Politics & Society

President Obama's Just Peace End to the War in Afghanistan

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I say and say again that President Obama is a just peace president. Peace people, including myself, have a list of complaints against this president, including the use of targeted drone assassinations of American citizens without due process of law. However, I still say that, for the most part, this president’s foreign policies reflect just peace theory. Many people are familiar with just war theory. This thinking dates back millennia, and we can find it in both religious and in secular philosophical traditions.

Healing Israel/Palestine

I Own Israel: A Diaspora Jew's Claim

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Israel is mine. I own it – or rather, I hold an ownership stake in it. No, I am not a citizen of the country – I’m an American Jew, born upon Georgia’s red clay, now living amidst lush, Pennsylvanian foothills. And no, I am not obligated to send my children to the IDF, nor do I pay taxes or vote in the country’s elections. I did not pitch my tent this past summer along Rothschild Boulevard, nor have I physically stood with Palestinian and Israeli protesters in Nabi Saleh on a Friday afternoon, inhaling tear gas and fleeing from cannon-propelled skunk water.

Healing Israel/Palestine

Israel: Losing the Struggle

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The name “Israel” means “He who struggles with G_d”. Genesis tells how that name was given to Jacob after he triumphed over an angel with whom he had wrestled all night. And indeed there is a tradition in Judaism, unlike any other religion with which I’m familiar, of arguing with G_d. A typical example is Abraham, the first Jew. He argues over the number of righteous people there needs to be in Sodom for G_d to forgive them, and talks G_d down from 50 to 10, which is good bartering with anyone, let alone the Creator of the Universe.

Empathy

The Holocaust and Arab Nationalism

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The clash of vital interests between Jews and Arabs was best illustrated by the Arab Revolt of 1936-’39: although defeated militarily, it resulted in an Arab political victory with Britain’s 1939 White Paper sharply restricting the legal immigration of Jews to Palestine—a virtual death sentence for countless Jews who might otherwise have survived.

Culture

A Letter to Anne Frank on Holocaust Remembrance Day

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“In the long run, the sharpest weapon of all is a kind and gentle spirit.” – Anne Frank
Dear Anne,
What would you make of it all? What would you think of what has become of the world? What would you feel about how we still behave? Would you be surprised at what has happened to the Jewish people since your death and how the Jewish story is unfolding in the 21st century?

Non-Violent Communication (NVC)

Katya Singer: Holocaust Collaborator or Hero?

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The Holocaust raises issues of moral complexity still being debated over sixty-five years after the end of World War II. Indeed, the discussion acquires greater nuance as more information is revealed about how some people were able to survive while others perished. Perhaps one of the most important figures that the historical record hardly recognizes and who embodied this moral complexity is Katya Singer. She can easily be seen as a “collaborator” in terms of being the Jewish “bookkeeper” for the SS in Birkenau as well as having an SS Nazi lover and special privileges. Yet Singer has been credited by many survivors with saving the lives of countless women in the camp whom she rescued from the “outside details”; finding “inside jobs” for them; and, most importantly, substituting the numbers of the living and dead, so that the SS were deceived about the numbers of women sent to the gas chambers.

Healing Israel/Palestine

Prediction: Israel and Palestine Will Reach Blue Heron Peace Agreement In 2016

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What didn’t happen at Camp David will happen at Blue Heron. But Palestinian and Israeli peace won’t happen before 2016: There are too many anarchists, terrorists, militarists, “sectarianists,” political apologists and lots of other “ists” — yes, even including journalists and columnists — that have too much vested in the Israel-Palestine blame recycling industries to allow peace to break out any sooner.

Healing Israel/Palestine

'Occupy Zionism' Activists Visit US

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These two young Israelis met with some Occupy activists in the US, but unlike that movement–which so far has succeeded more in terms of symbolism and public discourse than concretely–the Israeli movement has already affected government policies.

Healing Israel/Palestine

Time to Stop the Khad Gadya Machine

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Khad Gadya—the old Aramaic fable sung at the end of the Passover Seder is often associated with a sense of relief that the long evening is finally over.  It also helps that it comes after four glasses of wine. It traces a cascade of events beginning with a baby goat being devoured by a cat. Each verse adds a link to the chain reaction; a dog comes and bites the cat, a stick beats the dog, fire burns the stick, water puts out the fire…and on it goes. Each successive verse gets longer until the fable ends in a final karmic stroke; God kills the Death Angel. It’s part morality-play, part Rube Goldberg device.