Birthright Israel is back after a post-Oct. 7 hiatus,
trying to find meaning in a nation at war.
Last month, I spent ten days on a Birthright trip with 31 other American Jews ages 18 to 21. The trips, which cost Birthright an estimated $4,500 each, are free; donors and the Israeli government cover the organization’s $172 million budget.
We stayed in a variety of accommodations from a kibbutz to a five-star hotel, ate at upscale restaurants and visited parks and museums. Meanwhile, the war in Gaza raged and rockets flew over northern Israel.
This was the first trip since Oct. 7 for Yitzi Glickman, who’s been a group leader on over a dozen Birthright trips. Unlike previous trips, we were not allowed within 12 miles of the northern border with Lebanon. This meant that we could not go to Glickman’s favorite city, Tzfat.
“That’s normally our second day,” he said. “It gives everyone a chance to bond and to experience art, music and Rabbinic mysticism.”
Instead, we volunteered at a raspberry farm in the Golan Heights. Many of the farm workers were at war. That same day, Hezbollah sent over 200 rockets into northern Israel, including Tzfat.
FIRST PERSON
Glickman was one of three group leaders on our trip, along with a security guard/medic and a bus driver.
At the Kinneret we met Israelis our age who joined us on the Birthright program for four days. In normal times, they would have been there as honorary tourists tasked with teaching the foreigners about life in Israel. These are not normal times.
The war scarred each of them personally.
Together we visited the courtyard in front of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art that’s now known as Hostage Square. At the start of the war, a setting designated for each hostage was placed on a long table every Friday night. It was hoped that they would be able to use it soon. But over the months, the tablecloth became drab, torn and gray, as if hope was under siege.
While there, we met with a hostage family member, Efrat Machikawa, who had five members of their family taken hostage from Kibbutz Nir Oz; four were
See First person on page 2
Shoah survivor blesses family on 100th birthday Bibi’s DC adventure
and Democratic leaders. Meetings with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, and presidential candidate Donald Trump, were expected later in the week, after The Jewish Star print edition went to press.
By Ed Weintrob
When Jakub Rybsztajn celebrated his 100th birthday last week, he raised his hands and offered a blessing to everyone in the room, paying that G-d continue to extend His graciousness to each of them.
Rybsztain knows something about G-d’s graciousness. He and his wife Bonnie (who passed away two years ago at age 98, after 76 years of marriage) survived the Nazi death camps — she was the sole survivor of nine children; his parents and two of five siblings perished. As Allied troops approached and his camp was closed, he was sent on a death march, surviving that as well.
“Why am I so devoted to G-d, despite so much hell, so much torture? Why did so many millions die from hunger, from beatings? I don’t know why,” he said during a expansive interview published in The Jewish Star in 2017.
“I am telling this story for the sake of the world, to heal the world, to live and let live with respect. So the world should be a better place. People should not forget what happened.”
Rybsztajn’s children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren traveled from around the county to the Grandell Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in Long Beach to participate in the centenarian’s celebration. He moved there from his Woodmere home in January, after treatment at South Nassau.
The occasion was marked by the presentation of official citations and proclamations — by Deputy Commissioner Debbie Pugliese on behalf of Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, and from Gov. Kathy Hochul and Mayor Eric Adams.
In his 2017 interview (online at bit.ly/3LBjyYU) and a subsequent video interview by the Wagner College Holocaust Center (bit.ly/3zW65s3), Rybsztajn recounted his childhood in Poland, existence in the camps, liberation, meeting his wife and ultimately building and new life and family in the United States.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhu was engaging in high-profile diplomacy this week during a whirlwind visit to Washington. He met with hostage families on Monday (pictured greeting Liz Hirsh Naftali, whose of 4-year-old great niece Abigail Mor Edan was released after 50 days in Hamas captivity). On Wednesday, he was to address Congress, where protests were expected despite his being invited by both Republican
Amos Ben Gershon, GPO
Centenarian Jakub Rybsztajn is surrounded by family and friends at Grandell Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in Long Beach, clockwise from left: Great-grandchildren Bella Rybstein and Isaac Rybstein, Nassau County Deputy Commissioner Debbie Pugliese presenting a proclamation from County Executive Bruce Blakeman, neighbor Ken Moskowitz, son Austin Rybstein, grandson Marc Rybstein, daughter Jennifer Rybstein, grandson Jason Rybstein, daughter-in-law Brenda Rybstein, granddaughter Elleshevah Rybstein (holding a 100th birthday card), granddaughter, Jennifer’s daughter-in-law Marissa Rybstein holding great-grandson Benjamin Rybstein. Participating in the celebration but not pictured: Son David, and grandchildren Aaron, Josh, Moses and Rebekah. Ed Weintrob, The Jewish Star
Facing Oct. 7 denialism, Knesset hears new testimony to unspeakable horrors
This story contains graphic and disturbing language.
By Miri Weissman, Israel Hayom
In a chilling testimony before the Knesset, Rabbi Moshe Dickstein, who served as a reservist in the IDF’s Southern Command, provided disturbing details of the atrocities committed by Hamas terrorists during the Oct. 7 attack on Israeli communities.
“The first body we came across was an overturned stroller. Inside the stroller was a baby, and his head was thrown aside with a knife in it,”
Rabbi Dickstein said, choking back tears.
“The woman we found, presumably the mother, was lying on the couch with blood flowing from her private area. We were told to collect
The rabbi’s account, which included graphic descriptions of violence against women, children and men, shed light on the full extent of the horrors that unfolded that day.
only the bodies. In the next stage, they would come to clean up the blood and everything else.”
The rabbi continued with the difficult descriptions:
“And so we went from house to house and found women lying on the floor with legs spread, it’s indescribable. Another house and another house, then also in the field. They cut off men’s genitals, and we found women with sev-
ered breasts. A pregnant woman with her belly opened up to reveal the umbilical cord and the baby with a knife in its body.”
The rabbi, who serves in the reserves as a commander of the casualty identification unit in the Southern Command, spoke at a meeting of the Knesset Caucus for Ultra-Orthodox and Religious Women, which focused on “sexual crimes motivated by nationalism.”
Never forget: Exhibit to open on first anniversary
By Rolene Marks, JNS
An exhibit marking the one-year anniversary of the Hamas massacre will be open to the public on Oct. 7.
The exhibit, sponsored by the Israel Military Intelligence Directorate, will display never-before-seen evidence from the day on which the terrorist group ruling Gaza committed the worst atrocities against Jews since the Holocaust.
The evidence includes weapons used by the terrorists, such as Bangalore torpedoes for breaching fences and walls; rocket-propelled grenades; AK-47 gas-operated assault rifles; bayonets; thermobaric bombs; hand grenades, and Improvised Explosive Devices.
Also on display are various types of headbands worn by terrorists affiliated with different groups; two of the 350 motorcycles used by the terrorists during their rampage, after they infiltrated southern Israel at 30 different points along the border, and “hostage-taking kits” — replete with zip ties, drug-filled syringes and tasers — found in terrorists’ backpacks.
In addition, there are reams of documents. These include a note found on one of the terrorists in Sderot, which reads, “Commander’s message: Know that this enemy of yours is an
incurable disease, except for head decapitation and uprooting hearts and livers,” as well as transliterated Hebrew phrases in Arabic letters, such as, “women here,” “children here,” “take off your pants” and “take off your clothes.”
Other documents include a detailed layout of a training area designed to look like a kibbutz, plans for where to kidnap civilians and a map of Kibbutz Be’eri with neighborhoods and homes clearly marked.
The map, which the terrorist on whom it was found attempted to tear up before it was discovered, shows different entry points into the kibbutz — garnered by Gazan laborers with permits who did work on the kibbutz. The purposely targeted area on Be’eri was on the southern side of the kibbutz, where families with young children lived.
Then there is material gathered from inside Gaza. This includes copies of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf in Arabic and proof of terrorists’ employment at UNRWA.
“What happened on Oct. 7 was a very well-planned massacre, and we captured evidence found in Israeli territory and inside Gaza,” Major “T” told JNS during a preview for journalists. “There are vehicles, weapons, pictures and, of course, video clips filmed by
Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Terrorists.”
The purpose of opening the exhibit to the general public, he said, “is hasbara (public diplomacy) for our allies.
“It’s important for people to witness what
happened, because there’s so much denial surrounding it.”
The exhibit will open on Oct. 7 at the Israel Intelligence Heritage and Commemoration Center (IICC) in Ramat Hasharon, Israel.
First Person: My post-Oct. 7 trip with Birthright…
Continued from page 1
released. Machikawa told us about her uncle, Gadi Moses, age 79, who is still being held captive in Gaza.
With a clenched fist, she said, “We could have brought back our hostages three times … but instead of bringing birth to life, we are bringing birth to more death, and it is the responsibility of our government to bring them back.”
After that, with many of us in tears, we gathered around a piano and sang Jewish songs. We finally felt the pain tucked behind the veil of normality.
The itinerary wasn’t the only thing that changed. According to Glickman, Birthright now attracts a smaller and different crowd.
“We used to always have full 40 person groups but our trip of 32 was one of the largest this year,” he said.
“Before the war, some visitors were ambivalent or even anti-Zionist, but now I’ve seen a much stronger sensitivity towards Zionism. … They’re coming in bonded in a kind of way because of their shared Zionist feelings.”
Since its inception in 1999, Birthright required groups to attend a lecture on Israel’s geo-politics. Our speaker, Charlotte Korchak, distilled centuries of emotionally fraught history into a two-hour lecture.
Korchak, International Senior Educator at Stand With Us, began by acknowledging “the sensitivity of the topic,” but warned that she would “tell the whole story, not just our
side.” As she predicted, some people were uncomfortable. Some played on their phones or whispered jokes, or skipped the lecture altogether, but the majority of the room followed the presentation eagerly.
Korchak was raised in Israel. When she was 14, a suicide bomber killed three of her friends. “That was my introduction. I developed a lot of feelings based only on emotion.” She concluded, to those who were willing to listen, that “the past 8 months have shown us [emotions] can be very dangerous.”
Early the next morning, we went to Yad Vashem – The World Holocaust Remembrance
Center. Many in our group lost family in the Holocaust. My grandfather survived, but he lost most of his family and sadly passed away in 2023. In Yad Vashem, we were all survivors.
We spent Shabbat in the old city of Jerusalem. We lit candles. We prayed and danced at the Western Wall. I finally understood the Passover commandment to act as if we were back in time, the slaves who left Egypt.
Acouple days later, we did a sunrise hike near Eilat. We walked the same path the Torah says the Israelites took at the end of 40 years in the desert.
‘Before the war, some visitors were ambivalent or even anti-Zionist, but now I’ve seen a much stronger sensitivity towards Zionism.’
Birthright is designed to give people an understanding of Israel, and give them the opportunity to fall in love with the land and people. It is designed to attract future residents, tourists, and investors.
A few of us had already planned to make aliyah before the trip. By the time our plane landed back in JFK, many of us were already planning our next trip back.
During a time of war and fractious politics, Birthright provides a beacon of hope you might not expect. The people on this trip were representative of the entire Jewish community, from religious Zionists to liberal secularists. We did not always agree, but we found a way to bond.
Birthright has expanded from cultivating Jewish identity to forging Jewish unity. Alex Augenbraum is a resident of Riverdale and a student at Hunter College, where he works in the Media Department.
A detailed map of a Hamas training camp. Documenting Israel
Participants in the Birthright Israel journey taken by Alex Augenbraun.
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Pompeo: Don’t let PA or Hamas control Gaza
By Mike Wagenheim, JNS
Both Hamas and the Palestinian Authority are terrorist organizations, and as such cannot be in charge of the Gaza Strip after the war, said former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo last week.
Speaking at a Republican Jewish Coalition event in Milwaukee, the former CIA director said, “It cannot be that the government that exists there after this is controlled by Hamas or the Palestinian Authority, each of which are controlled by terrorists and underwritten by the world’s largest state sponsor of terror, Iran.”
The RJC’s “salute to pro-Israel elected officials” took place on the sidelines of the Republican National Convention and drew House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and Steve Daines, the Montana senator who leads the National Republican Senatorial Committee. Scott Walker and Kristi Noem, the governors of Wisconsin and South Dakota respectively, Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.) and Rep. David Kustoff (R-Tenn.) also attended.
“The world cannot expect that the Jewish state will allow weapons to be smuggled again across the Egypt-Gaza border, which will require either an Israel Defense Forces presence along the Philadelphi corridor or some other mechanism” to cut the flow of arms into the enclave, said Pompeo.
That language mirrored recent remarks attributed to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
With regard to a possible change in US policy on Iran and its nuclear program should Donald Trump be elected in November, Pompeo said, “We have democracy. Every four years we’re going to have an election. It is what it is.”
He noted that the Biden administration had freed up $6 billion in frozen Iranian assets, essentially as a quid pro quo for the release by
Tehran of six American hostages.
“Today, there are more Americans held than before we paid them $6 billion,” he said. (The Islamic Regime currently holds five US hostages).
The House speaker addressed the gathering, proclaiming the Republican Party to be the only “true pro-Israel party in America” and chastising Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer who, he claimed, had delayed an invitation to Netanyahu — which was ultimately issued —to address a joint session of Congress.
Gov. Abbott said from the dais “we shouldn’t have a Republican Jewish Coalition. There should be an American Jewish Coalition.” Colombian-American businessman Bernie Moreno, who is challenging Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) this November, told reporters that his foreign policy vision would be “supportive of the US having a leadership position in the world.”
In the weeks after Hamas’s Oct. 7 terror attack, Israel did not need additional American aid, said Moreno. “I’m not supportive of giving countries money to countries that hate us,” he added. “We’re giving tons of money to the Palestinian Authority. That’s ridiculous.”
He also criticized the $230 million that the Biden administration spent on a temporary Gaza aid pier. The Pentagon recently announced that the pier, which required repair and disassembly several times, had completed its mission.
Moreno said the pier operation was “disgusting.”
“We’re not going to give money to countries that hate us or countries that are on the terror watch list or harbor terrorists,” Moreno added. He called the UN Relief and Works Agency a “total disaster” and said Washington should defund the United Nations “as long as the UN continues to be sympathetic to terrorism.”
Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former Ambassador to Israel David Friedman visit the “Pilgrimage Road” in Jerusalem’s Old City.
Before Gaza war: Life under Hamas oppression
By Catherine Perez-Shakdam
In the claustrophobic enclave of Gaza, life for its two million inhabitants became a protracted ordeal under the suffocating rule of Hamas.
Ever since it seized power in 2007, the terrorist organization exerted its despotic influence over the territory, deploying an arsenal of coercion and relentless indoctrination to crush dissent and mold minds.
The streets of Gaza echoed with the silent cries of oppression. The air was thick with unspoken fear, as every corner, every alley and every home fell under the vigilant eyes of Hamas operatives. This was not merely a political regime; it was an omnipresent force that pervaded every aspect of existence, transforming a once lively community into a cage of submission.
Young children in Gaza were ensnared in the Hamas web. Schools were factories of propaganda. The curriculum is not designed to educate but to indoctrinate. Textbooks are filled with vitriol, glorifying “martyrdom” and breeding hatred against Israel and the Judeo-Christian world.
Playgrounds were tainted with the seeds of radicalism. Children were taught to aspire to become pawns in a deadly game of jihad.
This indoctrination was not confined to the classroom. It seeped into the very fabric of society through media, religious teachings and community activities. Television programs and radio broadcasts spewed the same dogma, creating an inescapable echo chamber that reinforced the regime’s narratives. Mosques were used as platforms for political agitation. Community events served as stages for entrenching the Islamist narrative.
The economic landscape was equally bleak. With unemployment soaring and poverty rampant, Hamas tightened its grip by controlling access to jobs and resources. Loyalty to the regime was rewarded with employment and aid, while dissent was punished with economic ostracization.
Violence and repression were the twin pillars upon which Hamas’s control rested. The regime did not tolerate opposition. Political rivals
were not debated with but eliminated. Dissenting voices were not countered with arguments but silenced with bullets. Arbitrary arrests, torture and extrajudicial killings were not exceptions but the norm.
The chilling stories of those who dared to speak out and paid the ultimate price served as grim reminders to the rest of the population of the cost of defiance.
Women bore a disproportionate share of the burden of Hamas’s Islamist rule. They were subjected to severe restrictions and discrimination under the guise of religious and cultural norms. Forced to adhere to strict dress codes and confined to traditional roles, their lives were circumscribed by the regime’s patriarchal decrees. The consequences of defiance were dire — public shaming, physical punishment, or worse.
Yet, the regime’s manipulation went deeper. Women were systematically traumatized and brainwashed to accept their subjugation, becoming unwitting enforcers of their own oppression. This internalized misogyny perpetuated a cycle of abuse and control.
The use of trauma as a tool of control was a hallmark of Hamas rule. Continuous exposure to violence creates a climate of fear and helplessness, fostering a sense of dependency on the regime for protection and stability. This systematic infliction of trauma ensured that the population remained psychologically subdued, with little will to resist or seek change.
Aparticularly insidious form of violence under Hamas’s rule was the pervasive sexual violence that became a grim norm in Gaza. The regime’s iron grip allowed sexual violence to flourish unchecked, becoming yet another tool of oppression.
Child marriage is rampant in Gaza, with girls as young as 12 being forced into marriages with older men.
The young brides, often seen as burdens by their families, are handed over to men who view them as property. These girls face not just the loss of their childhood but are thrust into lives of domestic servi-
tude and sexual exploitation.
Marital rape, a horrifying reality for many women in Gaza, is yet another manifestation of the pervasive sexual violence. Under the Hamas interpretation of Islamic law, the concept of marital rape does not exist.
A wife is seen as the property of her husband, her consent irrelevant. This legal and cultural framework leaves women with no protection or recourse, their cries for help silenced by a society that views their suffering as acceptable, even expected.
The LGBTQ community in Gaza faces an unimaginable plight. Under Hamas, homosexuality is not just taboo; it is criminal. Members of the LGBTQ community live in constant fear of discovery, persecution and violence. They are forced into hiding, leading double lives to avoid the brutal consequences of being discovered.
Torture, honor killings and forced conversions were common, as Hamas sought to eradicate what it saw as deviant behavior. The regime aimed to purge Gaza of anyone who did not conform to its ideals.
By framing its struggle as a religious duty, Hamas cloaks its political ambitions in a veneer of piety, making it difficult for outsiders to discern the true nature of its agenda. This manipulation extends beyond Gaza, reaching into the hearts and minds of Muslims around the world, fostering a global network of support and sympathy for the terrorist organization’s cause.
Manar al-Sharif’s harrowing experience under the rule of Hamas in Gaza highlights the oppressive environment faced by many Palestinians. Al-Sharif, originally from Damascus, was arrested multiple times by
Hamas for activities it deemed subversive, such as organizing virtual events with Israelis.
In one instance, she was forcefully taken from her apartment, blindfolded and placed in solitary confinement without the opportunity to contact a lawyer or her family. Her “crime” was facilitating a virtual meeting aimed at fostering dialogue between Gazans and Israelis.
To comprehend the dire situation in Gaza under Hamas, one must acknowledge the insidious influence of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
The mullahs of Tehran disseminate venomous ideology and foment chaos throughout the Middle East.
Iran’s theocratic regime has long sought to extend its influence across the region, employing terrorist proxies to destabilize and exert control.
Hamas is one such proxy, heavily funded and armed by Tehran. This support is not a result of shared visions of “Palestinian liberation” but a calculated strategy to project Iranian power and influence. By bolstering Hamas, Iran ensures a continuous state of conflict and instability on Israel’s borders, diverting attention from its own regional ambitions.
Iran’s backing of Hamas is multifaceted, involving financial aid, military training and the provision of advanced weaponry. This support empowered Hamas to maintain its stranglehold on Gaza, enabling it to enforce its draconian rule and pursue its genocidal agenda against Israel.
From their pulpits, the Iranian mullahs disseminate a toxic blend of radicalism and hatred. This ideological poison seeped into Gaza, where it was absorbed and propagated by
Hamas. The result is a populace indoctrinated to view the world through the lens of perpetual conflict and enmity.
Iran’s influence is not confined to material support; it extends to the very ideology that fueled Hamas’s brutal regime. The glorification of violence, the suppression of dissent, and the systemic abuse of human rights in Gaza all echoed the oppressive tactics of the Iranian regime.
Iran’s ambitions are not limited to Gaza. The regime’s influence stretches across the Middle East, from Lebanon to Yemen, Syria to Iraq. In each of these theaters, Iran employs proxy forces to foment instability and expand its reach. The mullahs’ vision is one of a Shi’ite crescent, stretching from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean, dominated by Tehran’s ideological and political hegemony.
This strategy of regional destabilization serves multiple purposes. It distracts from Iran’s domestic challenges, such as economic hardship and political dissent, by projecting an image of external conflict. It also undermines rival powers, both regional and global, by creating continuous crises that demand their attention and resources.
In Gaza, as elsewhere, the people are mere pawns in this grand chess game, their suffering a byproduct of Iran’s ruthless quest for dominance.
To truly understand the tragedy of Gaza, one must recognize the malign influence of Tehran. Iran’s support for Hamas is not an act of solidarity with the Palestinian cause but a cynical manipulation to further its ambitions.
The support for Hamas within the Palestinian territories is a tale that needs more nuanced understanding. What may appear as widespread allegiance to the terrorist group often obscures a much darker and complex reality.
Many Palestinians, finding themselves under the relentless gaze of Hamas, feel compelled to profess their support out of sheer necessity and fear of brutal reprisals.
In an environment where dissent is not merely discouraged but violently suppressed, aligning with Hamas can often be a survival strategy. Publicly denouncing the group can invite severe consequences, including imprisonment, torture or death. Thus, the support for Hamas is sometimes more a reflection of coercion than genuine ideological alignment.
Catherine Perez-Shakdam is a French journalist, political analyst and commentator specializinh in West Asian and Islamic affairs.
Jordan Wright (AD-70) Stefani Zinerman (AD-56) Michael Benedetto (AD-82) George Latimer (CD-16)
Forgotten fighters: Ultra-Orthodox in ’48 war
By Nadav Shragai, Israel Hayom
The cries of ultra-Orthodox leaders echo through Israel’s political landscape. Protesters from Peleg Yerushalmi (Jerusalem faction) decry the potential conscription of haredi youth, even those not engaged in full-time religious study.
Yet just over seven decades ago, a markedly different reality prevailed, one that seems almost fantastical by contemporary standards.
This alternate history, brought to light by historian Moshe Ehrenvald, challenges not only the current ultra-Orthodox narrative but also common assumptions held by secular Israelis. It’s a history that has been largely erased from the collective memory of the haredi community.
Consider the case of Eliezer Hager (19242015), a name that would later become revered in ultra-Orthodox circles as the admor (spiritual leader) of the Seret-Vizhnitz Chassidic dynasty.
As a young man, Hager enlisted in the Haganah’s religious platoon in Haifa. He fought in the brutal battles at Kibbutz Ramat Yohanan during the War of Independence, sustaining a leg wound from enemy fire. Hager even participated in capturing the very hill in Haifa where he would later establish his Chassidic community.
This wasn’t a clandestine act of rebellion. Hager’s father, Rabbi Baruch Hager (18951963), himself the admor of the Seret-Vizhnitz Chassidic sect, attended a farewell ceremony for ultra-Orthodox recruits from Haifa, including his son.
The Hager family’s story is far from unique. Rabbi Zelig Heine, a grandson of the Gur rebbe, fought to defend Jerusalem. His long beard and sidelocks stood in stark contrast to his military role, a visual representation of worlds colliding.
These individual stories reflect broader institutional shifts. At the prestigious Hebron Yeshiva, students staged what amounted to a “rebellion,” defying their supervisor’s wishes as they sought to join the battle for Jerusalem’s defense.
The establishment of a yeshiva students battalion, known as “Gdud Tuvia,” in May-June 1948 marked a watershed moment. Dozens of ultra-Orthodox youths enlisted, including scions of the community’s most respected families.
Ehrenvald’s meticulously researched Hebrew-language book, “Haredim during the Independence War,” compiles hundreds of such accounts. Taken together, they paint a picture of a community undergoing a seismic shift. In less than a year, the ultra-Orthodox world moved from near-total rejection of Zionism and the struggle for statehood to active participation in the war effort.
While this integration did not transform the haredi leadership into ardent Zionists, it represented a profound, if temporary, change in their relationship with the emerging state.
Perhaps the most striking contrast between past and present emerges in Ehrenvald’s recent discovery of wartime writings by Rabbi Ben-Zion Meir Hai Uziel (1880-1953), Israel’s first Sephardi chief rabbi. Uziel’s stance stands in direct opposition to that of Sephardi Chief Rabbi, Yitzhak Yosef, whose term recently ended.
Where Yosef has declared that yeshiva stu-
The ultra-Orthodox world moved from near-total rejection of Zionism and the struggle for statehood to active participation in the war effort.
dents are categorically exempt from military service, Uziel’s wartime position was unequivocal.
“There is no doubt,” Uziel wrote, “that every man in Israel is obligated to enlist … both from the law of God’s war which is the inheritance of the land, and from the law of ‘Do not stand idly by your neighbor’s blood’.”
The chasm between the ultra-Orthodox community’s earlier wartime participation and the modern resistance to military service is stark. Ehrenvald attributes much of this shift to changes in leadership dynamics. He points to Rabbi Yosef Tzvi Dushinsky (18671948), a prominent ultra-Orthodox leader in 1948, whose “clear leadership” commanded widespread respect and faced little internal challenge.
Ehrenvald notes, “Today, the ultra-Orthodox public is enormous, and its political and religious leaders are divided and not necessarily coordinated.” This fragmentation, he argues, has led to a situation where “heads of streams and yeshivas care primarily for their own institutions” rather than providing unified guidance for the community as a whole.
Dushinsky led his community towards a little-known agreement on the partial conscription of yeshiva students. This landmark accord, signed in Jerusalem in May 1948, would later be replicated in Tel Aviv and Haifa. Signatories read like a who’s who of the ultra-Orthodox world; alongside Dushinsky were both of Israel’s chief rabbis and a pantheon of respected haredi leaders.
When asked to explain the stark difference between the earlier wartime ultra-Orthodox leadership and today’s, Ehrenvald points to the shadow cast by the Holocaust.
“The memory of the Holocaust, which some rabbis and their families experienced personally, deepened their awareness of existential danger,” he explains. “It also reinforced their understanding that a Jewish state would allow for the rebuilding of the world of Torah that had been destroyed.”
By contrast, Ehrenvald sees today’s ultraOrthodox leadership engaging in “casuistry in a way that was never done before.” He cites troubling examples: Sephardi Chief Rabbi Yosef suggesting mass emigration in response to conscription.
The extent of ultra-Orthodox participation in 1947-48 is nothing short of remarkable. Hundreds of residents from Bnei Brak, now a bastion of ultra-Orthodox life, joined the ranks of the Haganah.
Most striking was participation of Gur Chassidim, members of one of the most insular Chassidic sects. A unit of Gur Chassidim fought alongside secular comrades in the Al-
exandroni Brigade.
The mobilization extended beyond the ultra-Orthodox heartland. Members of Poalei Agudat Israel living in frontier settlements answered the call to arms. Recruits from the religious Kibbutz Hafetz Haim bolstered the defenses of nearby Kibbutz Nitzanim, north of the Gaza Strip.
The transition wasn’t without its tensions.
Ultra-Orthodox leaders engaged in negotiations with military authorities over issues of religious accommodation — kashrut, modesty standards and conditions that would allow their young men to serve without compromising their religious principles.
In January 1948, Poalei Agudat Israel leaders Binyamin Mintz and Rabbi Kalman Kahana met with David Ben-Gurion to demand a mechanism ensuring appropriate service conditions for their constituents. But they didn’t wait for full compliance before acting.
In early January, Agudath Israel’s central committee took the extraordinary step of declaring a religious obligation for men aged 1725 to report for national service, and for those aged 26-46 to join civil defense units. The organization didn’t mince words, denouncing “any kind of evasion” in the strongest terms.
The justification for this mobilization was stark: “The hand of murderers threatens anyone who bears the name of Israel. Therefore, no man of Israel shall be exempt from defending life and property
The first wave of organized ultra-Orthodox recruitment unfolded with a fervor that’s hard to imagine nowadays. HaYoman, Agudath Israel’s Jerusalem bulletin, captured the
moment in near-messianic terms: “Today, the first organized groups of hundreds of Jerusalem’s young men, faithful to God’s word, are going out to duty within special brigades.”
A vivid account published in Davar Yerushalayim in August 1948 crystallized this transformation. It described an ultraOrthodox soldier manning a machine gun position on a Friday night, his religious garb a stark contrast to his military role.
The contrast with the current situation is indeed stark. Where now the prospect of arresting ultra-Orthodox draft evaders raises fears of riots, in 1948 such measures were met with widespread approval, even enthusiasm, within the haredi community.
Ehrenvald cites a public notice from Agudath Israel’s bulletin on March 8, 1948, a stern warning to those who had yet to report for duty: They must do so by March 11, or face “severe measures.”
Ehrenvald argues that rekindling this spirit of participation will require significant changes on both sides of the secular-religious divide. He points to recent controversies as examples of how trust has eroded
The historian advocates for a more accommodating approach.
“For a significant number of ultra-Orthodox recruits to join the IDF, we need to fundamentally change our approach,” he argues.
“This means creating separate units for them, with a different organizational culture, no female soldiers, and robust provisions for prayer, religious study and strict adherence to Jewish dietary laws. It’s not an insurmountable challenge.”
Chief Rabbi of the Edah HaChareidis, Yosef Tzvi Dushinsky, found ways to accommodate national needs. Zvi Oron-Orushkes via WikiCommons
Haredim being trained on weapons during Israel’s War of Independence. IDF Archives
Defy those who tell Israelis they’re trespassers
By Dave Gordon
The United Nations has long referred to Judea and Samaria as “occupied” Palestinian land, and the global body’s principal judicial arm, the International Court of Justice in The Hague, issued a non-binding ruling last Friday declaring that “occupation” to be “unlawful.”
French-Canadian attorney and scholar Jacques Gauthier said recently that the United Nations, countries, nonprofits and others that use the term “occupied territories” in this way misunderstand international law and legally recognized treaties.
“Never allow people to tell you that you’re trespassers. It’s your land,” Gauthier, who is not Jewish, told JNS. “It’s been given to you, in law.”
Gauthier, whose scholarly work focuses on the Jewish people’s legal rather than biblical claims to the modern State of Israel, thinks that the 1920 treaty that emerged from the conference in San Remo, Italy, ought to be as well-known as the Balfour Declaration.
Great Britain didn’t control the region of Palestine at the time, and its Balfour Declaration was just that — a declaration, not an international legal document.
But the 1920 San Remo agreement, which incorporated the principles of the declaration from three years prior, had the legal imprimatur of international support and “is the most momentous political event in the whole history of the Zionist movement,” Gauthier said.
Montreal-born and educated in Paris until elementary school, Gauthier didn’t know much about Jews as a child.
But when he sought a topic to study in his doctoral thesis, he wanted to work on “a good cause, on something that was bigger than me,” he told JNS. He settled on the legal claims to Jerusalem’s Old City.
“I chose that because I discovered the city of Jerusalem through different journeys with my family and I fell in love with it,” he said. “I could not have found a better cause. The Jewish people have dealt with injustice for so long.”
It took two decades to complete his 1,300page thesis, titled “Sovereignty Over The Old City of Jerusalem: A Study of the Historical, Religious, Political and Legal Aspects Of the Question of The Old City.” He earned a doctorate in international law from the University of Geneva in 2007, under the supervision of Marcelo Kohen, an international law expert and Guggenheim award winner.
The international law expert has spent decades making the legal case for Jewish sovereignty.
Gauthier has since presented his findings to the Canadian House of Commons, UK House of Lords, US Congress, Italian Senate, European Union and Japanese and Dutch parliaments. In 2000, French president Jacques Chirac knighted him.
The historical, archaeological and religious story of Israel dates back millennia, but the modern state’s legal story began after World War I with the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian, German, Ottoman and Russians empires.
The victors — the allied powers of Britain, France, Italy and Japan — convened to discuss how to divide the Ottoman territories after the war, with the US participating as an observer.
“What happens to property transferred in title in international law, very often, is a treaty between the victorious nations and the defeated nations,” Gauthier told JNS. “In that treaty,
the defeated nation will cede title, totally recognized in international law.”
The Ottoman empire’s territories, which were administered by the allies, were eventually transferred to other owners.
Under the leadership of then US President Woodrow Wilson, the Covenant of the League of Nations was formalized in 1919. Its Article 22, which created a “sacred trust” setting aside territories for the benefit of the local inhabitants, played a key role in international mandates, according to Gauthier.
During the February 1920 peace conference in Paris, the allied powers heard the case for autonomy from representatives from both an Arab delegation, led by Faisal I — who would become king of Iraq the following year — and a Zionist delegation led by Chaim Weizmann, who would become Israel’s first president.
Previously, the two had agreed on the Jewish aspirations for Israel and on Arab control over several other parts of the Middle East.
“The bottom line is that they commit to support the national movement of the other,” Gauthier told JNS.
The conference in San Remo, Italy, would formalize what became known as Mandatory Palestine, bestowing legal title to the modern nation-state of the Jewish people, which was to include today’s Israel, Judea and Samaria and present-day Jordan.
At the Villa Castello Devachan in San Remo, the allied powers agreed to the Jewish historical claim, transforming it into a binding international legal right.
Signatories to the treaty on Apr. 25, 1920, were the British, French and Italian prime ministers, as well as representatives from Japan. The document referred to the “reconstitution” of the Jewish homeland — acknowledging in a single word that there had once been a sovereign Jewish state in the land.
“If you study the Mandate for Palestine, there’s only one reference to the Arabs. It’s a reference to the Arabic language; 15 references to the Jews and the Jewish people,” Gauthier said. “It includes the recognition of the connection between the land and people.”
The Treaty of Sèvres, signed in August 1920, finalized Turkey’s relinquishing control over their Middle Eastern territories to the allied powers, with Article 95 incorporating the Balfour Declaration into international law.
The allies “had the power of disposition by international law and judicial power to bestow title and sovereignty,” said Gauthier.
The League of Nations ratified that on July 24, 1922, and all of the agreements still hold and are honored by Article 80 of the UN Charter, which guarantees the legality of prior international treaties.
“No one is allowed to touch these rights,”
said Gauthier. “All are legally relevant today.”
But Great Britain unlawfully gave away much of what lawfully belonged to the Jews, including Transjordan — later called Jordan — to the brother of the Hashemite sharif of Mecca. Gauthier believes a combination of Arab appeasement, oil and Jew-hatred led to that British decision.
The Council of the League of Nations approved the move on Sept. 23, 1922. “They didn’t have the right to do that,” Gauthier said. “In effect, they were acting outside of their powers, given the mandate.”
Today, world bodies and leaders from many countries “are determined to take away a substantial portion of what’s left” of the
lands promised to Jews, he added. If Judea and Samaria and Gaza were ever ceded to a Palestinian state, the Jewish people would only have about 18% of the land to which it is legally entitled, according to Gauthier.
The United Nations recently recognized “Palestine” as eligible for statehood. Many people “wouldn’t be following so many falsehoods if they knew the true narrative,” he said.
Looking ahead to the Jewish state’s negotiations for a potential Palestinian state, he advised that “whatever political solution you have in mind, at least agree that you have the rights to the land.”
Delegates to the San Remo Conference in Italy on April 25, 1920.
WikiCommons Lawyer and scholar Jacques Gauthier. Dave Gordon
In summer heat, we still scream for ice cream WINE AND DINE
America loves ice cream. Worldwide, it is so popular that the industry sells over a BILLION gallons every year. (The number one country of ice cream lovers is New Zealand where people gobbled up almost 28 liters of ice cream per person; the USA came in second at 20 liters per person.)
Yes, ice cream has fat and calories — but in limited quantities, it is a better alternative than other sugary foods because it also has calcium and protein and you CAN buy ice cream that is relatively free from chemicals found in processed desserts. You can also buy sugar-free ice cream and low-fat ice cream, sorbets, sherbets and more.
Most high quality, premium ice creams use primarily cream, milk, sugar and flavorings. Other, less “premium” kinds, add stabilizers and thickeners, and some ice creams include a laundry list of ingredients that I have no interest in eating or serving. Read the ingredients and take your choice.
Interestingly, in order for ice cream to be called “ice cream,” it has to be a minimum of 10-percent milk fat. Premium ice cream is about 14- to 16-percent fat. The higher the fat content, the richer and creamier the product. If the ice cream is labeled “frozen treat,” you know that you are getting something other than creamy, rich ice cream.
Air also plays a big part in ice cream production. Too much and you get a grainy mix that melts into an airy, bubbly mess. Commercial production of ice cream mixes in air according to the desired price point. Air is cheap; cream is not. And, while many people like the newer high protein ice creams, I would rather eat less of my favorite sweet treat, but eat the real thing!
If you buy good quality ice cream, you will be more assured of fewer ingredients and less air. The calories may be a bit higher, but there is nothing like it on a hot evening.
And don’t forget to try some frozen custard or gelato; both are delicious alternatives to ice cream. Even dairy-free ice creams (some but not all of which are pareve) are more creamy and delicious than ever, with coconut or almond, oat or soy based deliciousness.
Most deliciously, make your own. Ice cream makers are no longer the hand cranking, rock salt filled contraptions of my youth. They are compact and easy to use.
Ice Cream Sandwiches
My favorite ice cream treat (after a classic ice cream scoop in a sugar cone) is a homemade ice cream sandwich. They are fairly easy to make and so much better than the soggy wrapped items you buy in a market. Try them. You will be surprised how delicious they are. Make your own cookies and fill them with your favorite ice cream or frozen yogurt for an amazing treat. Wrap in plastic and freeze for treats that are so much better than storebought.
Here are some of my favorites, delicious with so many kinds of ice cream.
Make all cookies about 3 to 4 inches in diameter and try to make an even number of them. Let the cookies cool completely. Let the ice cream soften a bit.
Scoop some ice cream onto a cookie so that there is about a half-inch rim around a small mound of ice cream. Place a second cookie over
the ice cream and press gently to flatten the ice cream to about a half-inch thickness.
Roll in a “topping” (see below), wrap in plastic and freeze. Makes about 10 to 12 sandwiches.
Spicy Chewy Fruity Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies (Pareve or Dairy)
Ingredients:
• 2 to 12 cups rolled toasted oats
• 3/4 cup vegetable shortening or butter
• 3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup unbleached flour
• 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 2 tsp. cinnamon
• 1 tsp. allspice
• 1/2 tsp. ground ginger
• 1/4 tsp. ground cloves
• 1-3/4 cup dark raisins
• 2/3 cup chocolate chips
Directions:
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Spread the oatmeal on a cookie sheet and toast for 15 minutes, stirring several times until it is golden brown. Set aside to cool. Increase the oven heat to 350 degrees.
In an electric mixer, cream the butter or shortening. When light and creamy, add the sugars. Beat until fluffy. Add the eggs and vanilla. Beat well.
Sift the flours and the baking soda, baking powder and spices. Stir the flour mixture by hand into the creamed sugars. Add the toasted oats, chocolate chips and the raisins. Mix well.
Use a large tablespoon to drop rounded balls of dough onto a cookie sheet. Flatten slightly with clean hands or the bottom of a glass. Bake until golden, about 10-15 minutes, depending on
the size and your oven. Don’t over bake. Cool the cookies on the pan for about 5 to 8 minutes, until they are firm enough to move with a spatula.
VARIATIONS: Add chopped walnuts, white chocolate chips, dried cranberries, chopped dates, minced candied ginger or chopped apricots. Makes 12 to 18 cookies or 6 to 9 sandwiches.
Reverse Black and White Ice Cream Sandwiches (Dairy)
This uses white sugar cookies and dark chocolate ice cream — or any flavor you like to make delicious ice cream sandwiches.
Ingredients:
• 1 recipe Sugar Cookies Supreme (see below)
• Chocolate ice cream
• Vanilla bean ice cream
• Chocolate chip ice cream
• Black raspberry ice cream
• Black cherry ice cream
• Mint chip ice cream
• Mocha chip ice cream
• Orange sherbet
• Raspberry sherbet
• OR any flavor you like
• Sprinkles, mini chocolate chips, finely chopped white or golden chocolate
Sugar Cookies Supreme (Dairy)
Ingredients:
• 1 cup unsalted butter
• 1-1/2 cups granulated sugar
• 1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
• 1 extra-large egg
• 1 egg yolk
• 2-1/2 to 3 cups unbleached flour
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
OPTIONAL: Rainbow sprinkles or nonpareils, less than 1/4 cup
Directions:
Pre-heat the oven to 375 degrees. Line two cookie sheets with parchment and set aside. Place the butter and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer and beat on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add the vanilla and the egg and yolk, one at a time and beat until light and fluffy again. Mix the flour, baking powder and salt in a small bowl and add to the butter/egg mixture. Add the rainbow sprinkles or nonpareils, if using. Beat until the dough is smooth and thick. Take half the dough and roll into a ball. Place on a piece of plastic wrap and cover with the wrap. Flatten into a disc and refrigerate for about 30 to 45 minutes. Repeat with the other half. Roll out half the dough on a floured surface to about a quarter-inch thickness. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper. Use a three-inch in diameter glass and cut circles. Place them on the parchment and then immediately into the oven. Bake 7 to 10 minutes until golden brown. Let cool. Repeat with the other disc. Makes about 2 dozen cookies. These are fragile, so press gently when filling with ice cream. Makes 10 to 12 ice cream sandwiches.
Chocolate Drizzled Mocha Chip Cookies (Pareve or Dairy)
I love these with coffee ice cream, but any kind will do. The chocolate drizzle on the inside is a special surprise!
Ingredients:
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, pareve margarine, or vegetable shortening
• 2-1/4 cups unbleached flour
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder
Screaming ice cream…
• Pinch salt
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 Tbsp. instant espresso powder
• 2 Tbsp. pure vanilla extract
• 1-3/4 cups chopped chocolate or chocolate bits
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans Stripes: 1/4 cup chocolate chips; 1 tsp. butter, pareve margarine, or vegetable shortening
Melt the chocolate and butter together over very low heat. Set aside. Sift the flour, salt and baking powder together.
Beat the eggs and sugar together in an electric mixer until very thick and light yellow. This can take several minutes depending on your mixer. Add the espresso powder and vanilla and mix until blended. Add the cooled chocolate. Remove from the stand and fold in the flour. Set aside to set for 15 to 20 minutes.
Fold in the chopped chocolate and walnuts. Drop by rounded tablespoons (or, for more uniform cookies, make balls and gently flatten with a glass) on a cookie sheet that has been lined with a silicon liner or parchment. Bake at 350 for 10 to 16 minutes per batch, until; lightly golden. Allow to cool on a large tray.
Melt the quarter cup chocolate and the butter and allow to cool. When cool, pour into a plastic baggie and twist to close the bag, allowing the chocolate to accumulate in a corner of the bag. Turn each cookie over and then snip a tiny corner off the bag and drizzle a squiggle of chocolate over the bottom of each cookie in any creative design you like. Let cool completely and then refrigerate for 10 to 12 minutes to harden completely. Fill with coffee, chocolate chip, vanilla, cherry vanilla, or any kind of ice cream you like! Roll in any kind of chocolate chips or sprinkles or more that you like.
Great Triple Ginger Cookies (Dairy)
I love ginger and these have crystallized, freshly grated, and powdered ginger in them. Find some ice cream parlor ginger ice cream for a true ginger treat.
Ingredients:
• 1-1/2 sticks unsalted butter
• 1/4 cup unsulphured dark molasses
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup dark brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 2-1/4 cups unbleached flour
• 1/2 tsp. ground cloves
• 1 tsp. ground ginger (scant)
• 2 tsp. freshly grated ginger
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• 2 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 3-1/2 to 4 ounces crystallized ginger, coarsely chopped, a generous half to 2/3 cup
• Sugar for rolling the cookies
Preheat oven to 375. Cream butter, sugars and egg until creamy and well blended. Add molasses and fresh ginger and beat well. In a separate bowl, mix the flour, salt, cinnamon, powdered ginger, cloves, and baking soda. Add to the butter mixture and mix until blended. You can do this by hand.
Chop the candied ginger in a food process with a couple of pulses and fold into the dough. Form into 2-inch balls and roll in sugar. Place on a greased or parchment lined cookie sheet, press gently and bake at 375 for 10 to 13 minutes or until golden around the edges. Makes about 2 dozen.
Fill these with ginger, vanilla, salted caramel, coffee ice cream (or any flavor you like).
• • •
Ice Cream Soda Bar
By Joni Schockett
This is a fun activity for kids. Help younger ones make their sodas. You can even make a party around this theme. Make some ice cream sodas and turn on a good movie for a fun evening!
Ingredients:
• 16 to 24 ounce plastic cups (or soda shoppe-style glasses for older kids)
• Good quality chocolate syrup
• Good quality coffee syrup
• Soda shoppe vanilla syrup, raspberry syrup, or other flavors you like
• Half and half
• Ice cold plain seltzer (flavored seltzers, if you like)
• Vanilla, coffee chocolate, raspberry ice cream — really any flavors you like
• Whipped cream (canned works well)
• Garnishes like cherries, sprinkles, crushed candies, whatever you like
Directions:
Set this up in the kitchen along a counter with the cups first, then the syrups, half and half and seltzer, and then the ice cream and toppings. Place the half and half in a closed pitcher in a large bowl of ice and let people make their own sodas. Remember to refreeze the ice cream as soon as possible.
This can serve as many as you buy ingre-
You can roll your finished ice cream sandwiches in any of the following before wrapping and freezing:
• Crushed nuts
• Mini chocolate chips
• Crushed mint candies
• Crushed toffee candy bars like Heath Bar
dients for and you can expand the varieties of all ingredients when you have a larger crowd. Figure about 6 to 10 ounces of soda, 3 to 5 ounces of half and half and 4 to 8 ounces of ice cream per person. Syrup amounts vary, about 2 to 4 tablespoons per serving.
• Graham cracker crumbs
• Crushed cookies
• Sprinkles, nonpareils
• Mini M&Ms
• Graham crackers mixed with a little finely minced candied ginger Previously published.
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mountsinai.org/southnassau
jewish star torah columnists:
•Rabbi Avi Billet of Anshei Chesed, Boynton Beach, FL, mohel and Five Towns native •Rabbi David Etengoff of Magen David Yeshivah, Brooklyn
•Rabbi Binny Freedman, rosh yeshiva of Orayta, Jerusalem
contributing writers:
•Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks zt”l,
former chief rabbi of United Hebrew Congregations of the British Commonwealth •Rabbi Dr. Tzvi Hersh Weinreb, OU executive VP emeritus •Rabbi Raymond Apple, emeritus rabbi, Great Synagogue of Sydney •Rabbi Yossy Goldman, life rabbi emeritus, Sydenham Shul, Johannesburg and president of the South African Rabbinical Association.
Five towns candlelighting: From the White Shul, Far Rockaway, NY
תבש לש בכוכ
Fri July 26 / Tamuz 20
Pinchas
Candles: 7:57 • Havdalah: 9:05
Fri Aug 2 / Tamuz 27
Matos-Masei • Shabbos Mevarchim
Candles: 7:50 • Havdalah: 8:58
Fri Aug 10 / Av 5
Devarim
Candles: 7:41 • Havdalah: 8:49
Mon Aug 12 / Av 8
Tisha B’Av begins tonight
Fri Aug 16 / Tamuz 12
Vaeschanan
Candles: 7:32 • Havdalah: 8:39
Fri Aug 23 / Av 19
Eikev
Candles: 7:22 • Havdalah: 8:29
Timeless lesson in the boundaries of leadership
Embedded in this week’s parsha, Pinchas, is one of the great principles of leadership.
The context is this: Moses, knowing that he was not destined to lead the next generation across the Jordan into the promised land, asked G-d to appoint a successor.
May the L-rd, the G-d who gives breath to all living things, appoint someone over this community to go out before them and come in before them, one who will lead them out and bring them in. Let the L-rd’s people not be like sheep without a shepherd. Num. 27:16-17
G-d duly chose Joshua, and Moses inducted him. One detail in Moses’ request, however, always puzzled me. Moses asked for a leader who would “go out before them and come in before them, one who will lead them out and bring them in.” That, surely, is saying the same thing twice. If you go out before the people, you are leading them out. If you come in before the people, you are bringing them in. Why then say the same thing twice?
The answer comes from a direct experience of leadership itself. One of the arts of leadership is a sense of timing, of knowing what is possible when.
Sometimes the problem is technical. In 1981, there was a threat of a coal miners’ strike in the UK. Margaret Thatcher knew that the country had very limited supplies of coal and could not survive a prolonged strike. So she negotiated a settlement. In effect, she gave in. Afterward, and very quietly, she ordered coal stocks to be built up. The next time there was a dispute between the miners and the government — 1984-1985 — there were large coal reserves. She resisted the miners and after many weeks of strike action they conceded defeat. The miners may have been right both times, or wrong both times, but in 1981 the Prime Minister knew she could not win, and in 1984 she knew she could.
A much more formidable challenge occurs when it is people, not facts, that must change. Moses discovered this through the episode of the spies. Born in slavery, they lacked the courage
A leader who fails to work for change is not a leader. But a leader who attempts too much change in too short a time will fail.
and independence of mind to face a prolonged struggle. That would take a new generation born in freedom.
If you do not challenge people, you are not a leader. But if you challenge them too far, too fast, disaster happens. First there is dissension. People start complaining. Then there are challenges to your leadership. They grow more clamorous, more dangerous. Eventually there will be a rebellion or worse.
On Sept. 13, 1993, on the lawn of the White House, Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres, and Yasser Arafat shook hands and signed a Declaration of Principles intended to carry the parties forward to a negotiated peace. Rabin’s body language that day made it clear that he had many qualms, but he continued to negotiate. Meanwhile, month by month, public disagreement within Israel grew.
Two phenomena in the summer of 1995 were particularly striking: the increasingly vituperative language being used between the factions, and several public calls to civil disobedience, suggesting that students serving in Israel’s defense forces should disobey army orders if called on to evacuate settlements as part of a peace agreement.
Calls to civil disobedience on any significant scale is a sign of a breakdown of trust in the political process and of a deep rift between the government and a section of society. Violent language in the public arena is also dangerous. It testifies to a loss of confidence in reason, persuasion, and civil debate.
On Sept. 29, 1995 I published an article in support of Rabin and the peace process. Privately, however, I wrote to him and urged him to spend more time on winning the argument within Israel itself. You did not have to be a prophet to see the danger he was in from his fellow Jews.
The weeks went by, and I did not hear from him. Then, on Motzei Shabbat, Nov. 4, 1995, we heard the news that he had been assassinated. I went to the funeral in Jerusalem. The next morning, Tuesday, Nov. 7, I went to the Israeli Embassy in London to pay my condolences to the ambassador. He handed me a letter, saying, “This has just arrived for you.”
We opened it and read it together in silence. It was from Yitzhak Rabin, one of the last letters he ever wrote. It was his reply to my letter. It was three pages long, deeply moving, an eloquent restatement of his commitment to peace. But it was too late.
Great leaders see the need for change, but not everyone else does. People cling to the past. They feel safe in the way things were. They see the new policy as a form of betrayal.
It is no accident that some of the greatest of all leaders — Lincoln, Gandhi, John F. and Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Sadat, and Rabin himself — were assassinated.
A leader who fails to work for change is not a leader. But a leader who attempts too much change in too short a time will fail. That, ultimately, is why neither Moses nor his entire generation (with a handful of exceptions) were destined to enter the land. It is a problem of timing and pace, and there is no way of knowing in advance what is too fast and what too slow, but this is the challenge a leader must strive to address.
That is what Moses meant when he asked G-d to appoint a leader “to go out before them and come in before them, one who will lead them out and bring them in.” These were two separate requests.
•The first — “to go out before them and come in before them” — was for someone who would lead from the front, setting a personal example of being unafraid to face new challenges. That is the easier part.
•The second request — for someone who would “lead them out and bring them in” — is harder. A leader can be so far out in front that when he turns around he sees that no one is
following. He or she has gone out “before” the people, but has not “led them out.” He has led but people have not followed. His courage is not in doubt. Neither is his vision. What is wrong in this case is simply his sense of timing. His people are not yet ready.
It seems that at the end of his life Moses realized that he had been impatient, expecting people to change faster than they were capable of doing. That impatience is evident at several points in the book of Numbers, most famously when he lost his temper at Merivah, got angry with the people and struck the rock, for which he forfeited the chance of leading the people across the Jordan and into the promised land. Leading from the front, all too often he found people not willing to follow.
Realizing this, it is as if he were urging his successor not to make the same mistake. Leadership is a constant battle between the changes you know must be made, and the changes people are willing to make. That is why the most visionary of leaders seem, in their lifetime, to have failed. So it was. So it always will be.
But in truth they have not failed. Their success comes when — as in the case of Moses and Joshua — others complete what they began.
Lessons in leadership found in Parsha Pinchas
Too often, leaders cling to power. They are so intoxicated by the privileges of their position that they become blinded to their own vulnerabilities and even oblivious of their own mortality.
Jewish history has many examples of great leaders who failed to provide for their succession in a clear and unambiguous fashion. In some cases, strife and chaos ensued.
Such was not the case with the greatest of all Jewish leaders, Moses. In fact, one of the defin-
ing factors of his greatness was his concern that a proper successor to him be named.
And it is in this week’s Torah portion, Pinchas, that the story of Moses’ search for an appropriate successor is narrated.
Moses spoke to the L-rd, saying, “Let the L-rd, source of the breath of all flesh, appoint someone over the community who shall go out before them and come in before them … so that the L-rd’s community may not be like sheep that have no shepherd.” (Numbers 27:15-17)
Rashi draws our attention to the peculiar way in which Moses addresses the Almighty, “Source of breath of all flesh.” What can that mean? Why does not Moses address Him as “G-d of the heavens and earth,” or some similar familiar appellation?
Rashi’s answer yields a very important insight
into Moses’ concept of the nature of leadership. A leader must be able to tolerate the great differences that exist among individuals. Only the L-rd Almighty, “Source of the breath of all flesh,”
Failed leaders are those who’d be a Joshua without an Elazar, a king without a conscience, a human without G-d.
can identify a leader with the capacity of relating to “each and every person according to his personality.”
So Moses was not only exemplary in taking the responsibility to find and to name a successor, he was also careful to ask for divine assistance in locating a new leader with the capacity to deal with human differences. Moses knew from his long experience that a leader who expected uniformity and conformity was doomed to failure.
But there is another aspect to leadership that Moses did not seem to ask for, but which G-d provided for.
G-d not only responds to Moses’ request by naming Joshua as his successor; He insists that Joshua stand before and consult Elazar the See Weinreb on page 22
The broad wall, 17 Tamuz and a time to play
Earlier this week, we commemorated the breaching of the Old City walls of Jerusalem by the Roman Tenth Legion on the 17th day of Tamuz in 70 CE, heralding the beginning of the end of the Jewish Second Commonwealth and the destruction of the Beit HaMikdash. Picturing the ruins of those walls, we will fasted and remembered how 2,000 years ago, peaceful streets were filled with the triumphant cheers of Roman legionnaires bent on our destruction. But there is another wall in Jerusalem that
is worth thinking about, and that wall pre-dates the Roman destruction by almost 1,000 years. It is covered with moss and seeped with history. Most tourists don’t see it.
Twenty-seven-hundred years ago, the neighborhood bully was Assyria, known in the Bible as Ashur. Sargon, the Assyrian general, had been waging a campaign of terror over the entire Middle East and had mustered the largest army the world had ever seen — 185,000 men, known in the Talmud as Sancheirev, which comes from the word churban (destruction). After destroying the 10 northern tribes in a violent military campaign, Sancheirev set his sights on the pearl of the Middle East: Jerusalem.
At that time, the southern kingdom of Judea was not much to speak of. Encompassing just 20 to 30 square miles around Jerusalem, with little
in the way of a standing army and no natural barriers to rely on, the Jews who managed to stay ahead of the advancing Assyrian army escaped into the walls of Jerusalem.
Soon the city was overflowing with 30,000 Jews, desperate to survive the coming onslaught. The king at the time was Chizkiahu (Hezekiah), who was also a prophet, and the Tanakh tells us how he set about fortifying the walls of the city, which had fallen into disrepair. Especially, how he built a broad wall to encompass all the homes that had sprouted up in the northwestern corner of the city outside the walls.
See Freedman on page 22
Of anger and the reward of a Covenant of Peace
Moshe Rabbeinu’s accomplishments are legendary, his leadership was extraordinary, and his intellect was nearly unparalleled. Moreover, the level of nevuah he achieved was different in kind and degree than any other prophet who ever lived. As the Torah states: “There never arose another prophet amongst the Jewish people like Moshe, to whom Hashem revealed Himself face to face.” (Devarim 34:10).
Rabbi Baruch ha-Levi Epstein (1860-1942) explains that there was one objective that
Moshe did not realize which Pinchas was able to achieve: “Behold, I [Hashem] give to him [Pinchas] my Covenant of Peace” (Bamidbar 25:12).
“But the matter should, however, be explained in the following manner,” writes Rav Epstein. “There was a fundamental difference that obtained between Moshe’s and Pinchas’ ability to remove Hashem’s anger [from upon the Jewish people]. Moshe was able to remove Hashem’s anger for a limited time, and there remained, so to speak, in Hashem’s heart (mind) a grievance against the Jewish people. … Peace such as this cannot be called true and absolute peace. The removal of Hashem’s anger in regard to Pinchas, however, was a complete and total removal of anger [that continues to last]. Therefore, Pinchas merited the just reward [of the Covenant of Peace].”
In sum, Pinchas was able to bring about a total and permanent peace between Hashem and His people that was free of any future recriminations and punishments. This is something that escaped even Moshe Rabbeinu’s grasp. Yet, why did this difference obtain?
I believe the Torah provides an answer:
“When he [Pinchas] displayed the anger that I [Hashem] should have displayed.” (Bamidbar 25:11, per Rashi’s second gloss). Herein, Pinchas acted as Hashem’s messenger in expressing His legitimate anger. He channeled Hashem’s fury in response to the vulgar immorality and idol worship undertaken by many of the men with the women of Moab.
In this sense, Pinchas was a zealot who was totally devoted to Hashem. His entire being merged with Hashem’s righteous anger in his de-
sire to execute the Almighty’s will.
Paradoxically, Pinchas received the Covenant of Peace after having brought about total peace between Hashem and klal Yisrael, precisely because of the righteous anger he expressed on behalf of the Almighty. In this way, he served as a protective force and bridged the chasm between Hashem and the Jewish people and guarded His holy Torah and mitzvot.
(As spiritually heroic as Pinchas’ zealotry was, however, it must be stressed that this was permissible solely at this unique time and may never be repeated.)
With Hashem’s help, may we strive to emulate Pinchas’ love and devotion to the Holy One blessed be He, and may we ever dedicate ourselves to His Torah and mitzvot. V’chane yihi ratzon.
3-Weeks reading: ‘Heroes of Spirit,’ 100 Shoah tales
While the popular jingle goes, “Summertime and the living is easy,” for the Jewish people, the summertime has proven to a hot time of the year, literally as well as figuratively.
Beginning with the destruction of the First Temple and for many summers thereafter down through history, there was and is nothing easy, ritually, about the summer. Fully, three whole weeks during the heart of summertime are taken up as a collective mourning period for disasters that occurred over two millennia, from the
Crusades to the many pogroms that have dotted our people’s troubled history.
Framed by two fasts, this period has generated an array of literature that reminds us of the contemporary nature of persecution and woe that has overtaken our faith unto this very day.
This week, in line with that theme, I bring to your attention a book that relates to the personalities of those religious leaders whose lives were touched by the twin evils of Nazism and Communism.
Titled, “Heroes of Spirit: 100 Rabbinic Tales of the Holocaust” (Israel Bookshop, 2009)
by Rabbi Dovid Hoffman, this book’s 100 brief essays tell of our religious leaders, most of whom survived the terrible years of World War Two and the rule and ruin of World Communism to serve as witness to the evil and destructiveness of these ideologies and to the eternal indestructibility of our people.
The great leaders highlighted include such luminaries as Rav Aharon Kotler, Rav Josef Breuer, the Klausenberger Rebbe, the Bluzhever Rebbe, Rav Moshe Feinstein, and Rav Yisrael Gustman, and, among those who did not survive, the Piaczecna Rebbe, Rav Elchanan Wasserman and Rav Menachem
Ziemba.
The author gives an account of Rav Eliyahu Lopian who, having settled in England in 1925, helped establish the Etz Chaim Yeshiva in London as a premier center for Torah learning. It was Rav Lopian’s destiny to spend the war years in London and to witness, firsthand, the destructiveness of the Nazi Blitz. I am certain that the members of his family in Bayswater have taken special pride in this legacy.
The author also included several leaders who, from the shores of the United States, led the heroic Vaad Hatzalah effort to help assist those of our brethren in dire distress, among them Rabbi Irving Bunim. (For many years Bunim and his son Rabbi Amos Bunim were important residents of the Five Towns-Far Rockaway community.)
Originally published in 2009.
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Hezekiah’s Broad Wall in Jerusalem’s Old City. Ed Weintrob
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2024: Mamaws, bubbies and Jewish hillbillies
THANE ROSENBAUM
Distinguished University Professor Touro College
You have to hand it to Democrats: They sure know how to throw a party — for Republicans.
In four measly years, Democrats managed to alienate moderates and help transform Republican politics — formerly the province of the monied foreign policy establishment — into the party of the common man.
It has been an epic collapse, a radical departure from the party’s centrist base and a gross misjudgment of what’s on the minds of most Americans.
Trump remade the Republican Party consistent with the jingoistic themes he was marketing eight years ago. He is a marketing specialist, after all. But unlike his failed businesses — like Trump University, Airlines and Vodka — his insight about the soul of America’s heartland succeeded where Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater’s similar appeal in 1964 failed disastrously. Trump placed working-class Americana, with its churches, vet centers, rusted factories, rural flatlands, country music and rodeos, at center stage.
How else could wrestler Hulk Hogan and the president of the Ultimate Fighting Championship speak to America in primetime? Right before Trump himself! Lee Greenwood and Kid Rock serenaded Republican delegates, upstaging traditional Democratic favorites like Carole King, Bruce Springsteen and Barbara Streisand.
Trump may very well regain the White House — especially given President Biden’s decision to accept the inevitable, withdrawing from the race in favor of his widely unpopular vice president, Kamala Harris. Yet, the triumphant return of Trump would never have occurred without the Biden administration endorsing infinite anti-American grievances and exhibiting smug moral superiority — a stubborn willfulness that Americans move in directions they do not wish to go.
Populism, nationalism and large cheering crowds have never been a welcome sight for Jews.
Harris is even more representative of a cultural and political backlash that is defining this election.
We have come to learn what should have been obvious: The ruling class and coastal elites may be enamored of Hollywood celebrities, technocrats with PhDs, the patrons of opera and ballet and the drivers of electric cars. But those exotic features of American society do not align that well with the more natural zeitgeist of our country.
This contest between progressivism and populism is proving to be not much of a contest at all. Should Trump prevail, Democratic leaders should force a reckoning and take stock of how they got here.
In hindsight, was it really so important for transgender men to compete for swimming medals against women? Or to lock up January 6 rioters while BLM arsonists and looters roamed free? Or to launch all those political prosecutions against Donald Trump, accusing him of being undemocratic while trying to get states to ban him from their ballots? Or to absurdly insist that the border was secure? Or to proclaim that all America’s problems lie with racism, and that nearly everyone is a racist? Or to turn pronoun usage into a pledge of allegiance? Or to call for unity while demonizing everyone who isn’t entirely sold on Democratic dogma?
In the end, the Republican convention was a pep rally dedicated to all those who believe that America has become unlivable and revolting to anyone once proud to have been born here.
The Republican convention was not a crowd pleaser for everyone, however. It wasn’t just progressives who may have felt left out. For instance, Jews and pro-Israel supporters must have questions. As a general rule, populism, nationalism and large cheering crowds have never been a welcome sight for Jews. An anti-globalist, more isolationist agenda is not a good sign for allies who depend on America’s support — moral, military and financial. America First is one thing; a solitary America that does not stand in solidarity with longstanding partners in fostering democratic stability is something else altogether.
There is no guarantee that Israel’s security, or, for that matter, the protection of American Jews from marauding Muslims will be much of a priority for a Trump administration. Yes, of course I remember the first Trump administration with its Abraham Accords and endless beneficence toward Israel. But that administration looked a lot more like the neo-conservativism of the Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush years — which was intellectually rich with pro-democracy, pro-Israel Jews and others who believed in American exceptionalism and global leadership.
As a senator, JD Vance has said all the right things about Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza. In his speech accepting the nomination as vice-president, however, he spoke about America’s senseless involvement in foreign wars and delivery of military aid when beset with so many domestic problems of its own. The delegates lapped up anecdotes about his Mamaw. He knew his audience, a crowd familiar with G-d-fearing women with profane mouths and households accessorized with firearms.
This crowd was not especially predisposed to Jewish cosmopolitans with their bubbies and books and more agnostic view of the Second Amendment. Were any Jewish grandmothers in Milwaukee at the convention? I imagine they spent the night fidgeting.
Jewish hillbillies, anyone: please call home.
The first Trump presidency was packed with staunch pro-Israel advisers and Abraham Accords architects such as Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner, Jason Greenblatt and Avi Berkowitz. Nikki Haley was UN Ambassador. Steve Mnuchin was Treasury Secretary. David Friedman was the Israel ambassador.
Are any of them coming back? I’d feel a lot better had President Trump selected Haley, Sens. Marco Rubio and Tim Scott, or Rep. Elise Stefanik as his running mate. Will Sens. Ted Cruz and Lindsey Graham be brought into the Cabinet?
Yes, the Israeli-American parents of Hamas
hostage Omer Neutra, and Harvard student Shabbos Kestenbaum spoke movingly at the convention about returning the hostages and responding to campus antisemitism. There was a “Bring Them Home!” moment, but it was relatively short-lived and tepid given the boisterousness of the night.
More importantly, neither Vance nor Trump addressed the Israeli-American hostage situation, or the war itself, at all. Trump only said that Hamas would never have massacred Israelis on his watch. That may be true, in part because his Iran sanctions would have bankrupted Hamas’s benefactor. But how will Trump distinguish himself now that Israel is at war, the hostages have spent nine months in captivity, Iran is nearing a nuclear weapon and the world, along with American progressives, keep calling for a ceasefire in Gaza?
On the other hand, with Kamala Harris in the Oval Office, hostility toward Israel, and the disregard of domestic antisemitism, would be unlike anything we have yet seen.
Republicans are no longer the party of neocons and Wall Street financiers. The era of liberal Republicans like Gov. Nelson Rockefeller, and Sens. Jacob Javits and John McCain, is gone.
This is the era where Hulk Hogan will likely tear off his tuxedo at some future Kennedy Center cultural event. That’s not a very Jewish thing to do at all.
Hulk Hogan rips his shirt as he speaks on stage on the fourth day of the Republican National Convention. Chip Somodevilla, Getty Images
‘Abject, squalid, shameless’ Oxford Union debate
In an era dominated by social media and defined by short attention spans, it’s striking that longer, more involved debates hosted by elite institutions still matter.
The Oxford Union — a debating society created at Oxford University in the 1820s, immodestly billing itself as “the most prestigious debating society in the world” — is one of those institutions. During its forthcoming Michaelmas term, which covers the winter months, the Union is planning a debate on the motion: “This house recognizes that Israel is an apartheid state responsible for genocide.”
One of the proposed speakers at the debate is my good friend Prof. Gerald Steinberg, who teaches in the politics department at Bar-Ilan University in Israel. In 2002, Steinberg founded the Israeli watchdog NGO Monitor, which has since played an invaluable role in analyzing and exposing the role of non-governmental organizations in the war against Israel on the propaganda and legal fronts. The Oxford
An Israeli professor strikes back at the Union’s disgraceful attempt to paint Israel as a genocidal, apartheid state.
Union rightly assessed that Steinberg would be an ideal speaker to defend Israel’s reputation and duly sent him an invite.
An invitation to speak at the Oxford Union is commonly regarded in academic and media circles as a great honor and an affirmation of one’s expertise in a particular subject area.
Indeed, the invitation to Steinberg was dripping with the kind of self-importance that makes Oxford and Cambridge Universities the continual butt of dismissive jokes among the acerbically humorous, class-obsessed British. It ran through a list of speakers to have graced its hall over the past two centuries, including three US presidents, the late Queen Elizabeth II, the Dalai Lama and the radical AfricanAmerican advocate Malcolm X.
For good measure, the invitation highlighted two debates from the past century to entice Steinberg. One was from 1933, the year Hitler came to power and the Union shamefully voted in favor of the motion:
This House will in no circumstances fight for its King and Country.
The other was from 1962 — five years before Israel unified Jerusalem and conquered Judea, Samaria, the Gaza Strip and the Golan Heights during the Six-Day War — when the Union debated the contention that the creation of the State of Israel is one of the mistakes of the century.
Despite his impressive credentials, Steinberg is a modest man who can be relied upon to do the right thing. He sent the Union a response that ripped the premises of their proposed debate to shreds. Addressing the reference in the invitation letter to the infamous 1933 debate as an example of the Union’s “tradition of confronting the boldest questions of our time,” he observed:
“That tradition is also described as exploiting the Oxford Union as a platform for crude
It’s been 30
Last week, I led a Conference of Presidents leadership mission that represented the American Jewish community at the commemoration of the 30th anniversary of the bombing of AMIA, the Jewish center in Buenos Aires. On that dreadful day in July 1994, 85 people were murdered and 300 more injured, a wound that still feels fresh for global Jewry.
I flew to Argentina from Israel, my fourth visit there since Oct. 7, during which I was in the Old City of Jerusalem. With each visit, I prayed we would be celebrating the release of the hostages, but more than 100 of our brothers and sisters are still being held in the dungeons of Hamas — including American and Argentinian citizens.
As my friends Orna and Ronen Neutra so movingly asked at the Republican National Convention last week: “Where is the outrage?”
Israel has evacuated dozens of communities near the northern border, displacing over 60,000 citizens. As the war against Hamas grinds on and another against Hezbollah looms, Iran — the puppet master of these terror groups and others — fired ballistic missiles and one-way attack drones directly at the Jewish state for the first time in history. Even the most determined optimist’s resolve has been tested by the events of the last nine months.
There remains much work to be done, but global Jewry is united.
political propaganda. The histories of this event highlight the fact that the debate took place shortly after Hitler became the German leader and the Nazis launched the actions and laws targeting the Jewish population. Winston Churchill described the Union’s behavior in 1933 as an ‘abject, squalid, shameless avowal. … It is a very disquieting and disgusting symptom’.”
Churchill’s condemnation applies no less to the topic on which Steinberg was invited to debate.
“The gratuitous labels of ‘apartheid’ and ‘genocide’ add to this edifice, and some might conclude that the leaders and members of the
TOxford Union seek to repeat and reinforce the travesties of 1933 and 1962,” he wrote. Steinberg then dealt with the frankly libelous claims of “apartheid” and “genocide” against Israel, highlighting the historical context and moral significance of both these terms.
Regarding “apartheid,” Steinberg correctly reminded the debate organizers that this term originally appeared in relation to Israel as a result of intensive Soviet propaganda efforts during the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s to strip the Jewish state of its legitimacy, with Moscow lobbing words like “Nazi” and “racist” into the brew as well. On the invocation of genocide, Steinberg
See Cohen on page 22
years since the murders at AMIA
he two bloody days on our minds — Oct. 7 and the AMIA bombing — do not exist in a vacuum. Our history as a Jewish people has been marred by tragedy after tragedy, century after century.
From the exiles we endured from the Land of Israel to the pogroms of the shtetl, the Shoah, the AMIA bombing, the Sbarro bombing of the second intifada, Oct. 7 and many other dreadful days, we are bound to each other and our ancestors by the tragedies we face and the resolve we display as we endure.
While in Buenos Aires, our leadership mission participated in the AMIA bombing memorial service. There, we heard from a dozen relatives of victims who shared the stories of their loved ones and how the terror attack ripped indelible holes in their lives that still radiate 30 years later with visibly raw pain.
One of the relatives we spoke with was Sofia Gutterman. On the day of the attack, her daughter Andrea, an inquisitive nursery school teacher who had many friends, was at the AMIA job bank at 9:53 am looking for a new job when Iran’s proxies murdered her.
Like many other relatives of victims and survivors, Sofia has dedicated her life since the bombing to educating others, particularly youth, about the AMIA attack and the Jewish community.
Unfortunately, justice continues to evade the victims and their families. We cannot forget the fact that 17 years after prosecutor Alberto Nisman concluded that Iran and its proxy Hezbollah were responsible for the attack, the murderers have not been held accountable. Though Interpol issued “red notices” for the arrest of the terrorists responsible, no arrests have ever been made. Meanwhile, the investigation of Nisman’s own murder nearly a decade ago remains mired in government complacency and conspiracy.
Nor do the terror attacks in Argentina 30 years ago and in Israel nine months ago exist in a vacuum. The ayatollah’s regime and its ten-
tacles of terror threaten Israel and the Jewish people everywhere.
Earlier this year, under the direction of US Ambassador Marc Stanley, the United States and Argentina collaborated to ground and seize a plane sold from an Iranian airline that was used to ferry weapons and fighters for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Hezbollah to Venezuela.
Recently, US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines announced that Iran is engaged in fomenting and funding anti-Israel unrest on American college campuses.
Argentina is continuously on alert due to Iran’s activities in Bolivia and Venezuela, raising the possibility of terrorist infiltrations.
Global Jewry stands united in our resolve to protect ourselves and each other from the Iranian terror regime. We thank Argentina’s President Javier Milei for taking the important step of designating Hamas a terror organiza-
tion, making Argentina the first Latin American country to do so.
Beyond terror threats, Jewish communities around the world also share in the challenge of rising domestic antisemitism in the aftermath of Oct. 7. The ADL tracked a 400% increase in antisemitic incidents across the United States after that terrible day.
By Oct. 8, well before Israel launched its defensive operation in Gaza, we realized that we could not depend upon many of our traditional allies. They quickly denied, minimized and rationalized the murders, rapes and hostage-taking undertaken by the Hamas terrorist army.
Anarrative took hold in some circles that claimed Israel is an “oppressor state” that must be opposed “by any means necessary,” a thinly veiled euphemism for the justification of terror. Hostage posters are ripped down time and time again. Jewish businesses are boycotted and
A memorial event marking this year’s 30 years anniversary of the bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, which killed 85 people.
Professor Gerald Steinberg at a conference organized by NGO Monitor at the Knesset in 2016. Miriam Alster, Flash90
Saving intimacy in the wake of sexual violence
Chana Boteach, daughter of “Kosher Sex” Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, is CEO of the Kosher Sex Company online and runs the Kosher Sex Shop in Jerusalem.
Entering the ninth month of this terrible war has been especially harrowing. As our hostages continue to be held in unfathomable terror, my mind is consumed with the women, because we all know what can happen in nine months. I shudder to think of it.
Tragically, we Jews are no strangers to this level of terror. Historically, Jewish women have been targeted with horrific sexual violence: From the ancient Greek warlords who would force themselves on every new Jewish bride to the suicides of Ukrainian Jewish women during the Chmielnicki Pogroms. Those women jumped to their deaths, desperate to avoid a fate of sexual violence they saw as worse than death.
Then there were the Nazi officers who disre-
Rape is not about sex but about power. Taking something so holy to us and degrading it in the most evil way was about obliterating our very Jewish foundation of always choosing life.
garded their laws against having sex with a Jew if it meant raping their women.
But in 2023? In a world where women are seemingly safe and sexual violence is universally condemned? Who could have imagined this could happen?
In the days and months after Oct. 7, I was tormented by the accounts of survivors and emergency responders who had witnessed the carnage and evidence of truly evil sexual assault of both women and men; as well as the images I had seen of women lying in fields, clothing ripped off, their bodies stripped and contorted, violated in their last moments of life and even in death.
The nightmare continued as former hostages recounted their assaults, and a silent world of moral frauds reacted by denying that these atrocities even occurred.
My work that was centered around uplifting the concept of sex had descended into hell.
Messages flooded my inbox. Women in particular wrote to me seeking advice on how to navigate intimacy with their spouse when they couldn’t bear to touch or be touched. The trauma was widespread and deep and an act focused on creating closeness was now pushing couples apart.
All I could do was encourage couples to communicate and be open with their spouses about their feelings and decide for themselves what felt right.
I closed the Kosher Sex shop in Jerusalem for almost two months. The work didn’t feel holy to me anymore; it felt desecrated.
I made a video on my social media in which I explained that Judaism outlines laws for intimacy during times such as this because tragically, loss, suffering and war have become all too casual.
Ispoke about how the Shulchan Aruch stipulates that during an “Eit Tzara,” a “period of suffering” such as a famine, couples who refrain from intercourse are considered “righteous.” In Judaism, sex between a couple is holy and G-d revels and takes part in their closeness. Now it seemed G-d wanted there to be distance.
Then came the month of Nisan, six months into the war, and I stumbled upon something: I knew that Nisan is the month of miracles, the month in which G-d finally has mercy on His people, leading them from slavery into freedom and destroying their enemies. I looked deeper into the story of the Exodus for something to hold on to.
Amid all of G-d’s Passover miracles, we are told that “in the merit of Jewish women, our people were redeemed from Egypt.” This merit wasn’t women’s more natural inclination towards spirituality, their modest dress or prayers — it was their power of seduction.
The male Jewish slaves of Egypt were broken. Literally, their bodies were forced into “backbreaking labor,” but the real collapse was of their libidos. In the most famous instance, Moses’ father Amram separated from his wife Yocheved and took sex off the table. They saw no reason to reproduce and thus continue the Jewish people. Pharaoh was drowning all of their newborn sons in the Nile, a real genocide; so what was the point?
But the spirit of the Jewish women endured. They went to their battered husbands and soothed
them with promises that soon they would be free men. They pulled them under the shade of apple trees and teased and flirted with their husbands, “and then they would take the mirrors, and each gazed at herself together with her husband, saying endearingly to him, ‘See, I am more beautiful than you’.”
The men, if only momentarily, would forget the bitterness of their lives and allow intimacy to reconvene, giving them the strength to go on and also continue our great nation.
These mirrors were later used to create the Kiyor, the wash basin used to purify the priests before their service in the Temple. Moses initially rejected these mirrors, thinking they were tools of vanity and arousal. It was G-d who told Moses, “Accept them, for these are dearer to me than everything else.”
After learning this, I began to see a shift. One that not only brought me back to my work and gave me a new sense of purpose in helping couples connect and create, but one I saw in my customers too.
I get all kinds of people in the shop: soldiers, Haredim, Arabs, non-Jews, younger and older couples. But what has surprised me most is who is buying for whom.
It used to be a lot of husbands coming in, buying presents for their wives. But lately, it’s flipped. It’s the women coming in to buy gifts for their husbands, especially their soldier husbands serving in the war. It’s like what I read about in Egypt but 3,300 years later: Women taking the lead and using sex as a means to comfort their husbands and bring them closer and back to life.
Our collective trauma when it comes to sex hasn’t gone away and will remain for who knows how long, but it is being transformed. Just like in Egypt, the despair is forging a new will, one that pushes us to return to ourselves and our partners and fight like hell.
The fight now is not just on the battlefield and in the media but for our homes and relationships. The sexual violence perpetrated against our
See Boteach on page 22
Let’s chant, ‘Let them go,’ not ‘bring them home’
In the wake of the Hamas hostage crisis, a central and often-heard rallying cry has emerged from the Israeli and Diaspora Jewish communities: “Bring them home.”
Instead, the call should be: “Let them go.”
The nuanced difference is critical, as it rightly places the burden on Hamas, the terrorist organization that took the hostages, rather than on the Israeli government and the IDF.
“Bring them home” implies that the primary responsibility for the safe return of the hostages lies with the IDF and the Israeli government. This phrasing overlooks the root cause of the situation: the terrorist actions of Hamas.
In contrast, “Let them go” directly addresses the actions of Hamas. It places the responsibility and moral obligation where it belongs: On the terrorists who have taken innocent people hostage.
This shift in language helps to highlight the criminal nature of Hamas’ tactics and strengthens the moral and legal argument against them. It reinforces that the hostages should never have been taken in the first place and that their immediate release is the only acceptable resolution.
The onus must be on Hamas, not Israel, to return the hostages.
Using “Let them go” instead of “Bring them home” provides greater moral clarity. It unequivocally condemns the act of hostage-taking and emphasizes the fundamental human rights violation committed by Hamas.
This clarity is essential in garnering international support and pressure on the terrorist organization. By focusing the demand on the actions of Hamas, we ensure that the international community remains aware of the true nature of the crisis. This awareness can lead to more unified and decisive actions against the perpetrators.
The narrative shift from “Bring them home” to “Let them go” also impacts the psychological and strategic dimensions of the conflict. It reframes the situation in a way that delegitimizes Hamas’ actions and undermines their propaganda efforts.
Hamas often seeks to portray itself as a defender against Israeli aggression, but when the focus is on their responsibility to release hostages, it becomes harder for them to maintain this ludicrous facade.
This reframing can also influence public opinion within Arab communities. Emphasizing the unlawful and immoral actions of Hamas can help to erode support for the organization among those who may otherwise view them as legitimate resistance fighters.
Such internal pressure is crucial in weakening Hamas’ hold over the region and reducing its capacity to carry out such heinous acts in the future.
From a practical standpoint, the call to “Let them go” aligns with international legal standards and humanitarian principles. Hostage-taking is a clear violation of international law, and the demand for their release is a straightforward assertion of this fact. It rein-
forces the position that the international community should take against such actions, making it harder for any state or organization to justify or support Hamas’ behavior.
Furthermore, this approach can enhance diplomatic efforts. When the international community rallies around the call to “Let them go,” it strengthens diplomatic pressure on Hamas and their supporters. This unified stance can lead to more effective sanctions, diplomatic isolation, and potentially, the mobilization of international resources to assist in the hostages’ release.
While it is important to highlight the need for Hamas to release the hostages, this does not
diminish the role of Israel in ensuring the safety and security of its citizens. The IDF and the Israeli government have the challenging task of navigating this crisis with strategic precision. However, by shifting the primary demand to “Let them go,” we support Israel’s efforts without placing unrealistic expectations on their shoulders. It acknowledges that while Israel will do everything in its power to protect its people, the fundamental responsibility for this crisis lies with Hamas.
Steve Rosenberg is principal of the GSD Group and board chair of the Philadelphia Jewish Sports Hall of Fame.
Israelis call for the release of hostages held captive in Gaza, outside the Red Cross offices in Tel Aviv, on Jan. 18. Miriam Alster, Flash90
Why the teacher union’s butting into Hamas war
stephen M. FlAtow
When it meets this week at its annual convention, the American Federation of Teachers will not be focusing on the need to improve teaching in American schools. Instead, the AFT is weighing in on Israel and its war with Hamas.
In the aftermath of the Oct. 7 massacre and given Israel’s need to defend its citizens, I find myself shaking my head in disbelief more frequently than ever before. Pro-Hamas college students rioting and making life difficult for Jewish students on campuses, Jews being harassed and attacked on American city streets, the vandalizing of synagogues and Jewish schools, and hostage posters being torn down make my head spin. Now comes the AFT.
Those attending the convention in Houston will be treated to several anti-Israel resolutions, such as “Opposing the Weaponization of Anti-
semitism,” “For an End to the War in Gaza and Lasting Peace, Security and Self-Determination for Israel and Palestine,” “AFT Divestment from State of Israel Bonds” and “Stop Enabling Genocide: Halt US Military Aid to Israel.”
The resolutions make no mention of the corruption of Palestinian schools that use children’s education as a weapon against Israel, and there’s no condemnation of the Palestinian school system’s glorification of terrorism and martyrdom.
According to Palestinian Media Watch, it’s the Palestinian Authority and Hamas who are “pulling the strings” and “putting the content in the schoolbooks” glorifying terrorists and inculcating students in Jew-hatred.
Among the AFT resolutions, you won’t find a condemnation of UNRWA, which permits its school buildings to be used by Hamas for weapons storage or as launching pads for missiles, rockets and mortars aimed at Israeli civilians. Nowhere in the list of resolutions will you find any criticism of the PA’s treatment of teachers, including mass arrests of teachers on strike. Nor will there be any mention of the PA’s decision to spend money on salaries for convicted terrorists and stipends to their families rather than education.
Instead of targeting the PA and Hamas with its resolutions, the AFT calls for US aid to Israel to “be used only for purposes that conform
with American and international law: American military aid cannot be used in ways that facilitate the seizure of Palestinian land, the violent dispossession of Palestinian communities and the annexation of occupied Palestinian territory. Nor can US military aid be used to harm civilian populations.”
While it puts a modicum of blame on Hamas, which the AFT admits “has demonstrated a readiness to sacrifice Palestinian life on a massive scale when it thinks it will serve its ends,” the union nonetheless goes on to claim, “Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and his far-right government are an obstacle to achieving lasting peace, freedom and security.”
America’s schoolteachers have, at a minimum, a bachelor’s degree. Many have master’s degrees and Ph.D.s. They’re educated. We expect them to be rational and enlightened. That’s why we entrust our children’s education to them. We also expect them to know when they’ve crossed the line between areas of their expertise and international politics.
I’m not saying that these terrorist-defending teachers are typical of the entire public educa-
The epic failure of anti-Israel campus protests
Now that the campuses have settled down, it’s time to take stock of what has happened since the Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel on Oct. 7. Despite the hysteria, the protests were resounding failures in achieving their stated objectives.
Besides roiling college quads, they revealed disturbing truths about higher education, bringing the virulent antisemitism of students and faculty to the forefront, and scaring Jewish students.
Colleges are the only place in America where antisemitism is tolerated.
But how widespread was the problem, and was there a pattern?
A Washington Monthly study found that of 1,421 public and private nonprofit colleges, 318 (22%) had protests and 123 (9%) encampments. While these figures might seem significant, they represent only one-third of all institutions. Even as strains have occurred in black-Jewish relations, it is notable that none of the 78 historically black colleges had encampments, and only nine had demonstrations. Protests were primarily concentrated in California and the Northeast, and were most prominent at elite universities.
The amount of publicity given to schools like Columbia, Penn, Harvard, Berkeley, UCLA, Cornell, Michigan and New York University gave the false impression that protesters’ views were the norm rather than representative of a small fraction of the faculty and student body. The bad news is that these schools produce judges, business leaders and political officials, and they are churning out graduates who are, at best, ignoramuses and, at worst, antisemites.
Extremists chanting “From the River to the Sea” must be disappointed that Israel has not disappeared and that their Hamas heroes are being crushed. Meanwhile, “moder-
ates” advocating for a ceasefire proved equally impotent as Hamas terrorists rejected proposals requiring them to release their hostages.
The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement believed it had reached a critical mass. Votes were held at 24 schools, the most since 2014-15, and BDS measures were adopted at 18.
Do you know how many universities agreed to boycott Israel? Zero.
The president of Sonoma State University in California did cave to pressure, but his decision to boycott Israel was quickly reversed, and he was out of a job. Presidents of other universities said their institutions would not boycott Israel. Some of the more cowardly officials gave in to the campus terrorists and agreed to consider divestment or to be more transparent about their investments.
Meanwhile, the financiers in charge of university money said boycotting would violate their fiduciary responsibilities; economists explained there was little to divest, and the gesture would have no impact on Israel.
Throughout the history of the pro-Palestinian constituency, students have shown little concern for the massacre of Jews or Hamas’ use of Gazans
as human shields. Demands for Hamas to release hostages or criticism of their weaponizing of schools, hospitals and mosques were conspicuously absent from protests.
What many of us knew for decades was exposed for all to see — namely, that colleges are the only place in America where antisemitism is tolerated and that a double standard is applied to the treatment of Jews and other victims of prejudice.
University presidents, often lacking moral fortitude, failed to unequivocally condemn violence against Jews and address the bigotry within their institutions. Many disgracefully sought to appease protesters by inappropriately conflating antisemitism with Islamophobia. Some, like the presidents of Harvard, Penn and MIT, embarrassed themselves and their institutions by their inability to recognize that calling for the extermination of Jews was antisemitic and a violation of their codes of conduct.
Universities typically believe that they can outlast students by metaphorically patting the kids on the head and saying they’ll listen, knowing that summer is coming and expecting all to be forgotten by the next term. However, the ca-
Whose land Israel? History provides the answer
On Nov. 2, 1917, amid the turmoil of World War I, British Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour sent a public letter to Baron Lionel Walter Rothschild, a former member of Parliament and leader of the British Jewish community.
Expressing support for Zionist aspirations, the letter promised that the British government would use its “best endeavors” to facilitate “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.” Whether a “national home”’ was synonymous with statehood was not revealed.
The British promise to the Jews proved to be short-lived. Five years later, then-Secretary of State for the Colonies Winston Churchill issued a White Paper that undermined the Balfour Declaration. While affirming Britain’s commitment to its promise of a Jewish national home in Palestine, the White Paper nonetheless of-
fered reassurance to Palestinian Arabs that the Declaration did “not contemplate that Palestine as a whole should be converted into a Jewish National Home, but that such a home should be founded ‘in Palestine’.”
Churchill envisioned a Jewish community in Palestine comprising 80,000 people, with its own political, religious and social institutions, Hebrew language and customs, with “national characteristics” that should be “internationally guaranteed.” He imagined “a center in which the Jewish people as a whole may take, on grounds of religion and race, an interest and a pride.”
To reduce tension between Arabs and Jews, and placate Arab leaders, Churchill’s White Paper called for a limitation on Jewish immigration. Biblical Judea and Samaria, west of the Jordan River, were gifted to Emir (later King) Abdullah and eventually became Jordan’s “West Bank.”
Jews never forgot their ancient history. They restored their national sovereignty in 1948 with the birth of the State of Israel, but the new state’s constricted boundaries excluded the ancient Jewish Quarter in Jerusalem’s Old City, as well as Judea and Samaria.
Nineteen years later, as a result of Israel’s stunning victory in the Six-Day War, Israel regained its holiest ancient sites: Machpelah in Hebron where, according to the biblical narrative, Abraham purchased the first parcel of land in the Holy Land as a burial site for Sarah; and the Western Wall of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, seized by Arabs during Israel’s War of Independence.
The unrelenting insistence that Israel is “occupying” its ancient homeland ignores the reality that there already is a Palestinian state in historic Palestine. It is the kingdom of Jordan, east of the Jordan River, with a majority Palestinian population. A second Palestinian state west of the river would be superfluous and extremely dangerous to Israel.
More than 500,000 Israelis currently inhabit Judea and Samaria.
Ma’ale Adumim, located between Jerusalem and Jericho, is the largest Jewish settlement, home to more than 40,000 residents, a strikingly modern community with an industrial park, library, art museum and more than 20 schools, with a special program for new immigrant children. Although it has a largely secular
popula-
Mitchell bArd
AFT President of Randi Weingarten speaks in Chicago on July 13, 2023.
Daniel Boczarski, Getty Images for MoveOn
A view of Me’arat HaMakhpela, the Tomb of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, in Hebron. Ed Weintrob, The Jewish Star
Priest. The effective leader, nay the great leader, dare not think of himself as infallible, as the only source of intelligent leadership. Rather, he too must bow to a higher authority.
Hence, “he shall present himself to Elazar the Priest, who shall, on his behalf, seek the decision of the Urim before the L-rd. By such instruction, they shall go out, and by such instruction, they shall come in .… Moses did as the L-rd commanded him. He took Joshua and had him stand before Elazar the Priest.” (Numbers 27:21-22)
Joshua was to be the undisputed leader of the Jewish people. Indeed, our sages see him as fulfilling the role of king — chosen not just because he was a faithful disciple to his master, Moses, but because of the amazing skill he possessed to deal with a people as diverse and as fractious as the Israelites.
Yet he too, from the very beginning, was made to realize that he had limitations, that he needed to depend upon others, and that, ultimately, he had to bow before “the Source of the breath of all flesh.”
Whenever I read these key passages of our Torah portion this week, I cannot help but apply their lessons to the very many leaders across a span of history who began their careers with talents equal or perhaps superior to Joshua’s, but who ultimately failed because they tried to “go at it alone.” They yielded in their hubris to their inner conviction that they knew best, and that consultation with others was a waste of time.
Failed leaders, leaders who do not look to the Elazars of their own times, are not just historical figures. Bechol dor vador (in each and every generation) ours too, leaders arise with G-d-given personal gifts and with great promise, but to our disappointment, they fail dismally.
And, almost without exception, their failures can be traced back to their attempts to be a Joshua without an Elazar, a king without a conscience, an expert without a consultant, a wise man without an Urim, a human without G-d.
Freedman...
Indeed, in their haste to build this wall ahead of the advancing Assyrians, they built up two outer walls, throwing stone and mud inside to achieve a thick wall against the Assyrian battering rams. One has the sense the last stones were set in place just in time.
What must it have felt like, to see 185,000 men bent on your destruction coming up through the valley and surrounding your home?
There were 30,000 Jews trapped inside the city, and things soon went from bad to worse. There was no food, and the Jews were starving to death. They could not run, nor did they have an army with which to fight, and not for the first time and certainly not for the last, they were not given the option of surrender. So Chizkiyahu did what Jews have always done: he called the city together in prayer.
These Jerusalemites represented the entire Jewish people; no one else was left. The northern tribes had been completely lost, and there were as yet no Jews living in a Western Diaspora. It should have ended there, with a final solution to the Jewish problem.
But the people prayed, and Hashem performed a miracle. In the middle of the night, the entire Assyrian army fell dead before the angel of the L-rd.
(Amazingly, this story which is told partly in the 19th chapter of the second book of Kings, is also described in the ancient writings of Herodotus, the historian of Alexander the Great, who reports that the 200,000 strong Assyrian army was wiped out by a mysterious plague outside the walls of Jerusalem.)
Today, you can see this wall, discovered courtesy of Jordanian mortar fire in the Six Day War. You can see how the wall is built as a broad wall, rising on top of ancient homes and built exactly as the Bible describes. There are no words to describe what it feels
like to stand above such a wall, listening to the wind and the silence. It is almost too much to take in. So you look at one stone, and you wonder where these ancient Jews found the faith to build such a wall and believe they would survive.
Right above this ancient broad wall sits a playground, where the Jewish children of the Old City come to play and laugh in the sunshine.
Twenty-five-hundred years ago, amidst the flames of the destruction of the Temple, the prophet Zechariah (8:4-5) issued an amazing prophesy: “There will come a time, so says the Lord of Hosts, when the old will yet sit in the streets of Jerusalem, leaning on their walking sticks from length of days, and the city streets of Jerusalem will be filled with the sounds of the children, playing in her alleyways.”
These children, playing in that playground, above that wall, are the fulfillment of a centuries old dream. The Jewish dream has never been about armies marching in; it has been that one day the children will come back to play.
After 2,000 years of wandering, we are home. And despite everything, for the price of an El Al ticket, anyone can become a part of this journey begun so long ago in the midst of Egyptian bondage.
And if you come this summer, and walk through the alleys of Jerusalem, you can see it too, this incredible other old wall, waiting for so long for all of her children to come home to play. And while we mourn what we lost, we feel blessed for what we have merited to rebuild.
Originally published in July 2011.
Cohen...
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noted that this term — applicable to the Turkish slaughter of the Armenians during World War I, the Holocaust of six million Jews during World War II and more recent events of mass killing and systemic abuse in Cambodia, Rwanda and Myanmar/Burma — was now being distorted to “delegitimize responses to military aggression, asymmetric warfare and atrocities directed at civilian populations, such as committed by Hamas and its allies.”
Part of the problem here is that while the team at the Oxford Union is gushingly proud of the debate topics covered during that institution’s long existence, they appear to be less familiar with the underlying substance.
Had they examined the examples of genocide cited above, they might have noticed a common pattern: In every case, regimes targeted minorities simply based on their identity. In Pol Pot’s Cambodia, even wearing glasses marked one out as a candidate for death, because a pair of specs was seen as evidence of a bourgeois education. These regimes then used killing methods like mass executions and concentration camps to eliminate those they targeted.
Both before and during the killings, the victim groups were dehumanized in regime propaganda. The Nazis depicted Jews as “rats” and the Hutu killing mobs in Rwanda referred to Tutsis as “cockroaches.” Victim groups were at best poorly armed, at worst utterly defenseless, in the face of their killers.
Similarly, those who invoke the word “apartheid” in the context of Israel have little idea of what that system involved or the discredited racist ideology it was based upon. For most of the 20th century in South Africa, the Black population that comprises 90% of the country was subjected to humiliating restrictions in every aspect of their lives, along with the denial of suffrage.
While South African apartheid was unique, there are some ironic parallels visible in the Middle East — but not in Israel. In Syria and Bahrain, to take just two examples, unelected, heavily armed minorities engage in brutal rule over the majorities, as was the case in South Africa. In Qatar, less than 10% of the population are full citizens. Everyone else, including the vast reservoir of migrant labor toiling in conditions of slavery, is seen as a lesser being, deemed unfit to even enter the gleaming shopping malls and hotels built with their own sweat. In Iran, women and religious minorities suffer from discrimination rooted in the Islamic Republic’s interpretation of the Quran and other religious texts.
All of this is ignored because it contradicts the
dogma that Israel lies at the root of all the conflicts in the Middle East and, in increasing numbers of fevered minds, the world. The Oxford Union is no less guilty of sacralizing this dogma than is some idiot on Instagram posting an Israeli flag juxtaposed with a Nazi swastika.
Bard... Weinreb...
As Steinberg suggested at the end of his reply, if the Oxford Union is really serious about upholding its tradition of bold debates that pull no punches, it should consider the motion: “This house recognizes that its own history of Jew-hatred in different forms is fundamentally immoral and offers its apologies.”
Daroff...
vandalized. Our places of worship are under increased threat.
This hatred is being felt personally: A survey released in November by the American Jewish Committee found that 46% of American Jews avoided publicly displaying their Jewish identity in the previous 12 months out of fear of antisemitism.
Nevertheless, in the darkness there is light. I am gratified by the surge of communal participation and activism within the American Jewish community over the last nine months. Synagogue attendance has swelled, Judaica stores have run out of Stars of David jewelry, donations to Jewish institutions have skyrocketed and Jewish summer camps are now filled with the beaming faces of our next generation.
Amidst the tragedy of Oct. 7, the heartbeats of Jews around the world were synchronized. This does not only extend to American Jewry’s relationship with Israel but global Jewry’s relationship with each other.
That is why, 30 years after the AMIA bombing, the largest delegation of Jewish community members gathered in Buenos Aires for the memorial, many of us joined by antisemitism envoys and official delegations from our governments.
I know that through sharing our common experiences and best practices, we will create a better future for our countries and the Jewish people.
We in the American Jewish community continue to stand by our brethren in the Diaspora and Israel. As the challenges of antisemitism have metastasized in the United States over these last months, we in America thank you for standing with us.
Though there remains much work to be done, global Jewry is united. Our heartbeats are synchronized and, together, we will thrive and prevail, just as our people have for 3,500 years.
William Daroff is CEO of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.
pitulation to pro-terrorist protesters’ demands by some administrators emboldened the campus terrorists and perpetuated a cycle of unrest that promises to return in the fall as the war continues and likely escalates in the north.
Many faculty were also exposed as antisemites. They participated in protests, encouraged them, and signed and made statements that were blatantly antisemitic. Professors used their classrooms to indoctrinate their students with misinformation and propaganda. Many of us have warned of this rot within academia, but it has long escaped sufficient scrutiny.
We also learned that protesters were embarrassingly ignorant. Many joined without understanding the history or issues, like those who chanted “From the river to the sea” without knowing the name of the river or the sea.
Far from achieving their aims, demonstrators provoked a backlash that is reshaping campus policies and public perceptions:
•Several universities established antisemitism taskforces and planned to require students and faculty to attend meetings to learn about the persecution of Jews and what behavior is impermissible.
•Just as the BDS movement stimulated the adoption of anti-boycott laws in 38 states, the campus divestment effort also prompted legal action. The Pennsylvania state Senate, for example, passed a bill to block aid to any university that boycotts or divests from Israel.
•Anti-mask laws are being discussed to prevent cowardly antisemites and terror supporters from hiding from public view and evading accountability.
•Law firms and other companies declared they would not hire students who participated in protests.
•Some protesters were suspended and prevented from graduating. Others were arrested and charged with crimes.
•More strict rules were implemented as to the time and place where protests could be held to prevent disruption of university activity and the harassment of Jewish students.
•The number of civil-rights complaints demanding action against universities that failed to protect Jewish students filed with the US Department of Education increased exponentially.
•Jewish students also filed lawsuits. NYU settled one and “committed to take groundbreaking measures to address antisemitism.”
•Donors withdrew support for institutions that failed to address antisemitism, and parents and students decided not to attend them.
holy Jewish brothers and sisters had nothing to do with sex. Rape is not about sex but about power. Taking something so holy to us and degrading it in the most evil, demonic way was about obliterating our very Jewish foundation of always, always, always choosing life.
On Oct. 7, they succeeded: They stole irreplaceable, incalculable life from us. But we will fight against the death they try to choose for us and we won’t stop until our enemies are destroyed, our hostages are home and the light is back in our homes.
Continued from page 21
After eight months of glorifying terrorists who savagely raped and murdered Jews, protesters succeeded only in highlighting their hatred of Jews, including their fellow students. They failed to promote peace or aid a single Palestinian. tion, there are more than 40 synagogues and several yeshivas. It is, in many ways, a mirror of the Jewish state.
Twenty miles south is the ancient Jewish capital of Hebron, inhabited by 1,100 Israelis confined by their government to a tiny enclave adjacent to and separated from nearly 200,000 Palestinians living in a thriving Arab city. Destroyed by an Arab massacre in 1929, when dozens of Jews were brutally murdered, the Jewish community was restored following the Six-Day War when a handful of resolute Israelis overcame government resistance to their return.
tion community. I’m certainly not suggesting they should be deprived of their legal right to adopt immoral positions.
But parents have rights too — including the right to ensure their children get a first-rate public school education from teachers who focus on education, not politics.
So it is that Jews finally reclaimed their ancient homeland. After millennia of wandering in the wilderness of exile, they returned to Jerusalem and Hebron, their holiest cities. Now Jews who visit the Western Wall in Jerusalem and Machpelah in Hebron, where religious Judaism and Zionist nationalism have converged, can embrace the history and enduring memory of their Promised Land.
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