It was a hot day this past July, and it looked like the Old
City of Jerusalem was going to explode. A few days before, three Israeli Arabs
had killed two Israeli Druze police officers near the Temple Mount. Security
forces had closed off the area and then reopened it with metal detectors.
Israeli Arab leaders and the leadership of the Waqf, the religious authority
that supervises Muslim holy sites in Israel, staged a protest, and began
calling for a day of rage. Three Israelis were killed when someone broke into
their home, and three Palestinians were killed in rioting. For those of us
watching this past summer, it appeared that once again Israel would be
embroiled in violence.
In response to the increased tensions, Sarah Tuttle-Singer,
an American Israeli journalist who has been living in the Muslim Quarter of the
Old City, stood outside and, with a few friends, handed out popsicles to
passersby. She started with popsicles she had paid for out of pocket, and by
the end of the day merchants were donating them entire boxes.
She wrote the following of the experience:
On Thursday, a group of us stood in front of the Austrian
hospice at the intersection of Al Wad and Via Dolorosa and handed out (parve)
popsicles to anyone who would accept.
Men carrying prayer rugs on their way to the Mosque.
Guys going to the Western Wall.
Families walking north and south and back again.
A baffled looking priest and two nuns.
A guy in Border Police with braces on his teeth.
A pilgrim from Russia wearing a giant cross and strappy
sandals.
A bunch of tourists from Ohio.
Lots and lots and lots of kids.
Anyone who would accept a popsicle got one.
Why?
Because it's *** hot out.
And we may come from different cultures and religions, we
may speak different languages and see the world through different eyes, but we
are all a sum part of chemical and biological processes, and we all get hot.
And when we get hot we get irritated and the tensions that
are already there can ignite.
Also, the Old City is my home and I believe in treating my
neighbors with respect during good times, and bad.
As it happened, the next day, Israel removed the security
apparatuses and tensions were calmed.
I suspect many of us, as touched as we are by Sarah’s
gesture (on her birthday, no less) find it lovely but Pollyanna-ish. How do
popsicles solve the crisis between Palestinian and Jew in the area between the
Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan RIver? How does this account for the Waqf’s
incitement, fanning the flames of violence? How does it deal with the
Palestinian Authority continuing to pay the families of terrorists, including
the three who killed the Druze police officers? How do popsicles deal with
olive groves destroyed by settlers who build on hilltops that don’t belong to
them? What do popsicles do to protect our kids at college when someone paints a
swastika on their dorm room door? How does this really resolve anything? We see
the picture of Sarah handing out popsicles, and it’s lovely, and kind, yet by
the time we’re done thinking about the matzav, the situation, we get ourselves
so worked up that it feels futile and hopeless and irrelevant.
When I was a kid I had a book from AIPAC called “Myths and
Facts”, a guide to talking about the Arab-Israeli conflict, that was meant to
help someone who would get caught up in a conversation about Israel and quickly
get overwhelmed. That’s because the conversation is overwhelming. Because when
we speak of Israel, we are often very quick to speak of technicalities: dates
and maps and green lines and technical marvels, who did what when, who is to blame
and who is responsible, who really actually truly cares about others? And
what’s worse, the diversity of Zionist organizations on the left and the right
has created increasing fracture within the Jewish community, including here in
Delaware. Myths And Facts was meant for Jews to speak with non-Jews, but it
seems that we have reached the point where we may feel that we need it
internally, not just externally. It was one thing to combat well-meaning
non-Jewish peaceniks who would carry the claim that Zionism was racism. Now we
have the ZOA, AIPAC, J-Street, ARZA, IfNotNow, Open Hillel and many other
organizations whose relationship with Zionism is complex and nuanced, which
would be great, if we were living in a time of complex and nuanced discussion
and debate. But increasingly, we have been living in a world of alternative
facts, fake news, insistence that if the person across from me disagrees with
me even in the slightest bit, they are not just wrong, they are my enemy and
the enemy of all I hold dear. To be a J-Street supporter in the eyes of many is
to betray the Jewish state to an Iranian Nuclear Weapon, while to be an AIPAC
supporter is to capitulate to an Israeli Prime Minister unwilling and unable to
make peace. Is ARZA fighting to create space for Reform Jews to practice an
egalitarian Judaism at the Western Wall, or a distraction undermining the
fabric of Israeli society and Judaism as we know it? Does the ZOA advocate for
a strong Jewish State or is it a racist organization advocating bigotry against
Arabs? These are actual discussions that are taking place, if you can call them
‘discussions’. More like weaponized sentences, screaming matches, skirmishes
that have casualties. As one example, a student of mine, now in college, shared
this experience with me: She was getting ready to go on a birthright trip, one
geared toward LGBT individuals, that would coincide with Israel Pridefest. She
wrote: “Before the trip I had gotten anti-Israel hate on campus (anti-Trump
protests saying if you didn't vote to divest then you don't believe in human
rights, friends saying Zionism has no place in feminism) and my best friend
told me she cancelled her trip with me because she couldn't "morally go to
Israel" but nobody was like actually attacking me for going cuz I kept it
on the down low since I knew so many of my friends legitimately hated Israel
and would make laugh about terrorism on twitter. Only after I went did I have
people be blatantly anti-Semitic to me on twitter because of my trip and people
passive aggressively post articles about pink washing the day I got back” . Can
you imagine having friendships ruined, trips ruined, relationships blown apart?
That is what is happening, and this is being repeated over and over again. My
friends, we are tearing each other apart.
Friends, if we keep talking about Israel through
technicalities, as if it were a zero-sum game, without nuance or complexity or
an acknowledgement of each other’s lived experiences, then we are not going to
resolve the Palestinian-Israeli crisis. We are not going to stop dumb college
kids from saying dumb and terrible things and doing dumb and terrible things.
We aren’t going to be able to support the kind of Israel we want to see—strong
and diverse and safe. We are creating a no-man’s land within the Jewish
community; no one wants to talk about Israel. I’ve seen it for years: a survey
came out two years ago of rabbis across all three major movements that
indicated the majority refrained from discussing Israel because they feared for
their jobs; one prominent rabbi in the Northeast who does a great deal of
social justice work told a group of us ten years ago to approach the topic of
Israel gingerly, and treat it as a third rail in synagogue politics. And we see
it in Delaware. How many people are still giving to ARZA, or are willing to go
to an AIPAC or J-Street policy conference, or at least tell others? How many
look over both shoulders while at Temple before talking about Israel so as not
to get into a fight? I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we’ve been without an
Israel Advocacy Chair for more than two years, a Board position! Because no one
wants to touch it.
So let’s go back to those popsicles, shall we? Did some
blonde woman from LA who now lives in Jerusalem handing out popsicles resolve
the borders, water rights, Palestinian Right of Return and the boundaries of
Jerusalem? Nope. Did it resolve the issue on the Temple Mount? Nope. Did it
bring back the lives of those killed—the policemen, the family, the young
people at the protest? Sadly, no. But it was a human gesture, a recognition
that the people shared a city, shared a love for that city, and a love for each
other as well. It was neighborly, it was kind. And it allowed the people to be
people, to recognize the humanity in one another, even for one brief, cool,
sweet, drippy moment.
We need more of those moments. We need more opportunities
that are safe, where we can sit with our fellow congregants and speak from our
lived experiences, talk about what Israel means to each one of us personally.
We need to start not at 30,000 feet, at borders and drip irrigation and the
like. That doesn’t mean that isn’t interesting, that doesn’t mean it isn’t
cool, but that’s not our starting point. Our starting point needs to be each
other. Why do we care about Israel? What does that look like to me, or to you?
Where does it come from? How does it relate to the rest of our lives? How can
we listen and affirm that connection, deepen it, relate to it, let it resonate
for ourselves? How does Israel challenge us, upset us? How do we create space
to listen to one another, not scream the so-called correct answers at one
another?
This year, I want to try an experiment; an experiment in
listening. Over the course of this year, there will be sessions, held over several
months, beginning in October and culminating in May. The purpose of them is to
create the space to talk about Israel, to listen to each other in a safe space,
and to build relationships. No other agenda, no convincing one another of being
right or wrong, no yelling, no screaming, no Myths and no Facts. Only listening
deeply and seeing the humanity in one another, and acknowledging each other’s
experiences. I can’t promise there will be popsicles, but my prayer is that
we’re able to come together and speak honestly and compassionately, to hear one
another even when it’s difficult. Because it’ll be no good if we only speak
platitudes and avoid the subject; that’s what we’ve got now and it’s not doing
anything either. We need to be able to be honest, but to be able to hear one
another clearly as well, not just prepare our next fusillade. Rabbi Amy
Eilberg, in her book From Enemy To Friend, talks about “skilled disagreement”,
and this will help guide our conversations. Ideas like: we can be critical of
ideas but not people, we can separate our personal worth from criticism of our
ideas, we listen to everyone, even when we don’t agree, we try to understand
one another and stand in a posture of curiosity, asking questions. I’ll be
going into greater detail about those ideas tomorrow, but that is the
intention. I cordially invite you—all of you, each of you—to come and
participate, to share, to be present, to create those moments of empathy with
one another. Perhaps it will lead to something concrete for the synagogue—a new
Israel committee, a new program—or perhaps it will just mean that the
participants got to know each other better and learned how to speak
thoughtfully. Perhaps we will choose to extend the conversation: to the rest of
Delaware’s Jewish community, to the non-Jewish community, or perhaps not.
What’s most important is that we do it. Because if we do not start here, each
one of us, in this congregation, then I fear our relationship with Israel will
become increasingly tenuous, and our relationship with one another ever more
brittle. And should that happen, then we cannot advocate for Israel, at least
not effectively. And are we really ready to give up on the Hope and the dream
of a Jewish people, Free in our land?
The rabbis of old ask, “Who is the hero of heroes? The one
who makes an enemy into a friend.” May we, through our listening and our
kindness learn to keep our friends “friends”, and see those around us not as
enemies but as potential friends, then may our words be as sweet to one another
as a popsicle on a summer’s day. Amen
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