can easily spread dangerous ideas to those who may not, initially, recognize their danger.

The wormwood has been spreading through Israeli society, particularly in the national religious camp, for decades. If once, those in the violent extremist camp were rejected as “wild weeds,” now they have gained power in government, and have shifted the Overton window toward their dangerous views. Thankfully, many legacy American Jewish organizations and leaders have now condemned the violence sweeping the West Bank, though most continue to portray it as the act of a handful of extremists rather than the expression of government policy, or take at face value expressions of concern by Israeli government officials.

In the 1940s, Rabbi Moshe Avigdor Amiel, then the Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Tel Aviv, warned of two phenomena whose root had become “root sprouting poison weed and wormwood.” These were, on the one hand, assimilation, and on the other hand, secular Zionism, both of which placed land before Torah—the former, privileging any place where Jews might find themselves, and the latter privileging the Land of Israel. (LeNevuchei HaTekufah 4:8)

Secular nationalism, he writes, is based on “a materialistic worldview. . . where justice and uprightness are with whoever holds power” and where only one law prevails, “that the great swallow the small.” This brand of nationalism “draws nourishment [lit: nurses] first and foremost not from the ‘image of God’ within a person, but from the destructive impulse found within, from hatred of anyone not of one’s own race, or not a citizen of the land.” This nationalism, he says, is based on idolatry, not on a relationship to God.

In contrast, the mission of the Jewish people in the Land of Israel is to “perfect the world under the kingdom of God.” Thus, “the foundation of foundations and root of roots of [Jewish nationalism] is the image of God within a person, and this is the image of God within a person and the absolute spirituality reigning over all. . .And ultimately, the whole purpose of our nationalism is: “And it shall come to pass in the end of days... and all the nations shall flow unto it” (Isaiah 2:2). . . “there shall be one constitution (chukah) for citizen and ger alike” (based on Numbers 9:14, with a play on words between chukah and chok—law).

(I have written more about Amiel, specifically about the intriguing essay that follows this one, here.

Amiel was a Zionist. He believed that the return of Jews to the ancient homeland had the potential to fulfil the divine mission and to bring us closer to redemption. But he saw the poisonous roots and the wormwood being planted in the state early, encapsulated in the position that believed that only military and political might would make Jews safe. Today, these poisonous roots have spread, certainly in the religious Zionist communities that have set aside virtually every other law—including the most basic prohibitions against murder, as well as Shabbat actions, in order to pursue a dangerous messianic vision of taking more and more of the land of Israel and of driving out Palestinian residents. These poisonous roots have birthed a state policy that is currently ethnically cleansing Palestinians, and that threatens to destroy any future for both Jews and Palestinians in the land. Everyone who cares about the land and the people who live there must face this sobering reality head on, not hide behind claims that a few radical wild weeds have somehow gone astray.

Apologies for sending this out just a half hour before Shabbat in New York. Shabbat shalom, and an early Shana Tova.

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Perhaps God was looking ahead to July 2026 in dictating the ominous warning of this week’s parashah:

When you have eaten your fill, and have built fine houses to live in, and your herds and flocks have multiplied, and your silver and gold have increased, and everything you own has prospered, beware lest your heart grow haughty and you forget the Eternal your God—who freed you from the land of Egypt, the house of bondage. . . and you say to yourselves, “My own power and the might of my own hand have won this wealth for me” Remember that it is your God who gives you the power to get wealth, in fulfillment of the covenant made on oath with your fathers, as is still the case. If you do forget your God and follow other gods to serve them or bow down to them, I warn you this day that you shall certainly perish. (Deuteronomy 8:12-14; 17-19)

Right now, the West Bank is on fire—literally and figuratively—and the Netanyahu government is doing everything possible to fan the flames. This year, settler violence has hit an all-time high, with more than 100 incidents in July alone. On Friday, an incursion of armed settlers into a village near Nablus led to clashes in which four Palestinians and two Israelis were killed. In response, the army imposed closures and raided homes throughout the West Bank. Elsewhere in the West Bank, settlers set fire to two mosques, as well as cars and agricultural land. (Here’s a link to the statement that T’ruah, the organization where I serve as CEO, put out this week).

A new explosion of violence serves the purposes of the extremist Netanyahu government, which is seeking excuses to seize more and more land for settlements, push Palestinians out of Area C of the West Bank, and distract attention from their utter failures in every measure of governance, security, and diplomacy. A third Intifada just months before the election would likely drive Israelis toward the political right, and allow Netanyahu to return to his favorite talking points—that he’s “Mr. Security,” and the left endangers Israel. (The intelligence and operational failures of October 7 and his refusal to save the hostages any earlier belie this claim).

It’s like God knew this was going to happen.

A Warning about Sovereignty

At the moment that the people are standing on the other side of the Jordan preparing to enter the promised land, the Torah pauses and reminds them that sovereignty and power can be dangerous. It’s so easy to persuade oneself that “my own power and the might of my hand” are the sources of one’s good fortune, and to come to believe that one is justified in lording this power over others.

Over the past decades, there has been a massive shift in Religious Zionist communities from a focus on religious connection to the land and to the mitzvot that can only be carried out there, to the worship of militaristic power—what Israeli historian Dror Greenblum has called the shift from a “Redemptive-universalist stance” (ha’emdah ha’geulit-universalit) to a “Messianic-activist stance” (ha’emdah hameshichit-activistit).1

This messianic activist stance allows settlers to justify virtually any violent behavior, including behavior that violates fundamental Jewish laws, including the laws of Shabbat. In past years, we have seen settlers wearing kippot and tzitzit taking chainsaws to Palestinian olive trees and setting fire on Shabbat and chagim (major holidays). These are violations of the highest order (d’oraita) of Shabbat and chag prohibitions. This behavior reveals an approach toward sovereignty that exalts power and dominance over every mitzvah connected with living in the Land of Israel.2

Again and again, the Torah warns that God’s gift of the land is contingent upon the people observing mitzvot and living in the land in such a way as to glorify God, not to bring glory to themselves. “Let not the land spew you out for defiling it, as it spewed out the nation that came before you,” God warns. (Leviticus 18: 28) Even the most oft-quoted verse of the Torah in liberal circles, “Justice Justice you shall pursue” continues “so that you may live and inherit the land that God has given you.” (Deuteronomy 16:18). The divine bequest of the land goes hand-in-hand with establishing a fair system of justice there.

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God grants sovereignty and God takes sovereignty, according to the actions of the current stewards of the land. The land ultimately belongs to God (ki li ha’aretz), and its human stewards are responsible for living on it in such a way as to compel the divine presence to dwell there.

Nor is God particularly impressed with the quarrelsome group that has spent the past forty years complaining, rebelling, and doubting. Also from this week’s parashah: “It is not because of your virtues and your rectitude that you will be able to possess their country; but it is because of their wickedness that your God is dispossessing those nations before you, and in order to fulfill the oath that God made to your fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Know, then, that it is not for any virtue of yours that your God is giving you this good land to possess; for you are a stiffnecked people.” (Deuteronomy 9:5-6) Restoration of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel, as described by the Bible, comes about only if God wills it, and as a result of adherence to mitzvot, including both ritual practices and ethical behaviors.

But what about the conquest(s)?

Ok, you say, but doesn’t God command the Israelites to conquer the land? How is the Bible’s bloody story of conquest, related in the Book of Joshua, any different from what violent settlers are doing today? Indeed, many of these violent actors do view the conquests of the Bible as permission for any act of violence today, and do equate the Palestinians with the tribe of Amalek, whose annihilation the Torah commands, and with the seven nations whom God commands the people to conquer.

Those who make this comparison are wrong.

It’s not just me saying this. Some of the greatest sages of Jewish tradition have made clear that the conquests of the Bible are not precedent for carrying out one’s own conquests. For one thing, in the Bible, God speaks directly to Moses, Joshua, and later religious and political leaders, and tells them when and how to make war. Perhaps some violent settlers today believe they also have a direct line to God. To this, the Talmud would respond, “after the last prophets Chagai, Zecharia, and Malachi died, the divine spirit [of prophecy] departed from the Jewish people.” (Yoma 9b) In other words, God isn’t speaking directly to anyone anymore, and definitely is not dictating war plans.

Second, the relevant seven nations no longer exist—per tradition, they’ve gotten all mixed up with the other peoples and can no longer be identified. Rambam (Moses Maimonides), one of the most important legal scholars and philosophers, explains, “Their memory has already been obliterated.”3 As for Amalek, the mitzvah of wiping out their memory remains, but the tribe itself does not, and certainly cannot be equated with modern-day Palestinians. According to Sefer Mitzvot Gadol, a thirteenth century listing and elucidation of the commandments, the imperative to wipe out Amalek “is not operative except in the messianic era, after the conquest.”4

In the 1980s, when Rabbi Chaim David HaLevy, then the Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv, was asked whether biblical commands regarding killing Midianites could be applied to Palestinians, he rejected out of hand the suggestion that the seven nations still exist, and wrote, “This is a very grave mistake, for based on this it is not permitted to kill any individual person.”5 In other words, he makes clear what is implicit in Maimonides: any permission for violence against non-Jews in the land of Israel only includes people who have long since disappeared.

In a separate response to a question about whether all Palestinians should be seen as rodfim—pursuers who may be killed in self-defense, HaLevy wrote:

I am entirely astounded by the foolish idea that we should see in this light a million and a half Arabs, the great and decisive majority of whom live their private lives quietly and calmly, even if at the same time they are hostile to Israel, whom they see as an occupier, just because there are some like this among them—and they are no doubt a tiny minority—who do hurt us and come to kill us. Because of this tiny minority would we decree death on a million and a half human beings?”6

The obligation to remember Amalek remains—but, as midrash notes, this is a mitzvah of the heart and of the mouth.7 There is no license today to equate any people with Amalek or any of the seven tribes, and certainly no religious justification for murdering Palestinians, destroying villages, firebombing homes, or uprooting olive trees. Settlers or others who terrorize and attack Palestinian civilians are guilty of the very sin about which God warns us when readying us to enter the Land of Israel: becoming so drunk on our own power that we forget that the land comes from God, and we are just residents there (gerim v'toshavim atem imadi, Leviticus 25:23) A true religious stance demands yirah, fear and awe of the Divine, a refusal to turn the land itself into an idol for worship, and humility about our own place in relation to it.

Blood Pollutes the Land

We are just a few days past Tisha B’av, a day that reminds us that God is not messing around with the warning that disobedience can lead to expulsion. Among the sins traditionally understood to have led to the destruction of the Temples and the exile are murder and the utter disregard for human life:

For the sin of bloodshed, the Temple is destroyed, and the Divine Presence leaves Israel, as it says: “You shall not pollute the land in which you live” and “You shall not defile the land which you inhabit, in the midst of which I dwell.” If you defile the land, you will not inhabit it, and I will not dwell in it. (Talmud Shabbat 33a)

Shedding blood both defiles the land itself, and breaks the bond between God and the Israelites. This text offers an important rebuke to those who defend violence in the name of laying claim to more and more of Eretz Yisrael—including settlers who regularly attack Palestinian villages in the West Bank with Molotov cocktails and rock throwing, and the Israeli army, which routinely responds to demonstrations by Palestinians with rubber bullets and live fire.

In 1938, in the midst of an Arab revolt against the British powers in Mandate Palestine, including attacks on Jewish communities, the Zionist leadership, including both secular authorities and the chief rabbinate endorsed a policy of havlaga—restraint, both for reasons of morality and pragmatism. Responding to violence with more violence would both weaken the moral foundations of the state, and could also provoke the wrath of the British, who were the primary targets of the revolt. In this context, and in response to those who focused on the pragmatic justifications for havlaga, Rabbi Moshe Avigdor Amiel, then the Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv, wrote:

“Do not murder,” without any conditions, and without any exceptions. “Do not murder” because “Whoever sheds human blood, by the human hand shall that person’s blood be shed; for in the image of God God made humanity.” Every single person is included in this, whoever they may be. . . It is not appropriate for Israel to achieve its goal—the establishment of a national home in the Land of Israel—if the means of realizing this goal are invalid, for the final goal of Zionism is not only a majority of Jews in the land of Israel, but rather the goal of “the end of days” for tikkun olam b’malchut shaddai. (the repair of the world under the sovereignty of God)8

In other words, Zionism is legitimate to the extent that it upholds the highest moral principles consistent with bringing about the final redemption of the world. He wasn’t a pacifist, but rather insisted that power must be checked by the rigid ethical standards that God has made a condition of sovereignty.

This is not to say that Jews should reject sovereignty or power outright. Jews have tragically learned over and over throughout history the dangers of powerlessness, or of depending on the goodwill of gentile governments and leaders for our safety. The establishment of the State of Israel was a crucial step toward ensuring a refuge for Jews fleeing oppression elsewhere in the world. But unchecked power can easily lead to immoral and violent acts. As the Torah cautions, the realization of sovereignty must always be coupled with understanding that the land belongs to God, and that our sacred mission is to act in such a way as to reflect this humility.

Virtually every time I’ve traveled to the West Bank with Israeli and Palestinian activists, we have encountered settlers intimidating us, filming us, or trying to prevent us from entering certain areas. And increasingly, the IDF has prevented us from entering certain areas, saying that they are closed military zones. But I have experienced direct settler violence only once, this past November, while leading a group of T’ruah rabbis on a three-day protective presence visit to the West Bank. While we picked olives with a Palestinian family, along with Israeli rabbis and other Israeli activists, a drone operated from a local settlement buzzed above our heads. It drew lower and lower, until it fell onto the arm of an Israeli rabbinic colleague, leaving a gash in her arm. Minutes later, two armed settlers, dressed in IDF fatigues, ran down the hill to retrieve their drone. On their way out, one of them fired a shot, thankfully above our heads. The army then declared the area a closed military zone and escorted us out.

Because it was American and Israeli rabbis in the field that day, the incident garnered news coverage in the US, Israel, and across the world. The IDF even had to respond finally, claiming that they had reprimanded the two men involved. The Reform, Conservative, and Reconstructionist Movements issued an unusual joint statement condemning the violence and sending support to their rabbi members were there. This was really important. And it was also noticeable that other major organizations, including the Federations in the cities where these rabbis came from, said nothing. And, perhaps obviously, most of these organizations have said nothing as settler violence has become a daily, and sometimes deadly, occurrence in the West Bank, and as more and more Palestinian communities have been terrorized into fleeing their homes. Perhaps these major Jewish institutions were afraid to amplify the worst behavior of Israeli citizens and soldiers. Perhaps they believed, as so many pretend to be true, that these were the actions of a few bad apples, rather than government policy. But this silence serves neither Israel and Israelis nor Palestinians.

In the words of Rabbi Shimshon Raphael Hirsch, “The Torah was not given for the sake of the Land of Israel; Rather, the Land of Israel was given for the sake of the Torah.”9 There is a moral imperative for Jews, both inside and outside of Israel, to put an end to the violence and the bloodshed that are polluting this holy land, and to ensure that the state reflects the divine vision of a just society, and that it becomes a place that protects the dignity and safety of everyone living under its jurisdiction.

Earlier this week, I went to visit a colleague, a long-time leader of a partner organization of T’ruah, who has been in immigration detention for more than six months. Because his legal case is pending, I’m not going to use his name or share specific details about his situation, but he gave me permission to write about the visit in general, in order to share just a small glimpse of the cruelty and dehumanization of the Trump administration’s assault on immigrants.

Here’s how a visit to immigration detention goes:

(the specifics are different for each place, and this is actually one of the less terrible ones):

• The visiting hour is 4-5PM but you need to arrive by 2:30 if you want to make sure to get in.

• The waiting room is perfectly comfortable—air conditioning, a bathroom, seats. But you can’t wait there! The clerk at the desk tells you that you have to wait outside until she’s ready to give out tickets.

• There’s no shade outside. You lean against a pillar to try to get some shade from the building, and watch a pregnant woman sweltering as she consults with her lawyer about her husband’s case.

• At some random point in the next half hour or so, the clerk emerges with a set of numbered tickets. Now that you have a ticket, you can wait inside.

• Someone comes by to check everyone’s clothing. Here’s a partial list of what’s not allowed: shorts or skirts that don’t reach the knees when you’re sitting down; leggings; v-neck shirts, or any shirts that don’t sufficiently cover the clavicle; sleeveless shirts; open-toed shoes; “gang colors,” whatever that is supposed to mean; hoodies or jackets, even blazers. On this visit, I watched a 60-something year old woman get turned away because her pants were deemed too tight—I wouldn’t even have called them leggings, just tight pants. I desperately wished I had brought a pair of pants that would fit her—next time, I will come with a pile of sweatpants. On my first visit, I almost got rejected because I was wearing a blouse with a tiny keyhole, closed by a button, at the nape of my neck. I was wearing a blazer over it, but had to take it off—see the rule about no jackets. The clerk told me she’d let me in “because it’s your first time.” It no doubt helped that I was white, spoke English, and dressed like the lawyers also crowding the waiting room. Some facilities are even worse— there are stories at Delaney Hall of babies in onesies and toddlers in leggings not being allowed in. (if you’ve ever had a toddler, you know that they mostly only wear leggings. Anyone who thinks that is provocative is truly sick.)

• Eventually, the clerk starts calling numbers. When your number is called, you turn it in for a lock and a clip-on pass with yet another number. Now you wait until they start calling this set of numbers.

• It’s now past 4PM. Finally, they call numbers, and everyone goes through the metal detector and into a small holding area, from which we are eventually let into the visiting room. It’s 4:30 PM.

• The visiting area is thankfully a big room with small tables, where you can sit with your loved one and talk normally, not through plexiglass. The conversation feels weirdly normal—we talk about our families, the state of the world, and a book I recommended to him on the last visit and mailed to him afterwards. We talk strategy—it’s almost like the old days of being colleagues, except now the strategy is about his case, not someone else in need of support. We consider the danger of deportation to a third country. We pray together. At exactly 5:30, with one hug each, the visitors are escorted out, and those in detention are led back inside. (thankfully, they gave us the full hour even though they started late).

Here’s more of what I saw and heard:

• A mother, no older than 25, handing a tiny newborn to his father, perhaps for the first time. He holds the baby on his shoulder until the very last moment, when mom and baby have to leave him behind.

• Another mom with a giggly 13-month-old who is waving and smiling at everyone in the waiting room, and who gets to play with her dad for this one brief hour.

• A woman, on a previous visit, who tells me that she is trying to figure out how to run the family business without her husband, while spending hours every afternoon visiting him (or, more precisely, waiting to visit him).

• A motivational poster in the waiting room proclaims “we care.” (there were a few more declarations like that, but I forgot to take a picture). On the walls of the visiting room are multiple posters, in English and Spanish, encouraging voluntary deportation.

My colleague tells me about a man he met who owned a business that employed twenty American citizens, who are now all unemployed—one more reminder of the falsehood of claiming that immigrants take jobs from Americans. He tells me about the men who have been woken at 4AM to be flown to Louisiana or Texas, without their family having any idea that they have been moved. Some of these men have then been returned, bearing with them stories of the brutal conditions in these other prisons, and of being driven to the Mexican border, only to return to detention if they refuse to leave the bus. We talk about his $1/day job in prison —a depressing departure from full-time nonprofit work. He tells me that he’s spending a third of each day translating for Spanish speakers who are handed forms to sign that are all in English. He tells me about the many people in the detention center who have no legal representation. There are posters around the center, he says, with numbers to call for pro-bono lawyers, but none of the numbers work. Later that night, through the special app (35 cents a message) that those detained can use on a designated tablet, he texts me the name and id number of a person he told me about who is in particularly dire straits. I tell him I’ll look for a lawyer who can take his friend’s case, and start texting (for free) people who might help.

The midrash connects connect the first verse of our parasha, in which Moses speaks of his unsuccessful plea to God to enter the Land of Israel, with a verse in Proverbs, “The poor person beseeches; the wealthy one answers with arrogance.” (Proverbs 18:23) Riffing on this latter verse, Orchot Tzadikim, an anonymous 15th century book of ethics, comments:

The one who has the trait of arrogance commits sins in great quantities, but thinks of oneself as righteous. And in this vein, we confess our sins saying: We are not so arrogant and stiff-necked to say before you, God, “We are righteous and have not sinned,” but rather “we and our ancestors have sinned.” And this is a grave evil1, one who is wicked and says “I haven’t sinned,” and for this the Holy Blessed One enacts judgment and offers no mercy. . .

This attribute is very evil, as it brings a person to shame one’s fellow and the poor, as it says “The poor person beseeches; the wealthy one answers with arrogance.” (Proverbs 18:23). . . it is appropriate for a person to distance one’s soul from arrogance. (Orchot Tzadikim 4:5)

The Trump administration is not only carrying out grave evils against immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers, but also has the audacity and the arrogance to proclaim that they are fully righteous, and that they have not sinned. On the day-to-day level, we witness this arrogance in the blatant disregard for the humanity of our neighbors, and the justification of cruel policies, including ongoing ICE raids; the killing of two men in a single week (to make a total of four this year); the abominable conditions in detention centers, some of which were not designed to meet basic human needs; the stripping of temporary protected status from nationals of countries like Haiti, Syria, and Venezuela to which it is unsafe to return; and the banal cruelty toward those who spend most of their day attempting to visit loved ones in detention, only to be turned away because their pants are too tight, their shoulders are exposed, or their baby is wearing a onesie. I have some sympathy for those working in these detention centers. Most are people of color, and some are likely immigrants, including the clerk I watched translate for a few Spanish-speaking visitors. These are low-paying jobs, but steady jobs nonetheless in a moment when steady jobs are hard to come by. And yet, being put in this situation, as a representative of a cruel system, often breeds cruelty and a willingness to use one’s small amount of power to enforce arbitrary rules. Those stuck in detention, and their families, are reduced to pleading for mercy, often only to be answered harshly, and with arrogance.

We have just emerged from Tisha B’av, the day in which we mourn the destruction of the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem—incidents that Jewish tradition blames on the sins of the people, including wanton disregard for human life, permission for murder, idol worship, and senseless hatred. From here, it’s seven weeks until Rosh Hashana—weeks that are marked by a series of haftarot (readings from the prophets) that offer consolation, and a promise that God will accept our teshuva (repentance/return to our best selves).

This Shabbat is known as Shabbat Nachamu, from the first words of the haftarah, “Nachamu, nachamu ami,” “Comfort, oh comfort my people,” (Isaiah 40:1). The prophet continues, “all nations are as naught in God’s sight, who accounts them as less than nothing.” (40:17)

From God’s perspective, even the most powerful and arrogant of nations and of rulers are like gerim—temporary sojourners on this earth. (Leviticus 25:23) I believe that this arrogant administration will ultimately not triumph, just as other arrogant and evil governments have fallen before. And I believe that collective teshuvah remains possible. There is no better time than this moment, leading up to Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, and beyond to begin to restore our collective humanity.

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Many of those celebrating or condemning the 100+ democrats who voted in support of the Massie Amendment to cut off aid to Israel are falling into the usual binary of assuming that one must be either pro-Israel or anti-Israel. (Which as always makes no sense… are you pro-America or anti-America? pro-Canada or anti-Canada? Different people have different visions for what countries should be and do.)

But if you actually read many of the statements of those who voted for the amendment, you find something different. Yes, some of the yes votes came from members who have not shown a lot of love or concern for Israelis/Israel. But many came from members who have spent lots of time with Israelis, who mourned with Israelis/Jews after Oct 7, and who have reiterated over & over (including in their statements this week) a commitment to peace & security and 2 states for Israelis & Palestinians.

This week, Jewish communities read the beginning of the book of Deuteronomy, which consists largely of Moses’ last words to the people before they prepare to enter the Land of Israel after his death. In this week’s portion, Moses reminds the people of some of the ways in which they went down the wrong path during their time in the wilderness. Later on in the book, we will get many, many warnings about the responsibilities and potential pitfalls of sovereignty, including God (via Moses) warning the people not to get so full of themselves that they come to believe that they achieved sovereignty through their own efforts, rather than through divine provenance. And God repeatedly lays out the responsibilities of sovereignty—specifically, the privilege of having freedom, a land of one’s own, and a government of one’s own brings with it an obligation to use this sovereignty as a means of worshipping God and of making the divine presence manifest everywhere, not as a means of seizing more and more power or of serving one’s own material desires. God also reminds the people of the dangers of getting so drunk on their own power that they forget God, disobey God’s commandments, and come to worship idols. After all, from God’s perspective, we are all gerim—temporary residents of the earth, and God is willing to give and take sovereignty according to our actions.

These warnings, of course, presage the destruction of the first and second Temples, commemorated on Tisha B’av next week. (We always begin reading Deuteronomy in the week before Tisha B’av, and Moses’ cry of lament, eicha, at carrying the burden of the people is echoed in the book of Eicha, Lamentations, read on Tisha B’av). Despite God’s warnings, the people forget that the purpose of sovereignty is to worship God and to fulfill God’s commandments, and fall into a host of sins (slightly different in the case of the first and second Temples) that include idol worship, disregard for human life, wanton hatred, and more. As a result, God brings about the destruction of the Temple and of Jerusalem by way of the Babylonians and then the Romans, and sets the stage for millennia of exile.

To be clear, I don’t want Israel to be destroyed or for Israeli Jews to be scattered or exiled. I want Israel to thrive as a Jewish State, side-by-side with a Palestinian State, both of which also have equal protections for their minority populations. Nor do most of those who voted for this amendment want to see Israel destroyed. Like me, most of these Democrats have voiced their support for two states, which—despite the naysayers—remains the only plausible solution that will allow both Israelis and Palestinians to live in dignity and to fulfill their national ambitions. (Two states can happen with a hard border—i.e. the U.S./Canada model, or a soft border—i.e. the EU model, which is what Land for All is pushing. But this is a topic for another day.)

Tragically, Israel has increasingly become an illiberal democracy run by extremist messianic fascists. We are now in the sixth decade of occupation and settlement expansion, and the Netanyahu government has allowed for near-daily and sometimes deadly settler violence that serves the government’s purpose of ethnically cleansing Palestinians from most of Area C of the West Bank; has pursued anti-democratic legislation including just in the past week or so, attacks on the freedom of the press, on the independence of the Attorney General, and on access to polling stations and voting for the upcoming election. (Bibi REALLY doesn’t want old people, who remember when a different future was possible, to vote.); and has pursued forever wars that have killed tens of thousands in Gaza, and thousands more in Lebanon and Iran, including sending far too many young Israelis to their deaths and letting hostages linger and be killed in captivity rather than making a deal. I could go on, but you probably also read the news.

There are some people who say that this all is the inevitable end of Zionism, that the Netanyahu government was effectively pre-determined by the actions of the founders of Israel, and by the British Empire, in their disregard for the Palestinian population. I do not believe this to be true, any more than I believe that the Trump administration was inevitable, or pre-determined by the actions of the founders of the United States, including their embrace of slavery and of ethnic cleansing of Native Americans. Governments and electeds make choices along the way. Unfortunately, we can’t rewrite history, but we can see many, many moments in which a different choice could have been made that might have saved lives and contributed toward a future of dignity, safety, peace, and justice for both Jews and Palestinians. (We can also see some choices that did save lives—for example, the peace deals with Egypt and Jordan have likely avoided additional wars and saved countless lives on both sides. It’s impossible to imagine Netanyahu’s government signing such an agreement.)

It’s not pro-Israel to stand back and allow this government’s, or any government’s, worst impulses run wild. Just like it’s not pro-America to stand back and allow Trump to detain and deport immigrants, disenfranchise voters of color, or otherwise dismantle democracy. We can argue over which U.S. laws and policy changes might push Israel to move down the path of democracy, of following the international laws incumbent on all states, of ending its forever wars, and of moving toward a peace agreement. But it’s clear that the old ways of doing business are not good for Israel, not good for Palestinians, not good for the United States, and not good for the world. Those who care about saving both Israeli and Palestinian lives need to push Israel to make different choices, and to live up to the responsibilities God lays out for the Jewish people—to be a sacred community, and to use the power that comes with sovereignty to worship God and to bring the divine presence into every corner of the Holy Land and of the world.

Here’s a note I shared with the T’ruah community as we approach the 250th anniversary of this country:

The 250th anniversary of the United States arrives at a fraught time for our nation and for American Jews. The Trump administration is methodically dismantling the democratic protections and institutions that the founders of this country established in order to prevent autocracy. And our Jewish community is grappling with increased antisemitism, internal divisions, and debates about the fundamental question of what it means to be an American Jew.

The United States offered Jews a home unlike nearly any other that our people have experienced during the past 2,000 years. For much of Jewish diaspora history, the best we could hope for was governments that ignored us, or allowed us some degree of autonomy or status as a protected minority. In the worst cases, secular governments overtaxed, oppressed, murdered, and exiled their Jews.

The United States offered something different — a chance for Jews to write ourselves into the story of a new nation. In 1790, Moses Seixas, a leader of the Newport synagogue and a descendant of Jews who fled religious persecution in Portugal, wrote to President George Washington to confirm, or assert, the place of Jews in the fledgling country:

Deprived as we heretofore have been of the invaluable rights of free Citizens, we now with a deep sense of gratitude to the Almighty disposer of all events behold a Government. . . which to bigotry gives no sanction, to persecution no assistance. . . deeming every one, of whatever Nation, tongue, or language equal parts of the great governmental Machine.

In a letter of response to the Newport synagogue, President Washington echoed Seixas’s words:

It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights, for, happily, the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.

Jews were not merely to be tolerated in the United States. Rather, here we could be part of the story, even helping a president to craft the very words that would welcome Jews and others into the United States.

Of course, the story was never so rosy — even as Washington composed this rejection of bigotry, he himself enslaved human beings. The United States had a long way to go before it could claim to protect the “inherent natural rights” of all people.

And the nation’s posture toward and treatment of Jews was not always as positive as this letter might make it seem. The American Jewish community has experienced antisemitism throughout our history, in multiple arenas: legal, political, institutional, and social. At the same time, we have had the experience of finding refuge and comfort in the United States — of experiencing this country as a malkhut shel chesed, a kingdom of lovingkindness, as Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, one of the most prominent 20th century Orthodox rabbis, termed it.

Since the beginning, American Jews have been asking ourselves how to relate to the United States and our place in it. Should we employ shtadlanut — the classic diaspora approach to secular governments, in which our communal leaders appeal to the government for whatever protections we can secure? Or should we throw ourselves into advocating for the United States to do better — for Jews and for everyone who lives here?

The first approach assumes that our sojourn in the United States may be temporary, that secular governments are unlikely to do right by Jews, and that we should just attempt to secure any small concessions that they are willing to make. The second writes Jews into America as a fundamental part of the story of this country. This approach insists that Jewish safety in the United States requires that “every one, of whatever Nation, tongue, or language” is equally part of the country we are building together.

Today, as our community is rightfully scared by rising antisemitism, including violent hate crimes, on all sides of the political spectrum, some leaders and community members want to build our fortresses higher: to retreat inward and isolate ourselves from other communities, to seek out special protections for Jews, and to refuse to build relationships with political, interfaith, or other leaders with whom we may have serious differences.

But there is another vision of what Jewish life could be in the United States — one in which our community fights to ensure that every community is welcome here, that everyone is seen as a crucial part of the American story that we are writing together.

This vision need not be naive about the real physical threats to the safety of Jewish communities. We have seen security systems and courageous security professionals save lives. But ultimately, no number of security systems, guards, concrete barriers, can fully protect us from harm.

As we imagine the next 250 years of the United States, can we imagine a multi-racial, multi-ethnic democracy in which Jews are comfortable being unabashedly Jewish, where we do not fear for our safety when we go to synagogue and drop our children at the JCC preschool — and where people of all faiths, ethnicities, national origins, and backgrounds can also be unabashedly themselves, without fearing for their own safety in mosques, churches, gurdwaras, schools, workplaces, and streets? Can we co-author this story with our fellow Americans of all backgrounds?

Happy birthday, America. The story isn’t finished — let’s keep writing it together.

With the financial disclosure revealing that President Trump has raked in more than two billion dollars over the last year, primarily from the sale of his crypto coins, the extent of his grift is beginning to come into view. Not only has he used the presidency as a way to enrich himself, he’s no longer even pretending otherwise. Whereas during his first term, a foreign government trying to curry favor with the president might rent out one of his properties, now they can just pay him directly. (Of course, this is the precise scenario the founders sought to prevent through the Foreign Emoluments Clause.)

Trump is hardly the only world leader to try to make a buck off of his position. Corruption and greed in government have been constants for millennia. In the Bible, when the people approach the prophet Samuel to ask for a king, he attempts to dissuade them by predicting that any king will eventually compel their sons and daughters to work for him, and will “take a tenth part of your flocks, and you shall become his slaves.” (I Samuel 8:4-20) The Torah even tries to head off this possibility by prohibiting any future king from acquiring too many horses, or amassing gold and silver, lest he become haughty, forget Torah, and jeopardize the people’s sojourn in the land. (Deuteronomy 17:14-20)

Korach, whose story we read in full two weeks ago (three weeks ago if you live in Israel) makes a brief reappearance in this week’s Torah portion, in the midst of a genealogy:

The sons of Eliab were Nemuel, and Dathan and Abiram. These are the same Dathan and Abiram, chosen in the assembly, who agitated against Moses and Aaron as part of Korach’s band when they agitated against GOD.

Whereupon the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up with Korach—when that band died, when the fire consumed the two hundred and fifty men—and they became an example.

The sons of Korach, however, did not die.

(Numbers 26:9-11)

Not only do Korach’s sons not die, but they even show up again in the book of Psalms as meshorerim, Levitical singers in the Temple and the authors of nearly a dozen psalms. A long rabbinic tradition imagines them initially following their father, but then doing teshuva last minute and ending up permanently suspended between life and death. (Sanhedrin 110a). Or perhaps “the Holy Spirit rested upon them and they prophesied about the exiles, the destruction of the Temple, and the Kingdom of David.” (Rashi on Psalms 42:1)

What prompted these sons to do teshuvah? The Netziv (R’ Naftali Zvi Yehuda Berlin 1816-1893) suggests that these sons may originally have believed that their father was acting out of righteousness, “but once their father Korach followed after Dathan and Aviram, the haters of Moses, since the sons of Korach were disciples of Moses, for this reason, they did not follow him and did not die.”

Korach’s complaint against the existing leadership seems, at first glance, justified, even—or especially—to his sons. “The whole community is holy!. . . Why then do you raise yourselves above God’s congregation?” (Numbers 16:3). Korach is even a member of the Tribe of Levi, just like Moses and Aaron.

A rabbinic tradition imagines Korach as exceedingly wealthy, perhaps through ill-begotten gains. (There’s even a Hebrew phrase, ashir k’Korach, to describe someone super wealthy)

“Wealth is kept for the owner to his detriment.” (Kohelet 5:12). Reish Lakish says: This is the wealth of Korach. . . And Rabbi Levi says: The keys to Korach’s treasury were a burden requiring three hundred white mules, and all the keys and locks were of leather. (Sanhedrin 110a)

Where did all of this wealth come from? There are a few possibilities:

Joseph concealed three buried treasures in Egypt. One was revealed to Korach, one was revealed to Antoninus son of Asvirus [emperor of Rome], and one is hidden for the righteous in the future. (ibid).

Or:

“He will dwell in desolate cities, in houses in which one would not live, which are destined to become heaps” (Job 15:28) this is Koracḥ, who was a treasurer in Pharaoh’s palace, and had in his possession the keys to Pharaoh’s treasuries. The Holy Blessed One said to him, “What benefit are these to you? You don’t control them,” as it says: “Houses in which one would not live, which are destined to become heaps [legalim].”’ For whom are they destined? For those who are exiled [golim], for Israel who were exiled from Egypt. But Koracḥ will not become rich, and his portion will not endure – even when he dies, it will not endure. (Bamidbar Rabbah 18:15)

Another version:

Rav said, Koracḥ was very rich; the treasury of Pharaoh was revealed to him between Migdol and the Sea. (Yerushalmi, Sanhedrin 10:1)

There’s at least the suggestion that Korach may have stolen from Pharaoh’s treasury, or perhaps improperly taken advantage of wealth that Joseph left for future generations.

How did this all work out for Korach? “Wealth is accrued for its owner to his detriment” (Ecclesiastes 5:12). One midrash ascribes this verse to a series of biblical characters who pursue wealth, only to meet ruin, including Haman and Korach. (B’reishit Rabbah 50:11)

Korach enticed people to follow him by making a claim that sounded reasonable—a few people have too much power! It’s the deep state! I’m going to help you get what you deserve! God will stand with me! Perhaps Korach’s success in gaining wealth by questionable means persuaded him that he can get away with anything, that he can persuade more and more people to follow him in his pursuit of power, in his desire to hold onto his wealth (and perhaps accumulate more), and in his willingness to sacrifice his own people. “[He is called] Korach, because he made a gap (korcha) among the people of Israel.” (Sanhedrin 109b)

President Trump seems determined to drag the entire country into the pit with him in his relentless pursuit of riches and of power. Korach’s sons were eventually able to spot their father’s evil intentions, to save themselves (sort of), and to devote the rest of their time to composing praises to God. Here’s hoping that most Americans are also figuring out that Trump doesn’t have their interests, or any more lofty goals in mind, but is enriching himself at our, and the world’s expense.

I’ll just leave you with Psalm 49, attributed to the sons of Korach, with some apt messages for those who seek riches and glory (trans. JPS 2023):

לַמְנַצֵּ֬חַ ׀ לִבְנֵי־קֹ֬רַח מִזְמֽוֹר׃

For the leader. Of the sons of Korach. A psalm.

שִׁמְעוּ־זֹ֭את כׇּל־הָעַמִּ֑ים הַ֝אֲזִ֗ינוּ כׇּל־יֹ֥שְׁבֵי חָֽלֶד׃

Hear this, all you peoples;
give ear, all inhabitants of the world,

גַּם־בְּנֵ֣י אָ֭דָם גַּם־בְּנֵי־אִ֑ישׁ יַ֝֗חַד עָשִׁ֥יר וְאֶבְיֽוֹן׃

both low and high,
rich and poor alike.

פִּ֭י יְדַבֵּ֣ר חׇכְמ֑וֹת וְהָג֖וּת לִבִּ֣י תְבוּנֽוֹת׃

My mouth utters wisdom,
my speech is full of insight.

אַטֶּ֣ה לְמָשָׁ֣ל אׇזְנִ֑י אֶפְתַּ֥ח בְּ֝כִנּ֗וֹר חִידָתִֽי׃

I will turn my attention to a theme,
set forth my lesson to the music of a lyre.

לָ֣מָּה אִ֭ירָא בִּ֣ימֵי רָ֑ע עֲוֺ֖ן עֲקֵבַ֣י יְסוּבֵּֽנִי׃

In time of trouble, why should I fear
the encompassing evil of those who would supplant me—

הַבֹּטְחִ֥ים עַל־חֵילָ֑ם וּבְרֹ֥ב עׇ֝שְׁרָ֗ם יִתְהַלָּֽלוּ׃

those who trust in their riches,
who glory in their great wealth?

אָ֗ח לֹא־פָדֹ֣ה יִפְדֶּ֣ה אִ֑ישׁ לֹא־יִתֵּ֖ן לֵאלֹהִ֣ים כׇּפְרֽוֹ׃

Ah, it cannot redeem anyone,
or pay one’s ransom to God;

וְ֭יֵקַר פִּדְי֥וֹן נַפְשָׁ֗ם וְחָדַ֥ל לְעוֹלָֽם׃

the price of life is too high;
and so one ceases to be, forever.

וִיחִי־ע֥וֹד לָנֶ֑צַח לֹ֖א יִרְאֶ֣ה הַשָּֽׁחַת׃

Shall anyone live eternally,
and never see the grave?

כִּ֤י יִרְאֶ֨ה ׀ חֲכָ֘מִ֤ים יָמ֗וּתוּ יַ֤חַד כְּסִ֣יל וָבַ֣עַר יֹאבֵ֑דוּ וְעָזְב֖וּ לַאֲחֵרִ֣ים חֵילָֽם׃

For one sees that the wise die,
that the foolish and ignorant both perish,
leaving their wealth to others.

קִרְבָּ֤ם בָּתֵּ֨ימוֹ ׀ לְֽעוֹלָ֗ם מִ֭שְׁכְּנֹתָם לְד֣וֹר וָדֹ֑ר קָרְא֥וּ בִ֝שְׁמוֹתָ֗ם עֲלֵ֣י אֲדָמֽוֹת׃

Their grave is their eternal home,
the dwelling-place for all generations
of those once famous on earth.

וְאָדָ֣ם בִּ֭יקָר בַּל־יָלִ֑ין נִמְשַׁ֖ל כַּבְּהֵמ֣וֹת נִדְמֽוּ׃

Mortals do not abide in honor;
they are like the beasts that perish.

זֶ֣ה דַ֭רְכָּם כֵּ֣סֶל לָ֑מוֹ וְאַחֲרֵיהֶ֓ם ׀ בְּפִיהֶ֖ם יִרְצ֣וּ סֶֽלָה׃

Such is the fate of those who are self-confident,
the end of those pleased with their own talk. Selah.

כַּצֹּ֤אן ׀ לִ֥שְׁא֣וֹל שַׁתּוּ֮ מָ֤וֶת יִ֫רְעֵ֥ם וַיִּרְדּ֘וּ־בָ֤ם יְשָׁרִ֨ים ׀ לַבֹּ֗קֶר (וצירם) [וְ֭צוּרָם] לְבַלּ֥וֹת שְׁא֗וֹל מִזְּבֻ֥ל לֽוֹ׃

Sheeplike they head for Sheol,
with Death as their shepherd.
The upright shall rule over them at daybreak,
and their form shall waste away in Sheol
till its nobility be gone.

אַךְ־אֱלֹהִ֗ים יִפְדֶּ֣ה נַ֭פְשִׁי מִֽיַּד־שְׁא֑וֹל כִּ֖י יִקָּחֵ֣נִי סֶֽלָה׃

But God will redeem my life from the clutches of Sheol,
by taking me. Selah.

אַל־תִּ֭ירָא כִּֽי־יַעֲשִׁ֣ר אִ֑ישׁ כִּי־יִ֝רְבֶּ֗ה כְּב֣וֹד בֵּיתֽוֹ׃

Do not be afraid when someone else becomes rich,
when their household goods increase;

כִּ֤י לֹ֣א בְ֭מוֹתוֹ יִקַּ֣ח הַכֹּ֑ל לֹֽא־יֵרֵ֖ד אַחֲרָ֣יו כְּבוֹדֽוֹ׃

for when they die they can take none of it along;
their goods cannot follow them down.

כִּֽי־נַ֭פְשׁוֹ בְּחַיָּ֣יו יְבָרֵ֑ךְ וְ֝יוֹדֻ֗ךָ כִּי־תֵיטִ֥יב לָֽךְ׃

Though they congratulate themselves in their lifetime
—“All must admit that you did well by yourself”—

תָּ֭בוֹא עַד־דּ֣וֹר אֲבוֹתָ֑יו עַד־נֵ֝֗צַח לֹ֣א יִרְאוּ־אֽוֹר׃

yet they must join the company of their ancestors,
who will never see daylight again.

אָדָ֣ם בִּ֭יקָר וְלֹ֣א יָבִ֑ין נִמְשַׁ֖ל כַּבְּהֵמ֣וֹת נִדְמֽוּ׃ {פ}

Mortals do not understand honor;
they are like the beasts that perish.

When the Romans laid siege to Jerusalem, the Talmud says, three wealthy men stepped up to save the lives of the residents:

One of them said to [the leaders of the city]: I will feed them with wheat and barley. And one of them said to them [I will feed them] with wine, salt, and oil. And one of them said to them: [I will provide them] with wood. . . They had enough to sustain them for twenty-one years. (Gittin 56a)

This sounds great! Thanks to a few generous philanthropists, the residents have sufficient food and cooking fuel to survive a 21 year siege—presumably longer than the Romans have patience to sit around waiting to conquer a city that, let’s be honest, is pretty small and strategically insignificant in the context of the Roman Empire.

Of course the story doesn’t end there:

There were certain zealots (biryonei) among them. The Sages said to them: Let us go out and make peace with [the Romans.] But [the zealots] did not allow them. The zealots said to them: Let us go out and engage in battle against them. But the Sages said to them: You will not be successful. The zealots arose and burned down these storehouses of wheat and barley, and there was a famine.

That is, the zealots realize that as long as the people have sufficient food, they will not be inclined to go to war against the Romans. But a starving and desperate people will feel like they have nothing to lose.

I’ve gone back to this text over and over during the past few years, as the zealots in the U.S. and Middle East have pushed the world into war after war, and it came to me again as I was up having breakfast before 4AM today, in preparation for the fast of 17 Tammuz. This fast commemorates the beginning of the siege of Jerusalem and the start of the three week period of mourning that culminates with Tisha B’av, the anniversary of the destruction of the Temple, first in 586 BCE by the Babylonians and finally in 70 CE by the Romans. (& also taking an Excedrin—highly recommend both the headache killer & the slow release caffeine for fast days).

“Biryonei”: Men who are empty and reckless (pochazim) for war. (Rashi on above)

Rashi here echoes the language used to describe the “empty and reckless men” hired by Avimelech in the Book of Judges who, for the price of 70 shekels, help him to kill his 70 brothers and crown himself king. (Judges 9:4) For some small material gain (one shekel per murder), these men are willing to carry out massive violence and destabilize a society.

Today, we are all in the hand of zealots, intent on burning the storehouses and bringing about war, suffering, and death.

Over the past few years, we have seen Prime Minister Netanyahu, who has long insisted that Israel must always live by the sword, again and again choose war over the protection of his own people, let alone the lives of Palestinians or other peoples. During the height of the war in Gaza, this included rejecting one ceasefire opportunity after another, instead choosing to sacrifice the lives of hostages and of Israeli soldiers, along with tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza. It included casting hostage families, survivors of October 7, and bereaved families as the enemy when they begged him to end the war. And this zeaoltry has led him and his government into a war in Iran and Lebanon that has left thousands dead, including Israelis, without making anyone safer. (Israel's previous wars in Lebanon should serve as fair warning of the “recklessness” of this strategy, but zealots are reckless.) And he has aided and abetted the settler zealots in running wild in the West Bank, torching Palestinian villages, expelling communities, and even shooting and killing residents, even when these actions are not only morally wrong but also endanger Israelis as well as Palestinians.

We have seen President Trump rush into a deeply unpopular and illegal war with Iran without even bothering to offer a coherent explanation to the American people, and sacrificing the lives of American service members in the process. And from his financial disclosure this week, we have a small glance into the ways he is profiting from this office, in precisely the way that the founders tried to prevent, while ordinary Americans struggle to afford groceries or health care as the result of his policies, including the war.

The leaders of Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran too have abandoned their own people in pursuit of their zealotry—including Hamas’s persecution and killing of dissenters, the decision to carry out the October 7 attacks and to provoke the war that they knew would follow, the diversion of food to Hamas fighters rather than ordinary Gazans; Hezbollah wielding power over Lebanon, destabilizing the country and putting ordinary Lebanese citizens at risk; and the Iranian leadership quashing any dissent, murdering protesters, and spending decades threatening Israel and attacking it through their proxies.

Time after time, the zealots burn down the storehouses rather than seek peace and care for the needs of their people.

The Temple is destroyed, but Judaism is not. As the story continues, something extraordinary happens: Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai secretly approaches Abba Sikra, the leader of the zealots, who also happens to be his nephew, and asks, “How long will you do this and kill everyone through starvation?!?” Surprisingly, his nephew turns out to be seeking a way out, but is afraid of being killed. Together, they devise a plan that culminates in the famous story of Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai sneaking out of the city, making his way to Vespasian, the Roman general, correctly predicting that Vespasian will soon become emperor, and begging for the preservation of “Yavneh and its sages”—the remnant of the Jewish scholarly community that would build the future. (Ben Zakkai also makes a failed argument that Vespasian could have attacked the zealots without destroying the entire city.)

(In a parallel version of the story in midrash, the leader of the zealots, there called Ben Batiach, doesn’t initiate this reconciliation—rather, his uncle has to trick him into it. [Eicha Rabbah 1:31] We can’t always, or usually, wait for the zealots to change their minds—sometimes we need to force their hands.)

I can’t say that most of today’s zealots are ready or willing to find another path. When they are, whether through ceasefire or—God willing—peace agreements, we should encourage this shift. Right now, though, the storehouses are burning, people are dying, and the zealots are winning. Things might get even worse from here, as these three weeks of mourning remind us. And—hope is never lost as long as wise and brave leaders and ordinary people continue to show that there is another, less destructive way.

Wishing a meaningful fast to anyone who is fasting—and stay safe, especially if there’s extreme heat where you live—it’s better to drink water than to risk your health.

A few comments in response to comments I’ve heard since I published this piece a few days ago:

Why are you criticizing the left? Antisemitism on the right is so much worse.

Antisemitism is not like picking a sports team. This shouldn’t have to be said, but unfortunately, too much of the conversation about antisemitism consists of people denying instances on their own political side, and pointing out the antisemitism on the other side. We don’t talk about other bigotries like this (left wing sexism/right wing sexism, for example). Of course those on the political right in America are more likely to support policies that enshrine bigotries (like disenfranchising communities of color, banning abortion, and mandating the teaching of Christian doctrine in schools) but that doesn’t mean that antisemitism on all sides of the political spectrum (and in non-political spaces) isn’t real and dangerous and able to get people killed.

Yes, I’m terrified that white nationalists with guns want to turn the U.S. into a white Christian nation, and that this dangerous ideology has already inspired fatal shootings of Jews praying in Pittsburgh and Poway, the arson of a synagogue in Jackson, MS, and many, many other hate crimes and instances of harassment. I’m also terrified that anger at Israel has inspired the killing of a young couple at the Capital Museum in DC and an elderly woman in Boulder, as well as a horrific attack on a synagogue in Michigan, regular shootings at synagogues and schools in Toronto and Montreal (we do not yet have full information about the recent murder in Montreal), and many other hate crimes and instances of harassment. We don’t have to choose between being afraid and upset about one or the other of these. It’s possible, and honestly not that hard, to call out antisemitism wherever we see it. In the progressive movement, it is common to call out other forms of bigotry when they arise, both to protect everyone in the movement and beyond, and also because it makes the movement stronger when everyone is included. Right wing politicians, pundits, and organizations are thrilled to find examples of antisemitism on the left, as they can use these as justification for denouncing the entire progressive movement and for supporting the deportation of immigrants, the defunding of public schools and universities, restrictions on freedom of speech, and generally the dismantling of democracy. There is no reason to provide this opening. Or to drive a wedge between progressive movements and Jewish communities.

Do you now regret inviting Mamdani to your gala? Doesn’t this all prove that you were wrong about building relationships with elected officials on the left?

No.

I still firmly believe in the necessity of building relationships across lines of difference, of working with elected officials or other leaders or organizations on what we can work on together, and having conversations when we differ. Being in relationship includes sharing feedback and pushing one another to understand each other better, and to do better the next time.

There’s also some hypocrisy in this line of argument. Jewish institutions build relationships all the time with elected officials from the right who may agree when it comes to Israel, but who hold very different opinions on areas of general consensus within the Jewish community, including reproductive rights, LGBTQ rights, immigration, and democracy.

The Israeli government/AIPAC are really, really terrible–how can you say that there’s any antisemitism in calling out AIPAC’s role in elections

I agree that AIPAC has had a massive negative influence on both U.S. politics and on Israel/Israelis/Palestinians. (I covered this in some depth in the previous post). And I don’t have enough words for my anger at the Netanyahu government, which during the nearly two decades of his uninterrupted power (plus an earlier stint in the late 90s) has systematically destroyed any hope for peace, expanded settlements, dismantled Israeli democracy, persecuted civil society and human rights groups, and so much more. Many or most people here and in Israel and Palestine can’t even remember a time when a different future seemed possible. And, of course, American Jewish communal institutions have spent the past five decades denying occupation, denigrating Palestinians, and supporting the growth of settlements. As I wrote in the Forward a couple of years ago, this approach has had a terrible impact on both Jewish community in America and on Israelis and Palestinians.

AND it’s also the case that some of the language being used to talk about AIPAC during this election echoes antisemitic tropes– dark shadowy forces trying to control elected officials. Israel taking food out of the mouths of American children. And more examples that I mention in my original piece. In one case, a candidate (now nominee) accused her opponent of being backed by a Super PAC funded by AIPAC, and didn’t bother apologizing when it turned out that the funder was a different group altogether.

It’s true, of course, that elected officials respond to their funders, whether those are AIPAC, the weapons industry, the sugar industry, AI companies, or anyone else. It’s also true that for years, elected officials felt pressured by AIPAC to toe the line when it came to Israel. This isn’t true anymore. More than half of Democrats in the House and Senate are now endorsed by JStreet. The idea of elected officials being afraid to cross AIPAC is simply no longer true in the way that it used to be.

What I didn’t say quite so explicitly before is that there’s an assumption that elected officials only vote in line with what AIPAC/the Israeli government want because of their funding. This ignores the fact that elected officials make their decisions for all sorts of reasons–including responding to their constituents and their own deeply-held beliefs. To take just one example–in my own district, the now nominee, Darializa Avila Chevalier repeatedly accused Rep. Espaillat of being in the pocket of AIPAC because of their funding (for his part, he denied being in anyone’s pocket). It appears that she can’t imagine any other reason that he might accept AIPAC’s endorsement and mostly vote as they would want. As Espaillat’s constituent, I wish that he had instead accepted a JStreet endorsement and had voted with the growing contingent of Democrats (and some Republicans) pushing for U.S. policy that compels Israel to follow international law. And I also know that he represents a reasonably large historic and largely Orthodox Jewish community, and that he holds deep relationships with this community that go back to his childhood (so many Jews found refuge from Nazi Germany in Washington Heights that it earned the nickname “Frankfurt am Hudson). He has spoken movingly about the fact that during the years of white flight, the major Jewish institutions remained in the neighborhood. He also has his own relationship with Israel, which also goes back decades. The Jewish constituency of Washington Heights has not, for the most part, been pushing Espaillat to tack left on Israel. Some of his Jewish constituency of course has been. I obviously can’t get inside his or anyone else’s head, but it’s not fair to assume that he only takes the positions he takes because AIPAC is funding him. (Any more than to say that he only takes pro-immigrant anti-ICE positions because he is funded by the Latino Victory Fund.)

(I hope that Chevalier also gets to know the Jews in her new district. In an interview with journalist Ben Smith, when asked about the Jewish communities in her district, she spoke about her relationship with Jewish Voice for Peace, and about JVP members who disagree with other Jewish communities. She now represents the district that includes major Jewish institutions such as Yeshiva University, the Jewish Theological Seminary, the YMHA/YWHA of Washington Heights, Breuer’s, and many, many synagogues including a number whose roots go back to the 1930s or earlier).

Two more things that shouldn’t have to be said:

• Telling a member of Congress that he’s not welcome in your coffee shop because his relationship to Israel renders him a racist/fascist/genocide enabler/etc. is obnoxious and inappropriate. Also, $9.82 is too much for coffee.

• Calling a Congressional nominee (or any other Jew) a kapo because he holds a different position on Israel/Palestine than you do is obnoxious and inappropriate. Ditto for the people who commented on my Facebook post about this incident to tell me that I am also a kapo (and who share this opinion freely on my posts all the time).

In short:

• Antisemitism exists on both sides of the political aisle. It’s dangerous wherever it appears, primarily for Jews, and also for democracy. We all have an obligation to address it wherever it appears, not only when the other “team” is at fault.

• It is truly not difficult to criticize AIPAC, Israeli policy, Jewish organizational policy, etc. without being antisemitic. It’s the responsibility of everyone, especially those holding or running for elected office, to learn about the history and expression of antisemitism and to avoid using antisemitic language or ideas.

• Our political system is still truly broken, and all of these Super PACs are a horrible development.

• Being in relationship with electeds with whom we have serious differences is still the only way to advance one’s own agenda and to get anything done.

Shabbat Shalom. And in a moment when the loudest, most extreme voices too often prevail, I point you to this parasha’s talking donkey as a reminder to listen to dissenting and often wise voices, wherever they appear.