by BZ [➚] · Monday, July 14th, 2008
This post is dedicated in memory of my grandfather, Rabbi Dr. A. Stanley Dreyfus z”l, who died last week. As I gradually return to blogging, I’m also going to write more serious posts in his memory, but I’m not ready to do that yet. My grandfather’s funeral included musical contributions from a choir composed of cantors who had served at Union Temple while he was there and/or had been his students at HUC-JIR, and it was a deeply moving tribute. There is no doubt in my mind that he would disagree vocally and vehemently with most of this post (yet would still be proud of his grandson) if he could read it. I only wish he were still alive so that we could be having this argument in person. So if you write strongly worded comments arguing with this post, even though you won’t be able to do it as eloquently and passionately as my grandfather could, you too will be honoring his memory.
Last fortnight, Reb Yudel posted an article about tensions facing cantors today, and I said I’d write a longer response later. So here it is.
The problem with the article, as I see it, is that even though it appears to present two views/values in tension, it presents them within a single frame, and accepts this frame (promoted by the cantorial profession) uncritically. The frame goes something like this: the ideal form of Jewish congregational prayer includes cantorial music, in a cantorial style, led by cantors. If all of us were wise and all of us were learned in Torah, then all of us would prefer this style of prayer. But because the present generation is so removed from Judaism and Jewish tradition, they prefer different styles (God have pity on their souls – they don’t know any better). And therefore, out of self-preservation, it’s sometimes necessary to adapt. But this adaptation is a necessary evil, it’s a concession to harsh reality, it’s bedi’avad, it’s kiruv for the tinokot shenishbu, it’s eit la’asot lashem, it’s “engag[ing] more unaffiliated Jews”, it’s marketing to get “more people in the door”. So the tension described in the article is between how much you stand up for the ideals and how much you adapt to our less-than-ideal world.
This frame is reinforced by the quote from the sole (anonymous) non-cantor quoted in the article, who says (regarding Friday Nite Live) “I just love that service. I don’t know any Hebrew, I don’t know the prayers, but I love the music.”
But this frame simply isn’t accurate. There are Jewishly educated and Jewishly uneducated people who prefer a cantorial style in their prayer, and there are Jewishly educated and Jewishly uneducated people who prefer a non-cantorial style in their prayer. And I’m not just saying that the way I would say that there are educated and uneducated Reform Jews and educated and uneducated Orthodox Jews (which is 100% true, but everyone knows which way the correlation goes). In the case at hand, the preferences cut perpendicular to denominational lines, and there isn’t even a conventional-wisdom stereotype (let alone more solid data) about which preference is correlated with more education. I don’t know whether there’s a correlation one way or the other, but the article presents no evidence that there is, beyond cantors’ assertions.
More »
by Justin [➚] · Monday, July 14th, 2008
The New York Times has issued a searing (ha! pun not-so-much intended) editorial on the Postville affair, titled, “The Shame of Postville, Iowa”
In my opinion, skip the editorial and go straight to the source, an eye-witness essay of the handling of the workers. It is pretty disgusting and it’s too early in the morning to share any reactions, it’s really awful enough to stand on its own, no reflection necessary. read for yourself at your own risk of queasiness and rage.
inside the essay you’ll find joyful reports, such as:
Driven single-file in groups of 10, shackled at the wrists, waist and ankles, chains dragging as they shuffled through, the slaughterhouse workers were brought in for arraignment, sat and listened through headsets to the interpreted initial appearance, before marching out again to be bused to different county jails, only to make room for the next row of 10. They appeared to be uniformly no more than 5 ft. tall, mostly illiterate Guatemalan peasants with Mayan last names, some being relatives (various Tajtaj, Xicay, Sajché, Sologüí…), some in tears; others with faces of worry, fear, and embarrassment. They all spoke Spanish, a few rather laboriously. It dawned on me that, aside from their Guatemalan or Mexican nationality, which was imposed on their people after Independence, they too were Native Americans, in shackles
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Monday, July 14th, 2008
On a prior post this week, commenter balabusta linked us to a video from the NYT that I’m sorry to say I had missed. The video is disheartening in that it reveals quite a bit that generally has been missing from the whole Agri commentary on the Jewish side of the question. It’s not only our outrage at the workers being treated unfairly by Agri at this point (not to mention being abused, as is clear from the variety of investigations) but the very fact that the racial component is being ignored, but even more clearly that the illegal immigrants are actually being railroaded into pleading guilty for crimes which are almost certainly Agri’s.
While everyone following this story along with us here at Jewschool from the beginning, now years ago, can see that we nearly qualify at apoplectic at the combination of injustice and chillul hashem that’s being done, listening to the words of this translator, who in all his years has not been moved to speak out -until now- makes me sad and angry all over again.
It’s too early for the boycott to be called off. The workers are being charged with social security fraud and aggravated identity theft, the court is using the greater charge to browbeat the workers into pleading guilty for the lesser charge. If they refuse to plead guilty, they are told, instead of five months in prison and then deportation (forever, with no chance to return legally) they will have 6-8months in prison, with the possibility of two years more if they lose. Most of them are the sole economic support for their families and thus are choosing to plead guilty, despite the fact that many of them – according to the translator- clearly have no idea what a social security number is or what it’s used for (and are apparently ashamed of looking ignorant about it, most cannot read or write, and when asked what the number is say they don’t know, the factory people put it there.
In other words, of the crimes of social security fraud and aggravatedidentity theft, it is Agri who should be on trial, not the workers. If Agri wants their boycott lifted, some signs of tshuvah are in order. Confession (to God and to the victim(s), Apology, Restitution and Failure to Repeat the offense when given another chance. In order for us to even think about taking them seriously, they need to admit publicly that it is they, Agri, who are behind these offenses and not allow people who are innocent of these crimes to be tried and deported for them. The workers may be guilty of illegally entering the country, but they are almost certainly not guilty of what they are being accused. There are no signs of tshuvah yet from Rubashkin. Thus we should not be revoking the boycott.
I can’t even begin to say how disgusted I remain with this whole episode, how much harm the American Jewish community’s consumption of excess amounts of meat has done to other people, and that Agri will allow their workers to take the fall for them… well, it’s despicable.
by Justin [➚] · Sunday, July 13th, 2008
This man has every reason to look this worried. In the latest news in the corruption scandal clouding Ehud Olmert’s questionable stint as PM, according to the Israeli Police, Olmert funded personal and family vacations on the dime of non-profits and charities.
According to one Ha’aretz report–
Responding to accusations he stole money from charities such as Yad Vashem and the AKIM association for the mentally disabled, Olmert said “these are institutions that I worked to advance and I invested immense energy into raising funds and I believe I made a significant contribution to them. Therefore, precisely against this backdrop, the exploitation in this way was particularly hurtful.”
more after the jump More »
by Kol Ra'ash Gadol [➚] · Saturday, July 12th, 2008
Failed Messiah and Gawker report on the latest (what? Not over yet?) scandal in the kashrut world. After the last round of scandals, Agriprocessors hired a PR firm – because as we all know, Public Relations is far preferable to tshuvah when a corporation sins- to restore its image. The firm, 5WPR, who has also represented the charming so-called “pro-Israel” pastor, John Hagee, (who hates homosexuals and Muslims and has had to apologize for sliming Catholics, oh, yeah and also blamed Jews for the death of Jesus, called liberal Jews “poisoned” and “spiritually blind,” and been relatively unconcerned that he hopes for a preemptive nuclear attack on Iran even though he believes it will lead to the deaths of most Jews in Israel) apparently has engaged in some antics of its own.
It seems that 5WPR has left multiple comments on several blogs, including JTA and Failed Messiah’s, under a variety of aliases, and also posing as Rabbi Morris Allen of the Hekhsher Tzedek, as well as JVNA officer John Diamond and another frequent FailedMessiah commenter (all, as FM points out, federal crimes). The comments were designed to support Agri, bolster one another and discredit Hekhsher Tzedek, the Conservative Movement and Rabbi Allen. Failed Messiah posts screen shots of the comments – well worth looking at, if only for their utter ridiculousness.
More »
by Danya [➚] · Thursday, July 10th, 2008
As we noted a while ago, last summer the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies at the American Jewish University (nee UJ) published a curriculum/guide on Jewish theology called Walking With God, and had made it available for free download.
Well, now they have a new book out, called Walking With Justice, and it is truly fantastic. (I had some time to sit with it a few weeks ago, and was really impressed.) It features units on social justice in the Prophets and Rabbinic literature, and topical units on things like the environment, business practices, globalism, Israeli society, special-needs folk, and kashrut (which is, of course, extra relevant these days). It should also be noted that one unit was penned by Jewshool’s own Aryeh Cohen.
You can download both books (chapter by chapter, as .pdfs) here.
by backbeat [➚] · Wednesday, July 9th, 2008
Obama and McCain might not have been there to give bellicose speeches, but just a couple of weeks ago, over 140 Jewish activists from across the country took part in Brit Tzedek v’Shalom’s largest-ever DC conference, bringing the real pro-Israel, pro-peace message to the nation’s capital.
The conference included 115 Congressional visits, presentations by MK Yossi Beilin and Mideast analyst Daniel Levy, interactive activist trainings, and speeches by U.S. Representatives Henry Waxman (D-CA), Charles Boustany (R-LA), and Mike Capuano (D-MA).
Check out this six-minute highlight reel for a taste of what an American Jewish grassroots peace movement can look like.
by Danya [➚] · Wednesday, July 9th, 2008
This Biblical baseball game, compiled by late religious studies scholar Hyman S. Baras, was kind of cute, thought I’d share:
(Source.)
And Abner said to Joab, “Let the young men…arise and play before us” (II Samuel 2:14)
…[and] all the people rose up… (Exodus 33:8)
And Jehoshaphat the son of Ahilud was the recorder; and Sheva was scribe… (II Samuel 20:24-25)
And they said unto Jephthah, “Come and be our [Captain]” (Judges 11:6)
…and he measured two lines… (II Samuel 8:2)
And he set the bases… (I Kings 7:39)
And they stood every man in his place round about the camp (Judges 7:21)
…behold, Rebekah came forth with her pitcher… (Genesis 24:45)
Ehud…the Benjamite, a man left-handed … (Judges 3:15)
…the children of Israel …said “Who shall go up for us first…?” (Judges 20:18)
…seek out a man who is a skillful player… (I Samuel 16:16)
…Judah [shall go up] first… (Judges 20:18)
[And] Judah took… (Judges 1:18)
Three times… (Exodus 23:14)
…and…it was good. (Genesis 1:10)
…and Abram went down… (Genesis 12:10)
…out at the base… (Leviticus 4:18)
And Moses…smote… (Exodus 7:20)
…and… [it] became foul… (Exodus 7:21) More »
by Ari Hart [➚] · Tuesday, July 8th, 2008
From the Uri L’Tzedek website:
On May 23rd of this year, Uri L’Tzedek wrote an open letter to Aaron Rubashkin, expressing how deeply upset we were by evidence of worker mistreatment in his company, Agriprocessors, and calling on the community of kosher consumers to join us in demanding change. Since the outset of our campaign, Uri L’Tzedek has sought protection and fair treatment for workers at Agriprocessors’ Postville plant. Our effort has been guided by the spirit of Rabbi Yosef Breuer of blessed memory and his 1949 essay “Glatt Kosher – Glatt Yosher,? where he describes strict standards of kashrut and strict standards of ethics. As Rabbi Breuer wrote: “God’s Torah not only demands the observance of kashrut and the sanctification of our physical enjoyment; it also insists on the sanctification of our social relationships.”
The Jewish community in general and the observant community in particular are bound to the people who provide our food through the sacred social relationships of worker, employer, and consumer. Through this campaign, we have given voice to thousands of observant Jews who believe that the standards of kashrut of our food be matched by the kashrut of our ethics, and their voice has been heard loudly and clearly.
After the events of the May 11 federal raid at the Agriprocessors plant, and the release of government reports, affidavits, and media surrounding working conditions at the plant, thousands of observant Jews felt those sacred social relationships had been damaged. Uri L’Tzedek responded to those events with a letter that asked Agriprocessors to pay its workers a minimum wage and recommit to abiding by all U.S. law relating to worker safety and rights. In order to ensure that the company meets these modest requests, we asked that the company establish a department and staff to deal exclusively with these concerns.
In recent weeks, Agriprocessors retained James Martin, former Senior Federal U.S. Attorney to serve as Chief Compliance Officer for the company. Mr. Martin has instituted a number of important reforms including: the creation of an anonymous tip line for employees to report safety and rights violations without fear of retribution; establishment of a safety department within the company that is staffed by an officer and assistant (with plans for two additional employees); and development of new safety training initiatives. Mr. Martin has also assured us that his term is expected to last at least one year. His role, according to communications between Uri L’Tzedek and Agriprocessors, is to set in place the procedures and personnel to ensure that the compliance effort is ?continual, robust, and permanent.? Mr. Martin, a reputable and skilled attorney with years of experience prosecuting corporate crime, has now accepted on himself and his firm, the Prevene Group, the professional responsibility to ensure the company treats its workers with the respect, dignity, and rights that are demanded by U.S. law.
We believe that through hiring Mr. Martin, Agriprocessors is beginning to take significant steps towards directly addressing the concerns of the Jewish leaders and consumers who signed our May 23rd letter. In light of these early signs of reform, Uri L’Tzedek is no longer calling for the community to abstain from purchasing Agriprocessors’ products. Time will show what kind of results these reforms will yield for the workers at Agriprocessors, but the social justice philosophy of Uri L’Tzedek is one deeply committed to challenging what is broken in our world but partnering to support efforts towards fixing it.
We are inspired by all the people throughout North America and the world who have raised their voice on this critical issue. Their participation in this effort has been the critical foundation of our work, and it has generated crucial moral awareness and has yielded impressive results. We are similarly thankful to the Agriprocessors corporation and the Rubashkin family, who by and large have engaged in a respectful dialogue.
If Agriprocessors does not implement Mr. Martin’s recommendations or demonstrates that it is not committed to full compliance with all laws regarding worker safety, pay, and rights, then we will once again raise our concerns with Agriprocessors and with the community of kosher consumers.
There are still matters of great concern in Postville: shattered families left without wage earners, mothers unable to find jobs to pay for basic necessities, children thousands of miles from home living in fear of another raid, a broken Postville economy, and deeply flawed federal immigration policy. Addressing these larger issues is integral to our work as activists. Uri L’Tzedek leadership has helped raise significant funds for the families deeply hurt by the raids and has met with U.S. House and Senate staff, and has had a conversation with Senator Joseph Lieberman, Head of the Department of Homeland Security to express our concerns about the human suffering that results from these kinds of enforcement tactics.
These events strengthen our conviction that Klal Yisrael and the Orthodox community are committed to leading the way in creating a just society and sanctifying the Name of God. We believe that this campaign signals a new level of communal expectation of all our businesses to conduct themselves with the highest standards of yashrut and tzedek, ethics and justice.
by Justin [➚] · Tuesday, July 8th, 2008
Some new developments in the prisoner swap with Hezbollah:
Yesterday, Ha’aretz reported that Israel is exhuming the bodies of Hezbollah guerillas fulfilling part of their end of the prisoner swap for the captured soldiers Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser, captured June 2006. In that article, the remains of 200 Lebanese will be transferred at the border crossing at Rosh HaNikra.
In today’s news Israel’s High Court rejected an appeal against releasing Samir Kuntar, the Lebanese convicted murderer imprisoned in Israel since 1979. In that article, Hassan Nasrallah, leader of Hezbollah, is quoted as saying that reports that Regev and Goldwasser are dead are simply “speculation.”
Let us all hope and pray that he is not being a dickwad being truthful.
by Kung Fu Jew [➚] · Tuesday, July 8th, 2008
* Sarah Benor and Steven Cohen are doing a survey on language and identity in which they’re cross-referencing your Jewish parentage/upbringing with how you talk Jewy. Click the link to download your lingo. (Speaking of which, I’m collecting ideas for an independent take on Jewish communal buzzwords and slang – continuity, affiliated, OJC — so send ‘em my way.)
* Cohen’s last study about singles raised some hackles — but then again, all the comments on Haaretz are crazies. (Not like our well-behaved commentors on Jewschool…)
* Most Americans (and 14 of 18 countries) oppose taking one side in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including Israel’s.
* 83% of Palestinians support the ceasefire, according to the June 18th poll Palestinian Center for Public Opinion.
* An Ir-Amim poll found that 78% of Israeli Jews already see Jerusalem as divided — and 65% of the Israeli public accepts an agreement that puts the Palestinian neighborhoods of Jerusalem under Palestinian control.
* Olmert’s sweeping speech about moving Israel-Diaspora relations away from an institutional focus on aliya to supporting Jewish education, culture and heritage outside Israel is supported largely by the Israeli public — especially younger Israelis, by 46% before public debate. Only 20% supported taking Diaspora opinion into account in making national decisions.
by Josh Frankel [➚] · Tuesday, July 8th, 2008
That’s right folks, we can all eat meat again. So say the good people at Uri L’Tzedek.
A few weeks ago, Rubashkin’s retained former federal prosecutor James Martin from the Prevene group to insure the company’s compliance with relevant secular and Jewish laws. No one was really sure how serious this would be, or what Mr. Martin could actually do. However, following a meeting with Mr. Martin, the Uri leaders were satisfied that he was prepared to do exactly what they had wanted. The original open letter had called for the company to comply with all relevant laws (both Jewish and secular) and to bring in a third party for verification. Well, well, it looks like Mr. Rubashkin listened, and did exactly as he was asked.
So today is a happy day. A good day for Jewish law, for workers’ rights, for consumer activism, and for Uri L’Tzedek.
So it would seem at least. But, I don’t know, I feel a little empty. Something doesn’t sit right for me. Uri L’Tzedek had the right demands, and they were fulfilled, but I guess I wanted a little repentance, a little chest thumping. Something akin to how Tylenol dealt with the cyanide crisis of the ’80s. A radical change, a broad corporate effort to make the world better. That hasn’t happened. Well, maybe that’s asking too much. You can’t ask people to be good people, only to do the right thing. And, well, it seems they have.
However, Uri L’Tzedek, and the rest of us should remain vigilant. Mr. Martin was only retained for one year, and we need to make sure that the work he does is effective. But, until then – enjoy your hot dogs!
by Danya [➚] · Tuesday, July 8th, 2008
One of the perks of lurking around the Jewish publishing world is that sometimes you get to read stuff before it’s out. One of the best things that I’ve read recently is Ariel Sabar’s forthcoming My Father’s Paradise: A Son’s Search for His Jewish Past in Kurdish Iraq. Sabar’s father, Yona, grew up speaking Aramaic in a small town in the mountains of Northern Iraq, and left for Israel as part of the mass exodus of Iraqi Jews in the early 1950′s. Yona Sabar eventually became a prominent linguist of Neo-Aramaic; he’s a professor at UCLA now.
The book is primarily Yona’s story, and offers a valuable look at life as it was in Sabar senior’s small town of Zakho for his and his parents’ generation, and of how things were for Mizrahi Jews just after the founding of the State of Israel (hint: not easy.) More than biography, though, the author weaves together history, folklore, third-party recollections and the occasional juicy linguistic nugget to paint a compelling portrait of small-town Iraqi Jews (and their transformation from small-town Iraqi living) over the last 100 years. There’s a lot of important stuff here, and it makes for yummy and worthwhile reading.
My Father’s Paradise isn’t out yet, but you can pre-order it.
by Kung Fu Jew [➚] · Monday, July 7th, 2008
From The Independent, also in JTA and Reuters, Britain’s first Muslim minister Shahid Malik has said that many Muslims feel like “the Jews of Europe”:
“I think most people would agree that if you ask Muslims today what do they feel like, they feel like the Jews of Europe,” he said. “I don’t mean to equate that with the Holocaust but in the way that it was legitimate almost – and still is in some parts – to target Jews, many Muslims would say that we feel the exact same way.
“Somehow there’s a message out there that it’s OK to target people as long as it’s Muslims. And you don’t have to worry about the facts, and people will turn a blind eye.”
MP Malik speaks to a big truth – a plus ca change truth. Let’s play with this for a sec:
No, Muslims are not having their rights to property or occupation taken away (even if their rights to wear hijabs are under constant threat), even if people do eye them suspiciously. The animosity towards the Islamic bloc countries is rooted also in a fear of East vs. West geopolitical conflict — something the Jews never could claim to have. Further, terrorist acts on a grand scale are also missing from the early 1900s history of Jews and Europe. One might more accurately say that Muslims might be the new Russians. Or the new Communists.
All that being said, does it matter if Islam actually can declare war on the West — or if we just think it has? Jews were accused of running the world, manipulating finances, and so on, which were exaggerations and lies. The “Islam against the West” line is also a bit hazy in the facts area, yes? Islamophobia is a tiny hop, skip and jump away from anti-Semitism, in its pervasive nature, it’s reliance on cultural myths, and appropriation of populist fears. It is a disease of the logic, backed up by credibility and “research.” The target people is different and the trappings are green-tinted not blue, but the portrayal and useage of it is the same.
This statement is more than interesting to Jewschool because it happens to have “Jews” in the article. And this issue is more important than an exercise in backing up or debunking the similarities between Jews and Muslims in Europe. MP Malik’s statement is a hot poker in the butt of the Jewish people asking us if we (and our societies) have not fallen into the same mental traps as our predecessors’ oppressors. And what, other than decrying or debunking the comparison, we’re going to do to prevent the accusation from going any further.
(By the way, the UK’s online resources for members of Parliament are phenomenal — on his overall Parliamentary participation; on terrorism his speeches and votes.)
by Danya [➚] · Sunday, July 6th, 2008
The New York Times reports,
A three-foot-tall tablet with 87 lines of Hebrew that scholars believe dates from the decades just before the birth of Jesus is causing a quiet stir in biblical and archaeological circles, especially because it may speak of a messiah who will rise from the dead after three days.
If such a messianic description really is there, it will contribute to a developing re-evaluation of both popular and scholarly views of Jesus, since it suggests that the story of his death and resurrection was not unique but part of a recognized Jewish tradition at the time.
The tablet, probably found near the Dead Sea in Jordan according to some scholars who have studied it, is a rare example of a stone with ink writings from that era — in essence, a Dead Sea Scroll on stone.
It is written, not engraved, across two neat columns, similar to columns in a Torah. But the stone is broken, and some of the text is faded, meaning that much of what it says is open to debate.
Still, its authenticity has so far faced no challenge, so its role in helping to understand the roots of Christianity in the devastating political crisis faced by the Jews of the time seems likely to increase.
Full story.
by Danya [➚] · Friday, July 4th, 2008
Remember Mordechai/Marc Gafni? He was the guy who fled Israel two years ago to avoid charges of sexual misconduct and possibly rape after he was–once again–found to be using his charismatic rebbe-hood to exploit his female students and followers. It’s a pattern that had been going on for some time, with some of his past victims decidedly underage at the time of the abuse. (He was famously quoted in the NY Jewish Week as saying, in response to one woman’s claims that he had “repeatedly and forcibly sexually assaulted” her that “she was 14 going on 35…”) (The NY Post has some graphic accounts of abuse by some of his victims; Reb Zalman revoked his smicha; Gafni, when the story broke, wrote a letter to Aleph pleading mea culpa and referring to himself as sick–just as he was sneaking to the States and disappearing.)
Well, he’s back, like a bad penny–this time in Salt Lake City. Failed Messiah reports that he’s now in bed with a new age magazine called Catalyst, which has come to his defense. Evidently he’s been writing for them for a while under a pseudonym, and now Catalyst is coming out in support of Gafni, painting him as the victim of “sexual McCarthyism”; Gafni, for his part, is now denying his guilt with a bunch of New Age pablum:
“Sexuality creates wounds…but if we learn to live wide open even as we are hurt by love, the divine wakes up its own true nature…I believed that what we were doing was sharing love, and that therefore there was nothing ethically, and certainly not legally, wrong. I still believe that.”
According to the Catalyst article, he’s started to teach and has a couple of book contracts going (and, according to other sources, may be operating under the name “Marc Israel.”) He’s clearly positioning himself for another rise to guru-hood, and there’s no reason to believe that he won’t continue his pattern of exploitation and abuse. He must be stopped.
ETA: It looks like Gafni himself (or one of his supporters) wrote his Wikipedia page, and so, needless to say, it’s in need of some correcting–it’s nauseatingly sympathetic, and notably absent of links to news sources explaining the “allegations of impropriety” against him. Anyone want to have a crack at it?
by Aryeh Cohen [➚] · Thursday, July 3rd, 2008
The right wing of American Orthodox Judaism, those who align themselves with various factions of chareidi and Yeshivah Judaism, are committed to what might only be called “triumphalist Zionism” (my locution, as far as I can tell). Triumphalist Zionists skip the whole cultural and political transformation piece of Zionism and go straight to “now we have an army and its our turn to kick gentile butt.” Most of these groups are extreme hawks on Israeli (and, often, therefore, American) foreign policy. Lubavitch, for example, were exceedingly anti-Zionist through the second world war (as Avi Rivitzky demonstrates in his important book Messianism, Zionism, and Jewish Religious Radicalism). They are also very active in opposing any territorial compromises or peace negotiations.
This process of triumphalist Zionism in the States was followed by the same trend in Israel. Whereas there was some talk that Rav Ovadyah Yosef, former Sephardic Chief Rabbi, (who does not see the settlement movement with the same messianic urgency as does Gush Emunim) would direct his political party Shas to support peace overtures, this did not in fact happen. The same holds true for Rav Shach, the dean of Roshei Yeshivah (Yeshivah heads) in Israel, and his Degel HaTorah party. Shas’ supporters were far more right wing than their leader and Rav Yosef ultimately let the party follow the more hawkish line. Rav Shach (an early mentor of Rav Ovadyah) too, expressed himself in opposition to the settlements, however his hatred of secular Jews and especially kibbutzim won out, with his Degel HaTorah party not supporting the peace overtures of the Labor Party.
It was only a matter of time before the patina of ambiguity toward co-existence cracked and the ramifications of triumphalist Zionism became obvious to all. On the one hand, this ideology afforded the chareidi parties internal justification to join the government as ministers (and ensure funding for their families and institutions), and to be in the heart of policy-making for all citizens of Israel (a seeming compromise with the Zionist project); the flip side of this was that this position of power gave the chareidi parties much political capital. Moreover, the chareidi parties could use foreign/security policy (settlements, wars) as leverage to score more funding for families and institutions (with the tacit and explicit backing of the American Jewish right).
This devil’s bargain has just now blown up again in the face of those Israelis who still see Israel as a Zionist project. This week in the Knesset a bill which exempted certain Yeshivot from the core curriculum that is mandatory for all elementary schools in Israel, passed the first reading. The Israeli High Court ruled three years ago that schools which do not teach the core curriculum can be denied government funding. The core curriculum mandates the teaching of basic civics and democratic values, Hebrew language and literature, English and Arabic, (though this latter is being contested mainly by the chareidim), along with sciences and mathematics, etc. This bill would grant exemptions to certain chareidi institutions (the so-called yeshivot ketanot), which would allow them to be funded by the government without having to teach the core curriculum.
The chareidi community in this latest move, has used its political leverage to undermine any sense of homogeniety or even unity of identity in Israel. This might not be a bad thing: liberal democracies are based on the notion that ethnic and/or religious minorities need not conform to the ideologies of the majority. However, and here is the chiddush, the chareidi parties are using their power from within the supposedly Zionist political institutions (not only Knesset seats, but government ministries) in order to undermine Zionism’s claim to forging a new kind Jewish identity. As Prof. Ruth Gavison wrote yesterday in Ha’aretz:
“It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of this law to the image of the State and the manner in which it educates its young citizens. The law perpetuates a situation in which particular groups receive significant public financing even though the curriuclae of their institutions do not impart to their students the skills necessary to become part of the life of the State and fulfill their part in the activities needed for the survival of the State. The law gives a hechsher [kosher certification] to the ideologies which are the basis of the “their Torah is their craft” arrangement.” (my translation)
This move follows fast on the heels of the Israeli Rabbinate’s declaration that only chareidi conversions are okay, and that converts practicing modern Orthodox Judaism can have their conversions reversed (as Gershom Gorenberg has been assiduously documenting). In the States, Shaul Magid has argued, modern Orthodox high school graduates go to Yeshivah in Israel for a year and then come back alienated from the modern-Orthodox values of their parents.
It would seem then that the vaunted Zionist “return to history” is actually history repeating itself, playing out once again the fight over modernity of eighteenth and nineteenth century Eastern Europe and Germany. The new variable is, of course, political power. The chareidim now have the ability to enforce their own brand of Wahabism. It would also seem that only on Birthright (or the mainstream American Jewish community more generally) is Israel seen as paradigm which provides an answer to question of Jewish identity.
by Temim Fruchter [➚] · Thursday, July 3rd, 2008
The 4th of July has forever been one of those occasions where I wish we could just take giant X-rays of this place, this country – turn the layers inside out, uncover its history. What did this street used to be named? Over whose home was this highway built? From whom was this neighborhood stolen? And at whose expense was this city, this country built? Literally looking at those x-rays might be the most potent way to understand the many fraught and disturbing answers to those questions.
While this is certainly not the same as talking about similar history-layer-uncovering work being done in Israel/Palestine, it still feels connected to me – and I thought that posting about it would be an opportunity to engage some of the comments on my last post (particularly, the questions about what it really means to be an anti-Zionist, which I appreciate, and hope I can continue to address in coming posts). So in that light, I want to mention the work of Zochrot – a group whose goal is just this kind of uncovering, of reminding. As an anti-Imperialist US citizen, and as an anti-Zionist Jew, it’s important to me to be a part of making visible the history that governments, history books and popular discourse try so desperately to erase – both here, in the U.S., and internationally – and this is central to Zochrot’s work.
For me, one big part of being an anti-Zionist is to remember – and to bring into public conversation as much as possible– that what’s happening in Gaza and across Palestinian communities today started the moment the state of Israel was founded. While it is widely accepted to talk in our Jewish communities about 1967 being the year that marks the beginning of Israeli occupation of and military violence against Palestinians, it’s so important to remember that 1948 was the year that more than 500 Palestinian villages were depopulated and/or destroyed, and 800,000 Palestinians were expelled from their lands, communities, and homes, so that a Jewish-majority state could be created.. Israel’s continued violence against and repression of Palestinian communities today is a continuation of the project of 1948 – a Jewish majority state at the ongoing expense of another people.
Zochrot does an excellent job of uncovering the history of the place we call Israel that is so rarely publicized or talked about. They bring tourists and locals to see where Palestinian villages used to stand, what streets used to be named, and what that map of Israel that some of us know like the backs of our hands used to look like. This is a vitally important and creative way to help insure that this history stays a part of the conversation – the colonization of Palestinian land did not start with sieges or with settlements, but with the vision for a Jewish majority state that initially drove them out in 1948. And talking about, staying rooted in this history, and in the ongoing fact that ethnic cleansing is not a Jewish value – for me, this is one big part of what anti-Zionism is about.
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