Israel/Palestine
Israel/Palestine
Fear and Consequences: Healing from Jewish Historical Trauma
Centuries of persecution and genocide have left many Jews so fearful that we see ourselves always and forever as victims, which blinds us to our role in the current oppression of Palestinians. As anti-Occupation Jews, we honor the legacy of Jewish resistance when we consciously choose solidarity over fear.
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Nonviolent Activism
Tikkun Olam: The Art of Nonviolent Civil Resistance
Faith in militarism is on the rise in the Jewish community, and yet, violence, as Hannah Arendt reminded her generation, always leads to more violence.
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Israel/Palestine
Unhealed Terror
It is my understanding that this was the first time the story of a Holocaust survivor had ever been aired on national television in the United States, and the program treated Ms. Kohner’s story as just another made-for-television soap opera. If this was how the non-Jewish world treated the survivors of the Holocaust in the 1950s, what hope was there for the Jewish world to find a place to grieve?
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Israel/Palestine
The Ethical Challenge for Diaspora Jews
Armed against all forms of criticism, the Israeli public is increasingly sequestered in its own psychological fortress. Two responses that dominated my discussions with Israelis were: It is just a chain reaction. You should only know what they have done to us; and Why are you here? Go home and tend to your own country’s problems.
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Israel/Palestine
Solidarity with Palestinian Activists
Having long decried the violent means that some Palestinians have used to call attention to their plight, we in the American Jewish community cannot now turn our backs on a Palestinian movement that uses nonviolence to work for peace. We must do everything in our power to proclaim our solidarity with them.
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Israel/Palestine
Pro-Palestinian and Pro-Israeli
Living in the polarizing atmosphere of the Middle East, I feel the need to reassert the very basics — like affirming that Palestinians and Israelis are all human beings. I say this only somewhat facetiously, as dehumanizing, collective rhetoric justifies violations of many individuals’ basic rights.
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Israel/Palestine
Tikkun Olam in East Jerusalem
For the better part of a year, nearly every Friday afternoon, we have been coming to this ravine in the Palestinian half of Jerusalem. Standing with hundreds of Jews and Palestinians and foreign visitors, young and elderly, and intellectuals and working people, we take part in a protest movement that began spontaneously and refuses to die.
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Israel/Palestine
On Narratives, Power, and Peace: A Note from a Palestinian Activist
Here in Palestine, we unfortunately face a unique narrative that acquired tremendous power and resulted in a large population of refugees after World War II. The question many Jews are struggling with is how to separate this Zionist narrative from the rich and wonderful history of Jewish contributions to humanity.
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Israel/Palestine
We Don’t Need Israel to Feel Secure
When I was in Jewish Sunday school many years ago, I was taught that Jews arrived in Palestine in the late 1940s to an empty land. It was a lie. Just like being told at an Anglican school that in 1788 the British arrived in an Australia without Aborigines. I was ill-served by both myths.
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Israel/Palestine
Reflections on Liberal Zionism
America is not an “honest broker” nor is it working on a just solution to the conflict. Our government, largely as a result of pressure from our community, provides blanket support for Israel.
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War & Peace
The Decalogue as an ABC of Human Behavior
For there is hardly any other people which has something as substantial and striking to offer as Judaism with its Ten Commandments. As the German writer Thomas Mann explained after the terrors of National Socialism, these are the “basic instruction and rock of respectable humanity,” indeed the “ABC of human behavior.”
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Judaism
Elements of a Philosophy for Diaspora Judaism
Why be Jewish? Why join temples? Why bother to introduce our children to Jewish ideas and practices? Answers to these questions vary from person to person and from age to age, but the questions persist. The questions seem as perpetual as the Jewish people itself.
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Editorial
Middle East Peace Negotiations?
Instead of playing to each side’s elites, those who seek peace must launch a broad educational campaign to reach ordinary Israelis and Palestinians with a message that says, here are the terms of a fair peace agreement and here is why we believe that if each side makes the necessary compromises, it will work to meet your best interests.
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Analysis of Israel/Palestine
The New Zionist Imperative Is to Tell Israel the Truth
This is an extremely interesting and terrible time for the issue that I work on, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I’d like to think together about some reactions to the flotilla incident and about where we go from here—what are the policy options, the implications for our politics, and, from my perspective, the implications for the American Jewish community.
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Humor
How to Have a Civil Conversation About Israel
1. Give up. 2. Devote a large portion of your life to avoiding the subject. 3. Respond to a mid-life crisis by seeking comfort in tradition while at the same time avoiding the constraints of religious practice…
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