Rabbi Janet Marder

Erev Yom Kippur 5766

Od Yavo Shalom Alenu –  Erev Yom Kippur 5766

            My wonderful husband did it again. As you know, if you’ve ever heard me speak on Kol Nidre before, Shelly’s annual High Holy day gift to me is a fat folder of obituaries from the New York Times. So here’s this year’s account of those we have lost – the famous and the infamous; the memorable and the merely bizarre.

            From the world of journalism we lost Shana Alexander, the liberal who debated conservative James J. Kilpatrick on the ”Point/Counterpoint” segment of  “60 Minutes.” Also Hunter S. Thompson, who inspired the eccentric “Uncle Duke” character in “Doonesbury”; and ABC news anchor Peter Jennings.

            The legal world lost Johnnie Cochrane and Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist. The scientific world saw the passing of Maurice Wilkins, Nobel Prize-winning physicist who worked with Watson and Crick to unravel the structure of DNA; astronaut Gordon Cooper, the last American to fly solo in space; Cicely Saunders, who pioneered the modern hospice movement; Dr. Maurice Hilleman, who developed vaccines for mumps, measles, chickenpox, pneumonia, meningitis and other diseases -- -and who probably saved more lives than any other scientist in the 20^th century; and Dr. Ancel Keys, who identified saturated fat as a cause of heart disease, championed the Mediterranean diet, and died at the age of 100, remaining intellectually active through his 97^th year.

            Gone from literature are two great playwrights : August Wilson and Arthur Miller; best-selling self-help author M. Scott Peck; Israeli mystery writer Batya Gur; and the amazing Saul Bellow, whose father once said to him, “You write and you erase….You call that a profession?”

            From the arts we lost British ballerina Alicia Markova; designer Geoffrey Beene, photographer Richard Avedon; Dale Messick, who drew the “Brenda Starr” comic strip; producer Ismail Merchant, of the Merchant-Ivory collaboration; and Robert Wise, who edited “Citizen Kane” at 25 and went on to direct “West Side Story” and “The Sound of Music.”

            Speaking of music…the music world lost Robert Moog, creator of the electronic synthesizer that bore his name; blues pianist Johnnie Johnson, who played with Chuck Berry, and in whose honor Berry wrote “Johnny B. Goode”; composer Cy Coleman, who wrote “Witchcraft” and  “The Best is Yet to Come”; jazz clarinetist and big band leader Artie Shaw’; elegant pianist and cabaret singer Bobby Short; and baritone Robert Merrill, a Jewish boy from Brooklyn who sang at the Met for 30 years. A passionate baseball fan, he died while watching the first game of the World Series on TV.

            Some great actors passed from the scene: Marlon Brando; Ossie Davis; Sir John Mills; the courageous Christopher Reeve; musical star Howard Keel; character actor Eddie Albert; Jerry Orbach, who played Lenny on my favorite show, “Law and Order”; James Doohan, who played our beloved “Scotty” on “Star Trek.”

            We lost actresses Barbara Bel Geddes, Miss Ellie Ewing on “Dallas”; Sandra Dee of “Gidget”; Janet Leigh, who took a famous shower in “Psycho”; Thelma White, star of “Reefer Madness” in 1936; Virginia Mayo, film star of the 40s; Geraldine Fitzgerald and Anne Bancroft.

            We lost people who made us laugh: Bob Denver of “Gilligan’s Island”; Paul Winchell and John Fiedler, the voices of Tigger and Piglet in the “Winnie-the-Pooh” movies, who died one day apart; Don Adams, the hilarious Agent 86 of “Get Smart”; Nipsey Russell, one of the first black stand-up comics; Rodney Dangerfield and Johnny Carson, my second-favorite person from Nebraska.

            Some great minds passed away last year: psychologist, educator and civil rights leader Kenneth Clark, whose work helped end school segregation; eminent philosophers Jacques Derrida; Richard Popkin and Paul Ricoeur; writer and social critic Susan Sontag; feminist anti-pornography crusader Andrea Dworkin.

            And gone from the world of politics are Shirley Chisholm, the first black woman elected to Congress, who ran for president in 1972; Molly Yard, president of the National Organization for Women; Cold War strategist George F. Kennan; Peter Rodino, who chaired President Nixon’s impeachment hearings; Rosemary Woods, who accidentally erased 18 minutes of a fateful tape; Pierre Salinger, press secretary to President Kennedy; General William Westmoreland, WW II hero who was vilified for his leadership of the war in Vietnam; Prince Rainier of Monaco and King Fahd of Saudi Arabia.

            The Jewish world lost Peter Tzvi Malkin, former Mosad agent who captured Eichman in Argentina; biblical scholar Nahum Sarna; Ezer Weizman, former president of Israel; and Rafael Eitan, chief of staff in the Israeli government during the war in Lebanon.

            We also lost John Paul II, the first pope to pray in a synagogue, the first to acknowledge the failure of Catholics to act against the Holocaust; the first to call anti-Semitism a sin “against God and man,” and the first to pay an official papal visit to the Holy Land and to establish diplomatic relations between the Vatican and Israel.

            There are always a few people who defy easy categorization:  Morris Gold, who helped make his mother’s horseradish a household name, and put it on almost every Passover seder table; John DeLorean, inventor of the glamour car; Thurl Ravenscroft, the voice of Tony the Tiger. And let’s not forget Bertram King, who invented the Waste King garbage disposal; H. David Dahlquist, who invented the bundt pan; and George Molchan, who portrayed the Oscar Mayer mascot for more than 30 years, and who was attended to his grave by the 27-foot Wienermobile.

            I’ve saved for last two very different people who, in their own way, represent the passing of an era: Simon Wiesenthal, death camp survivor who dedicated his life to tracking down fugitive Nazi war criminals; and Yasir Arafat, terrorist who in 1959 co-founded Al Fatah, which means in Arabic “the Conquest” -- an organization that became the core of the PLO, founded by the Arab League in 1964 to destroy Israel.

            Many of you have asked me to speak about the month my husband and I spent studying in Israel this past summer. Tonight I want to share with you some of what we learned.

            What dominated the summer for everyone in Israel was anticipation of the disengagement from Gaza . We heard many different talks about the disengagement from a variety of perspectives – left, right and center; Jewish and Arab; political, religious and military leaders; governmental officials and civilians.

            Why was there such strong opposition to the Gaza withdrawal? Did it not make sense for Israel to vacate lands that belong to others? Is Israel simply becoming dominated by right-wing extremists?

            We learned from our speakers that those who opposed the disengagement – and this included Khaled Abu Toameh, an Arab Israeli journalist, who called it “a disaster for Israel” – did so because they believed it would not make Israel more secure or bring her any tangible benefits. They predicted that Gaza would soon be overrun by violent extremists and renewed hostility against Israel . Worse, they said, Israel ’s unilateral withdrawal in the absence of negotiations, without a peace agreement, would simply embolden terrorist groups.

            Up until now, Israel ’s policy has been to return land for peace. The Sinai Peninsula, for instance – three times the size of Israel -- was returned to Egypt after Egypt signed a peace treaty. Disengagement opponents said that Hamas and Islamic Jihad will portray the Gaza withdrawal as a victory for terrorism. Since the Palestinians have now gained far more through suicide bombings than they gained at the negotiating table, unilateral disengagement gives them no incentive to return to negotiations.  Hamas will say: “We killed a few thousand Jews and received Gaza . If we kill a few thousand more, we’ll get the West Bank . And a few thousand more after that, and we’ll get Haifa and Tel Aviv.” They will be wrong, of course, but that is what they will say.

            Did supporters of disengagement from Gaza believe it would bring peace and stability to Israel ? No – opponents and supporters agreed that it would not. But supporters of withdrawal claim that there is no viable alternative, and they warn that there are compelling demographic reasons for Israel to separate from the Palestinians. If Israel annexes the territories Jews will soon become a minority in Israel , and Israel will no longer be a Jewish state. If Israel does not annex the territories but continues to occupy them, a Jewish minority will rule over an Arab majority, and Israel will no longer be a democracy.

            There were other voices in Israel while we were there, as well. Voices of right-wing religious settlers who believe that no Jewish state has the right to order withdrawal from any part of the Holy Land . Some ultra-Orthodox rabbis instructed soldiers to disobey the orders of their commanders and defy the legitimacy of the state. All summer there were real fears of violent civil unrest within Israel , or of a revolt within the army.

            Hundreds of thousands of people gathered in public demonstrations for and against the disengagement throughout Israel – the only country in the region where such demonstrations could take place. Given the impassioned debate, in language reminiscent of the era in which Prime Minister Rabin was assassinated, it is all the more impressive that in mid-August the state of Israel carried out the disengagement from Gaza in an orderly and civil manner, with a minimum of violence.

            Its young soldiers behaved with remarkable discipline, restraint and empathy for all parties. The Israeli public, grievously divided, fearful of the risks entailed in withdrawing from territory without receiving anything tangible in return, demonstrated their courage and commitment to democracy. Israel showed itself, once again, to be a vibrant democratic state, with the capacity to air passionate disagreements, to tolerate dissent and opposition, to respect the rule of law and to make extraordinarily difficult political choices.

           Yossi Klein Halevi, an Israeli journalist and writer who spoke here at Beth Am last November, recently published in the Israeli press an open letter to the Palestinian people. Halevi reflected on his own journey from the left to the center, and upon the years he spent pursuing spiritual dialogue with Arab Christians and Muslims in an effort to find common ground.

            “Repeatedly,” he wrote, “Palestinians would say to me, ‘Why are you and I arguing over who owns the land when in the end the land will own us both?’ That wise ability to place our earthly claims and struggles in the context of our shared condition of mortality gave me hope that peace between us may someday be possible.

            “But,” he continued, “I learned too, during numerous candid conversations with Palestinians at all levels of society, that, in practice, few within your nation are willing to concede that I have a legitimate claim to any part of this land. I will cite one telling example.

            “During my journey into Islam in Gaza , I met General Nasser Youssef (who at the time of our meeting was head of one of the Palestinian security forces and is now the PA Interior Minister). At one point during our conversation, I asked the General to describe his vision of the relations between a Jewish state and a Palestinian state after we signed a peace agreement.

            “Let’s assume, I said, that Israel withdraws to the 1967 borders, uproots the settlements and redivides Jerusalem . What then? He replied that, once the [Palestinian] refugees begin returning to the area, so many would gravitate to those areas in Israel where their families once lived, that eventually we would realize there was no need for an artificial border between Israel and Palestine.

            “The next step, continued the General, was that the two states would merge. ‘And then we’ll invite Jordan to join our federation. And Iraq and Syria . Why not? We’ll show the whole world what a beautiful country Jews and Arabs could create together.’

            “’But,’ I asked the General, ‘aren’t we negotiating today over a two-state solution’? ‘Yes’, he replied, ‘as an interim step’. And then he added, ‘you aren’t separate from us; you are part of us. Just as there are Muslim Arabs and Christian Arabs, you are Jewish Arabs’.

            “This story is particularly relevant,” Halevi writes, “because General Youssef is widely known as a moderate, deeply opposed to terror as counter-productive to the Palestinian cause. And so what I learned in my journeys into your society is that moderation means one thing on the Israeli side and quite another on the Palestinian side.

            “An Israeli moderate recognizes the Palestinian-Israeli conflict as a struggle between two legitimate national narratives. A Palestinian moderate, by contrast, tends to disagree with the extremists about method, not goal: He opposes the destruction of Israel through terror and war, perhaps because that option isn’t realistic; yet he advocates the disappearance of Israel through more gradualist means, like demographic subversion. Like General Youssef, he sees a two-state solution as an interim agreement, a step toward Greater Palestine. When your moderates speak of peace and justice, then, they usually mean a one-state solution.”

            Halevi’s words remind us that Arabs and Western intellectuals who would destroy Israel today – either through armed aggression or gradually, through demographic means -- sometimes speak of their desire to see Israel replaced by “a democratic Palestinian state where Muslims, Christians and Jews could live together in equality and peace.”

            What’s wrong with this vision? It ignores the fact that over the centuries Jews and Christians have never attained equal rights in a state dominated by Muslims.  The Palestinian Authority itself is anything but a democratic organization. Khaled Abu Toameh, who formerly wrote for a PLO newspaper, denounces the PA as a corrupt and oppressive body that will not tolerate dissent and has stolen billions of dollars from the Palestinian people.

            The vision of doing away with separate nation states may be a beautiful ideal. Why not let it start by having Mexico merge with the United States , or France with Germany ? Why not, for that matter, have the Presbyterians merge with the Methodists? When the rest of the world gets around to eliminating all parochial identities, then, perhaps Israel can amalgamate with its Arab neighbors. In the meantime, Israel , which allows Arab citizens full voting rights, Arab political parties, Arab Knesset members and an Arab on the Supreme Court, already serves as a democratic, multi-religious state.

        There are 22 countries in the world today in which Islam is the official state religion; more than a billion Muslims live in countries in which Islam is the primary religion. Centuries of persecution, culminating in the Holocaust, have taught the Jewish people the absolute necessity for one small country – the size of New Jersey – that maintains a Jewish majority. One state where the government can never turn against its Jewish citizens – isolate them, strip them of their rights, demonize them, expel them, destroy them.

            Israel is not a perfect country. Its leaders, like our own, are fallible; its citizens sometimes intolerant and its policies sometimes flawed. But Israel is the only country in the world whose right to exist is denied because of the alleged crimes of its government. As Rabbi David Wolpe writes, “I have heard calls for the end of this or that government but never for the end of the state. No one said Germany after two world wars should cease being a state.  The world did not agitate for the end of Uganda under [Idi] Amin. Only Israel . Only the state populated by and run by Jews. Remarkable coincidence, is it not?” [“Because They Are Jews” on Beliefnet].

            What to do now, in the absence of a peace partner that acknowledges the Jewish people’s long history in the land of Israel , its deeply-felt tie to that land, and its permanent need for a sovereign Jewish state? What to do in the face of terrorist groups that continue to seek the obliteration of Israel ? Virtually all Israelis – left, right and center – now accept the necessity of a security fence to protect its citizens from terror attacks. Abu Toameh, the Arab Israeli journalist, deplores the fence, but he commented, bitterly and ironically, that Yasir Arafat’s name should be written all over it, since he is responsible for it. The fence is nobody’s ideal, but it helps prevent the murder of innocent people. Let us always see it as temporary; as do the most courageous Israelis, who struggle not to be overcome by anger and hatred, who strive to see the human face of the other.

            “When we look at each other,” writes Yossi Klein Halevi to the Palestinians, “we see the embodiment of our worst historical traumas. When you look at us, you see an expansionist power that recalls your defeat and humiliation in recent centuries….When we look at you, we see the incarnation of the latest in a long line of genocidal enemies who have tried to destroy us…

            “…Just as you see in us colonialists and crusaders, we increasingly see in you Nazis.

            “Having been privileged to spend time among you, I know that most of you are not Nazis, just as I know that most of us are not colonialists. We are two traumatized peoples who, tragically, have projected their most demonic images onto the other.

            “In withdrawing from Gaza , we [Israelis] have begun our territorial contraction. Yet can your side stop actively dreaming of destroying us – through terror, demographics, the Muslim bomb? Can you accept the moral legitimacy – not just temporary political necessity – of a two-state solution?”

            Halevi concludes: “One remarkable exception was a pilgrimage of Palestinian Israelis to Auschwitz , two years ago. For Palestinian citizens of Israel to reach out to Jews at the height of the Intifada was the deepest expression of the generosity of Arab culture. I was privileged to be among the Jewish participants in that Arab initiative. We stood at the crematorium, Arabs and Jews holding each other in silence, facing the abyss together. At that moment, anything seemed possible between us.

            “…I approached you then…without apology for my presence here [in this land] or dismissal of your presence. And that is how I dream of being with you again: as fellow indigenous sons of this land, which one day will claim us both” [Jerusalem Post September 28, 2005].

         Last month, in a historic moment, Prime Minister Sharon addressed the UN General Assembly. He challenged the Palestinians to demonstrate their commitment to peace, now that Israel has completed its withdrawal from the Gaza Strip [New York Times, September 18, 2005].

         We watch, now, to see if the Palestinians will be able to meet this challenge by conquering the extremists among them, as Israel has demonstrated its willingness to confront its own right-wing extremists. We watch, hoping for signs of progress and some respite from violence that has brought suffering to both sides.

         The Israeli poet Abba Kovner wrote: “What good are friends who watch from the balcony / while our heart wrestles on the stage” [“I Don’t Know if Mount Zion ” from Observations, 1977].

            So often it feels as if we American Jews are watching Israel from the balcony – mere spectators, observing the events at a comfortable distance, commenting, advising, critiquing and sometimes condemning – while Israelis struggle heart and soul with agonizing issues of life and death.

            How else could it be? We are, after all, thousands of miles away from the Jewish state. Here are some words from the Talmud that suggest another way it could be. The passage describes the actions of three Sages of the 3^rdand 4^th centuries who lived in the Land of Israel when it was under Roman rule:

            “Rabbi Abba used to kiss the cliffs of Acco. Rabbi Hanina used to repair broken sections of the roads in the land. Rabbi Hiyya ben Gamda used to roll himself in its dust, for he read in the Psalms: ‘God’s servants take pleasure in her stones, and cherish her dust” [Ps.102:15; Tal.Ketubot 112a].

            Rabbi Abba used to kiss the cliffs of Acco, a beautiful port city near modern day Haifa . His kisses speak of a love for Israel that endures in the darkest times.

            Rabbi Hanina used to repair the roads. His labors speak of the practical work of helping Israel achieve its ideals – through planting trees, building hospitals and universities, promoting justice for all her citizens.

            Rabbi Hiyya used to roll in her dust and take pleasure in her stones. His contagious joy speaks of celebrating the daily miracle of ordinary life in Israel   -- a miracle that can never be taken for granted.        

            How should an American Jew relate to Israel ? Not from the balcony, and not through rose-colored glasses, but up close and personal. With compassion and empathy; with pleasure and delight; with gratitude and love for a country that is a gift to every Jew in the world. With emotion, but not with emotion alone.  By translating our feelings into positive action. By visiting, by sending our children to study and travel there, by offering our advocacy and support, by keeping Israel in our prayers. 

            How should American Jews relate to Israel ? Not uncritically, but not with criticism alone. With a readiness to help fix what’s broken, to educate ourselves about the issues, to donate our time and money to organizations that are working to build the kind of Israel we believe in.

            We can all take an important step in that direction by registering to vote in the upcoming World Zionist Congress election. You will hear more about that election tomorrow morning, but I urge you now to register, as I have, and to vote so as to strengthen the Progressive Jewish Movement in Israel . Our votes in this election can translate into millions of dollars in funding for synagogues and other institutions that embody a liberal, modern, humanitarian and egalitarian Jewish voice in Israel .

         More and more of us are coming down from the balcony. I am thrilled to announce that this coming spring 43 of us from Congregation Beth Am will be visiting Israel together – more are on the waiting list. Another family group, led by Rabbi Zweiback, will travel there next summer.

            I want to share with you one last memory from my summer in Israel . It was our visit to the dramatically redesigned Yad Vashem, the largest Holocaust history museum in the world. The new museum is a large, prism-shaped structure built into the side of a mountain. At the end of your walk through the exhibit – an intense, heartbreaking experience that takes some three hours – you come out of the mountain onto a cliff with a breathtaking view of Jerusalem .

            When you visit the Holocaust Museum in Washington , you mourn for the dead and despair. When you visit Yad Vashem, you come out of the depths of despair and see the renewed life of the Jewish people. You feel what it means to breathe free and to look at the open sky. You feel the difference between the Jews of those terrible years, who stood isolated and alone, with no one – not the good liberals of Western Europe , not even the Americans -- to come to their defense; and the Jews of today, who have a home – a government that welcomes and protects them, wherever they are.

            You see a people that emerged from the nightmare of the Holocaust focused not on hatred or vengeance or nihilistic rage at a world that abandoned them, but on building something beautiful together in Israel .

         The building continues now, in the year 5766. We are all part of it. And it’s likely to be a very long process. None of the Israelis we met this summer expect peace in the foreseeable future. Though none were giving up, none said they were optimistic.

         I remember tonight the words of Admiral Jim Stockdale, the highest-ranking U.S. military officer held as a prisoner of war in Hanoi during the Vietnam War. Tortured repeatedly during the eight years of his captivity, Stockdale had no certainty that he would survive or ever see his family again. He did his best to provide leadership to his fellow prisoners and to resist the efforts of his captors to break their spirits.

         After his release, he was once asked: “Who didn’t make it out?” “Oh, that’s easy,” he said. “The optimists. They were the ones who said: We’re going to be out by Christmas. And Christmas would come and Christmas would go and then they would say: We’re going to be out by Easter. And Easter would come and Easter would go. And then they would say: Thanksgiving. And then it would be Christmas again. And they died of a broken heart.”

         And then he said: “This is a very important lesson. You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end  -- which you can never afford to lose – with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.”

         Yasir Arafat is dead. Israel has withdrawn from Gaza . The fence is being built and terrorism has dramatically diminished. Finally, after years of stalemate, there appears to be some movement. But we cannot be naïve in our optimism – or we will have our hearts broken again and again. Despite our wishful thinking, despite the anguish of two desperately weary peoples, true peace may be a long time coming.

            It is not optimism we need now but something stronger and more essential: the persistence to go on loving and celebrating and working hard to fix the roads. The patience to put up with imperfection and the will to make things better.  And the faith that in the end – no matter how far off it is – hatred will subside and good will prevail. That is why we end every service at Beth Am with these words: “Od yavo shalom alenu. Peace will yet come to us – to us, and all the world.”