oints of view

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Essay

Editorial

Israel's Bus
Decree Must
Clear Scrutiny

Prayerful

Original clergy passages accentuate
Temple Israel's new siddur.

E

p

rayer: It provides a gateway to speak to God. Making
From The Heart
a spiritual connection during prayer creates the con-
For Rabbi Jennifer Kaluzny, the
ditions to meditate — to hear God.
siddur enabled her to share some
So prayer is a catalyst toward a higher calling.
very personal feelings
But it can be uplifting by itself. It's because of this 11111Prilw
following the death of
dual opportunity that prayer punctuates syna-
her newborn daughter
gogue services, whether it's Shabbat, Havdalah or
Sage, about 21/2 years
a Jewish holiday.
ago. Twin brother Asher
At Temple Israel, Shabbat prayer has become
survived to join his
magnified by use of a new locally edited siddur
mom, big sister Bayla
replete with original prayers, poems and contem-
and their father, Ryan.
plative verses from the West Bloomfield syna-
In the midst of
Renee and Martin
gogue's clergy and spouses.
mourning, Kaluzny pri- Laker found spiritual
Robert Sklar
At Shabbat services Sept. 26, congregants
vately captured what it
fulfillment through
Contrib uting
dedicated the third edition of Shema Yisrael:
felt like to stand at Sage's the gift of siddurim to
Edit or
Hear, 0 Israel, edited by Rabbi
grave — then walk
Temple Israel.
Paul Yedwab and funded by
through life as a parent
congregants Renee and Martin
grieving a child.
Laker. The Shehechianu heralded the siddur's
She found comfort in the hope that her
arrival.
poems' publication in Shema Yisrael: Hear,
Rabbi Harold Loss called the dedication "a
0 Israel would help others who felt simi-
very special night in the life of our congrega-
lar grief. Appropriately, the poems appear
tion:'
before the Kaddish.
Yedwab — who wrote several of the pas-
"They are the honest offerings of my
Rabbi Loss
sages, including prayer notes — observed
heart:' Kaluzny told congregants. "I hope
that the siddur serves "to connect us more
that you can find yourself in them, too, if
Rabbi Kaluzny you have lost someone that you loved:'
closely to our congregation, to our people, to our religion, to
our God and to one another."
Prayerful on page 33

A Time Of Reckoning

T

o finish the new Temple Israel
siddur this summer, Rabbi
Paul Yedwab, the editor and a
major text contributor, awoke at 4 a.m.
to communicate with the Israeli design
team, Ikan Maas.
"But nearer the book came to frui-
tion, the more picayune became the
communications," Yedwab recalled.
For example, Yedwab would instruct:
"Move this comma from this word to
that word. Or the dot over the letter
shin on page 47, line 6 has to shift one
millimeter to the right:'
As he sent along editing changes,
Yedwab was keenly aware that graphic
designer Yiftach Maas' son, Tomer, was
serving in the Israel Defense Forces
in the Gaza Strip — "literally running
through heavy gunfire between the
tanks that were under his command."
"And here I was, writing to Yiftach,
his father, about dots on a piece of
paper. And that was when I under-

32

November 6 • 2014

ion

stood, as clearly as I have ever
understood anything in my life:
The dots were nothing. The com-
mas were nothing. It was Tomer,
whose prayer of courage was filling
the world with righteousness, who
was important. Don't just say a
prayer; be a prayer!"
Words still command a role
"in getting us to those authentic
prayers within us," Yedwab said.
He cited a poem he wrote about Israel
— proclaiming "0 Jerusalem ... you
are my soul:' "the center of my Jewish
heart" and "ever before my eyes" —
that circulated on social media and
which became part of Shema Yisrael:
Hear, 0 Israel.
To amplify his personalized notion
about prayer, Yedwab pointed to this
Chasidic expression, by Reb Pinchas of
Koretz, in the siddur: "Everyone believes
that one prays before God, but it is not
so; prayer itself is the essence of God:'

"Don't
just say a
prayer;
be a
prayer!"

-Rabbi Yedwab

"If we are made in God's image:'
Yedwab continued, "then prayer is also
the essence of who we are:'
As beautiful as they may be, Yedwab
said, the words in Shema Yisrael: Hear,
0 Israel "are not the prayers; they are
only the passageway to the prayers,
which were written into our souls by
God, our Creator, at our births and are
still being written there every single
day:'

very day, thousands of Palestinian
workers enter Israel by bus from
the West Bank. An Israeli order
would prevent these laborers from riding
Israeli buses to and from work. The decree
would force Jewish settlers and West Bank
Palestinians heading into Israel for work to
ride separate bus lines.
As a democratic stakeholder, Israel must
be certain the pending order, rooted in
security concerns, has merit.
Israel's attorney general, Yehuda
Weinstein, gave Defense Minister Moshe
Yaalon, who oversees security, till Nov. 9
to justify the Oct. 26 edict. It would bar
Palestinian workers from the buses they
ride from and to their homes in the West
Bank - territory Israel captured from
Jordan in the 1967 Six-Day War and which
Palestinians seek as part of their future
state.
The new guidelines take effect in
December.
The defense minister insists they wouldn't
be discriminatory or stop Palestinians from
holding jobs in Israel. But does the decree,
which also would require Palestinian work-
ers to travel via specific military check-
points when headed home, hold up under
the glare of public scrutiny? Israel has an
utmost obligation to protect its citizens, but
it must not quiver in the backdraft of settler
demands.
Jews living in the West Bank and their
local leaders have lobbied the Israeli gov-
ernment for the kind of public transpor-
tation order that Yaalon decreed. Their
motivation: crowded buses for Jews living in
the West Bank as well as claims by Jewish
female passengers that Palestinian laborers
harass them, according to a JTA report.
The Israeli government has boiled down
issuance of the order to the all-encompass-
ing rubric of security.
The Union for Reform Judaism quoted
reports from the Israel Defense Forces
Central Command noting that Palestinian
workers entering Israel don't endanger
security because the Shin Bet and the Israel
Police prescreen them before work permits
are granted. None of these workers has
been implicated in terrorist attacks inside
Israel.
If there's a legitimate, overriding security
need that demands the pending order - for
example, discernable threats - then great.
The directive would have a basis. But if sep-
arate bus lines are the byproduct of settler
prejudice, the decree should be rescinded.
The defense minister must either make
his case or drop the bus order.

❑

- Robert Sklar