We are a people of the book, a people of an ethical tradition, a people of Torah through which our lives are shaped.
It is heartbreaking to see the loss of life in Israel and Gaza, all people should be shaken by this tragedy.
The Middle East, the Land of Israel, has always taken up a place of fascination for people across the world. The government of Israel has become used to these additional layers of scrutiny. I too, as a non-Israeli scrutinise the Jewish homeland with a harsher light than I would any other country. By way of intimate association, I care and critique.
BUT with all the suffering, with 1,400 Israelis (and non-Israelis) butchered and 240 taken hostage, with more than 11,000 Gazans lives taken, we must take stock.
The scrutiny can help, can hold our Jewish state to a higher standard; it can also be suffocating and unhelpful.
It is dangerous to compare but for better and for worse, seems appropriate. At exactly this time some half a million people have lost their lives from the outbreak of war in Ethiopia. Almost 6 million people have been made refugees from the Syrian conflict. Yemenis experience gender-based violence and abuses against the LGBTQ+ community. Thousands are dead from war in the Ukraine. No protests, no uproar. It is not within my job description or capacity to make ethical comparisons and not my intention to claim any one life to be more precious than another.
At the same time, moral clarity is important. People of the West and western countries must decide for what they stand. Israel is a country that mimics and models itself on a version of western democracy (with imperfections). Israel values freedom of expression, equality between men and women, embraces and provides protection for people of the LGBTQ+ community and seeks to protect a diversity of political voices inside its government, including Arab-Palestinian. As a rabbi with significant experience of working with Palestinian leadership, my glasses are not rose tinted, I do not shirk away from the troubles and abuses that are also part of this story.
But when students, academics, influencers, politicians and more raise their voices to ‘Free Palestine’, whilst a noble ambition, they should pay attention to the side of history they situate themselves. Hamas that brutally opened this round of hostility on October 7, 2023, advocates for a liberation of Israel from the ‘River to the Sea’; if they were to realise their ambition, they would leave all Israelis without a home and facing violence on a scale that we began to imagine, broadcast on our screens just a month ago.
Hamas is anti-human rights, anti-gay, anti-women and has viciously repressed freedom of expression in the years since it violently took control of Gaza in 2007. Among one of the greatest affronts to Hamas is talk of peace with Israel and the timing of the October attacks were an attempt by Hamas to derail the warming of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel.
I am no fan of the current Israeli government, there are fewer and fewer people who call themselves fans, but for Jews and Israelis alike the October attacks were a wake-up call as to what the world is up against – a stark, unmissable view of what Hamas is capable. This is not cast in any doubt; they made hundreds of videos for the world to see their rape, torture and mutilation of children. In spite of the moral clarity of the moment, the world has chosen to campaign in their thousands for the liberation of Palestine.
With that said, I recuse myself and retreat once more to my Torah, to the confines of my profession. In recent times, I have avoided reflections which are overtly political. I believe our ambitions as religious leaders are undermined when we foray into a world of politics.
Oh well!
In our Parsha, we read of the story of the twins Jacob and Esau, their struggles. Some of my favourite lines of Torah, ‘וַיִּתְרֹצְצוּ הַבָּנִים בְּקִרְבָּהּ’, the twins, Jacob and Esau wrestled in the pregnant belly of Rebecca. Our arguing and our competition for resources, for land, for blessing, is biblical, ancient and will continue to persist, it is written in our story.
Rebecca’s response is awesome, literally, ‘וַתֹּאמֶר אִם־כֵּן לָמָּה זֶּה אָנֹכִי’, as Jacob and Esau fight inside of her, she questions the essence of her own existence “why do I exist?”. This is the story of Jewish life right at this time, everything is on the table. It frames something crucial and urgent about pregnancy, about children and childhood and about conflict at its core. Conflict is urgent, personal and all-consuming.
So what is a Jew to do? I don’t know the answer but I can tell you my answer…we gotta double down. At time when Jews feel scared and intimidated, we gotta dig in deeper and find our kernel of connection and intimacy with the Divine. Re-acquire our spiritual plane, say a blessing, sing a psalm, bless your children. Be with our people.
At a time when our ethical convictions are questioned, we have to reapply ourselves to the values of our Torah: ‘נֹתֵן לֶחֶם לָרְעֵבִים’, ‘gives bread to the hungry’, ‘מַתִּיר אֲסוּרִים’, ‘releases the imprisoned’, work to free our captives! ‘שֹׁמֵר אֶת־גֵּרִים יָתוֹם וְאַלְמָנָה’, ‘protect those without home or place, the orphan and the widow’, those who are most vulnerable [Psalms 146].
I cannot change your opinion or that of any other but I can find spirit and care, and a lot of it!
SHABBAT SHALOM
