In June, 1996, I had an epiphany. In a motel room in Indiana, the night before returning home from a solo camping trip in Michigan and Canada, I discovered how much I had lost in my life because of so fiercely protecting myself. Up until that day, bringing forth my vulnerable self was to be avoided at all costs, which kept me numb much of the time, disconnected from myself and from much of life. Alone in my room, I cried, I talked out loud, and I finally exclaimed to myself that I wanted to reclaim every last bit of my vulnerability, just like I had it as a child.

I have had other dramatic moments in my life, before and since; rare and precious experiences of life opening up, my heart expanding, my spirit soaring, defenses falling away. Things suddenly felt possible where previously I was stuck, clarity replaced muddled thinking, hope came in as despair was leaving. I’ve also had such moments since. Only very few of those peak experiences turned into actual life-changing events. This particular one was the beginning of a clear path, the centerpiece of my practice of living the principles of Nonviolent Communication. At the time, I didn’t know this. Today, more than 15 years later, it’s easier to see how things have unfolded and what has helped me turn this from singular moment to a path I’ve been following all these years.

A children's group reads books donated by PJ Library. / Image Courtesy of PJ Library

When one man dreamed of sending Jewish books to young children, he never imagined the transformative impact it would have on families all over the world.

More than 200,000 children receive blue and white envelopes from PJ Library each month across the globe, packed with books such as Something for Nothing, Bagels for Benny, Chicken Man, and A Coat for the Moon. Those tales spark a special magic as they become part of a child’s nighttime routine, a family ritual, a bond between parent and child, and the fusion between generations and Jewish communities.

The brainchild of Jewish philanthropist Harold Grinspoon, the PJ Library grew from his desire to engage families who had moved away from their Jewish roots either through intermarriage or simple disconnection from the faith. By delivering a beautiful picture book that carries Jewish stories, traditions, and folklore into the homes and bedrooms of children, the message would permeate in a gentle, welcoming way. Today, there are reams of letters from grateful recipients to validate Mr. Grinspoon’s conviction that the way to a Jewish family’s heart and soul is through storytelling.

Over the last few months, I have been an active, critical, yet ultimately proud member of Occupy Oakland. Despite the sometimes-questionable tactics and lack of much diversity in this working-class, multi-racial city, I believed that Occupy Oakland was still a young movement and would mature into a more solid political force. Sadly, it seems, we still have a long way to go.

On January 28, Occupy Oakland’s attempt to take over an unused public building turned into yet another painful, predictable street battle with the Oakland Police Department (OPD), with over 400 people arrested by night’s end. The police’s actions were more brutal than ever, from the tear gas and sound grenades to the unlawful mass arrest that has left many of my comrades still in jail as I write this. I stand unequivocally against the severe repression and the increasing police state that we find ourselves in. To my fellow Occupiers, though, it is time that we critically examine our own tactics. If we don’t, Occupy Oakland is going to fizzle out quicker than Rick Perry’s presidential campaign.

The events in Oakland on January 28 indeed occupied national headlines and local jail cells, but they almost certainly lost more supporters to the movement than they gained. Needlessly picking fights with the cops, vandalizing City Hall, and putting our own people in harm’s way is not the path to social and economic justice. It is a losing, incoherent strategy, one that will continue to damage the public’s support for Occupy until our claim that “We are the 99%” becomes a bad joke. Forget whether folks can survive endless police confrontations and court dates. The question now is: Can Occupy Oakland survive itself?

Concerned Women for America is promoting National Marriage Week USA, which runs from February 7-14, appropriately encompassing Valentine’s Day.

The event’s professed goals sound laudable:

Such a BIG TOPIC that pro-Israel is.Moment Magazine published a fascinating series of interviews in its January/February issue — so BIG no one issue could contain it! — asking prominent Jews to define “pro-Israel.”

Some people had nothing to say, but they said it anyway. Some people had a lot to say and you may wish they hadn’t.

Some even cast votes for who and what doesn’t belong on the pro-Israel island. Caroline Glick, deputy managing editor of the Jerusalem Post, and fan of pro- and anti-Israel absolutes and using lots of “neo-s,” is my choice.

Glick would consider herself to be quintessentially pro-Israel,because she recognizes severe   internal and external threats   that other, far less visionary people, choose to either ignore or tolerate.In just  one recent article, her identified threats to Israel ranged from Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Jordan, to theBrookings Institute  and non-governmental organizations like B’Tselem and Peace Now, to “fanatical misogynists” — the Taliban not the ultra-Orthodox — to “Israel’s radical left,”to Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Leon Panetta and U.S. Ambassador to Belgium Howard Gutman, and even to a White House and its officials who Glick says “exhibit classical anti-Semitic behavior.”

On Glick Island, the calendar is permanently stuck on 1967. Well over half of the Jewish Diaspora and most Israeli politicians outside of the current coalition, would have a hard time passing her pro-Israel citizenship test. Yet Glick does have a base and as you read the interviews in Moment you’ll recognize some Glick Island citizens.

Rather than summarize all of the varying views — Glick’s are, thankfully, not representative of the more thoughtful responses — it’s best you read them yourselves, including Kadima party leader Tzipi Livni’s refreshing  comments in a much longer interview inThe Atlantic.

We’re still on the appetizer portion of the pro-Israel series, so go whet your appetites and return soon for the salad portion…..

Note: I welcome your thoughts. If you email your views on what it means to be pro-Israel, I will include them in upcoming articles (and keep them anonymous if you prefer). The first part of this series can be accessed by clicking  here.

Image by Chisda Magid, 1/27/2012

“How would a Republican administration help bring peace to Palestine and Israel when most candidates barely recognize the existence of Palestine or its people? As a Palestinian American Republican, I’m here to tell you we do exist.”

Abraham Hassan, a self identified Palestinian-American Republican, asked a question in Thursday night’s Republican debate, raising an interesting issue of Republican credibility in the Palestinian community domestically and abroad. Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich in typical fashion characterized the Palestinian population as “Hamas and others who think like Hamas,” as Romney said. Both candidates were emphatic that American and Israeli interests, especially when it comes to the Palestinians, are exactly the same. Gingrich attempted to defend past suggestions that Palestinians are an “invented people” by arguing that “[the term Palestinian was] an invention of the late 1970s…prior to that [Palestinians] were Arabs.”

In his book, Palestinian Identity, Columbia University professor of history Rashid Khalidi extensively chronicles the emergence of a Palestinian national consciousness as early as the late 19^th century, like modern Zionism, belies Gingrich’s proposition (ironically, Gingrich fashions himself a professional historian yet seems unaware of Khalidi’s historical work). All national movements are imagined communities, to use Benedict Anderson phrase, but that does not mean they are meaningless, as the word “invented” seems to suggest. By denying the origins of Palestinian peoplehood, and hence much of its history, Gingrich is rejecting precisely what it means to be a Palestinian. Hassan’s statement that Republicans “barely recognize” the Palestinian identity appears to be a gross understatement.

NY Times Magazine cover, Jan. 29, 2012

The New York Times Magazine’s Jan. 29 cover story, “Will Israel Attack Iran?” frighteningly argues that Israel is nearing a decision to make an all-out military effort against Iran’s nuclear program. What may prompt an imminent go-ahead is the calculation that Iran’s facilities will soon be hardened and dispersed beyond Israel’s capacity to cripple its program.

I’m very much against an Israeli attack on Iran and I agree with Prof. Shibley Telhami that moving toward regional nuclear disarmament may facilitate a solution. But I take Iran’s nuclear program seriously as a security threat to the region.

The crisis would likely end once Iran reverses course: quickly opening its facilities to international inspection and stopping its constant “death to Israel” rhetoric and other overt expressions of hostility toward Jews (Holocaust denial being one); Iranian officials usually do not even mention Israel by name, referring instead to the “Zionist regime” or some such. When coupled with its ongoing support for Hezbollah and Hamas, it’s no wonder that many Israelis and Jews believe they face an existential threat from Iran. (It would not be enough for Iran to invite renewed negotiations, such as Pres. Ahmadinejad claims to have just done in a rather belligerent way; negotiations can be used as a delaying tactic, and Iran has backed away from solutions proposed in previous discussions.)

Yet, aside from inviting a catastrophic war, an Israeli attack would not deter Iran’s nuclear ambitions (quite the opposite). Part of the problem is the already hardened and dispersed nature of Iran’s nuclear facilities; another is Israel’s limited military capability. Over five years ago, I blogged about the widespread myth that Israel is a military superpower (with the supposed implication that it’s invulnerable) beginning as follows:

Tim Wise has done it again. As America’s leading anti-racist educator and writer he’s identified the next greatest threat to racial justice. It’s a new group of people, that according to Wise, enable a similar world-view as that of the legendary racist and Nazi David Duke. He believes they are “are empowering the reactionary, white supremacist, Social Darwinists of this culture.” For even the most timid members of this group ­- the ones who utter a few words of support – Wise offers no sympathy. Who, according to Wise, would fit into this group?

Cornel West.

Wait, who?

Cornel West.

You mean the most prominent black intellectual in the country? That Cornel West? Yep. The one who Wise has shared the stage with in the past? Yep.

He must have said something pretty terrible to deserve placement in such a category from Mr. Wise. Right?

Cover your ears.

The thing wrong with America is white racism. White folks are not right…It’s time for America to have an intensified study on what’s wrong with white folks. - Dr. King

There may be periods where segregation may be a temporary waystation to a truly integrated society…We don’t want to be integrated out of power; we want to be integrated into power. – Dr. King

I am inclined to think that they [white moderates] are more of a stumbling block to the Negro’s progress than the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner. – Dr. King

The “Decent White Majority”

The standard narrative regarding Dr. King’s approach to racial issues says that he was simply an integrationist who believed that with persuasion, nonviolence and love the conscience of the white majority could be won over and racial justice would be achieved. Racism, as he understood it was mainly psychological. This popular interpretation – the one the mainstream media loves – fails, however, to embrace a holistic view of his mature thinking on white people, institutional racism and white supremacy culture. While for much of his career he optimistically believed the “great decent majority” of whites could be transformed, he began, in 1965, to understand just how deeply embedded racism was and how unwilling white people were to give up privilege and power for the sake of racial justice. Whereas he had once described America in the highest democratic ideals, he began to see it as “a confused…sick, neurotic nation.”

When Jon Stewart is called a “smug, self-loathing Jew” by a right-wing Jewish personality (who is often called upon by conservative pundits to wax political), it’s tempting to dismiss the comment as a disgusting tribal dig.

When Jon Stewart is called a Judenrat who “would have been first on line to turn over his fellow Jews in Poland and Germany” by this same hawkish voice, it’s tempting – even though this voice has a visible platform – to just ignore the comment as the product of the Republican, FOX-inspired echo chamber.

However, ignoring these comments wouldn’t just be dangerous, it would be to allow a growing brand of hatred coursing through America’s veins – produced on the fringes – to continue infecting our public discourse (and public opinion) on matters both foreign and domestic.

It’s a hate-filled islamophobia that masquerades as patriotic, as anti-terrorism, as proudly American and Zionist (as though the two are synonymous). It’s a brand of hatred that the current GOP seeks, a hatred it feels it needs, a hatred it foments for perceived political gain at great cost to civil society. And, as much as it pains me as a progressive Jewish American to say, it’s a hatred right-wing American Jews are often solicited to be spokespeople for on venues like Fox News, with claims of anti-Semitism at the ready should they be critiqued by people such as, well, Jon Stewart.

Some of the real-life people featured in the television series, "All American Muslim." / Photo Courtesy of TLC

Next Sunday is the last installment of All American Muslim, the reality television series on TLC that was the target of fringe, anti-Muslim hate rhetoric. The show introduced five Muslim-American families to the reality TV audience– two groups who would not, in all likelihood, have otherwise met. As it turns out, these five families are not shills for radical extremists. They are not hiding sinister plots, surreptitiously trying to turn American law into Sharia law, lulling America into a false sense of security by showing a few “good Muslims.”

These families are the real Muslims. They are folks from Dearborn, Michigan, where the show takes place, who struggle to raise their families to the best of their abilities. Some wear headscarves; others wear tattoos. They suffered through 9/11 alongside us, and they decry those who hijack Islam in the name of terrorism. They, it turns out, are just like us, and that is the reality that the fringe groups who called for advertisers to boycott the program, cannot tolerate.

When I first heard about Congress adding a provision to a Defense Authorization bill that would allow for the U.S. MILITARY to arrest and indefinitely detain American citizens, without trial, just for being suspected of supporting anyone who was “engaged in hostilities against the United States,” I assumed it was just the work of some whacky right-winger who knew that the language didn’t have a chance of surviving the first round of mark-ups in conference committee. When the Senate and House overwhelmingly voted for the bill, with the President signing it in the dead of night when no one was looking, it struck me that something very strange was happening, and so far, no one has offered a serious explanation of why this bill came to be and is now law.

A mosque in Dearborn, MI attended by members of the reality TV show, "All American Muslim." / Photo Courtesy of TLC

We are community leaders from the three Abrahamic faiths who don’t normally look to reality TV to teach lessons of faith and religious freedom. But TLC’s new show, All American Muslim, is doing just that. It’s also come under recent attack from Islamophobic extremists who seem to have forgotten the values on which this country was founded. Rather than tune out in protest, as Americans, it’s time to tune in.

It has been a year since I started blogging for Tikkun Daily, covering the Christian Right beat and other issues related to ideology. I remember my first post, which called for an end to toxic discourse, in the wake of the Gabrielle Giffords shooting and Sarah Palin’s shameless commentary before and after.

I am often very pessimistic about politics and the future of our society, but in reflecting on the past year, I realized that there are a lot of positive signs. Below is a list of the top ten that arise from my Tikkun Daily beat.

Faced with Israel’s continued settlement expansion in the Palestinian territories, as well as Palestine’s statehood efforts at the U.N., European members of the U.N. Security Council released a joint statement Tuesday declaring the settlements as a principal obstacle to peace and illegal under international law.

The joint statement – made by Britain, France, Germany and Portugal – came after the UNSC’s closed-door meeting on the state of the Middle East, at which every member (except for the United States) condemned both Israel’s continued settlement expansion as well as the increase in settler violence against Palestinians, including the repeated torching of mosques in the West Bank.

According to Haaretz, Israel’s Foreign Ministry angrily responded by not just delegitimizing the critiques, but by denigrating some of its strongest allies in Europe:

A statement released by the Foreign Ministry on Wednesday said that the EU members of the Security Council would be well advised to exert their efforts on resuming direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians, instead of “interfering” in Israel’s internal affairs.

“If, instead of contributing to stability in the Middle East through these steps, they invest their efforts in inappropriate bickering with the one country where the independent law and justice system can handle lawbreakers of all kinds, they are bound to lose their credibility and make themselves irrelevant,” the statement said.

Last night, a miracle occurred for this Pagan-Jewish girl: the Winter Solstice and the first night of Chanukah, sacred holidays devoted to the coming back of the light, happened on the same night.

Last year’s Winter Solstice coincided with a full lunar eclipse for the first time in 400 years, and in that moment I felt a tremendous shifting of the energies of the planet and a powerful, beautiful dawning of a new era. This year has indeed proven to be one of seemingly unimaginable shifts and a global social awakening unlike anything we’ve seen before, which left me wondering – what does the synchronistic alignment of these two holy days portend for the coming year?

Continuing on with the theme of synchronicity, it just so happened that the wisest and most well-studied Jewitch that I know had traveled down from Washington to celebrate the solstice with my pagan community in San Francisco, and just as all of this was occurring to me, I found him kneeling by our bonfire on Ocean Beach lighting two white candles in the sand.

Challenged by interviewer Michael Krasny on the NPR affiliate KQED’s Forum show Tuesday morning to defend one part of Embracing Israel/Palestine (my claim that the path to peace requires a transformation of consciousness, and that Israel and Palestine not only could live together in peace but that there is no peace and justice for Israel without peace and justice for Palestine, so the best way to be both pro-Israel is to be pro-Palestine, and the best way to be pro-Palestine is to also be pro-Israel), I argued that the majority of both Israelis and Palestinians actually want peace but cannot believe that the other side wants it too.

It is this depressive paranoid certainty that “the other” wants to destroy us that has been a central part of what keeps Israeli and Palestinians from finding the path to their common interests, just as it is a similar paranoid and pathogenic fantasy that keeps the U.S. population willing to finance an inflated military which keeps in an ending state of hyper-alertness and makes it a ready tool for imperial ambitions of the wealthy. I also presented my psychological assessment of both sides and my view that consciousness transformation, though difficult, is both possible and absolutely necessary, both in Israel/Palestine and in the U.S.

The answer from the Jewish Right came tonight in the fourth attack on my house, this time on the first night of Chanukah (Dec. 20th). This one was relatively mild–two black-hooded men pasted signs on the outside of my house and garage saying “Palestine is an Arab fantasy.” They were taking their clue from Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich who has tried to out-do his Republican opponents in the primaries by, among other things, showing that he can be even more extreme on Israel than anyone else. Thus the notion that Palestine is an “invented nation.”

The history of Chanukah squeezes us between two competing narratives: one of idealization and one of consternation.

The former encourages us to view Chanukah as a holiday of liberation, when the Maccabees overthrew their Hellenistic occupiers in pursuit of faith and freedom. The Jews wanted a homeland free of outside ruler and were willing to pick up arms in self-defense.

The latter emphasizes the un-miraculous nature of the conflict and the fact that, when ‘free’ during the Hasmonean period (which followed the Maccabean conquest), Jewish leaders at times engaged in programs of forced conversion and other unsavory acts. Freedom from Hellenistic domination did not liberate Jews from internal strife and harsh rulers.

An Edom!
Ein Jahrtausend schon und länger,
Dulden wir uns brüderlich,
Du, du duldest, daß ich atme,
Dass du rasest, dulde Ich.
Manchmal nur, in dunkeln Zeiten,
Ward dir wunderlich zu Mut,
Und die liebefrommen Tätzchen
Färbtest du mit meinem Blut!
Jetzt wird unsre Freundschaft fester,
Und noch täglich nimmt sie zu;
Denn ich selbst begann zu rasen,
Und ich werde fast wie Du. Heinrich Heine

What is the meaning of Chanukka? Is it a religious holiday? A nationalist holiday? Does it mean anything like what we think it does? Given its new place as the major Jewish holiday in the United States, the standard version of the story of Chanukka is now well known. The “Greeks” conquer the Jews, a small gang of freedom fighters repulse them, cleanse the Temple, find a flask of oil which burns for eight days, and now everyone gets presents, and plays a dreidle made of clay. This holiday has taken on a major role, of course, not because of its message, but because of its proximity to Christmas, allowing marketers to broaden their audience as Jewish parents try to create a substitute for the majority holiday, inescapable in particular for children who watch any TV at all. So in a sense, Chanukka, now morphing into Chrismukka, as per the popular TV program, has become a holiday through which the Jewish community can now feel part of the larger community; it has become a feel-good festival of assimilation.