Reform Judaism: Israel Archives

Galilee Diary: Fringes
July 27, 2010 (2 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

That shall be your fringe, look at it and recall all the commandments of the Lord and observe them, so that you do not follow your heart and eyes in your lustful urge.
-Numbers 15:39

Three stories, no comment:

On Rosh Chodesh Tevet of this year (in December), the Women of the Wall held their monthly morning service at the Western Wall plaza. This service, ostensibly religious, also has obvious overtones of political protest, seeking to draw attention to the unequal status of women dictated by Orthodox control of an area which seems like it ought to belong to everyone. One young woman put on a tallit, which aroused the ire of some bystanders who called over the police (of whom there are always plenty at the Wall), who arrested the offender and held her for several hours "for questioning" at the local station before releasing her. This past week on Rosh Chodesh Av, Anat Hoffman of the Center for Religious Pluralism was arrested for carrying a Torah.

Later this month I will be leading a group of visitors around the Old City of Jerusalem, and want to include the Temple Mount in our route. Not having been there for years, I decided I should make an advance review visit. So on a recent day when I was staying over in Jerusalem, I got up early and, on the way from my hotel to HUC, walked through the awakening alleyways of the Old City. This is a lovely time to walk there: the streets are mostly empty, the fragrance of fresh-baked bread wafts from the bakeries, shopkeepers are sweeping the pavement, kids are hurrying home with breakfast purchases from the local grocery, and religious Christians, Moslems, and Jews are on their way to and from morning prayers. I was first in line at the security gate to the Temple Mount, which opens for Jews at 7:30. After convincing the guard that this was an innocent visit and not a right-wing provocation, he waved me through with the warning: "Remember, no praying, and no entering the mosques; you walk around and you leave!" But the guy manning the x-ray machine studied the image of my backpack carefully, opened it, and pulled out a plastic bag. "What's this?" "A tallit." "Sorry, you have to leave it outside." "But I'm not going to pray." "Doesn't matter, you can't take it in." I tried to suggest I leave it with him until I finished my visit, but no way. So I missed my opportunity, on that morning, to tread on holy ground.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

Praying with Heart
July 23, 2010

by Larry Kaufman

A highlight of any trip abroad is the chance to get off the tourist route and into the homes of locals. We've accomplished that in Israel by traveling with organized Reform movement groups, which typically includes Erev Shabbat services at a Progressive congregation, followed by dinner at the home of a member of the congregation.

While that opportunity was available to us on our trip this past June, we chose the other option, attending services at a fledgling congregation in downtown Tel Aviv, followed by potluck supper with the congregants. It was the right decision!

Our Kabbalat Shabbat was at T'filat HaLev, Prayer of the Heart, a congregation that was launched last year at Rosh Hashanah by HUC-Jerusalem rabbinic student Or Zohar, and that has met approximately monthly since. T'filat HaLev meets in a dance studio in downtown Tel Aviv, off Allenby Street - and the dance studio director plays an integral part in the service as she relaxes the congregation with a variety of motion exercises. The service is very musical - Or's primary vocations are radio broadcaster and musician, and he leads services with his guitar while his wife Feliza, who describes herself as a musician and voice movement therapist, functions as the cantor, singing and playing the harmonium. This video provides a feel for what the service is like. (This was not filmed the night we were there, but it captures the "vibe" we experienced.)

Filed Under: Community | Israel | Jewish Living

Galilee Diary: Shopping
July 20, 2010 (4 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

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They reached Wadi Eshcol and there they cut down a branch with a single cluster of grapes - it had to be borne on a carrying frame by two of them - and some pomegranates and figs... At the end of forty days... they made their report to the whole community, as they showed them the fruit of the land.
-Numbers 13:23, 25, 26

Since 1992, our seminar center has provided educational tours for many North American tour groups, to various sites around the Galilee. One of the "must-sees" of course, is Safed, the city perched in the mountains, which was, for barely a century, a major center of Jewish religious creativity: refugees from the Spanish expulsion of 1492 settled there and made it a hub of kabbalistic thought and literature. Among the well-known products of 16th century Safed are the Kabbalat Shabbat service and the hymn L'chah Dodi, and the major law code, the Shulchan Aruch. Later, Safed's economic and political fortunes declined, and it was destroyed by earthquakes in 1759 and 1837; in 1948 it was an Arab town with a small Jewish community, mostly ultra-Orthodox. The Arabs fled in the War of Independence, and new neighborhoods were built for new immigrants. For years Safed was a summer resort destination because of its mountainous location, but with the spread of air conditioning it was eclipsed by Tiberias, which, while hot and sticky, offers a waterfront. An artists' colony developed in the old city, which helped keep the town on the tourism map, but it has remained a "must see" that almost no one stays in for more than the two hours it takes to do a standard tour.

Filed Under: Israel

There is No Jewish Pope
July 19, 2010 (1 Comment)

by Rabbi Dan Moskowitz
Temple Judea, Tarzana CA
Sermon given on July 16, 2010. Also available as a podcast on iTunes.

Tomorrow we will read Parshat D'varim the beginning of the last book of the Torah when Moses gathers the Israelites around him and shares with them his final words of advice before he dies. In that moment Moses reflects on how he did it, how he managed to lead 600,000 Israelites through the desert without them killing him or each other. And then he remember the critical moment when he asked God for guidance. He asked "Aicha - How can I possibly lead this people by himself, bear their burdens and bickering?" God said to Moses , "You can't, it would not be good for them and it would not be good for you, no one person, no one voice or opinion will suffice to lead this people." And God instructed Moses to choose wise, discerning and experienced leaders from the people and let them share the burden of leadership. Their first duties he explained were to decide justly the disputes between Jew and fellow Jew, to deal with the infighting that was overtaking the camp and the community. Because God saw that it was a cancer, like it the times of Korach, or Cain and Able, or Jacob and Esau and if left untreated would destroy this precious and chosen people.

On Tuesday we will read another book of torah, Lamentations; the woeful song of pain after the destruction of the First Temple and the dispersion of the Jewish people. Lamentations begins with the same questioning word Aicha/How?! But this time is God asking his people How did this happen? "How lonely sits the city [of Jerusalem], once great with people?! She that was great among the nations, has become like a widow."

It will be Tisha B'av, the 9th of Av, the day that commemorates the destruction of the first and second temple both of which our tradition teaches were brought down not by the Babylonians and the Romans to whom history gives much credit, but because of Jewish infighting, because of senseless hatred between Jews. Specifically the Talmud explains that it was because a certain man held a dinner party and an uninvited guest attended that the Temple was destroyed.

Filed Under: Conversion | Holidays | Israel

Our Impact on Blocking the Conversion Bill
July 19, 2010

by Rabbi Daniel R. Allen
Executive Director of ARZA

In just a couple of hours Jerusalem will be filled with the readings of Lamentations. You have your choice of our congregations, dozens of readings at the Tayelet overlooking the Old City, the Windmill just off King David Street. You can hear Eichah with any accent- Morrocan, Yemenite, Traditional Ashkenaz, and American from the many, many NFTY, USY and Ramah groups that are here. It is actually quite a social evening after the readings as folks run into each other as they discover who is visiting, or friends who live here whom they forgot to call.

As we exited the Knesset earlier this afternoon I was struck by the fact that as free Jews, we could come and address our Jewish cousins inside the seat of a sovereign Jewish state on matters of Klal Yisrael. On the eve of recalling destruction, despite all the controversies, complaints and difficult conditions both for Israel and for our issues in Israel, we, all of us, can participate in Jewish life in a way not seen for 2,000 years.

Filed Under: Israel

The Fight Is Not Yet Over
July 18, 2010

by Rabbi Daniel R. Allen
Executive Director of ARZA

The atmosphere is probably on normal mode for typical Israeli politics. The budget has not been approved, the peace process is shaky, and there are threats to bring down the government. By the time you read this what I write may be old news. What is most fascinating is that we, and here I mean the vast majority of affiliated Jews in America and around the world, are part of the maelstrom.

Many of us have seen this move before. The fights over who is a Jew in the early 70's, the crisis in the 90's that led to the Ne'eman Commission, and the court cases brought by IRAC. In 2002 the Israeli Supreme Court ruled that Israel is not a religious state but a State of the Jewish People. As such, the civil government had a right to provide the means -- whether through the Law of Return, the population registry or other means -- for Jews to come to and live in Israel. The Court opinion, written by Justice Barak, clearly stated that the controlling factor for the Jewish people was not solely Jewish religion. One reason given was that there was not agreement on the religious questions.

Filed Under: Israel

Tishah B'Av and Our Israel
July 16, 2010

by Rabbi Daniel R. Allen
Executive Director of ARZA
(Originally posted on Ten Minutes of Torah)

I will hear Parshat D'varim on Shabbat and Lamentations on Tuesday in Jerusalem. I am here to participate in the effort to stop the Rotem Conversion Bill from passing in the Knesset. How ironic it is that the bill was voted out of committee on the first of Av and will be brought for first reading just after Tisha b'Av (the 9th of Av), the fast day on which the Jewish world commemorates the loss of the two ancient Temples. One of the reasons our ancient Rabbis gave for their destruction was sinat chinam - the internal arguing of one Jew with another.

Rabbi David Saperstein and I are in Israel to represent our Reform Movement organizations that are working alongside the Conservative Movement, the Federations of North America and the Jewish Agency for Israel to stop the Conversion legislation. Our joint efforts have involved the URJ, ARZA, CCAR, WUPJ, WRJ, MRJ, and of course, the Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism and its Israel Religious Action Center.

Filed Under: Conversion | Holidays | Israel

Carrying the Torah with Pride
July 14, 2010 (2 Comments)

by Phyllis Sommer
Originally posted on Ima on (and off) the Bima

Today, I was greeted with this news about the arrest of Anat Hoffman, one of the leaders of Women of the Wall and the Reform movement in Israel.

From the Facebook page of Women of the Wall, this press release:

ANAT HOFFMAN TAKEN INTO POLICE CUSTODY FOR CARRYING TORAH
Chairperson forcefully removed by police for carrying Torah

Jerusalem, Israel - One of the leaders of the Reform movement in Israel and Women of the Wall (WOW) was arrested for holding a sefer Torah during a Rosh Chodesh celebration at the Western Wall.

Women of the Wall (WOW) gathered this morning for their monthly Rosh Chodesh services at 7 a.m. on the women's side of the Kotel. Anat Hoffman, with a sefer Torah in her arms, led the 150 women strong prayer group in song as it continued its celebration in a procession toward Robinson's Arch.

Moments after leaving the Wall, police confronted and blocked the procession and began menacingly to attempt to remove the Torah from Hoffman's arms. Hundreds of participants watched in shock and distress as the Torah was jostled by police.

Hoffman was detained under the pretext that she was not praying according to the traditional customs of the Kotel. Hoffman was taken into police custody and interrogated for five hours. Police claim that holding the sefer Torah is against the Supreme Court ruling. Police are currently consulting with Attorney General to determine her charges.

Anat and her lawyer stated that the act of carrying a Torah is not mentioned in the Supreme Court ruling. Women of the Wall stood in solidarity with Anat outside of the Kishle Police Station near Jaffa Gate. Hoffman was released from police custody and banned from the Kotel for 30 days.

The arrest of a woman on the first day of the month of Av is a harsh reminder of the price that Israeli society may pay for its religious intolerance and fanaticism. Tomorrow at 13:30, WOW will lobby at the Knesset for civil equality and pluralism at the Kotel, emphasizing the Wall as a holy site for all streams of Judaism and advocating for equal rights of women at the Wall.

This morning at URJ Olin-Sang Ruby Union Institute, Torah was read all over camp. Our readers were women and men. The Torah was carried by rabbis and teachers, counselors and staff - male and female. The Torah for which Anat was arrested is the Torah from which we teach and learn each and every day. The country that allowed for the arrest of a woman carrying the Torah is the country for which we pray for peace and safety each and every day.

Filed Under: Israel | Torah

Galilee Diary: Accidental Hero
July 13, 2010 (3 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

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...There is no mitzvah greater than the redemption of captives... However, we do not redeem captives beyond their fair price... so that our enemies will not be motivated to pursue and capture hostages; and we do not try to rescue them... so that our enemies will not be cruel to them and guard them harshly.
-Rambam, Mishneh Torah, Laws of Gifts to the Poor 8:10, 8:12

I am writing this on an Egged bus crawling along on a usually fast route, as traffic patterns around the center of the country have been disrupted lately by the march dedicated to the release of Gilad Shalit. This poor kid and the public discussion of what can and should be done about his fate have been a kind of national obsession off and on through the past four years, and have come back to center stage in the past week. Captured by Hamas near the Gaza border (two other soldiers who were with him at his post were killed), he has been held hostage in Gaza with no Red Cross or any other access. Negotiations have dragged on, with periodic reports of breakthroughs followed by accusations by each side that the other was upping the ante or negotiating in bad faith. The Shalits, a quiet, middle class family from a small community in the Western Galilee, have been at the center of an often noisy campaign that seems mainly to be aimed at the Israeli government, urging that greater efforts be made to "bring Gilad home now!" There have been demonstrations and yellow ribbons, a children's book based on Gilad's childhood writings, concerts, vigils outside the prime minister's residence, weekly special prayers in synagogues of every denomination, and constant emotional front page coverage of all of this in all the media.

Filed Under: Israel

Anat Arrested and Other Emergencies: Act Now!
July 12, 2010 (7 Comments)
by Anat Hoffman, Executive Director, Israel Religious Action Center

Today appeared to be an excellent day for the ultra-Orthodox hegemony here in Israel. Before 9 AM, I was arrested for carrying a sefer Torah on the women's side of the Western Wall. At the same time just miles away, the conversion bill - that would change forever the definition of who is a Jew in Israel - passed its first vote in the Knesset.

The ultra-Orthodox are applauding the events of today. They succeeded in preventing women from carrying a Torah and praying at the holiest site of the Jewish people, and they moved one step closer to erasing all recognition ever achieved for Reform and Conservative conversion in Israel.
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Filed Under: Conversion | Israel

Israel Revisited
July 8, 2010 (3 Comments)

by Larry Kaufman

Almost two years ago, I asked the readers of this blog to advise me on what to see on a fifth trip to Israel. As it happened, the trip we were then planning didn't happen until just now, and turned out to be built around the World Zionist Congress instead of around the World Union for Progressive Judaism's Connections 2009 biennial. (Side note: we - and you - have another crack at a WUPJ Connections this coming February in San Francisco.)

As I explained in that earlier post, on our four previous trips we had seen the obligatory tourist sites along with enjoying a variety of off-the-beaten track adventures. I asked what was worth going back to because it had changed since last we were there (for example, we've seen three different incarnations of Yad VaShem) or what had materialized since our 2007 visit (when, for example, the very worthwhile Menachem Begin Museum was relatively new). Although we got some very good advice at that time, we ended up on this trip doing different things from those suggested then or that were on our tentative 2009 itinerary.

Some of those things - like shopping on Ben Yehuda Street in Jerusalem or in the Carmel Market in Tel Aviv - had been available on previous trips, we just hadn't done them. Some, like the indoor playground built by the Jewish National Fund to give the children of Sderot a safe place to play away from Gazan rockets, had come into being since 2007. And some were things we couldn't have done on our own, but were privileged to do because we were part of the Reform Leadership Mission that followed the Congress.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: What might have been...
July 6, 2010 (5 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

The bare fact...that simple and unsophisticated peoples have unbounded faith in education does not mean that the faith is untenable.
-George Counts, "Dare the School Build a New Social Order?" (1932)

Last week I accompanied a group of HUC students (Mandel Fellows) on a visit to the Galilee School, located a few miles from Shorashim; a number of my neighbors send their children there. The Galilee School is one of five integrated, bilingual (Jewish/Arab) schools in the country, one of the four that were initiated and are supported by the Hand in Hand Foundation. In other words, of a million or so students in Israel, a few hundred attend mixed schools; the vast majority attend schools that are formally designated as: state (culturally Jewish), state religious (Orthodox-zionist), state Arab, independent (Ultra-orthodox), or private (usually Christian). The educators who founded the Jewish education system in pre-state Palestine (even before the British Mandate began after WWI) began with a vision of a universal system (for the Jews, at least) based on Jewish culture (without religion); if you wanted to teach your child a particular religious or ideological approach, you would do so in the afternoon or on weekends. The public school system of the US was the model for many of these educators. But already by the early 20s, the universal vision had collapsed, and separate "streams" developed, "general Zionist," "religious Zionist," "socialist Zionist," Arab and Ultra-orthodox. And from the beginning, it had been taken for granted that the Jews would educate their children - and the Arabs theirs. The British tried to operate truly "separate but equal" systems, but the Jews brought in their own resources and expertise - and demanded autonomy; there was frequent conflict between the Zionist educators and the British education authority. With the creation of the state, the "streams" were adopted by the new ministry of education, and that structure continues to this day.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: A New Song
June 30, 2010

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

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...How goodly, goodly are our tents;
We will yet return to an ancient melody.
-"Ancient melody," popular folk-song (and dance) by Michael Kashten and Amitai Ne'eman

Sing unto the Lord a new song, sing unto the Lord all the earth.
-Psalm 96:1

Three pop music experiences in one week:

On Saturday, at the biennial convention of the Israeli Reform Movement, one of the study sessions was devoted to the text of a song by the popular singer Ehud Banai, which strings together a collection of expressions from the lingo of telephone talk (perhaps it's a wrong number; no reception here; I hear you broken up; I'm waiting on the line; etc.); each verse ends with "Are you still with me? / Answer me." While it might be a song about love or friendship, it is hard to avoid the impression that it is a prayer, and that at the other end of the bad connection is God.

Filed Under: Israel | Jewish Living | Torah

Galilee Diary: Different lenses III
June 22, 2010 (7 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

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If you will it, it will not remain a fantasy.
-Theodore Herzl, Altneuland

In addition to The Jewish State, the manifesto that sort of kicked off the Zionist movement, Theodore Herzl also wrote a novel, Altneuland ("old-new land") describing a fictitious tour of the future state of Israel in the 1920s (Herzl died in 1904). The Hebrew translation of the book was titled Tel Aviv ("ancient mound of springtime"), and the city was named after it. Herzl's Zionist utopia was a peaceful, liberal, democratic, pluralistic European welfare state, with freedom of religion. It was inhabited by smart, cultured, self-reliant, generous, Jews, and cosmopolitan, well-integrated, respectable Arabs. He didn't seem to have struggled too much with the definition of the Jewishness of the state - in 1902, the idea of a world made up of peacefully-coexisting, gently ethnic nation states had not yet crashed and burned. A sort of vaguely Jewish national identity was enough for him.

This semester I was assigned to teach a course in the Israel Rabbinic Program at HUC, and decided to revisit Herzl's vision; the assignment for the semester was for each student to write his/her own Altneuland. A novel was not required, just an outline of the main points of the writer's own vision of the ideal Jewish state. It occurred to me that we complain a lot about the reality of the state, but we rarely articulate what it would look like if we could get it right. And it turns out, when you sit down to spell out your vision, that you suddenly develop more respect for Herzl's efforts, unsatisfying as they may have been. At least he took on the challenge, and tried to sketch the outlines of the Jewish state as he envisioned it, attending to politics, culture, industry, and economics. But in a way, those are the easy questions. The topic Herzl fudged is the one we struggle with - and all of my students who have made their presentations so far have really struggled with it - the Jewishness of the state.

Filed Under: Israel

Reform Leadership Mission in Tel Aviv
June 21, 2010

ARZA, URJ, and WUPJ senior lay and professional leadership experienced the fullness of our Reform Movement in Tel Aviv on Friday June 18, 2010. What follows is from Rabbi Daniel Allen, Executive Director of ARZA, reflecting on the Friday experience of the leadership.

The fence was proposed to be built between two schools in Jaffa; one with Arab students and Arab Israeli curriculum and the other with Jewish students and some Arab Students with and Israeli National curriculum, the standard "secular" school. The fence would have divided the joint playground used during recess.

The Weizman school had been struggling. Very few Jewish families were signing up their kids to attend. The city school authorities turned to our movement and to Rabbi Meir Azari of Beit Daniel to run the early grades of the school. The first year there were 6 Jewish kids and 4 Arab kids in the one kindergarten classroom. This year there were 12 Jewish kids and 15 Arab kids. Next year the registration is for two classrooms with about a 60%/40% split of Jewish and Arab kids.

The classes are in Hebrew and the culture is Jewish. Across the hall an all-Arab kindergarten teaches in Arabic and Arabic Culture.

Filed Under: Israel

ARZA Notebook: From the 36th World Zionist Congress, Our Many Accomplishments
June 18, 2010 (4 Comments)

The 36th World Zionist Congress runs from June 15 to June 17, 2010. Rabbi Danny Allen, Executive Director of the Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA), is in Jerusalem attending the Congress. This is the 4th and final blog of his series of dispatches.

It may well be true that 90% of life is showing up. ARZA has been showing up at the World Zionist Congresses every four years for three decades. This congress was led by the incoming President of the Israel Progressive Movement (IMPJ) Yaron Shavit, a first for our movement.

Our accomplishments through the resolutions process partially include:

Overwhelming support to oppose the currently proposed changes in Israeli conversion law that will both negate the Law of Return and prejudice the rights of Jewish communities to act, each in its own way, regarding the conversion process.
Equal funding for all Jewish religious streams within the WZO budget. This could mean an additional $500,000 for the IMPJ.
80% positive support stating that the Government of Israel should recognize all streams of Judaism and their right to perform marriages and conversion in Israel.
Approved a new requirement that 30% of the membership in all WZO committees, boards, etc. must be women.

Filed Under: Israel

ARZA Notebook: From the 36th World Zionist Congress: Day 2, The Zionism Continuum
June 16, 2010 (3 Comments)

In the age of 19th century nationalism our own version of national liberation, Zionism, came to life once again in our people. Today, at the 36th World Zionist Congress, Professor Stephen Cohen led an intense two hour conversation on what Zionism is and means now. He divided the current Zionists (and all supporters of Israel) into two groups: Protective and Corrective. Diaspora Protective Zionists tend to feel that Corrective Zionists are often no better than Israel's enemies. Corrective Zionists tend to feel that Protective Zionists--Israel right or wrong--are one cause for the younger generations to be increasingly less supportive of or engaged with Israel. Where do you fall along the continuum of Protective-Corrective Zionism?

With a focus on the future, how should we position the Reform Zionist message through ARZA? Professor Cohen suggests three possibilities:

Filed Under: Israel

ARZA Notebook: From the 36th World Zionist Congress: Day 1, Mechinah and More
June 15, 2010

The 36th World Zionist Congress runs from June 15 to June 17, 2010. Rabbi Danny Allen, Executive Director of the Association of Reform Zionists of America (ARZA), is in Jerusalem attending the Congress. Below is part of his series of dispatches.

We left the hotel just after 7 a.m. for the 36th World Zionist Congress only to return after 11:00p.m. Some might think our more than 50 ARZA delegation a bit daft. The merry band of Reform Zionists is led by ARZA President Rabbi Robert Orkand and includes Chairman of the URJ Board of Trustees Peter Weidhorn and URJ Senior Vice President Danny Freelander, with 25% of our delegation under the age of 30.

Back to the daft part. Through our efforts within the WZO it is our expectation that the Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism will receive support of approximately $1,500,000. It is our hope, and our ARZA holy task, to raise our fundraising sights to match these funds in the coming year and to continue our support for the work of the Israel Religious Action Center.

One of the projects for which we hope to raise funds is the IMPJ Mechinah. In Israel there are many year long programs (Mechinot) that prepare high school graduates to enter the Israel Defense Forces. Our movement has sponsored our own mechinah for nine years. Last Thursday evening ARZA honored Rabbis Elyse Frishman and Danny Freelander in a New York event. The IMPJ Mechinah will be a significant beneficiary of the funds raised.

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Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Different lenses II
June 15, 2010 (1 Comment)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

The country that we traversed and scouted is one that devours its inhabitants. All the people that we saw in it are men of great size...; we looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them.
-Numbers 13:32-33 (the report of the spies)

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For twenty years, the "flagship" project of our educational center has been setting up encounters between Diaspora Jews and Israeli Arabs. While the visiting groups include adult synagogue and community tours, the vast majority of the guests are teenagers or birthright participants. There have been years when we have hosted over 3,000 people in July alone; in recent years the numbers have been in the range of 1,500-2,000. The standard program consists of a 45-60 minute background presentation surveying the history of Jewish-Arab relations in the land of Israel, and trying to explain the current reality and the dilemmas we face here - both the Jewish majority and the Arab minority - as we try to live together in the democratic Jewish state. Then, either the group reboards their bus for a 15-minute drive to a nearby village, where they meet Arab teens in the school; or, if the group's tour operator forbids entry into Arab villages (there are still some who do), we send a bus to bring the Arab kids to Shorashim.

Filed Under: Israel

ARZA Notebook: Dispatches from the 36th World Zionist Congress and Beyond
June 14, 2010 (1 Comment)

Monday June 14,2010
Jerusalem

Patience and perseverance fully describe the ARZA day of preparation for the opening of the World Zionist Congress Tuesday. Our delegation is the largest element of the world ARZENU group that is here. ARZA and the other ARZA's from around the world form the largest single Zionist party at the WZO Congress.

Meeting on the beautiful Hebrew Union College campus in Jerusalem we discussed many subjects including the essence of Reform Zionism. Rabbi Stanley Davids and Rabbi Gilad Kariv, the Executive Director of the Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism, led the intense discussion. The conclusion of a core meaning of Reform Zionism was summarized thusly "The Torah speaks of human beings created in the image of God. It does not say Jewish human beings but human beings."

We also spent time in committee meetings preparing for the upcoming resolutions session of the Congress. Several resolutions are attempting to lesson the WZO commitment to the pluralism of the Jewish world. Our folks are ready for this fight.

Dining alfresco in serenity on one of the terraces of HUC, sharing a light dinner with friends, old and new, from IMPJ congregations, being led in singing by members of the IMPJ youth, one can hardly imagine that Israel lives in a tough neighborhood. Your ongoing support of ARZA is a key factor in the ongoing success of the congregation and programs of the Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism.

The day began at 8:00 am with the final meeting concluding at 10:30 p.m. Congress opens tomorrow. More to come.

From Jerusalem,

Danny

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Different lenses I
June 8, 2010 (2 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

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But the people would not listen to Samuel's warning. "No," they said. "We must have a king over us, that we may be like all the other nations: Let our king rule over us and go out at our head and fight our battles."
-I Samuel 8:19-20

I have been asked by a few readers to write about the flotilla incident, and even though I generally refrain from commenting on "national" topics, this seems a good case study for examining the dilemma of Israel-Diaspora relations. There is of course no unanimity in Israel regarding the incident; the various positions more or less fall where you might expect along the left-right spectrum. Here is a schematic catalog:

1. The Gazans elected a government that declares itself Israel's enemy and refuses to recognize or make peace with Israel. When in war, as in war. Israel is justified in blockading Gaza and enforcing that blockade by force if necessary. The ship carried terrorists who attacked the soldiers attempting peaceably to enforce the blockade.

a. The condemnations and calls for an inquiry - internal or external - are unjustified and hypocritical.

b. The decision of how to respond to the challenge was faulty, and a less risky approach should have been chosen. There should be an internal inquiry and/or the minister of defense should resign.

c. The operation was appropriate, but the implementation (intelligence, planning) was faulty. There should be an internal inquiry and/or the relevant official(s) should resign.

d. The operation was appropriate and successful; the failure was in the area of public relations and diplomacy - we won the war but lost the propaganda battle. There should be an internal inquiry and/or the relevant official(s) should resign.

2. The policy of siege on Gaza has proven over the years to be ineffective in changing either policy or public opinion, and it only leads to continued and escalated enmity on the part of the Gazans, and condemnation in the world. This operation is only proof that the policy is counterproductive and bankrupt. It is time to rethink our entire approach to the use of force in defining our relationship with the Palestinians.

Filed Under: Israel

Gaza Flotilla and Israel: Finding Balance Amidst the Mayhem
June 4, 2010 (1 Comment)

by Rabbi Paul Kipnes
Originally posted on Or Am I?

The Baal Shem Tov (founder of Chasidism) urged his followers toward hishtavut, equanimity or levelheadedness. He recognized that powerful emotions of others will sway us in directions that lead us away from emet or truth. As we are assaulted by media messages about the Gaza Flotilla, let us strive for hishtavut (levelheadedness) in our response to the onslaught.

Here's what is known: A flotilla of 6 ships moved toward Gaza with the stated purpose either of delivering humanitarian supplies or of breaking Israel's military blockade of Gaza. After repeatedly rejecting Israel's request that the ships turn back or land at the Ashdod port for offloading supplies (which would be transferred by Israel to Gaza with the other humanitarian supplies Israel sends in almost daily), and after previous entreaties of the same by the European Union, the ships sailed forth toward Gaza. We know Israeli troops peaceably boarded 5 ships and turned them back. We know that on the 6th ship, soldiers were attacked and beaten. We know people died and many soldiers were injured.

It is too easy to throw hands up and blame Israel for making this happen.
It is too easy to fall into the trap of accepting the news coverage accounts of a supposedly peaceful non-violent action by the flotilla to help the Gazans.
It is too easy to dismiss this as another way Israel embarrasses itself and our people.

Hishtavut, levelheadedness, demands that we learn more so that we do not jump to conclusions. Why?

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Conflicting Memories
June 1, 2010 (8 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

...By virtue of our natural and historic right and on the strength of the resolution of the United Nations General Assembly, [we] hereby declare the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz-Israel, to be known as the state of Israel.
-from the Israel Declaration of Independence, 1948

We recently engaged a new Arabic editor for our foundation's Hebrew-Arabic web newspaper www.dugrinet.co.il. While only in her early 30s, Samach has been working in Israeli Arab media since high school and has accumulated impressive experience, and we are excited finally to have found someone who can help us build the Arabic component of the website. I first met with her in early May, and in discussing what topics might be of interest to both populations, the Nakba came up. Nakba, or "disaster" in Arabic, is the word that has come to be commonly used to describe the experience of the Palestinian Arabs in Israel's War of Independence in 1948. For years, public discussion of that experience was pretty much non-existent in Israel. If the Arabs thought about it or talked about it, it remained below the radar. There were even years when the government checked to make sure that Israeli Arab schools were properly celebrating Independence Day. But the country has grown up a bit, and so have the Arabs, and in the past decade or so, the word has come to be a common part of public discourse. Loaded, emotionally charged, arousing powerful feelings, but out there.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Standing at Sinai?
May 25, 2010 (7 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

On the day of the first fruits, your Feast of Weeks, when you bring an offering of new grain to the Lord, you shall observe a sacred occasion; you shall not work at your occupations.
-Numbers 28:26

Of the three pilgrimage festivals, Shavuot seems to have been the most difficult to translate into a meaningful holiday for Diaspora Jews. Pesach, with the seder, with its symbolic foods and powerful story; Sukkot, with its colorful symbols and observance - and both of these also have strong seasonal resonances of spring and fall (at least in the Northern Hemisphere) - while they may not be as central in Jewish consciousness as the High Holy Days, are nevertheless easy to relate to and remember. Poor Shavuot has been a harder sell. It doesn't have a clearly defined date in the Torah; it is only one day; it was, according to the Torah, completely tied to agriculture and to the Temple cult; thus, once the Temple was destroyed and our lives were not directly linked to the agriculture of Israel, Shavuot was orphaned. Fortunately, the rabbis figured out that the timing of the day fit with the timing of the revelation at Sinai, and, post-biblically, Shavuot took on the additional meaning of the Festival of the Giving of the Torah. This in turn led to the development, in the middle ages, of the "tikkun layl Shavuot," the custom of staying up into the night to engage in intensive study of Torah, as a kind of reliving of the revelation. And, since the prescribed texts for study in the tikkun represented the whole historical spectrum of traditional text, the tikkun was also a reaffirmation that all Torah learning, in all generations, originated at Sinai.

Filed Under: Holidays | Israel

Galilee Diary: Being Green
May 17, 2010 (1 Comment)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

When in your war against a city you have to besiege it a long time in order to capture it, you must not destroy its trees, wielding the ax against them. You may eat of them, but you must not cut them down.
-Deuteronomy 20:19

Living out here among the green valleys of the Galilee, it is interesting to consider our footprint:

Our county considers itself pretty advanced regarding recycling. Here on Shorashim (population - 80 households) there are separate bins in our parking lot for plastic bottles and bags, newspaper, white paper, cardboard, glass, and garden waste. While we pay deposits on wine bottles and beverage cans, the stores have made it so inconvenient to actually return the containers and retrieve the deposit that almost no one does, at best separating the materials in the recycling bins and forfeiting the deposit. Food cans go into the regular landfill garbage. The county offers plastic backyard composters at a subsidized cost, and they are quite popular here.
In addition, everyone has a solar hot water heater, and three neighbors have installed solar panel arrays, selling power back to the electric company. I know of a handful of others who, like me, have set up modest gray water systems (from the shower to the trees). A neighbor who wanted to put in a rain water cistern was deterred when he learned that the area of the cistern would be counted in the area of his home for calculating the monthly property tax.
I've noticed a couple of hybrids, a few green diesels (that get better mileage than hybrids), and about half a dozen SUVs.

Filed Under: Israel

In Memory of Rabbi David Forman
May 11, 2010 (5 Comments) by Anat Hoffman
Executive Director of the Israel Religious Action Center
(Originally published on RACblog)

"I'm a civil war" - this is how Israeli poet Chaim Gouri described himself. After the death of Rabbi David Forman last Tuesday, I thought that he might have recognized himself in those words, too: From his student days in America with the Freedom Riders in the segregated South, to his founding of Rabbis for Human Rights and his consistent pursuit of "justice, justice" ever since, Rabbi Forman did not once let up the fight.

It is no easy thing to come to Israel and work for social change, to keep your Judaism intact while not letting the Jewish state cause you to forget the rights and humanity of everyone else. Yet Rabbi Forman built and lived a life in Israel according to his ideals, all while battling the civil war within himself, the contradictory impulses one can't help but feel here. So how did Rabbi Forman keep his sanity all these years, remain focused and not give in to defeat? I think he did it in three ways.

First, he wrote. He described Israel's internal struggles for American readers, and by documenting what he saw, he controlled the extent to which such wars could destroy him. Israelis, he understood, were schizophrenic - "one 'I' pulls in one direction while another 'I' pulls in the opposite direction and then a third and fourth 'I' pull in yet other directions" (Forman, Jewish Schizophrenia in the Land of Israel).

Next, he took action. He was the founder and spirit of Rabbis for Human Rights, "the rabbinic voice of conscience in Israel." He was also the architect of the North American Federation of Temple Youth (NFTY)-Israel program, creating the connection for countless numbers of young people between Judaism and Israel. While he could have chosen a different path, he lived by one of his favorite verses from Pirkei Avot: "Study is not the chief thing, but action." And he reminds us we need to keep up the work - "the Jewish state has yet to fulfill its historical and theological mission to become that 'holy nation:' a country based on the prophetic ideals of social justice and equality" (Forman, Fifty Ways to Be Jewish).

The third way: he loved his family. His wife, his daughters, their husbands, their families - and his seven grandchildren, Sivan, Binyamin, Yarden, Zohar, Tal, Shani and Nitai. "I pray, that as my grandchildren grow older, they will find their Jewish way in the world; and that their conduct will be determined by the historical traditions and practices of our people, which find their longevity and continued strength in a prophetic vision of social justice and equality, of personal commitment and collective responsibility, of familial respect and human dignity." His memory is a blessing.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

Galilee Diary: Reform Zionism
May 11, 2010 (16 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Justice, justice shall you pursue, that you may thrive and occupy the land that the Lord your God is giving you.
-Deuteronomy 16:20

Among the programs operating at the Hebrew Union College Jerusalem campus are two different rabbinical training courses: since August, I have been directing the Israel Rabbinic Program, a four-year course of study designed to ordain Israelis to serve as Reform rabbis here. There are currently 22 students at various stages of completion. They tend to be in their 30s and 40s, often already experienced educators, from varied religious and cultural backgrounds. They study two days a week intensively, while also working on an MA in Jewish studies from an Israeli university. Meanwhile, we share the campus with another 50 or so full-time rabbinical (and cantorial and education) students spending their required first year in Israel before beginning their studies at New York, Cincinnati, or Los Angeles. They tend to be recent college graduates, from Reform backgrounds; their focus here is Hebrew language and Israel studies - and the experience of Jewish peoplehood. People often wonder why we operate two separate programs - after all, they're all learning to be Reform professional leaders. However, it is obviously not so simple - the gaps in age, experience, language, life-stage, and program structure make it quite challenging for the faculty to design even limited joint programs and shared experiences. Having decided to try harder, Rabbi Yoshi Zweiback (director of the program for the North Americans) and I have managed to pull off a couple of interesting experiments this year.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Letting Go
May 4, 2010 (5 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Leaning on the lessons of the past in order to build a future, using the suffering of the past as a political argument, are like inviting the dead to participate in the democratic process of the living.
-Professor Judah Elkanah, 1988

In the middle of the counting of the Omer, the seven weeks between Pesach and Shavuot, the fields of the Jezreel valley are golden with ripening grain, the carob trees are heavy with bright green pods, there are peaches in the market, and hollyhocks are blooming along the roadsides. A friend once commented that hollyhocks make her sad, as they are the last in the sequence of spring wildflowers to bloom; they mark the end of spring, and once they appear, the dry season is about to begin. In northern climates, spring is a time of promise that leads into the lushness of summer; here in the Middle East, the joy of spring gets us only as far as the sadness of the hollyhocks, and then we have to lie low for six months and long for the relief of the first showers of fall.

The tradition defines the period of the counting of the Omer as a time of mourning, for reasons that remain unclear (a plague? the catastrophe of the Bar Kochba revolt? concern for the vulnerable ripening grain?). And modern Israel has placed within this period Yom Hashoah - and a week later Yom Hazikaron, the memorial day for fallen soldiers and for civilians killed by enemy action. Interesting how nature, religious tradition, and nationalist symbols, all seem to come together during this time. As the world dries out around us, and the landscape fades from lush green to thorny brown in what seems like just a few days, we find ourselves looking back, preoccupied with sad memories and with the attempt of find meaning in them. In this dry time when nature's face is bleak, we mourn those who suffered and perished in the confrontations with evil in the past century; we remember those who were cut off and weep for the lost potential, for what might have been. And we express our feelings with traditional expressions of memorialization like reciting Kaddish, lighting candles, visiting graves.

Filed Under: Israel

New Bill Would be "Disastrous to the Unity of the Jewish People"
April 30, 2010 (2 Comments)

by Kate Bigam
Press Secretary, Religious Action Center
Originally posted on the RACblog

Israeli Knesset Member David Rotem, who has proposed a piece of legislation dealing with conversion in Israel, met earlier this week with leaders of the North American Jewish community to discuss the bill's possible ramifications. Following a series of discussions with Rotem in new York City, the Conservative, Reform and Reconstructionist movements together issued a joint statement expressing our disapproval of the bill and our concern about its potential ramifications.

The statement is after the jump. Read more about this bill in this story or this one, both from JTA, and in this op-ed by Rabbi Uri Regev, president of Hiddush, a group that advocates for religious freedom in Israel.

Filed Under: Conversion | Israel

Galilee Diary: Right and Responsibility
April 27, 2010 (3 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

The official shall go on addressing the troops and say, "Is there anyone afraid and disheartened? Let him go back to his home, lest the courage of his comrades flag like his."
-Deuteronomy 20:8

Dugrinet (www.dugrinet.co.il), our Hebrew-Arabic internet magazine, has begun to sponsor public events as a way of creating a relationship between the site and the community. Last week, we held a panel discussion on the topic of national service by Arab youth. This is part of a larger, ongoing discussion (sometimes rational, sometimes not) in Israeli society about conscription.

It is a pillar of mainstream Israeli ideology that army service is a sacred obligation, a key Zionist mitzvah that has made possible "the Jewish emergence from powerlessness." It is considered heretical to question this value. And indeed, about 75% of Jewish 18-year olds are drafted. Among girls, about another 20% do alternative national service in hospitals, schools, etc. These are primarily Orthodox girls whose religious commitments make it impractical for them to serve in the army. Among boys, around 15% are exempted for medical, psychological, and other reasons, and over 10% are exempted as they are full-time yeshivah students. This category is hotly controversial, and is a major source of the antagonism felt by the general population toward the Ultra-Orthodox. It is also a contributing factor to the widespread poverty among the Ultra-Orthodox, because in order to receive a yeshivah-study deferment you must be a full-time student and thus may not be employed.

Filed Under: Israel

Heroes
April 23, 2010

by Phyllis Sommer
Originally posted on Ima on (and off) the Bima

What I love so much about Israel are the remarkable stories. "Only in Israel" is a phrase that I love to hear. On a visit to Israel in 2008, I heard this remarkable tale...

It was the War of Independence. Ilana was a teenager, a volunteer in Moshav Shafir. She, along with other teenaged volunteers, had been recruited as a saboteur. The tanks were coming, a long line of them, up through Gaza from Egypt. She and her fellow saboteurs were ordered to find all the explosives they could and place them under the bridge in Shafir, to blow up the bridge as soon as the first tank was on the bridge.

All the women and children had been evacuated from the area in anticipation of the arrival of the tanks, so the girls had been told. Ilana and her team stationed themselves directly under the bridge, awaiting their task.

Filed Under: Israel

Thirteen Things I Love About Israel: Reflections on Yom Ha'atzma'ut
April 21, 2010

by JanetheWriter
(Also posted on JanetheWriter Writes)

On this Yom Ha'atzma'ut, inspired by fellow bloggers Ima on (and off) the Bima and Rabbi Paul Kipnes, I've compiled my own list of 13 things I love about Israel. Although I've been there only twice (both times within the last six years), and haven't yet had the pleasure of a Dead Sea float, an Eilat mud bath or a sunrise hike to Masada, there's still plenty I know and love:

1. The tarmac at the old Ben Gurion Airport: wet, oily, dirty, Israel!
2. Breakfast of briny olives, cucumber and tomato salad, thick yogurt, smoky cheese and crusty bread. Who needs Cheerios or Kix?!
3. The cool clear water of the Mediterranean. It'll wash away whatever ails you.
4. Ben Yehuda Street. Thus far I've only had a chance to rush through right before Shabbat, as the shopkeepers were closing up, but someday (hopefully soon), I know I'll stroll through leisurely on Motzei Shabbat.
5. Riding along the highway in a tour bus and feeling a chill with the sudden realization that I'm in Israel!
6. Waving to oh-so-many familiar faces during kabbalat Shabbat services at Kehilat Kol Haneshama.
7. Rolling a tiny note like a chiffonade before stuffing it into the ancient crevices in the Western Wall.
8. Standing at the Haas Promenade overlooking Jerusalem of Gold.
9. Israeli flags flying in crystalline skies.
10. The "only in Jerusalem" experience of bumping into people you know, but didn't know would be there at the same time. (Yes, it happened to me the very first time I was there...and the second time, too!)
11. The peppery onion board sold by an unnamed bakery on Jaffa's Razi'el Street.
12. The view from the patio of the King David Hotel.
13. The idea that my next visit isn't too far in the future...and even if it is, I know that it's definitely worth the wait.

Happy birthday, Israel....see you again soon!

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Definitions VI
April 20, 2010 (7 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Rabbi Abba said in the name of Samuel: for three years the School of Shammai and the School of Hillel were in disagreement, each insisting that the halachah was according to its view. A heavenly voice was heard, saying "Both views are the words of the living God, and the halachah is according to the School of Hillel." But if both are the words of the living God, why did the School of Hillel merit that the halachah followed its view? Because they were soft-spoken and humble, and taught both their view and the view of the School of Shammai - and even mentioned the opinion of the School of Shammai first.
-Babylonian Talmud, Eruvin 13b

A couple of months ago I began a series of entries trying to explain the fine points of difference among the religious "streams" in Israel. Before moving on, herewith a scorecard, to help keep track of the players (in rough order of numbers):

1. Cultural, non-religious Zionism: The "mainstream" of Israeli culture that has dominated the education system and public life for a century. Sees Judaism as a national culture (like Frenchness for French people, or Polishness for Poles), in which the symbols of the Jewish tradition are secular, cultural symbols, no longer necessarily connected to religious belief. The prime exponent of this approach, Achad Ha'am, was a strong influence on Mordecai Kaplan, founder of Reconstructionism in North America.

Filed Under: Israel

An Israeli Perspective: Israeli Memorial and Independence Day
April 19, 2010 (1 Comment)

by Hanan Cidor
Originally published in iTorah. Subscribe to iTorah

Being an Israeli, one of the hardest things to deal with, and as far as I know it is unique to Israel, is the seemingly unbelievable and immediate passage between sorrow and celebration, as portrayed in the pairing of Yom Hazikaron (Israel's Memorial Day) and Yom Ha'Atzmaut (Israel's Independence Day). The idea behind this is that the day before celebrating our independence, we are reminded of the price and sacrifice made by so many in order to keep us free.

If you've never been in Israel during those two days, nothing can possibly explain the experience and the kind of emotions that it evokes. After a full day of grief and remembrance, something that is very much relevant from a personal standpoint to literally every Israeli, we go rather abruptly to a truly joyous celebration of our freedom and achievements during Israel's Independence Day.

Those achievements are indeed very impressive. In just 62 years, Israel has managed to become a regional power, a modern, flourishing democracy in a region that has very little. In almost every possible measurement of world countries and societies, the Jewish state, especially when taking into consideration its small size, is at the top of the ladder alongside countries that have been around for centuries. When you think about the fact that all of this was done while facing constant security threats, some of them even starting literally from day one, the amazement and sense of awe is even greater.

Filed Under: Holidays | Israel | Youth and Family Life

Galilee Diary: And now for something completely different
April 12, 2010 (10 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

You shall not hate your kinsfolk in your heart. Reprove your kinsman but incur no guilt because of him. You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against your countrymen. Love your fellow as yourself: I am the Lord.
-Leviticus 19:17-18

Herewith a translation of a piece I recently published in www.dugrinet.co.il, the Hebrew-Arabic internet magazine sponsored by our foundation.

Once the Chilazoner Rebbe was sitting with his Hasidim around the holiday table, and he told the following parable:

Once I was driving along the highway and a car passed me and cut in quickly in front of me, cutting me off. "Damn Arab kids," I said. "They have no respect for the laws of the land, not even for the traffic laws. They whine about having no rights, but they refuse to accept responsibility!" A few minutes later I found myself stopped at a red light next to the car that had passed me. The driver was Ultra-Orthodox.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Definitions V
April 7, 2010 (6 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

May it by Your will, our God and God of our ancestors, that You lead us and guide our steps in peace...and bring us safely to our desired destination - in life, in joy, and in peace...
-From the traditional travelers' prayer

On a recent Friday afternoon Tami went up to bring a cake to a new young family who had just bought a house here in Shorashim. The woman was wearing jeans. The man was wearing a large, knitted kipah. Tami mentioned that kabbalat Shabbat services would be at 6:00. The man said that our synagogue was not appropriate for him. Turns out that he is from a non-religious (yes, non-religious: not Orthodox, not Reform, not Conservative, not Reconstructionist, not Renewal...) Jewish background, and has begun a process of what is called in common parlance here "strengthening," meaning, moving toward Orthodoxy. Therefore, our egalitarian synagogue is not a place where he feels comfortable praying. Presumably, his wife will not attend because she remains non-religious, and so doesn't feel comfortable praying in any synagogue. They are the second family here to represent this process and this mix. And they are among thousands like them throughout Israeli society. The commonly held view of the polarized division between Orthodox and non-Orthodox is in fact far from accurate. While there are all sorts of examples of opposition and active conflict, of mutual fear, there is also heavy traffic along the paths leading in both directions - from Orthodoxy to other definitions, and from other positions toward Orthodoxy. I have not seen statistics, but anecdotal evidence suggests that flow in both directions is deep and wide. Just as we have several examples of "born-again" Orthodox here in our little community, we also have at least as many who would fit the slang definition of "datlash," (an acronym for "formerly religious"). These personal religious journeys, as well as marriages across the lines of religious definition, lead to a reality in which it seems like every extended family contains a variety of disparate positions. One sees these especially at life cycle observances and Passover sedarim, when the families gather and you can tell from the headgear and the skirt length that the whole spectrum is represented.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Definitions IV
April 1, 2010

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Esther did not reveal her people or her kindred, for Mordecai had told her not to reveal it.
-Esther 2:10

At a recent in-service day for coordinators and facilitators in the ORT "Jewish roots" program, one of the guest speakers was Hannah Azulai, one of the most popular and busy actresses in Israel today (stage, screen, and TV). She told her life story - and it was interesting and moving (needless to say, she knows how to tell a story). Her parents were immigrants from Morocco in the 50s - her father a blind Torah scholar who worked here as a janitor, her mother illiterate, she was raised in Beersheba's tough "Neighborhood D." Interestingly, Tami and I spent a year in Neighborhood D, when Hannah Azulai was about ten years old; she was probably one of the kids we used to see around the shopping center. She spent a couple of decades of her life trying to suppress and hide her Moroccan origins, and to "pass for white" in order to make it in elite Ashkenazi society - and there were plenty of well-meaning educators and mentors who were only too eager to help her with this project. Only as a successful adult was she able (with the help of her husband, playwright Samuel Hasfari) to confront this cover-up and reclaim her identity, with sympathy for and pride in her family and what they had experienced in the transition of aliyah. Awareness of her not atypical experience is important for understanding another dimension of the complex religious tapestry of Israel.

Filed Under: Israel | Jewish History

Galilee Diary: Definitions III
March 23, 2010 (1 Comment)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, "Surely the Lord is present in this place, and I did not know it!" Shaken, he said, "How awesome is this place! This is none other than the abode of God, and that is the gateway to heaven."
-Genesis 28:16-17

Recently I led a day trip for the Avshalom Institute, one of a number of organizations around the country providing adult education programming on "Israel studies," including lectures, courses, and field trips. The clientele are mostly active senior citizens, and many of the programs are quite rich, with prominent academic lecturers. Our topic was "the 'streams' of Judaism in the Galilee." After an introductory lecture on the development of the denominations, especially Reform, we went on to four encounters:

At the Conservative kibbutz, Hannaton, we met the new young rabbi, Yoav Ende, who explained both the philosophy of the movement and the story of the community - a kibbutz that failed (socially and economically) in the past, but is now going through a rebirth. The participants, who were pretty much all from the sector that defines itself as "secular," found it difficult to place the boundaries - between Reform and Conservative - and between Conservative and Orthodox: "So, if you follow halachah, how are you different from Orthodox? But if you apply your own reasoning to change the halachah, how are you different from Reform?"

Filed Under: Defining Reform | Israel

Definitions II
March 16, 2010 (2 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

One should never occupy oneself with the legends and midrashim relating to the messianic age, and should not consider them as central beliefs, as they foster neither love of nor obedience to God; likewise one must not calculate the end - as our sages said, "accursed be those who calculate the end." One must simply wait and believe... -Rambam (Maimonides) Mishneh Torah, Laws of Kings 12:2

Because of its commitment to the state of Israel, and to having that state function as a modern, democratic, Jewish state, Orthodox Zionism was from the beginning viewed positively by many "secular" Israelis. While these Orthodox aroused opposition and resentment sometimes by their insistence on public observance of religious strictures (no El Al planes on Shabbat, no pork...), they were also respected as loyal, constructive citizens who were generally moderate in their Orthodoxy (witness the Orthodox kibbutz movement), and who shouldered their full share and even more than their share of the sacrifices needed to build the country. Indeed, since the beginning of Zionism, the stridency of the polemic between the different strands of Orthodoxy (pro- and anti-Zionist) has been greater than that between the Orthodox and secular wings of Zionism.

Filed Under: Israel

Welcoming Rosh Chodesh with Women of the Wall
March 16, 2010

by Liz Piper-Goldberg
Legislative Assistant, RAC

(Originally published on RACblog)

"Wondrous God, in ancient days You led our people from bondage to freedom; redeem us now out of our exile from one another, making all Israel one united people!"
-From the liturgy for Rosh Chodesh

Tomorrow is Rosh Chodesh Nisan, the beginning of the Hebrew month of Nisan. Rosh Chodesh, which literally means "head of the month," is the holiday that marks the beginning of each month in the Jewish calendar.

Many communities meet to pray and celebrate Rosh Chodesh together each month. One such group is the Women of the Wall, a progressive prayer group that meets at the Western Wall (Kotel) in Jerusalem. You may have been following our coverage of the recent events surrounding the Women of the Wall. In late 2009 Nofrat Frenkel was arrested for wearing a prayer shawl, or tallit, while praying at the Wall, and in January 2010, Anat Hoffman, who serves as director of the Israel Religious Action Center and leader of Women of the Wall, was interrogated and fingerprinted due to the actions of this group.

Below the jump, you can find more information on the Jewish rituals associated with Rosh Chodesh, prayer resources to hold your own Rosh Chodesh service, and ways that you can get involved in supporting the Women of the Wall. If you're on Twitter, follow @womenofthewall and #kotelwomen tomorrow to track their t'filot in Jerusalem!

Are you holding your own Rosh Chodesh Nisan event in solidarity with Women of the Wall? If so, email a description and photos to me and media@womenofthewall.org.il!

Filed Under: Holidays | Israel

From ARZA: An Important Request for Action
March 9, 2010 (6 Comments)

by Rabbi Bob Orkand
President of ARZA

We have learned that the Knesset may vote as soon as Tuesday on legislation that would make important changes to the Law of Return, which sets forth who can claim Israeli citizenship. This particular legislation would target converts to Judaism.

The various arms of our Movement are asking that urgent messages of protest be sent to Michael Oren, the Israeli Ambassador to the United States, and to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

We cannot permit the ultra-Orthodox parties in Israel to push through legislation without regard to the millions of Diaspora Jews who are active, dedicated and devoted members of the Jewish people who identify themselves with non-Orthodox streams of Judaism.

The bill sponsored by MK David Rotem of Yisrael Beitenu, deals with both the authority of the Chief Rabbinate and matters of Conversion. The Rotem Bill does three things:

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Definitions I
March 9, 2010

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Sound the great shofar for our freedom, raise the ensign to gather our exiles, and gather us from the four corners of the earth. Blessed are you, O Lord, Who gathers the dispersed of His people Israel.
-from the traditional Amidah prayer

About ten years ago the local Orthodox community turned to our seminar center at Shorashim and asked us to organize programs that would bring them together with the other, non-Orthodox communities around the county, as they were feeling as though they lived in a ghetto. We began with some joint study evenings, and ever since we have been producing programs of different types, with that original goal of bringing people together across the denominational lines: film evenings, lectures, holiday observances, etc. At the end of one of the first evenings, at which the discussion had been very open and lively, I asked a "secular" friend, who had been somewhat cynical about the project, what she got out of the evening. "Well," she said, "I learned one thing: they are not all the same!" From the occasional reader comments, directly or on the blog, I have the impression that, as is so often the case, people find it hard to recognize differences among those who are "the other" to us. Therefore, as a public service, over the next few entries I will present a guide for those who might be interested in some nuance:

Filed Under: Israel | Jewish History

Standing with our sisters at the Kotel
March 9, 2010

by Shelley Lindauer
Executive Director, Women of Reform Judaism

In this week's Torah portion, Ki Tisa, the Israelites begin to worry that Moses will not return from Mt. Sinai, and in their fear encourage Aaron to create an idol, a molten calf. Aaron said to them "Men, take off the gold rings that are on the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me."

According to Pirkei de Rabbi Eliezer 45, the women heard about the making of the Golden Calf and refused to give their jewelry to their husbands. The women argued that the molten image was an abomination, and they would not participate. God rewards the women with a holiday, Rosh Chodesh, acknowledging their independence, wisdom, and piety. Rabbi Eliezer tells us the women were to observe more new moons in this world than the men, and in the next world they would be renewed like the moon.

Men and women have different responses to stress, and reacted quite differently to the anxiety generated by waiting for Moses to return. While men tend to have a "fight or flight" reaction, women - in the words of psychologist Shelley E. Taylor - approach stressful situations with a "tend and befriend" response. During times of stress women take care of themselves and their children (tending) and form strong group bonds (befriending).

Filed Under: Community | Israel | Torah

Galilee Diary: Shabbat shalom
March 2, 2010 (6 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

You shall destroy all the peoples that the Lord your God delivers to you, showing them no pity. And you shall not worship their gods, for that would be a snare to you.

--Deuteronomy 7:16

Six months ago, our daughter Ilana, seeking a non-urban, inexpensive apartment near Haifa, moved to the Druze Arab village of Usfiya. This town is just beyond the outskirts of Haifa as you go south along the top of the Carmel ridge, less than ten minutes from Haifa University. Because of its location it has been considered as a sort of suburb of Haifa for decades - and yet, for all its development and its economic interdependence with Haifa, it retains many features of a rural Arab village.

The Druze constitute about 10% of Israel's million Arab citizens. They believe that the founder of their religion was Moses' father-in-law Jethro, and thus it antedates Islam (the shrine of Jethro's tomb, in the mountains above Tiberias, called Nebi Shuaib, is a major pilgrimage site); on the other hand, historians argue that the religion was founded in Egypt in the 11 th century as a split-off from Islam; persecuted by the Muslims, the Druze ultimately concentrated their communities in the mountains of what later became Lebanon and Syria (where the vast majority live today) and northern Israel. The two southernmost Druze villages in Israel are Usfiya and its neighbor, Daliyat el-Carmel. After 1948 the Druze leadership agreed that Druze men would be subject to the Israeli military draft, and indeed, they have served with distinction in all branches of the army since then. That is perhaps the reason that many Jewish Israelis don't define them as Arabs. It is quite common for Arab villages in Israel to be of mixed religion, and indeed, Usfiya is home to some Moslem and Christian Arab families, as well as quite a few Jews, especially university students.

Filed Under: Israel

From Russia, with Love
March 2, 2010

by Larry Kaufman
(Also posted at Larrykaufman's Weblog)

When I was first getting involved in synagogue life, my rabbi had a cartoon pasted to the door of his study, showing a group of men sitting around a boardroom table -n those days, temple boards were all men -- as the president of the congregation announces, "We have only two items on our agenda this evening, the leak in the men's room ceiling and the future of American Judaism."

When we talk about the future of American Judaism, a number of recurrent themes come immediately to mind -- building Jewish identity, developing a new generation of leaders, the differences between the generations, creating ties with worldwide Jewry and especially with Israel, and the place of Reform Judaism in the big picture

How interesting it was, therefore, to participate the other day in an international conference call of the Committee on the Former Soviet Union of the World Union for Progressive Judaism, and to hear a report from Rita Furman, the Netzer (Youth) Coordinator for the FSU, about a leadership seminar recently conducted at the Moscow Center for Progressive Judaism, and devoted to our exciting Reform camping programs in Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine. Possibly the most important message to emerge from Rita's report was that the issues that confront American Judaism are equally if not more important in Eastern Europe, except that we have a lot more resources than they do for dealing with them.

Filed Under: Community | Israel

We Dare Not Be Silent
February 23, 2010 (14 Comments)

by Rabbi Eric Yoffie
(Originally published in Reform Judaism magazine)

When the history of Reform Judaism is written a century from now, its authors will ask many questions: Did Reform Jews study Torah, perform mitzvot, bring justice to the world? But most important of all: Did we do enough to safeguard the security and well-being of the State of Israel?

I am worried now, not because we don't love Israel, but because we are distracted. As we learned in the aftermath of the stock market crash of 1929, during tough economic times North American Jews turn inward, focusing on personal problems and not the problems of the Jewish people. Though understandable, this is a huge mistake at a time when the government of Iran, supported by Russia and China, is inching toward the nuclear threshold--and the potential to deliver on its off-repeated promise to destroy the Jewish state. Not since the Yom Kippur War has Israel's survival been more precarious.

Filed Under: By Rabbi Eric Yoffie | Israel

For Out of Zion....Reflections - On a Very Busy Season
February 23, 2010 by Rabbi Stanley M. Davids
Immediate Past President of ARZA

Resa and I returned home to Jerusalem on January 25th. We plunged immediately into what has become a month long period of programs, meetings, encounters and conference calls. We aren't complaining. It's just that the days aren't long enough.

First up was Resa's challenge to organize a national meeting of the 15 chapters of Women of Reform Judaism - Israel for February 14th. (OK. For those who are curious: besides the "Day of Love," which is observed in Israel on February 14th, what is the date of the OTHER celebration of romantic attachment in Israel? Did you guess the 15th of the Hebrew month of Av? Congratulations!). The national meeting just happened to have been scheduled in the midst of rising concern over events regarding the Women of the Wall. By now we all know of Nofrat Frenkel who was arrested while worshipping with WOW in November at the Kotel on Rosh Hodesh (New Moon). That event set off a tsunami of anguished responses throughout the Diaspora, as Reform and Conservative Jews expressed profound resentment at what clearly has become a series of escalating restrictions aimed at accommodating the ultra-Orthodox at the expense of just about everyone else.

What kinds of restrictions? Women cannot wear Tallitot at the Kotel; there is now a 'men only' walkway at the rear of the Western Wall Plaza; some bus routes in Jerusalem have been proclaimed 'women in the rear of the bus' routes; some Haredi air passengers are demanding the right to wear portable Mechitzahs (barriers) over their heads (sic) while they are flying, so that the sight of women won't distract them and so that they will not see the projected movies; in some areas of Jerusalem Haredim have gender-segregated sidewalks. Nofrat Frenkel's arrest for many was simply the last straw.

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Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Perspective
February 23, 2010 (5 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

...Even a poor person who is supported by tzedakah is obligated to contribute tzedakah to others. -Rambam (Maimonides), Mishneh Torah, Laws of gifts to the poor 7:5

Recently the Masorti (Conservative) congregation in Kfar Vradim (a rural town with a sort of suburban life style, located about 30 minutes north of Shorashim) celebrated the ground-breaking for their new synagogue. It marked an important milestone, as the little community there has struggled for years against the opposition of the Orthodox minority and against the apathy of the "secular" majority who couldn't quite understand what all the to-do was about. As has happened in many places, the liberal community finally managed to win the support of local government, which has the power to allocate land for public use. Thus, there are a number of Reform and Conservative synagogues on land allocated by local municipalities, throughout the country. This is of course still a long way from equality with Orthodoxy, whose rabbis are government employees and whose synagogues are often built partly or completely by tax dollars. But on the local political level the liberal movements have made great strides in the past couple of decades.

In general, I think it is important to keep the "persecution" or "disenfranchisement" of liberal Jews in perspective. On the individual level there are issues - primarily in the areas of recognition of marriage and conversion; and of course it is not uncommon for nominally neutral institutions like the army or the schools to hew to an Orthodox line when inviting holiday speakers, or performing public ceremonies (especially galling when it involves the status of women), so it does happen that liberal Jews find themselves feeling like outsiders. On the other hand, they can live where they want, and work where they want (unlike, say, Arabs or Ethiopian Jews, who are persona non grata in various settings).

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Saturday night
February 16, 2010 (1 Comment)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Who is the mightiest of the mighty? He who conquers his urges... Some say: He who turns his enemy into a friend.
-Avot d'Rabbi Nathan, version A chapter 23

Since leaving the United States we have been living on the edge of Asia - and Africa is just next door. I have developed somewhat of a fascination with this near neighbor and the experiences and cultures of some of its many nations. In particular, the transition from Apartheid to democracy in South Africa in the 90s has been a subject that I find most interesting and inspiring. Therefore, as soon as it opened here, we went to see Invictus, Clint Eastwood's new film on Nelson Mandela's use of rugby as a force for creating a shared identity and culture among the disparate populations of his newly liberated nation. It was sort of schmaltzy, but then, the reality was pretty schmaltzy. And there is no question that Nelson Mandela was a rare example of a leader who truly had vision, and who led his people away from their natural instincts of revenge and domination, presiding over a process of reconciliation from which perhaps we could learn.

Filed Under: Israel

Peaches, Natanya
February 11, 2010

by Elaine Starkman

He sold peaches from his cart
Yehiel, an old immigrant
from Eastern Europe, paler
than I, light eyes and lashes
I never knew if he landed here
before or after the war
when he might have changed his name.

With him was his young helper
Yosef the singing Yemenite; his dark
sandaled feet dangled over the cart
pulled by a donkey. They slowly rolled
into our village just before noon heat.

Cush, the dog, ran along side them.
He knew his way back to nearby borders
always licked my face.

They both knew I'd buy; I always did.
How do you call that? I pointed to a peach.

Ahfarsek, Yosef, pronounced
the word with deep nasal twang.

An odd sound. I copied the way
he placed his tongue

on the roof of his mouth.
Ah-far-sek.

Excellent!! Now taste! he laughed.
The older man silently sliced

into the soft fuzzy peach skin.
"Sweet, yes?" Yosef grinned.

And here, Madame, apples-of-the-earth.
Here is mish-mish. Here is the best,

Better here than in the city. Buy many, Madame,
half kilo, just three shekel.

O fruit of the land. O, honey and milk,
Coastal Sea

Where are you now
Singing Yosef,

Silent Yehiel,
Lost Cush.

Together with her husband who worked as physician, Starkman and her family of three small children went to Israel immediately after the Six Day War. Since then she writes on her experiences, as one of her subjects. Her work appears in the new Torah: A Women's Commentary published by URJ Books and Music. She's also the co-editor of Here I Am: Contemporary Jewish Stories from Around the World, JPS, which won a PEN/Oakland Award in 1999. She now lives and teaches writing in Northern California.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Whose wall?
February 9, 2010 (8 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

The Council of Progressive (Reform) Rabbis in Israel views the Western Wall as an area that does not represent the Jewish attachment to God, the experience of prayer, or modern Jewish thought... For the Reform Jew the Wall may be a place of historical connection, but it does not have any place in a Reform theology.
-Responsum of the Council of Progressive Rabbis in Israel

It takes me about four hours to get to Jerusalem by public transportation; not a great distance as distances go in the world - and merely a fraction of the distance to the North American Diaspora. And Jerusalem is very familiar to me from living there and visiting frequently over the years. I even remember it before the unification of the city in 1967. Yet sometimes it looks, in my "peripheral" vision, like another world. And since it is the "center of the world," and the capital of Israel (depending on whom you ask), it represents Israel in the eyes of the world. Thus, sometimes it seems that the Jews of Boston and Omaha and Phoenix are more involved in the symbolic events occurring in Jerusalem than are we Galileans. You might say that Jerusalem looks to us like Washington DC looks to a Montanan: What's all the fuss?

This mismatch comes to mind in the wake of the most recent installment in the ongoing jousting match between the ultra-Orthodox and the liberal movements in Jerusalem: violating a court order, the Women of the Wall, a group of women who pray every Rosh Chodesh at the Western Wall, took their prayer out of the Robinson's Arch area that had been designated for them, and held it in the open plaza behind the "official" prayer areas at the wall. One of them even put on a tallit - and was promptly arrested (and released after a few hours "interrogation"). The repercussions have been continuing for weeks, almost entirely among liberal Jewish organizations here and abroad. Most Israelis, who are not affiliated with these movements, are not very interested in what seems to us to be a test-case for religious rights of a significance equivalent to Rosa Parks' historic bus ride. Indeed, they can't imagine why a woman would want to put on a tallit anyway.

Filed Under: Israel

Progressive Judaism on the Map in Argentina
February 9, 2010

by Sherry Levy-Reiner

I was gratified to read the constructive comments about my previous blog, "Progressive Judaism: the Un-'official' Alternative," January 7, 2010. I hope that the dialogue sparks action. In 2006, my husband and I spent two months in South Africa shortly after the "Chief Rabbi" refused to participate in a memorial service for Yitzhak Rabin either because - we heard variously - a Reform rabbi was participating and/or a girl's chorus was singing. This issue obviously is very much alive and not just troubling but debilitating.

Now we have just returned from three weeks in Argentina, where the state does not support religion. While the Jewish community of course has many different kinds of problems and issues, in Buenos Aires - largely as a result of its history - it is not controlled by the Orthodox. The oldest congregation in the country, La Congregación Israelita de la República Argentina, is affiliated with the World Union for Progressive Judaism.

Filed Under: Community | Israel

Galilee Diary: Galilee encounters
February 2, 2010 (2 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Do not uproot what has been planted Do not forget the hope Return me and I shall return To that goodly land.
-Naomi Shemer

So, rabbi, what do you do all day anyway? Wednesday I spent the day with 50 students from HUC, spending their first year in Israel before beginning their studies at the stateside campuses. The day included three encounters:

Iman is a 21 year old religious Muslim woman studying to be an English teacher. She has been working with us for a few years, speaking to groups, organizing encounters with her classmates. She is bright, thoughtful, poised, extremely articulate in English, and honestly ambivalent about her relations with her Palestinian - and Israeli - identity and culture. One of 17 children in a working-class family, recently married to a Technion graduate, she is a fascinating case study in the transitions that the Israeli Arab community is experiencing.

Filed Under: Israel

Israel and Haiti
January 28, 2010 (1 Comment)

by Frederick D. Strober
President, Congregation Rodeph Shalom in Philadelphia, PA
(Originally posted on BlogRS)

When I was 25, I wound up in a unique place, doing my best to help. In October, 1973, I visited Israel for the first time. I was staying with an aunt in Jerusalem, scheduled to return home after the High Holidays, and experiencing a Yom Kippur morning literally without a car on the road. Suddenly, sirens started wailing and cars quickly began to appear--at noon on Yom Kippur! The Yom Kippur War had begun and I got to see a country mobilize in a matter of hours. It was controlled chaos, and I was amazed how calm the Israelis stayed as hundreds of young men raced to collection points and sped away in army vehicles. It's a day I'll never forget.

The men were away at war and the kibbutzim needed workers to finish the harvest. Once the actual fighting ended, my plans laid aside, I headed to Kibbutz Kfar Giladi, in the far north, to do what I could to help.

I stayed for seven months, learned enough Hebrew to get by, worked where needed during the day and taught youngster basketball when school was out. And I learned how remarkable a people the Israelis are. There was a guest house at the kibbutz which the army used for R & R, and one of the things that struck me was how calm and mature the soldiers were. Here were guys my age, even younger, with the weight of the world on their shoulders, many with stories of brutal battle just two months behind them, but they kept their humor and gave you all the confidence in the world that Israel was safe during their watch. Their brashness came through, but so did their tenderness, and for all their poking fun at me for my American ways, they were genuinely pleased that someone would take the time to help -- and more than one of them told me that they wish they could have the same opportunity one day.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

Galilee Diary: Rainy day
January 26, 2010 (3 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Moving from the Midwest to the Mideast involved looking at rainy days in a new way. It took me a number of years to internalize the concept that rainy days are not an inconvenience, but rather a blessing. For a long time I knew how to say the words, but I didn't feel the feeling. But after a while I noticed that awakening to the sound of rain actually feels good; the overcast sky, the drumming of the drops, the smell on the air - all are actually - and counterintuitively - cheering and invigorating. I guess it takes years for one's body to attune to the seasonal rhythms of a place.

We are having a stormy week. The headlines are the weather - yesterday two rain tourists were killed in the Negev. There are different Hebrew terms for two types of streams: "nachal eitan," a "strong stream," refers to streams in which water flows all year around; "nachal achzav," a "disappointing stream," refers to streams that exist only in the rainy season. All of the rivers in the desert are in the latter category, indeed, they may flow for only a few days a year - but after a few stormy days, they gush with overwhelming force, and the rapids and waterfalls that suddenly appear in the dry environment are beautiful and impressive (and often destructive) sights, which every year claim casualties - either macho drivers undaunted by some water on the road, or sightseers who get too close. Here in the Galilee we also have "disappointing streams," like the Hilazon, whose course passes just below Shorashim. For years it flowed constantly - with raw sewage from the area; however, that was solved, and it has gone back to its natural dry state except for a few days after a really heavy rain, like today, when the runoff gushing down the mountains turns it into a real river flowing west into the sea. Meanwhile, it's not only the brave and the foolish who are affected by the rain - roads and train tracks all over the country are flooded out today, and my neighbors and I are watching our ceilings for signs of the usual dampness from the sensitive spots on our flat roofs. But when the sun comes out tomorrow the landscape will be lush and green and ablaze with wildflowers.
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Filed Under: Israel

Rabbi Yoffie on Women of the Wall
January 25, 2010 (5 Comments)

Rabbi Eric Yoffie, President of the Union for Reform Judaism, had an op-ed published last week in the San Francisco Bay Area's J Weekly, titled "At the Wall, which side is the right one?: The Kotel belongs to the entire Jewish people." In it, he addresses the controversy surrounding the Women of the Wall, including the 2009 arrest of Nofrat Frenkel for wearing a prayer shawl at the Kotel, as well as the recent interrogation of Anat Hoffman, Director of the Israel Religious Action Center, for her leadership of the monthly women's prayer group. Rabbi Yoffie writes:

Why turn [the Kotel] into a source of division? Why should the Wall be an ultra-Orthodox synagogue rather than a place that belongs to us all -- a place where all Jews can find space to pray, to gather, and to celebrate the Jewish homeland and the Jewish people?

Twenty years ago I proposed a solution to the problem of access to the Wall, and it remains the best answer. There is ample room to divide the Wall into three areas: one for men to pray according to Orthodox custom; one for women to pray according to Orthodox custom; and one for non-Orthodox prayer and secular and civil ceremonies of various kinds.

He goes on to say that the "Robinson's Arch solution," which permits non-Orthodox Jews to pray at an archaeological site at a distance from the Wall, is no solution at all; he goes on to dismiss the idea that permitting Reform and Conservative Jews to pray at the Kotel could lead to chanting by visiting Catholics or Buddhists. Finally, Rabbi Yoffie writes:

And since there is not a single, universally accepted religious standard that governs Jewish religious life, we should make no attempt to impose one at the Kotel. What we need, rather, is to be respectful of each other's choices and customs.

You can learn more about the Women of the Wall controversy at urj.org/israel/wow, and then listen to a recording of Anat Hoffman speaking about the Women of the Wall (albeit before her interrogation).

What do you think of the Women of the Wall controversy? What should be done? Is there any solution in sight? read MORE

Filed Under: Israel

Israel's Response to the Haitian Earthquake
January 22, 2010

by Rabbi Ira Youdovin
former ARZA Executive Director and current chair of ARZA's Rabbinic Cabinet

Televised images of Gaza, Israel's security barrier and alleged mistreatment of the Palestinians have undermined the Jewish State's standing in world opinion. CNN footage from Haiti tells a very different story, and reveals much about Israel's soul, and the circumstances under which Israelis live.

By last Thursday evening, only 48 hours after the devastating earthquake, Israel had assembled and sent airborne a flight loaded with military and civilian medical personnel, including 120 doctors and nurses, rescue teams, search dogs, and equipment and supplies for establishing a sophisticated field hospital capable of treating 500 patients daily. The hospital went operational in Port-au-Prince Friday afternoon, serving as the only facility in Haiti offering advanced treatment to the seriously wounded. "It came from halfway around the world", an astonished CNN's reporter notes. The United States, which lies only a few hundred miles north of Haiti, had yet to put its mission in place.

The sad aspect of this heroic story is that Israel was able to mobilize so quickly because its people have had much experience----too much experience--- in addressing emergencies in which human lives hang in the balance. The rapid response skills displayed in Haiti have been honed through years of rescuing critically wounded victims of suicide bombings and other acts of terrorism.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

Israel in Haiti: Lending More than a Hand
January 22, 2010 (2 Comments)

by Rabbi David A. Lyon
Congregation Beth Israel, Houston, TX

The aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti is still coming into focus. The daily news reports the devastation on the ground. We see the desperate lives of people fending for themselves, rummaging for food and shelter, and seeking medical help. It tears at our hearts and souls. Americans have responded generously with extraordinary amounts of goods and money. Troops, ships and planes are arriving with capable personnel and mass quantities of food, water, and medical supplies. The world has grown accustomed to America's commitment to serve humanity in times of natural disasters. What the world has not always known in times of natural disasters is the remarkable response of the people of Israel.

Surely, you have seen on the news or read in the paper about Israel's unprecedented level of aid to the people of Haiti. As of January 20th, only days after the earthquake, Israel set up field hospitals to serve various levels of medical care. In the very short time they have been in Haiti, it is reported that 367 patients have been cared for in Israel's field hospitals; 104 life-saving operations have been performed; 44 patients are currently hospitalized; and 7 babies have been born in the hospital. The description of the level of sophistication and readiness in the Israeli field hospitals is simply extraordinary.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action | Torah

Galilee Diary: Values collide
January 19, 2010 (4 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

We hold that the State of Israel was not permitted, by law, to allocate State land to the Jewish Agency for the purpose of establishing the communal settlement of Katzir on the basis of discrimination between Jews and non-Jews.
-Israel Supreme Court decision, March 8, 2000

The issue of "admissions committees" in rural communities, which has been simmering for over a decade, came to a boil in recent months and has now sort of boiled over. For decades, kibbutzim and most other gated rural communities had rather draconian admissions procedures. For example, when we came to Shorashim in 1990 there was a preliminary interview, psychological testing, a weekend visit, a weeklong trial residency, a vote for acceptance to a year of probationary membership, and, at the end of the year, a final vote for membership. It was taken for granted that small communities had the right to choose their members, to perpetuate their values. We got in; some other families didn't. While troubled on one level by this exclusivity, on another level Tami and I believed in it, as it seemed obvious that without it, our little Camelot would be overrun by city-dwellers looking for suburban life, with no interest in preserving and supporting Shorashim's liberal Jewish life style. Of course, we tended to think keeping out those who might undermine the comfortable homogeneity that had so attracted us to the community meant selecting for people like us in our Jewish and liberal values. The flip side of that selection, which we didn't really think about, was that non-Jews would certainly not fit the criteria. And since around here, non-Jews are mostly Arabs, we were essentially adopting a policy that was ethnically/religiously exclusive, something that we had railed against whenever we encountered it in the United States, growing up in the 50s and 60s.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Torah for the masses
January 12, 2010 (3 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Ben Bag-Bag says: Turn [the Torah] over and turn it over, for everything is in it. -Mishnah, Avot 5:22

I just returned from Limmud Galil, where I had the misfortune to be teaching a class in the first period of the morning (8:00) on the second day of the event, after the participants had all stayed up singing until 2:00 am. And my class was in the same slot as several big name speakers - and a Pilates workshop. So it was intimate.

Limmud ("learning") got its start in England 25 years ago, and has since spread all over the world. The idea is to make Torah study accessible to the masses by creating a sort of festival that brings together learners and teachers of every background and interest for a brief, intensive experience of learning and socializing and crossing ideological and institutional boundaries. The idea is that everyone volunteers - to teach, to organize, so it really becomes a learning community. The "costs" are that there is a certain amount of chaos (my class was small; a few years ago a friend had no learners at all at her session; it's nice to let people learn what they want when they want, but to volunteer to teach, spend time preparing and end up not teaching is rather annoying); and that the quality of instruction can be uneven. And by definition, just about anything goes (a woman stuck her head in the door of my class on halachic controversies, to ask where the class on spirit communication was taking place).

Filed Under: Israel | Torah

Let's Raise Hell
January 9, 2010 (4 Comments)

by JanetheWriter
(Originally posted on JanetheWriter Writes)

A few weeks ago, I wrote on the Union's blog about the ongoing controversy involving women wearing tallitot and praying at the kotel in Jersusalem. Earlier this week, Anat Hoffman, excecutive director of the Israel Religious Action Center (IRAC) was interrogated by police for her efforts to spearhead this sacred endeavor.

In this video, she talks with JTA's Ben Harris about the experience:

As she suggests, we can keep quiet or we can raise hell.

I'd vote for the latter. What about you?

Filed Under: Israel

Progressive Judaism: the Un-"official" Alternative
January 7, 2010 (9 Comments)

by Sherry Levy-Reiner

When my husband and I visited Vienna several times in the 1990s, the gemeinde (official Jewish community) would not publish the schedule of services at the Progressive Congregation Or Chadasch in its communal newspaper or even allow the congregation to buy an ad.

I thought about Vienna when I read an article currently being distributed by the JTA and printed in many local Jewish newspapers that paints a picture of the "bleak future" of Danish Jewry. The article is by Ben Harris, who also blogs at JTA as "The Wandering Jew," where he frequently writes about the bleak future of small Jewish communities in the U.S.

In reporting on Danish Jewish assimilation, Harris fails to make a crucial connection between two facts of Jewish life in Europe:

Religious activities are state-supported with a religious "head tax" that is distributed by the government to the religious communities.
The Jewish "community" is controlled by and defined as the Orthodox Jewish community.

Filed Under: Community | Israel

Galilee Diary: Health care
January 5, 2010 (8 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

And if you do obey these rules and observe them carefully, the Lord your God will maintain faithfully for you the covenant He made on oath with your fathers...The Lord will ward off from you all sickness; He will not bring upon you any of the dreadful diseases of Egypt, about which you know, but will inflict them upon all your enemies.
-Deuteronomy 7:12, 15

A recent trip to the regional specialty clinic in Haifa reminded me that for all the criticisms that it is possible to level at Israel for the gap between rich and poor, and for the inequalities in opportunities for different ethnic groups, one area in which we really have the right to be proud of our achievements is the health care system. First of all, it is important to point out that Israel has universal basic health care coverage. In return for a small monthly payroll deduction (waived for those who don't have a paycheck), every citizen can choose to enroll in one of several national HMOs. All normal, routine care and preventive care are covered, and there is a large "basket" of more expensive treatments, diagnostic tests, hospitalization, and medications that are included. Of course, the system is not infinite, and there is always controversy about what conditions or treatments are excluded from the "basket." Moreover, the limitations and inefficiencies that are probably inherent in any such system lead to class-based inequalities: those who can afford it buy supplemental insurance to cover what the system doesn't - and bypass the bureaucracy and waiting periods by paying for surgery privately. And at any given time there is a least one campaign being waged in the media to raise money for someone needing a hugely expensive treatment (e.g., organ transplant). The system clearly has its deficiencies. But it is a system that works. Everyone, regardless of religion or social class or ethnic group, can go to the doctor, can get a prescription for an expensive antibiotic, can have a CT scan, can see a top specialist - without stopping to wonder how to pay for it. Is the equality absolute? No, if you live in the periphery you'll have to spend time and money travelling to that regional specialty clinic; if you live in an unrecognized Bedouin village your local clinic may be limited in equipment (and in the hours it has electricity). If you are a foreign worker, you may be at the mercy of your labor contractor. We still have plenty to do; but it seems that the glass is way more than half full.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

President Shimon Peres Visits Kibbutz Lotan
January 3, 2010 (1 Comment)

by Alex Cicelsky
Founder, Kibbutz Lotan

The recent President's Conference in Jerusalem opened with a video that showcased innovative research and development in the Negev and highlighted Reform Kibbutz Lotan's ecology center. To see this work for himself, the President of Israel, Shimon Peres, visited the Eilot Region in Israel's southern Arava Valley. Peres's visit focused on initiatives the region is taking in environmental education and renewable energy.

Kibbutz Lotan, which has achieved national prominence for its ecological projects, was Peres's final stop. After being greeted by a delegation of kibbutz children, Peres and the kibbutz general director Mark Naveh (a graduate of NETZER Australia) toured the Center for Creative Ecology's facilities. The President met the young Israelis doing a year of service after high school who demonstrated the art of making mud bricks. He also learned about assembling a geodesic dome with palm branches from American college students participating in the Center's Peace, Justice & the Environment semester program (affiliated with Living Routes, the University of Massachusetts and MASA).

Peres met with kibbutz members in the Center's solar tea house reception area. One of Lotan's founders, Mike Nitzan, related the history of the Kibbutz and its Reform Zionist vision. Michael Livni, the first shaliah (emissary) to the Reform Movement of North America in the 1970's, presented Peres with a copy of his book, "The Reform Option: Another Zionism". The President expressed his appreciation for Lotan's pioneering role in ecological innovation and also noted the significance of the affiliation with the Reform movement - the largest stream of Judaism in the Diaspora.

Peres was particularly impressed with the sustainable technologies incorporated in the Center including organic gardening, solar ovens, strawbale construction and sewage treatment using a constructed wetland. The visit ended with the President making a personal evaluation of the waterless toilets, an important tool for eliminating pollution and conserving precious resources.

Pictures are below the jump, or visit KibbutzLotan.com for more.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Round and round
December 29, 2009 (1 Comment)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die...
-Ecclesiastes 3:1-2

Last Thursday, after a long struggle with cancer, Tsippy Oren, a veteran member of Shorashim, passed away, at home, at the age of 58. She was a remarkable member of a remarkable family. Classically "secular" Israelis deeply sympathetic to the liberal religious orientation of Shorashim, devout Zionists, strong advocates for social justice and civil society, open minded and open hearted - a sort of embodiment of the mythical Israeli. Tsippy was an occupational therapist, but beyond her professional commitments she was always quietly finding ways to help others - bereaved families, Arab women, families in trouble - and who knows who else. One son helped found a new kibbutz dedicated to education and social activism without great prospects for prosperity; a daughter became ultra-orthodox. The Orens didn't miss a beat and remained a model of a close and loving and inclusive family. Tsippy was our liaison when we were first visiting and considering joining Shorashim, and was our advocate when our candidacy was questioned because of our advanced age (44). I think part of what drew us here was the prospect of living in a community made up of people like her. Her loss is a very sad moment for all of us at Shorashim - all the more so because it represents a sort of actuarial turning point for us; in the early days of the community a young mother died of cancer, but that was an anomaly, a tragedy. In this death, on the other hand, we all hear the clock ticking.

Filed Under: Community | Israel | Lifecycle

No Better Place to Be
December 23, 2009 (3 Comments)

by JanetheWriter

An article in this week's New York Times and this post right here on the Union's blog--also published this week--both reminded me of a Facebook conversation I had with a college friend back in February, right after Rosh Chodesh Adar when women celebrated by (gasp!) singing at the Wall. At that time, I'd posted this piece on my own blog, which prompted my friend to be in touch.

My friend: "Hi Jane - enjoyed your blog and the links about the women singing at the wall. Doesn't that hatred of women make you never want to visit Israel again? It makes me furious. How do you reconcile?"

Filed Under: Israel

Some Color at the Kotel: Rosh Chodesh Tevet
December 21, 2009 (1 Comment)
Anat Hoffman is the Executive Director of the Israel Religious Action Center in Jerusalem. This post originally appeared as a message in IRAC's December 21, 2009 newsletter, The Pluralist. To sign up for updates from IRAC, visit www.irac.org.

Last Friday, Rosh Chodesh Tevet, 153 women found it in themselves to get up early on a wretched, rainy, and miserable morning and walk to the Kotel, for what could be - following Nofrat Frenkel's arrest one month prior - an unpredictable morning of prayer.

We were women of all ages and denominations, gathered together under a canopy of bright umbrellas that looked especially vibrant on a gray day. We stood at the back of the women's section to pray, and when it was time to read from the Torah we walked toward Robinson's Arch, singing as we went. We were joined by a couple dozen men who walked with us in solidarity, while others spit on us and threw potatoes and colorful insults.

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Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

Israel Makes it Hard to be a Zionist
December 18, 2009 (12 Comments)

by Olivia Cohen-Cutler and dcc

In September of this year, Jay Michaelson wrote an essay for The Forward about why his love for Israel was waning because he was tired of constantly being forced to defend her. Most of his essay was focused on the fact that it is hard to defend a state that fights rock-throwing kids with tanks. We all know that isn't the whole story, but as Michaelson explains, that is what most people see, and therefore, that is the burden those who support Israel must bear.

It seems like he missed a major reason why liberal Jews have trouble supporting this State. Not only are there glaring international problems with Israel's approach to fighting its wars, its increasingly fundamentalist cultural stands make it harder and harder for liberal Jews to identify with the State of Israel.

Last month, 25 year-old medical student Nofrat Frenkel was arrested at Judaism's holiest site, the Western Wall, for the "crime" of leading a Torah service and wearing a tallit for the Rosh Chodesh group "Women of the Wall." Her offense, according to the police, was "performing a religious act that offends the feelings of others."

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Laughter
December 15, 2009 (8 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Thus said the Lord: Again there shall be heard in this place, which you say is ruined, without man or beast - in the towns of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem that are desolate, without man, without inhabitants, without beast - the sound of mirth and gladness... -Jeremiah 33:10-11

So there I was on the train from Tel Aviv, coming home to the Galilee, on a Tuesday evening after rush hour. The train was nevertheless full - I had to walk through two cars to find a seat. The passengers on these late trains seem to be characterized by their tiredness - it has been a long day. Many people doze and/or listen to their ipods, some read books (they read the tabloid on the way to work - there's nothing left to read in it by evening), more and more work on their laptops. There are always a few passengers travelling with a friend or acquaintance or coworker, who actually converse during the ride; a much larger number are conversing with someone far away, by cell phone - you can hear them all - the soldier breaking up with her boyfriend, the teenager arguing with his mother, the foreman barking work instructions, the mother guiding her kid through dinner preparations. Conversations in Hebrew and Russian and Arabic and English and occasionally Amharic. Seems like the harder you try not to listen, the more you hear. I've noticed, too, that many who are not talking on their cell phones are nevertheless busy with them, texting or playing games or exploring "features."

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Rabbis II
December 8, 2009 (1 Comment)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

I have indeed removed them far among nations and have scattered them among the countries and I have become to them a diminished sanctity [or small sanctuary] in the countries whither they have gone...
-Ezekiel 11:16

Rabbi Isaac says "a small sanctuary" refers to synagogues and houses of study... -Babylonian Talmud Tractate Megilah 29a

One of the most interesting challenges facing us as we think about the recruitment and training of Reform rabbis in Israel is the difference between the synagogue in the Diaspora and the synagogue in Israel. Consider:

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Rabbis
December 1, 2009 (5 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Joshua ben Perachiah says: Make yourself a teacher (rabbi) and get yourself a colleague (friend) and judge every person leniently.
-Mishnah, Avot 1:6

Last week was the ordination ceremony for the new crop of rabbis in the Israeli program of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, in Jerusalem. Although I am new on the faculty, I had the privilege of calling up the six ordinees to receive their semichah from Rabbi David Ellenson, president of HUC-JIR. There was a large, enthusiastic crowd of family, friends, rabbis, teachers, and community leaders present in the Blaustein auditorium, whose stage backs up to a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows affording a magnificent view of Jerusalem. It was a moving ceremony for the ordinees and their families - and for the Reform Movement in Israel in general. Slowly but surely, year by year, we are building a cadre of professional leaders for Israeli society with a liberal vision of Judaism for a Jewish state. Most of the graduates are already placed in congregations - from the Galilee to the Aravah.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: The Long Arm of the Law
November 24, 2009 (4 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Judges and officers [shotrim, the word used in modern Hebrew for police] shall you set up in the gates that the Lord your God shall give you for your tribes, and they shall judge the people justly.
-Deuteronomy 16:18

The other day I was driving through Karmiel when my cell phone rang. I answered it and navigated off the road to a bus stop bay where I could stop out of the flow of traffic. I ended the call quickly and continued my journey, when I noticed a police flasher in my mirror. Sure enough, the cop had seen me talking on my phone while driving. He asked me if I had anything to say for myself, and I protested feebly that I had pulled off as soon as I answered the phone, but he was not impressed; after all, I had been driving and talking, even if it was just for a few seconds. The law is the law - and the cost of violating it was 1,000 shekels (about $250). I really do think that the law makes sense (it has been on the books, and enforced, since cell phones first became popular), and rarely speak on the phone while driving - generally only long enough to tell the caller that I can't talk now since I'm driving. And while there was the temptation to say something nasty (and unhelpful) like "Why are you spending your time nailing minor offenders in town when you could be preventing fatal accidents by lying in wait for speeders and illegal passers who abound on the rural highway just a mile away?" I resisted that temptation and accepted my fate, if somewhat sullenly, and really have resolved simply to ignore my phone if it rings while I'm driving.

Filed Under: Israel

Beyond Pita & Falafel: Sustainable Eating in Israel
November 17, 2009 (1 Comment)
Miriam Farber is currently living in Jerusalem and studying in the Year Program at the Pardes Institute for Jewish Studies. She is an alumna of Eisner Camp and NFTY. To read more about Miriam's time in Israel, visit her blog at http://tovahhaaretz.blogspot.com.

(Originally posted at RACblog)

A few months before I left to spend this year studying in Jerusalem at the Pardes Institute for Jewish Studies, I brainstormed a list of all the things I was looking forward to enjoying once I arrived in Israel...most of which was food. Falafel, shwarma, shoko b'sakit (chocolate milk in a bag), chocolate bars filled with pop rocks, the fruits and vegetables of Machane Yehuda, Jerusalem's open-air market. So much of what I love about Israel is connected to its foods.

In the almost three months since I've been living in Jerusalem, the ways I connect to Eretz Yisrael through eating its food have moved beyond junk food and street food, to incorporating my Jewish social justice values in the way I cook and eat in Israel, through a CSA share (community-supported agriculture) and the Tav Chevrati.

Filed Under: Israel | Jewish Living | Social Action

Galilee Diary: Jewish identity/Israeli identity
November 17, 2009

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Take your son," - "Which son?"
"Your only son," - "Each is the only son of his mother."
"The one you love," - "I love them both."
"Isaac."
-Midrash Genesis Rabbah 39, on Genesis 22:2

The other day I observed a Bible class in the regional high school at Kibbutz Sasa, in a gorgeous setting in the mountains of the Upper Galilee. This is a relatively small high school (about 350) and serves a number of non-Orthodox communities in the region. The classes tend to be small; there were only about 15 ninth graders in the lesson I visited, but the levels of interest and knowledge were pretty heterogeneous: there were some kids (mostly boys) who sat slumped in their seats and seemed to be working at demonstrating how uninvolved they were (one boy either fell asleep or pretended to do so, forcing the teacher to wake him up), while others participated actively, answering and asking questions as the teacher reviewed with them the dramatic narrative of Abraham's almost-sacrifice of Isaac. The teacher was dynamic and energetic, and worked at trying to get the students to think about the problematic nature of this story.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Free Will
November 10, 2009 (6 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Proclaim: "This is the truth from your Lord," then whoever wills let him believe, and whoever wills let him disbelieve.
-Quran 18:29

All is foreseen - and freedom is granted...
-Mishnah, Avot 3:15

A few years ago our foundation facilitated, for the Interreligious Coordinating Council of Israel, a course on Judaism for local village imams (Moslem religious leaders). The group of about a dozen imams met monthly with various rabbis, and were a congenial and curious group. A question that was asked more than once was, "How come this is one-way? Where are the Jews who are curious about Islam?" We decided to find out the answer, and invited, a couple of times over the past year, a local imam to speak on Islam, publicizing the event through our usual local channels of advertising. The attendance both times was about 15 people. Unfortunately, the speakers were not really successful at conveying a coherent and intellectually satisfying account of Islamic customs or beliefs, in Hebrew, and the audience went home frustrated. The training that these clergy receive in Islamic seminaries does not include much in the way of pedagogy or critical inquiry - or comparative religion. Meanwhile, a friend referred me to an imam from a village a little farther away, near Nazareth, whom he recommended for such settings. I called Khaled Abu Ras and we arranged to meet at his home, and he turned out to be a charming and articulate 30-something doctoral candidate in religious thought at Bar Ilan University, a teacher in his local high school, and a Sufi (devotee of Islamic "Kabalah"). We talked for a long time - and looked at all the photos of him and his wife on their recent pilgrimage to Mecca, and I invited him to speak.

Filed Under: Israel

Greetings from His Majesty King Abdullah II
November 8, 2009

Aron Hirt-Manheimer is Editor of Reform Judaism magazine

In the aftermath of the Fort Hood mass murders, King Abdullah II's hopeful message to the General Assembly was very reassuring.

Talking to us from Amman, Jordan and seated next to a portrait of his late father, King Hussein, the monarch made two key points. First, that the end game -- a Palestinian state alongside a secure Israel -- is possible and necessary because the Middle East conflict is a flashpoint of international tensions. Second, that, at their core, Judaism and Islam have much in common, and that one of the paths to peace is robust interfaith dialogue. He praised URJ President Rabbi Eric Yoffie's leadership in this endeavor.

I sometimes doubt that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict will be settled in my life time. But I am not yet at the point of despair, because I know that there are Muslim leaders who are willing to risk their lives for the cause of peace. King Abdullah and his father before him certainly fall in this catagory, as does Azhar Azeez, who spoke at the Biennial in the session on Muslim-Jewish Dialogue. I saw in Azhar Azeez, a founder of the Islamic Society of North America, a true ally in the battle for peaceful coexistence among Jews and Muslims.

Whenever I feel my hope slipping, I will focus on our Muslim allies, like Abdullah and Azhar, and blot out the words and actions of those who use religion to spread hatred.

Filed Under: Israel

Resolutions Coast Through General Assembly (eh?)
November 6, 2009 (2 Comments)

Aron Hirt-Manheimer is the Editor of Reform Judaism magazine

Shocking! All four resolutions passed without a soul grabbing the con microphone. I heard not even a whisper of opposition from among the 3000 delegates who voted on climate change and energy, the treatment of Israeli Arab citizens, special needs camping, and Reform day schools. What happened? This is in defiance of the Jewish maxim -- two Jews, three opinions! Well, there are two reasons, actually.

The first, as explained by the chair of the resolutions committee, Jennifer Kaufman, is that for the first time in Biennial history congregations received the resolutions sixty days in advance allowing for revisions in advance of the convention. So what comes before the delegates has few wrinkles and does not require an army of editors fighting over the placement of commas.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

My Biennial
November 4, 2009

by Larry Kaufman

Twenty-four hours and four meetings after arrival, and the pace is accelerating. So far, we've admitted two congregations to their first membership in the Union, and re-admitted two that had dropped out and realized what they've been missing. We've also heard reports on the progress of the URJ re-structuring.

But most important, we heard Rabbi Eric Yoffie report to the Board of Trustees on his much-talked about appearance at the J-Street Conference. He called special attention to the valuable role of J-Street as a place where those of us who care deeply about Israel can talk about issues, like settlements, that are "off the table" for many of the mainstream Jewish organizations. In particular, he expressed the hope that Union congregations are hospitable places for conversation about Israel issues, whether in support of the positions he expressed in his talk to J-Street, which he described as reflecting positions the Reform Movement has repeatedly expressed, while acknowledging that they are not necessarily those of all congregants.

Bottom line, in my interpretation of his remarks, was he sees the value of J-Street, as long as it does not allow itself to be co-opted by the anti-Zionist, ant-Israel faction that was represented at the conference.

Subscript to the bottom line: I was once again proud of his eloquent expression of positions I share, at least in part because his leadership brought me to them.

Filed Under: Israel

Klal Yisrael - One Jewish People
November 4, 2009

by Rabbi Denise L. Eger
(Originally published on the RACBlog)

Rabbi Erger is the founding Rabbi of Congregation Kol Ami, West Hollywood's Reform Synagogue. She is the first female president of the Southern California Board of Rabbis and is also president of the Pacific Association of Reform Rabbis.

Last week I was part of a very historic mission to Israel sponsored by our Los Angeles Consul General, Yaakov Dayan. It was his vision and leadership that brought together 18 of Los Angeles' most prominent rabbis representing Reform, Conservative and Orthodox congregations and communities in Los Angeles. We traveled to together for a whirlwind trip to Eretz Yisrael. We were in Israel for a very short time - 58 hours on the ground and almost as much time in the air!

The group of rabbis also included: Rabbi Marvin Hier, Dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center; Rabbi Robert Wexler, president of the American Jewish University; Rabbi David Wolpe of Temple Sinai; Rabbi Laura Geller of Temple Emanuel of Beverly Hills; Rabbi Eli Herscher, Sr. Rabbi of Stephen S. Wise Temple; and Rabbi Elazar Muskin of Young Israel of Century City; Rabbi Yosef Kanefsky of the Orthodox B'nai David-Judea congregation; Rabbi Stewart Vogel of Conservative congregation Temple Aliyah; Conservative rabbi Sharon Brous of Ikar and several others. Diverse indeed! But we came to Israel with one thing in mind - unity. We came in solidarity to show the Los Angeles Jewish community our commitment to Israel. We came in solidarity to show Israel that it is possible for rabbinic leaders of all stripes to join in dialogue and in spite of our differences, to show our commitment to the notion of Klal Yisrael - the peoplehood of the state of Israel is a sacred tenet that we all share.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

Galilee Diary: Sound the Horn
November 3, 2009 (5 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

If ...[one was walking] with a barrel ahead of one with a beam, and the barrel is broken by the beam, the one with the beam is responsible; and if the one with the barrel stopped [suddenly] then the one with the beam is free of responsibility; but if he said to the one with the beam "Stop!" then the one with the beam is responsible.
-Mishnah Baba Kamma 3:5

The other day I had occasion to take a cab across town in Tel Aviv. The driver, who appeared to be in his fifties, tossed that morning's tabloid paper to me as I sat down, apparently so that our conversation could be text-based. The headline had to do with the current basketball scandal: the manager of the Maccabi Tel Aviv team committed suicide after sinking into huge debts generated by black-market investments he had been making on behalf of officials, players, and even referees. And the inside pages were still processing the grisly murder of an entire family a few days earlier, apparently related to a protection racket. The commentary wasn't long in coming...

Filed Under: Israel

Lech Lecha - Ur-Text for Zionism
November 1, 2009

by Larry Kaufman

The first time I spoke on Zionism from a synagogue bimah happened to be on Shabbat Lech Lecha, and I had been taught to relate any talk from the bimah on Shabbat to parashat hashavuah. In finding my connection, I also had what I naively thought was an original insight - Shabbat Lech Lecha should be observed everywhere as Zionist Shabbat. Here "the land that I shall show thee" is first promised as the home of what is to become a great nation. I later learned that the American Zionist Movement was ahead of me on that concept (and in fact, AZM now promotes November, when Lech Lecha is generally read, as Zionist Month).

After fifty years in Jewish organizational life, I am cynical enough to wonder whether Lech Lecha was chosen for Zionist Shabbat because of its content, or because it came at just the right time to focus attention on Israel and Zionism, right after the holidays and early in the organizational year. And are the Zionist messages that I now extract from the text actually there, or am I just stretching to read them in?

Filed Under: Israel | Torah

Hiddush, a New Way to Promote Religious Freedom and Diversity in Israel
October 28, 2009

by Rabbi Paul Kipnes
(Originally posted on Or Ami I?)

Let's celebrate Hiddush, new Jewish advocacy organization, aimed at "promoting religious freedom and diversity" in Israel. Its a public education organization comprised as a partnership between Israeli Jews and world Jewry. And it has a purpose, direction and leadership that makes it destined to move Israel in the direction of religious freedom.

Hiddush, which in Hebrew means innovation and renewal, marks an unprecedented new drive to strengthen Israel as a Jewish and democratic state and to realize the promise of Israel's Declaration of Independence, which states that "The State of Israel... will uphold freedom of religion and conscience and ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion."

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Living on the Edge
October 27, 2009 (7 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Three times a year - on the Feast of Unleavened Bread, on the Feast of Weeks, and on the Feast of Booths - all your males shall appear before the Lord your God in the place that He will choose.
-Deuteronomy 16:16

I am writing this entry while sitting on the mostly empty train from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, my first ride on this route since it was reopened four years ago. Originally laid by a French contractor for the Ottomans in 1892, this line winds through beautiful vistas of the Judean hills for over 90 minutes. It was shut down in 1998 as inefficient and little-used; recently it was refurbished at great cost, for reasons that are not clear, as it is still inefficient and little-used. A high-speed alternative is under construction. Now that I have started working at HUC in Jerusalem two days a week, and have to be there by 9:00 am on Mondays, I have been exploring the various alternative ways to get from the Galilee to the capital:

Filed Under: Israel

Rabbi Yoffie Speaks at First National J Street Conference
October 26, 2009 (8 Comments)

Speaking this afternoon to some 1,500 activists at the inaugural J Street National Conference, Rabbi Eric Yoffie, President of the Union for Reform Judaism, called for "a broad, sensible, and inclusive definition of what it means to be pro-Israel." He challenged American Jewry to be more outspoken about the danger of a nuclear Iran, sharply criticized the Goldstone report, and called for diplomacy that emphasizes a two-state solution as the key to peace in the Middle East. If progress toward a peace agreement does not materialize, he backed a "borders first" option as a strategy to move it forward.

Rabbi Yoffie is widely considered the American Jewish community's leading "dove." His address at J Street's conference underscores both the maturity of the dialogue over Middle East peace and the Reform Movement's commitment to peace.

Basing his remarks in what it means to be "pro-Israel," Rabbi Yoffie welcomed the growth of J Street and chastised those who insist there is only one manner by which to pursue peace and be an ohev Yisrael, a lover of Israel. He called for pro-Israel forces to stand in abiding solidarity with the State of Israel, to "battle Israel's enemies on the right and the left, to reject the trap of false moral equivalence, and to never, ever, express contempt for the State and its people."

Rabbi Yoffie, whose disagreement with J Street on Israel's military actions in Gaza sparked considerable controversy earlier this year, outlined the significant commonalities shared by diverse pro-Israel groups. The full text of his speech is below and here.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Sound reflections
October 20, 2009 (1 Comment)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Blow the shofar on the new moon, on the full moon for our feast day, For it is a law for Israel, a ruling of the God of Jacob.
-Psalms 81:4-5

Shorashim is located on the west-facing slope of a shoulder of Mt. Gilon, overlooking the Hilazon Valley. Across the valley, less than a mile away, is the Moslem village of Sha'ab. We don't have that much contact with the villagers, but we hear from them all the time. Weddings are held outdoors, and the amplification system for the dance music is quite robust, so we "participate" in every wedding - which means, during the summer, just about every night. Fortunately, they usually end by midnight. And the muezzin's call to prayer in the mosque is also amplified, and carries clearly across the valley, five times a day. Within our first year here we had already "stopped hearing" these sounds, in the sense that they had just become a normal part of the environment, often blotted out of our consciousness by other stimuli - not waking us up or disturbing us. The other day I happened to be awake at 4:00 in the morning. It was a clear, cool morning, a few days before Rosh Hodesh, so there was a bright sliver of a moon in the eastern sky, and the nasal, mournful chant of the muezzin drifted across the valley, and it occurred to me that this was a beautiful moment, and that actually I like hearing the muezzin; it has become part of what defines home for me - a part of the landscape like the olive trees that carpet the valley. During the day or early evening, I guess I really have stopped hearing it; and if I happen to be in a village at prayer time, it is often rather a nuisance, like a low flying jet - you have to stop conversation for a minute or two until the noise subsides. But in the pre-dawn silence, attenuated by distance, it seemed somehow comforting. Often, the muezzin's call wakes up the jackals that live down the mountainside, and they add a backup chorus of howling that seems just right.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Sukkah season
October 13, 2009 (4 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

You shall live in booths seven days; all citizens in Israel shall live in booths, in order that future generations may know that I made the Israelite people live in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I the Lord you God.
-Leviticus 23:42-43

The day before Sukkot I was walking down the street in Jerusalem, and kept having to make detours around the "construction sites" of sidewalk sukkot being erected by restaurant workers. In general, Sukkot offers a wonderful case study in the successful Zionist transformation of Judaism from religion to culture. Sukkot are ubiquitous - on roofs, balconies, courtyards, and parking lots. There are huge institutional ones at hotels and kibbutzim and yeshivot, modest family models, and tiny ones built by falafel stand owners to allow their customers to perform the mitzvah of dwelling in the sukkah (usually interpreted as eating there). Indeed, the sidewalk sukkot of Jerusalem are a classic case of the interface of religion and capitalism: if you operate a kosher restaurant and want to keep your religiously observant clientele during the week of Sukkot, you need to provide a sukkah or they'll patronize the competition.

Filed Under: Holidays | Israel

Galilee Diary: Gedaliah
October 6, 2009 (2 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

In the seventh month, Ishmael son of Nethaniah son of Elishama, who was of royal descent and one of the king's commanders, came with ten men to Gedaliah son of Ahikam at Mizpah; and they ate together there at Mizpah. Then Ishmael son of Nethaniah and the ten men who were with him arose and struck down Gedaliah son of Ahikam son of Shaphan with the sword and killed him, because the king of Babylon had put him in charge of the land.
-Jeremiah 41:1-2

There are four traditional fast days associated with the fall of Judah to the Babylonians: the 10th of Tevet (beginning of the siege of Jerusalem), the 17th of Tammuz (breaching of the walls), the 9th of Av (fall of the Temple), 3rd of Tishrei (murder of Gedaliah). Only the 9th of Av is a full 25 hour fast like Yom Kippur; the others are only from sunup to sundown. With the re-establishment of a sovereign Jewish state these fasts have become less significant for many people; indeed, most Israelis pretty much ignore them, and except for the 9th of Av are generally not even aware that they are occurring. Personally I have never been able to find much meaning in the three minor ones and haven't observed them. I do feel that it is important to clarify that however wonderful the state of Israel is, it is not yet the messianic state: we still have a lot of work to do before redemption; therefore, I do try to observe the 9th of Av as a symbol and a reminder of that belief.

Filed Under: Holidays | Israel

Galilee Diary: Uncertainty
September 29, 2009 (6 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

These are the festivals of the Lord, holy convocations, which you shall proclaim at their proper time. -Leviticus 23:4

One of the things that many immigrants from traditional backgrounds learn to appreciate about living in Israel is the fact that the "second day of the holiday for the Diaspora" is not observed here. So, for example in the Diaspora, the eighth day of Sukkot, Shmini Atzeret, a full holiday, is doubled, and its second day (i.e., the 9th day of Sukkot) observed as Simchat Torah. In Israel, it is only one day, also observed as Simchat Torah, so Israel and the Diaspora celebrate Simchat Torah a day apart. Pesach is only seven days in Israel instead of eight, and there is only one seder. Most people find this a great relief (liberation!), but it causes havoc with in-law relations: instead of tonight at our place and tomorrow at yours, we have to alternate years. This is not so simple.

Filed Under: Holidays | Israel

Putting Aside Preconditions: Taking Risks for the Pursuit of Peace
September 24, 2009 (3 Comments)

by Liz Piper-Goldberg
Eisendrath Legislative Assistant at the Religious Action Center
(Originally posted at RACblog)

This morning, President Obama made the first address of his presidency to the UN General Assembly. In outlining four fundamental pillars for world engagement and improvement, President Obama emphasized nuclear-non proliferation and the diligent pursuit of peace, echoing the Psalmist's mandate that we "seek peace and pursue it." Generally, President Obama committed to "positive engagement that builds bridges among faiths, and new partnerships for opportunity." He then quickly turned to dedicate a significant portion of his speech to address the urgency of restarting negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians without preconditions.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: On the Waterfront
September 22, 2009 (1 Comment)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

He will take us back in love; He will cover up our iniquities, You will hurl all our sins into the depths of the sea.

-Micah 7:19

One of our main early sources regarding customs among Ashkenazic Jewry is a book by the Maharil, (Rabbi Jacob Moellin) who lived in Germany around 1400. His book is the first documented source we have for the custom of Tashlich on Rosh Hashanah, which is now widespread throughout the Jewish world (though mainly in Ashkenazic communities). He describes walking down to a river after lunch on Rosh Hashanah in order to fulfill the above verse, "to hurl our sins into the depths..." He makes a point of saying that one should not take food along to throw to the fishes for the fun of it, as this might lead to the violation of the restrictions of the holiday. It would seem that the custom was not a new invention by him, and that indeed, he felt constrained to warn people against what probably was common behavior - taking a walk along the riverbank after lunch with the kids, tossing challah crumbs to the fish - perhaps a way to relax between many hours spent in synagogue. Beyond the verse from Micah (which is basically the only "liturgy" for the ceremony), he suggests further justification for the practice: the Torah reading for the second day of Rosh Hashanah is Genesis 22, the binding of Isaac. (It is the reading for the first day in most North American Reform Congregations.) There is a midrash that Satan tried various methods to prevent Abraham from trying to obey God's command; among these was to take the form of a river blocking Abraham's path. Abraham and Isaac continued walking, until the water was up to their necks, at which point God intervened. Hence, a connection between the Rosh Hashanah Torah reading and bodies of water.

Filed Under: Holidays | Israel

Galilee Diary: Cats
September 15, 2009 (7 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

Therefore the lion will strike them from the forest, the wolf will attack them from the plains, the leopard watches over their cities - and will devour anyone who comes out, on account of their many sins, their overwhelming iniquity.
-Jeremiah 5:6

In most communities and cities in Israel, one takes one's household garbage out to the street and dumps it into a covered dumpster - usually green, usually steel with plastic doors in a lid that slides back when the truck comes to lift and dump the container. These containers are treated roughly, especially by the lift mechanisms of the collecting trucks, so their plastic doors are often broken off, or the seals and/or bearings on their sliding lids are non-functional. Hence, they are usually open for the easy entrance and exit of the feral cats that live around them. I was reminded of this particular ecosystem recently when I noticed one of Shorashim's feral felines watching over two new kittens. Tourists who have the chance to leave the tourist routes and hotels and visit a home, anywhere in the country, often comment on the ubiquitous cats. In suburban America we had raccoons who rummaged in the garbage; in New York city I knew there were rats and mice, though I rarely encountered them. In Israel, there is no place without cats. And despite a sporadic effort by the county to bait and sterilize them (killing is not allowed), they are a constant (and I think constantly increasing) presence here on Shorashim. I do not know if they are as prevalent in other warm countries or if their presence is related to the degree of development. But for those of us whose world of experience is primarily North America and Israel, the association of alley cats with Israel is quite strong.

Filed Under: Israel

Responding to Hunger in Israel
September 9, 2009 (1 Comment)

by Sophie Vener
2009-2010 NFTY Social Action Vice President

I arrived in Jerusalem on Monday, August 31st, to begin my year on Shnat Netzer, the World Union for Progressive Judaism's gap year program in Israel. We spent the first week in the Beit Shmuel youth hostel for orientation, learning rules and regulations as well as getting acclimated to our new home in Jerusalem.

Included in the week of orientation was participating in the Israel Religious Action Center's program Keren B'Kavod, the progressive movement's response to poverty in Israel. One of the ways that Keren B'Kavod addresses poverty is through holiday food drives, in which people donate boxes of nutritionally balanced meals to hungry Israeli families. We were sent on a mission to Machane Yehuda, the Israeli outdoor marketplace also known as The Shuk, with 100 sheckels each to find and purchase food for a nutritionally insecure Israeli family. It was a powerful image to see 26 British and American Reform Jewish teenagers enthusiastically storm the streets of Jerusalem in an effort to provide food for families in need.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

Galilee Diary: Fitting in II
September 8, 2009 (10 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

Since its earliest days, Reform Judaism has asserted that a Judaism frozen in time is an heirloom, not a living fountain. Changes must be thoughtful, of course, and must be rooted in the history and traditions of our people. But we assert Judaism's innovative character, and we assert, too, that a stubborn failure to change will make Judaism an irrelevance.
-Rabbi Eric Yoffie

When we first moved to Israel, our 10th grade son came back from an overnight at a new friend's home - a family who explicitly defined themselves as "secular," and reported incredulously that the friend's father put on tefillin every morning. Over the years I've learned not to be surprised by such inconsistencies - our neighbor who never attends synagogue but will not cook on Saturday, the vast majority of the "secular" population who fast on Yom Kippur, light Chanukah candles, and attend a Passover seder, the thousands of Israelis who, over the past 15 years, have joined non-denominational Torah study groups, or who attend neo-chassidic and/or new-agey Kabbalat Shabbat services in community centers, private homes - even on the boardwalk in Tel Aviv. There are many families who light candles and recite Kiddush on Friday nights but see no inconsistency in going to the mall or a soccer game on Saturday morning. There are a thousand variations - but one thing most of these people have in common is that if you asked them if they were Reform Jews they would emphatically deny it.

Filed Under: Defining Reform | Israel

Protesting Segregated Buses in Jerusalem
September 8, 2009 (7 Comments)

by Anat Hoffman
(Originally published in IRAC's newsletter, The Pluralist)

Last Sunday, seven Israel Religious Action Center staff members and I boarded at the front of Bus No. 40, one of Jerusalem's segregated bus lines. After paying the fare, we sat down right behind the bus driver, which prompted shouts of "Women in the back, women in the back!" from the ultra-Orthodox men on board. Two men rushed to the front and complained to the driver; I couldn't make out what they were saying, but I did hear the driver say, "It's hard enough to drive a bus in Jerusalem traffic without having to deal with all this balagen [chaos]."

Our protest was part of a larger demonstration that day co-sponsored by IRAC and other organizations. Forty people, men and women, boarded several segregated buses around the city and sat together up front. None of the protestors sat next to ultra-Orthodox passengers or deliberately provoked them in any way other than our boarding and sitting in the front.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

Galilee Diary: Fitting In
September 1, 2009 (10 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

Rabbi Abba said in the name of Samuel: for three years the School of Shammai and the School of Hillel were in disagreement, each insisting that the halachah was according to its view. A heavenly voice was heard, saying "Both views are the words of the living God, and the halachah is according to the School of Hillel." But if both are the words of the living God, why did the School of Hillel merit that the halachah followed its view? Because they were soft-spoken and humble, and taught both their view and the view of the School of Shammai - and even mentioned the opinion of the School of Shammai first. -Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Eruvin 13b

A friend recently asked me to officiate at her wedding here on Shorashim. I explained to her that Reform and Conservative rabbis are not considered agents of the state like they are in the US, and therefore, a ceremony performed by me could not be registered as an official marriage. The policy of both movements is to request that couples desiring a Reform or Conservative wedding ceremony travel outside of Israel before or after the religious ceremony, in order to obtain a certificate of civil marriage. Cyprus, for example is only an hour's flight away - and has lovely beaches; there are travel agents offering combination wedding/honeymoon packages for Israelis. Civil marriages in other countries may be registered with the Ministry of Interior, even though there is no mechanism for performing civil marriage within Israel's borders. The bride was uncomfortable with this solution, so I turned to our regional rabbi (Orthodox, employed by the government). He said he would be happy to co-officiate with me. That way I can be responsible for the more personal aspects of the wedding ceremony, while the marriage will be registered as a wedding performed by the government rabbinate.

Filed Under: Israel

The Chief Rabbi and I
August 31, 2009 (1 Comment)

by Rabbi Rifat Sonsino
(Also published on From Istanbul to Boston)

It is well known that most Orthodox Jews do not have high regard for Reform Jews. They consider the Reformers as assimilationists and even "lesser Jews" because of the Reformers' alleged lack of religious observance and their "devious" theological views. I grew up Orthodox in Istanbul, Turkey in the early 40's. The then Chief Rabbi, David Asseo (z'l), was formerly my Hebrew teacher in the Jewish High School. He knew me well. Yet, when, much later, I visited him, along with other Reform Rabbis of the USA, he excoriated me in front of all of them for "leaving the only true religious path."

This does have to be the pattern of relationship between Orthodox and Reform Jews today. It is possible to transcend the feeling of animosity between them if there is goodwill and personal rapport between us. My friendship with the present Chief Rabbi of Turkey, Isaac Haleva, is a good example.

Isaac and I were part of Mahazike Hatorah ("Supporters of Torah"), a group of young Turkish Jews who were interested in synagogue life. We attended weekly Judaica classes taught by its director, Mr. Nisim Behar, who later on was ordained Rabbi in the State of Israel. Isaac was just a few years younger than me, but we were both part of the same Havurah, and remained personal friends our entire life.

Filed Under: Israel | Jewish Living

Israel's Real Crisis: Education
August 27, 2009

by Rabbi Eric Yoffie
(Originally published in The Jewish Week)

The State of Israel's most significant long-term problem is not the security situation or the absence of peace. It is not even the looming threat posed by a nuclear Iran. More important than any of these matters is the utter disarray of her educational system. And this for a very simple reason: none of these other problems can be solved without the superior human resources that can be produced only by first-rate schools. Tragically, Israel's schools are no longer first-rate.

Israel's education crisis results, in some measure, from the downturn of the world economy. Israel's universities are desperately short of funding, and her primary and secondary schools are experiencing terrible overcrowding and diminished budgets.

Filed Under: By Rabbi Eric Yoffie | Israel

Galilee Diary: Fish Stories
August 25, 2009 (11 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally posted in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

These you may eat of all that live in water: anything in water,, whether in the seas or in the streams, that has fins and scales - these you may eat.

-Leviticus 11:9

Last week I hosted a couple of guests from the US who happen to be in the gourmet food business. In planning an itinerary in the Galilee, they told me they had heard there is a caviar farm in the region, and that they'd be interested in seeing it. I had no idea what they were talking about, but did a little research and discovered that sure enough, Kibbutz Dan, at the very northern tip of the country, in the shadow of Mt. Hermon, does indeed produce caviar. We made an appointment, and spent a fascinating hour being shown around by the manager. Here is some of what I learned:

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Roots
August 18, 2009 (4 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

When in your war against a city you have to besiege it a long time in order to capture it, you must not destroy its trees, wielding the ax against them. You may eat of them, but you must not cut them down. Are trees of the field human to withdraw before you into the besieged city?
-Deuteronomy 20:19

While we don't have a lot of time to devote to our modest yard, we do get pleasure out of it. Tami has managed to create some lovely different corners - everything from a cactus terrace to a sort of tropical jungle with a waterfall. It is in a constant state of "needing work," but there is always something interesting blooming. And over the years, we have planted a number of fruit trees, some of which have really been successful - a hugely prolific blood-orange tree; a sabra plant that has grown to monstrous proportions, yielding more fruit than we can possibly use or even give away; a pecan tree that produces enough for a couple of pies; a little clementina heavy with perfect fruit - and others more modest, like the peeling orange, mulberry, fig and grapevine. And then there have been failures, like the guava, cherry, apple, plum, and grapefruit. Our yard, indeed, is so small that we planted a number of the trees in the open space behind our lot, that borders on several neighbors' lots and the brushy undeveloped area leading down to the road. Some of the trees were a joint project of a few families.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Tradition, tradition
August 11, 2009 (5 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

Rabbi Johanan said in the name of Rabbi Simeon bar Yohai: If Israel were to keep two Sabbaths according to the laws thereof, they would be redeemed immediately. -Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Shabbat, page 118b

When Shorashim was founded by about a dozen young families in the early 1980s, the group decided that while they were not (yet) affiliated with any particular denomination of Judaism, they wanted Shabbat to be an important part of the life of the community. They decided to hold services Friday evening and Saturday morning. Shorashim did not have a rabbi or other professional religious leadership, so the tasks of conducting services, preaching, and reading Torah were divided up among those with the requisite skills and willingness. Alas, there was only one competent Torah reader in the community, and he, like everyone else, wanted occasionally to spend Shabbat with friends or relatives elsewhere in the country - or even to go abroad. A problem: what would we do in his absence? A solution: commit to Shabbat morning services every other week. On "off" weeks, the Torah reader - and everyone else, would be free to travel (or sleep late) without letting the community down. Friday evening services could still be held weekly.

Filed Under: Community | Israel | Shabbat

I ♥ Israel: A Tu B'Av Post
August 5, 2009 (6 Comments)

by Phyllis Sommer
(Originally posted on Ima On and Off the Bima)

Wednesday is Tu B'Av, a relatively unknown "holiday" in the Jewish calendar. Coming fast on the heels of Tisha B'Av (the 9th of Av), Tu B'Av (the 15th of Av) is completely its opposite. It is a Jewish "love" day - young unmarried girls would dance in white dresses and sing in the vineyards of Jerusalem. Less than a week after the mournful day of Tisha B'Av, Tu B'Av offers a respite, a reminder that life goes on, that love goes on, that we must endure and continue to celebrate. It is a chance to be joyous and silly after weeks of preparation for mourning.

Yesterday, my brother made aliyah. This means that he "went up" to the Land of Israel, it means that he accepted his "Right of Return" available to all Jews all over the world, it means that he officially became an Israeli citizen.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Moving rocks
August 4, 2009 (5 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

The stone that the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. -Psalms 118:22

Every morning I take my "constitutional" (yes, even now that the dog has died) up the Shorashim hill and along the road where our newest neighborhood is under construction, and enjoy watching the progress of the new homes through the various phases of construction. And occasionally, I find myself wondering about the logic of the process. Shorashim is built on a shoulder of Mt. Gilon, mostly sitting on exposed limestone bedrock. When the founders settled here in the early 80s, they brought with them from California the well-known, somewhat iconoclastic architect from California, Chris Alexander, who helped them design a community that was integrated into the natural topography, requiring minimal bulldozing of the landscape (but, it would later turn out, requiring a long walk from the car to the house). The original houses are scattered around in clusters, each at a different elevation according to the lay of the land. Later development of the hill has been more traditional, less concerned with preservation. In order to build a row of houses on rectangular lots along a street, large amounts of rock has to be drilled out to create a flat platform at the right elevation. Then pilings have to be drilled deep into the bedrock, as this is an earthquake zone.

Filed Under: Israel

Israel as a Model for Health Care
July 30, 2009 (10 Comments)

by Jill Zimmerman
Eisendrath Legislative Assistant at the Religious Action Center
(Originally published on the RACBlog)

As Congress is working to reconfigure our country's health care system, many are pointing to health systems overseas as examples. Israel has one of the most advanced health care systems in the world, and rivals the United States on everything from quality to cost to coverage.

I recently listened to a podcast by the Israel Project in which Dr. Rafi Cayam (Leumit Director of Medicine for the Jerusalem District) and Professor Shlomo Mor Yosef (Director-General, Hadassah Medical Organization) explained how Israel's health care system works.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

Galilee Diary: Bottled Up
July 28, 2009 (4 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land with streams and springs and fountains issuing from plain and hill. -Deuteronomy 8:7

One of the experiences of our trip to Ethiopia that left the strongest impression on us was that of not being able to take for granted basic necessities that we have never really had to think about. Electricity, for example, is provided every other day, more or less. On off days, some businesses use portable generators; people use candles and LED flashlights; the streets are really dark at night; and there are no blenderized fruit juices or French fries in the coffee shops. And generally, when there is no electricity there is also no running water. We learned not to postpone a shower till tomorrow morning, but to shower when there was water. And it is common knowledge that even when there is water in the pipes, the state of pollution of the main water sources around the country is such that the piped water is not safe to drink. So we found ourselves, for the first time in our lives, living on bottled water (from unpolluted mountain springs, in Ethiopia). This was a little hard to get used to, after so many years of making a point of avoiding bottled water here in Israel. In Israel, the water flows from the tap without interruption every day, everywhere in the country (except in those unrecognized Bedouin villages that are not connected to the grid; but that's a story for another column...). And the quality is at least as good as that of bottled spring water. Indeed, after a couple of recent bacterial contamination incidents at bottling plants, it appears that tap water may be safer. Therefore, there is something beyond absurd about the huge industry of capturing spring water (instead of letting it flow down its natural course, through the mountain valleys of the Golan or the oases of the Judean Desert), putting it in plastic bottles, and trucking it around the country, leaving dirty carbon footprints - and empty plastic bottles - all over the landscape. Aside from the issue of wasted energy and materials, this industry exists under a cloud of questions regarding private profits made at the expense of the public, as the natural streams in national parks are reduced to a trickle.

Filed Under: Israel

D'var Acher: Are You Paying Attention, Israel?
July 27, 2009

by Faith Joy Dantowitz
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Reform Voices of Torah)

Sh'ma is often translated as "hear.' There is a difference between "hearing" and "paying attention", and I think we the people Israel are called upon by God to pay attention, to notice God in our lives, and to cultivate awareness.

The Sh'ma reminds us to arouse our thoughts of God in our lives. We can cultivate our awareness simply by reciting this prayer with kavanah, "focused attention" or "meaning". In some synagogues this means being seated and chanting the prayer slowly. In other worship experiences, it may mean chanting the line slowly, word by word, to allow more time to focus our attention. Another option may be repeating the line as a call and response in order to hear the words so that we may truly pay attention. The Sh'ma as a prayer is also a gift in that it is a daily reminder to notice God in our lives.

Filed Under: Israel | Torah

Galilee Diary: Teach them diligently...
July 21, 2009 (5 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

For a while now the complaints regarding the Jewish schools in Israel are unceasing - that the children of Israel, the students in these schools, lack "the taste of Torah," a residue of Judaism - they feel no joy in their Jewish identity... -Historian Joseph Klausner, Israel, 1921

As part of the work of our center staff as facilitators and consultants for ORT high schools "Israel Roots" program, we recently conducted in-service sessions for teachers slated to participate in the program next year. These were very interesting and encouraging experiences. In Hebrew, there is a definite difference in connotation between chinuch (education) and hora'ah (instruction). Since the beginning of the 20th century, what Americans call the "homeroom" teacher is called here the mechanech, or "educator." Regardless of ability grouping, majors, etc., every student meets once a week with his/her homeroom class and educator - generally the same group and same teacher for at least two and often three years. The position has a definite "guidance" element to it, and the period is used, beyond the usual bureaucratic functions, for informal activities relating to various social and moral issues that are of concern to the school or the community. This is a universal practice in Israel, and is considered a pillar of the system. The homeroom teacher has a kind of parental responsibility for his/her charges, and many teachers take it very seriously.

Filed Under: Israel | Youth and Family Life

The Young Shall Dream Dreams...
July 20, 2009

by Larry Kaufman

I was in college during the heyday of David Reisman, whose seminal The Lonely Crowd taught my generation to classify ourselves as other-directed or inner-directed. I can still hear my room-mates scolding me, "The trouble with you is you're not other-directed and you're not inner-directed - you're tradition-directed."

One of the lasting values of a University of Chicago education is that you learn to speak authoritatively about books you haven't read, which properly describes my relationship with The Lonely Crowd. And thus empowered, I'll define other-directed as responsive to peer pressure, inner-directed as a higher form of life, with overtones of rebelliousness, and tradition-directed (so far as I know, my room-mates' coinage, not Reisman's) as self-explanatory.

Filed Under: Israel | Youth and Family Life

Galilee Diary: Summer Vacation
July 14, 2009 (4 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally posted in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

When the queen of Sheba observed all of Solomon's wisdom, and the palace he had built, the fare of his table, the seating of his courtiers, the service and attire of his attendants, and his wine service, and the burnt offerings that he offered at the House of the Lord, she was left breathless. -I Kings 10:4-5

According to the Kebra Nagast, the medieval "midrash" that has become the national epic of Ethiopia, when the queen of Sheba (Ethiopia) was visiting Solomon, he seduced her. Their offspring, Menelik, was educated at Solomon's court; but when he left to go to his own country, he took with him the Ark of the Covenant. Thus, according to this epic, the Ethiopians are the true heirs of Israel - ruled by David's grandson, possessing the original Tablets of the Law. Haile Selassie, who ruled Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974, was believed to be a member of this Davidic dynasty. And the Ark resides in a church in the northern town of Axum (but only one priest has access...)

Filed Under: Israel | Jewish History

D'var Torah: From Rebellion to Realization: Becoming a People at Last
July 13, 2009

by Elyse Frishman
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Reform Voices of Torah)

In the hills and valleys of the Berkshire Mountains in Massachusetts, there's a particular trail up to the peak of Lenox Mountain. Arriving, it's disappointing, even ugly, with a damaged fire tower partially surrounded by rusty barbed wire fencing, and the ground littered with broken glass. The view itself is obscured by wild growth. The hiker must continue a half mile further to the north to experience the magnificence of Mount Greylock and Pontoosuc Lake, the Hoosac Range blending into Vermont's Green Mountains. Who would know to travel further without a guide book or advice from previous hikers?

In Parashat Sh'lach L'cha, the Israelites absorbed the dismal news from the scouts; amassed at Kadesh-barnea, overlooking the Promised Land, that report obscured their vision. A communal mutiny occurred: "'Why is the Eternal taking us to that land to fall by the sword?' 'Our wives and children will be carried off! It would be better for us to go back to Egypt!' And they said to one another, 'Let us appoint a captain and turn back,' " (Numbers 14:3-4). Joshua and Caleb exhorted them to trust God, to no avail. The ten other scouts were stricken with fatal plague and God punished the entire people with forty years of wandering. Some Israelites insisted on entering the Promised Land despite being warned that without God's support, they were doomed; indeed, they were massacred. It's really quite amazing that the Israelites didn't quit then and there (Numbers 14:40-45).

Filed Under: Israel | Torah

D'var Acher: The Land of Israel: Possession, Residence, or Inheritance
July 13, 2009

by Jonathan A. Biatch
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Reform Voices of Torah)

The words of Mas'ei probably resound in the minds of those who have chosen to strive to retain land seized by Israel during the Six-Day War:

"When you have passed over the Jordan into the land of Canaan, you will drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, destroy all their figured pavements . . . and you will be caused to [take possession of, inherit] the land, and live in it, for I have given you the land [to possess, to inherit]." (Numbers 33:51-53)

Part of the response to these words lies in the way we translate v'horashtem ,(take possession of, inherit) and lareshet (to possess, to inherit), from the Hebrew root yod-reish-shin, in these verses, which is why I have provided a few alternative translations above.

Filed Under: Israel | Torah

My 140,000 Steps Through Israel
July 10, 2009

by Sybil Schwartz
Anita Saltz Student, Jerusalem
Beth Emeth Synagogue, Wilmington, Delaware

I yearned for a Judaica journey of sustenance - one filled with opportunities for intellectual growth, spiritual awareness, and engagement in and with the land and people of Israel. One that I could afford. Two years earlier I had connected with one of the ongoing seminars at the The Anita Saltz International Center's progressive study center in Jerusalem that was created in conjunction with the Union of Reform Judaism's Department (URJ) of Adult Education. Upon returning home my appetite had been whet by the Rabbinical and academic scholars who skillfully integrated and wove together prayer, text and field study to nourish my Jewish soul.

Again this year I found myself craving Judaica immersion in the spiritual and historic land of our people. A "traditional tour" was not going to satisfy my appetite. In mid-May 2009 a diverse collection of fellow sojourners (who for the most part did not know each other) along with our teachers from Saltz and URJ began our journey of steps through Israel: engagement with text, prayer, tikkun olam, and the political historical and religious landscapes of Israel.

Each step of the journey was a unique learning experience.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Peace talk VII: A modest proposal
July 7, 2009 (17 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

And they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not take up sward against nation; they shall never again know war; but every man shall sit under his grapevine or fig tree with no one to disturb him. -Micah 4:3-4

I have tried over the years to avoid pontificating on large-scale national issues, but to keep this diary focused on the Galilee and my personal experiences there. However, sometimes it is hard to remain silent on the macro questions, and my experiences with Jewish-Arab relations here in the Galilee led me to the observations about "talking peace" in the last six entries. Which led me to the questionable step of wondering, "so, what is my vision, after all?" And even though I claim no authority in political science, international relations, etc., it seems a cop-out to keep speaking in generalizations and leaving the dirty work to others. So here is my peace proposal:

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Peace talk VI: Listening
June 30, 2009 (6 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

They combined against Moses and Aaron and said to them, "You have gone too far! For all the community are holy, all of them, and the Lord is in their midst. Why then do you raise yourselves above the Lord's congregation?" When Moses heard this, he fell on his face.
-Numbers 16:3-4

Last week, the local chapter of Sikkui, a moderate, non-militant non-profit organization that engages in programs of research and education to further equal rights in Israel (research reports, public lectures, seminars, etc.) held an evening panel discussion on the topic of "fear, racism, and inequality;" the focus was on discussing the reasons behind the efforts for and against residential segregation in the Galilee. The invited speakers represented a pretty wide range of views (similar to a program we offered a few months ago, about which I wrote here). And while the audience, characteristically, consisted mainly of people with more "leftist" sympathies, it was actually pretty heterogeneous, as the speakers were a draw (The moderator was Israel Prize Laureate Prof. Gabi Solomon). However, one part of the audience was a little surprising: a busload from the nearby city of Karmiel (pop. 50,000), led by a mayoral candidate from the last election, whose platform had been "keep the Arabs out of Karmiel." They seem to have come not to listen and discuss, but to heckle and disrupt and wave Israeli flags, until, largely ignored, they got bored and left.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Peace talk V - Living with the other
June 23, 2009 (12 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

When she saw that [Joseph] had left [his garment] in her hand and had fled outside, she called out to her servants and said to them, "Look, he had to bring us a Hebrew to dally with us! This one came to lie with me; but I screamed loud. And when he heard me screaming at the top of my voice, he left his garment with me and got away and fled outside."
-Genesis 39:13-15

In Jew Suess, the infamous Nazi propaganda feature film, a central plot element is the cruel sexual exploitation of the virgin Aryan Dorothea by the conniving Jew Suess.

When I was a teenager, the real estate developer and social activist Morris Milgram tried to build an explicitly integrated development in our area. My parents were supportive. Their friends' comment was "that's because you don't have daughters."

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Peace talk III - Living with history
June 9, 2009 (14 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Ten Minutes of Torah and Galilee Diary)

Who is the mightiest of the mighty? ... Some say: he who is able to turn his enemy into a friend.

-Avot d'Rabbi Nathan version A chapter 23

One of the obstacles to the creation of a political future shared by Jews and Arabs in Israel, as discussed in the last entry, is perhaps the fact that we don't share an understanding of the past. And the fact that the story told by the Other casts doubt on the truth of the story we tell about ourselves consistently makes us so angry that we can't continue the conversation.

Filed Under: Israel

How Not To Protect the Jewish State
June 4, 2009 (21 Comments)

by Rabbi Eric Yoffie
(Originally published in The Jewish Daily Forward and Ten Minutes of Torah)

During his recent visit to the United States, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeated his demand that Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state should be a precondition for talks aimed at achieving a peace settlement. While such a request might seem reasonable -- after all, Israel is a Jewish state -- it is actually a serious mistake.

First of all, what does the term "Jewish state" mean? Does it refer, for example, to a state governed completely or in part by Halacha, by traditional Jewish law? Does it refer to a particular set of linguistic, cultural and educational policies that the state will adopt? In my experience, if you put a half-dozen Jewish Israelis in a room and ask them what it means for Israel to be a Jewish state, you will receive four or five different answers, along with at least one indignant insistence that the phrase has no meaning whatsoever. Debates among American Jews on the topic are no less heated.

Filed Under: By Rabbi Eric Yoffie | Israel

Tuesday the Rabbi Was Not A Friar:
When Sirens Sound Across Israel
June 3, 2009

by Rabbi Rich Kirschen

This morning was one of those mornings I dread living in Israel because I had given in to my wife's demand that it was my turn to take the car to the garage and get it fixed. This is always the moment of truth when I know the essence of my manhood will be tested. A virtual auto motive Akedah (the binding of Isaac) if you will.... where I am forced to go up a mountain in Jerusalem (actually Talpiot where all the garages are) and hand myself over as an offering- if not an actual sacrifice to my auto mechanic - Amnon. I am not mechanical and never will be...hey, I'm from Woodmere, Long Island. And any time men get together to talk about power tools or automotive matters ...I try to switch the conversation to an interesting and sensitive midrash. Now when I was living in the States it was bad enough, but here with my fellow Jews speaking in the holy tongue of Hebrew ...it brings up my issues about actually living up to the Zionist dream.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Peace talk II: Jewish and democratic
June 2, 2009 (3 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

...We, members of the people's council, representatives of the Jewish community of Eretz-Israel and of the Zionist movement..., hereby declare the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz-Israel, to be known as the state of Israel.

-Israel Declaration of Independence

As I suggested in my last entry, in thinking about what it will take for Jews and Arabs to live together in peace in Israel, there are (at least) four different dimensions to consider: the political, the historical, the cultural, and the personal.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Peace talk
May 26, 2009 (5 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

...Priest and prophet alike, they all act falsely, They offer healing offhand for the wounds of My people, Saying "Peace, peace," when there is no peace. -Jeremiah 6:13-14 (and 8:10-11)

Recently I was invited to speak at a conference on "Discovering and Accepting the Other," at Nes Ammim, a Christian community tucked among the avocado and banana orchards just south of Nahariya. Nes Ammim was founded in the 1960s by European Protestants who sought to support the State of Israel and the Jewish people, and to provide opportunities for Christians to live and study in Israel. Until a recent financial downturn, this peaceful little kibbutz raised flowers, produced furniture, and offered study programs for visiting Christians; today the population has declined, and the only continuing business is their kosher hotel, which serves Israelis and tourists. Their study center presents various public events in the course of the year, most notably a Kristallnacht commemoration that generally focuses on one of their main themes - the role of the bystander and the importance of taking responsibility.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Standing guard
May 19, 2009 (10 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

Asher did not dispossess the inhabitants of Acco or the inhabitants of Sidon, Ahlab, Achzib, Helbah, Aphik, and Rehob. So the Asherites dwelt in the midst of the Canaanites, the inhabitants of the land, for they did not dispossess them. -Judges 1:31-32

We have been running a series of two-day seminars for participants in pluralistic pre-army preparatory programs ("leadership academies") that have become popular in recent years (a year of intensive study and service between high school and the army). The seminar consists of a day exploring and studying Yodfat, where the Jews fought to the death in the first battle of the great revolt (67 CE), and a day in Zippori, where we signed a surrender agreement before the revolt started. The focus is on understanding the values implicit in these two responses. The two days involve hiking, meetings with archaeologists, text study in situ, simulations, an encounter with an actor representing a character from the period, etc. Seeking a cheap place for groups to camp near Zippori, we found our way to the hilltop outpost of Joel Zilberman, who was happy to give us a place in return for the kids' listening to his story and helping him with shifts of guard duty over night. And it is an interesting story, which I heard along with the kids in the first of our groups to visit, last week:

Filed Under: Israel

Give Israel's Arab Citizens Full Equality
May 19, 2009 (6 Comments)

by Rabbi Eric Yoffie
(Originally published in Reform Judaism magazine)
Menachem Begin must be turning over in his grave.

The late Prime Minister and long-time leader of Israel's right-wing parties was an enthusiastic champion of Israel's Arab citizens. He viewed equality for Arab Israelis as a matter of principle: now that a Jewish state had at long last been created, it had a special responsibility to confer the same rights enjoyed by Israel's Jewish citizens on her Arab minority. He also knew that ending discrimination against Arab Israelis was in the nation's self-interest. Absent fair treatment, her Arab citizens would be radicalized, threatening Israel's security.

Filed Under: By Rabbi Eric Yoffie | Israel

Galilee Diary: Green thoughts V: spring report
May 13, 2009 (2 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

For now the winter is past, the rains are over and gone. The blossoms have appeared in the land, the time of pruning has come; The song of the turtledove is heard in our land. The green figs form on the fig tree, the vines in blossom give off fragrance... -Song of Songs 2:12-13

It may be complicated, but it works: the Jewish solar-lunar calendar once again has put Pesach right where it belongs, and when we chanted Song of Songs on the Shabbat during Pesach, the text and the landscape were in sync. Here is a field report from the Western Galilee:

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Independence
May 5, 2009 (3 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

Our hope is not lost, the hope of two thousand years To be a free people in our land, the land of Zion and Jerusalem. -Hatikvah, Israeli national anthem

This year's observance of Yom Ha'atzma'ut was particularly interesting and thought-provoking for me; here are some hightlights:

At mid-day on Tuesday, Memorial Day, almost the entire population of Shorashim, a few hundred people, set forth in a bus and a caravan of cars toward the Bet Shean valley. Every year we do an educational excursion on the afternoon of Memorial Day, to a historical site connected with the creation of the state. This year, we explored the area settled by Orthodox kibbutzim in the late 30s and early 40s. A highlight of the afternoon was a meeting with Jonathan Bassi, whose parents were among the founders of one of these kibbutzim. Bassi, who was a baby in 1948, recently got interested in researching a pivotal battle from 1948 that helped set the borders in the area, in which several of his parents' close friends and comrades were killed. He discovered a fascinating history of silence, regret, and guilt - that generation didn't discuss their feelings, and when he probed, fifty years later, it all came out - the one who was passed over in making up that morning's patrol because he was needed on the farm, the one who still feels guilty that he didn't clean the machine gun - and it jammed in battle, the young widow who only knew her husband had been killed when he didn't come back with all the others (no one would tell her)... etc. It was interesting to contrast that almost pathological restraint with our present invasive media culture, which would not have let any intimate detail escape the public spotlight. We complain about that sensationalistic, prying scrutiny - but it does have its advantages.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Spring festival
April 28, 2009 (6 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

As she kept on praying before the Lord, Eli watched her mouth. Now Hannah was praying in her heart, only her lips moved, but her voice could not be heard. So Eli thought she was drunk. -Samuel 1:12-13

Schools are closed during Pesach, and many businesses and offices are closed for part of the week. This creates a great opportunity for family vacations - or, alternatively, a strong need for activities to entertain the children. Thus, traffic on the roads is a constant nightmare, 24 hours a day. There seems to be no major intersection that is not backed up in all directions. Part of the cause of all that traffic is a plethora of festivals - it seems that there are more every year. Sculpture, storytelling, music, juggling, beach, dance, wine, theater - you name it, there is some locality somewhere in the country holding a festival for it during Pesach. These are generally the result of a combination of local boosterism, somebody's artistic vision, and capitalism. In particular, localities in the periphery seek to capitalize on the presence of thousands of vacationers from the center of the country, luring them to buy food and drink and stuff by means of cultural events and family entertainments.

Filed Under: Community | Israel

Galilee Diary: Spring countdown
April 21, 2009 (8 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

And from the day on which you bring the omer offering - the day after the sabbath - you shall count off seven weeks. They must be complete: you must count until the day after the seventh week - fifty days; then you shall bring an offering of new grain to the Lord. -Leviticus 23:15-16

As principal of a Jewish school in the US, I always felt that once we hit Tu Beshvat, the year is over - there is no time or energy left to do anything except cope with the succession of holidays, get ready for the end of the year, and work on the plans, hiring, etc. for next year. Any kind of continuity, of concentration, of orderly instruction is pretty much shattered by one special day after another, with their associated preparations. And if that is true in the microcosm of the Jewish school in the Diaspora, imagine what goes on in the Jewish state!

Filed Under: Holidays | Israel

Galilee Diary: By the Sea
April 14, 2009 (2 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

The ocean sounds, O Lord, the ocean sounds its thunder, the ocean sounds its pounding. Above the thunder of the mighty waters, more majestic than the breakers of the sea is the Lord, majestic, on high.
-Psalm 93:3-4

Many Israelis spend Pesach in Sinai (despite both the irony of returning to Egypt for Pesach, and the government warnings of terror attacks). That's always seemed a bit extreme to us, but this year we did repeat an adventure of several years ago, transporting our seder to a beachfront kibbutz guest house south of Haifa. Not Sinai and not the Red Sea, but plenty of sand and sea nevertheless. With two other families we prepared and brought with us all the symbols and the foods, and organized the seder in one of our rooms (after a bit of furniture-moving). The circumstances forced us to keep food and utensils simple, releasing us all from some of the "bondage" of Pesach preparation. Since no one had to leave for home afterwards, we could drink wine and sing as late as we wanted. And we could take long walks along the beach, by sunlight and by moonlight, a setting conducive to thoughts about freedom.

Filed Under: Holidays | Israel

T'fillin - The perspective of a Conservative convert, Reform Jew
April 13, 2009 (10 Comments)

by Jacob V. Aftel
Ohef Sholom Temple of Norfok, VA

Well, there it is - mentioned four times in the Torah; Exodus 13:1-10, Exodus 13:11-16, Deuteronomy 6:4-9 and Deuteronomy 11:13-21 where we are commanded that "you shall bind them for a sign upon your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes." Them and they of course refer to the words of G_d. The specific words are the story of the exodus and the mitzvot. Of the 613 mitzvot, the act of laying t'fillin is considered by its adherents to be a serious one to ignore.

Beyond the commandment to do so, the Torah does not describe the t'fillin nor does the Torah instruct how the t'fillin should be put on and worn. Oral tradition is mostly responsible for the handmade, relatively expensive adornment used as an adjunct to daily prayer. The interpretation of the directive in the Torah is how we ended up with t'fillin.

Filed Under: Israel | Jewish Living

Galilee Diary - Green thoughts IV: Ponzi and Heschel
April 7, 2009 (5 Comments)

by Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

The solution of mankind's most vexing problem will not be found in renouncing technical civilization, but in attaining some degree of independence of it. In regard to external gifts, to outward possessions, there is only one proper attitude - to have them and to be able to do without them. On the Sabbath we live, as it were, independent of technical civilization: we abstain primarily from any activity that aims at remaking or reshaping the things of space. Man's royal privilege to conquer nature is suspended on the seventh day.
- Abraham Joshua Heschel, The Sabbath (1951)

American immigrants here always used to joke about how the new developments and cultural fads of Europe and North America generally took a decade or two to find their way into our mainstream. Often we had the sense of living in a state of delayed development. We were still carrying reusable baskets and even refillable bottles to the market when America had long changed to disposables; we were still mostly riding the buses when everyone in America had a car. Now, however, the time lag has shrunk considerably, probably to zero. Indeed, I think we were even ahead of America in the use of ATMs and later, of cell phones. So now, the world-wide fad in environmentalism has arrived here pretty much simultaneously with its flowering elsewhere. We too now recycle plastic bottles (though only the 1.5 liter ones); we too now use cloth bags instead of plastic at the supermarket; the elites are even buying hybrid cars and installing solar panels.

Filed Under: Israel | Shabbat | Social Action

Galilee Diary: Leaving the desert behind
March 31, 2009 (3 Comments)

By Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

Encamped at Gilgal, in the steppes of Jericho, the Israelites offered the Passover sacrifice on the fourteenth day of the month, toward evening. On the day after the Passover offering, on that very day, they ate of the produce of the country, unleavened bread and parched grain. On the same day, when they ate of the produce of the land, the manna ceased. The Israelites got no more manna; that year they ate of the yield of the land of Canaan. -Joshua 5:10-12

We learn in chapter 5 of Joshua that while the generation of the Exodus had been circumcised in Egypt, their children and grandchildren born in the desert had not been. And since only the circumcised may eat of the Passover sacrifice, it seems that this ritual too was not maintained during the forty years in the desert. Anyway, we couldn't have eaten matzah in the desert as we had no grain - only manna. Thus, the first Passover in the land of Israel was rather a significant event, a new experience for the people.

Filed Under: Holidays | Israel

Galilee Diary: Green thoughts III: humility
March 24, 2009

By Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

We will dress you in a dress of cement and mortar;
We will spread for you carpets of gardens;
On the soil of your redeemed fields
The grain will sing out like bells.

Through the desert we will carve a road;
The swamps - we'll dry them all up.
What more we can give you, we will,
What haven't we given that we still can give?
-Nathan Alterman, from "Morning Song" 1934

Originally written for a Keren Hayesod (European UJA) fundraising film, this song by perhaps the most popular and prolific Israeli poet and songwriter of the pre-state and early state period was sung by generations of school children until it fell out of favor in recent years. The song's disappearance from popular culture is a striking indicator of the change in consciousness that has occurred and is occurring regarding our relationship to the land of Israel. For decades we lived on the myth that Israel had once, long ago, been a fruitful, green land - in the years when we were sovereign here and cultivated and cared for the soil. But then, when we left, the land fell into disrepair and was abused - armies cut down the trees, goats ate the new growth, silt plugged up the streams - leaving the dismal and pathetic combination of swamp and desert that the Zionist pioneers found when they returned.

Filed Under: Israel | Social Action

Avigdor Lieberman and My Jaffa
March 24, 2009

By Rachel Reynolds
(First posted on the RACblog)
Rachel Reynolds is a graduate of Sweet Briar college and an intern at the RAC. All views expressed are her own.

Though rumors are still swirling that Bibi Netanyahu has yet to give up on a national unity government with either Labor or Kadima, this last week appears to herald the formation of a government that unites Likud with Yisrael Beitanu. This coalition will elevate Avigdor Lieberman to a position of power frightening to those of us who support the rights of Israeli Arabs.

When I lived in Tel Aviv, I resided in two worlds. The first was that of Tel Aviv. The locus of this world was my Jewish, Kiryat Shalom universe: the neighborhood pizza stand, the kids who attended the secular elementary school where I taught, and the dirty sidewalks on the main road, Kibbutz Galyot, that we had to cross to get to the bus station or our yeshiva.

Filed Under: Israel

Galilee Diary: Green thoughts II: My space
March 17, 2009 (8 Comments)

By Marc Rosenstein
(Originally published in Galilee Diary and Ten Minutes of Torah)

Once there was a man who was clearing stones from his field and throwing them into the public domain. A pious one kept nagging him: "Why are you clearing stones from what is not yours and throwing them into your own space?" The man ignored him. Later, he sold that field, and was walking past it and tripped on the stones. He said, "Now I understand what that guy meant with his nonsense." -Mishnah Ta'anit 1:5

Visitors often wonder why it often seems that in Arab villages, the insides of the homes are spotless and well maintained while the streets are littered with garbage. The answer I have received is a cultural one, regarding the perception of "my space" vs. no-one's space: what is inside my courtyard is my responsibility. What is outside is no man's land. When the population is small and the refuse is minimal and quickly biodegradable (which was the case around here until the 20th century), that approach was sustainable. It isn't any more - but cultures change slowly.

Filed Under: Israel