6 | MARCH 23 • 2023
1942 - 2023
Covering and Connecting
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PURELY COMMENTARY
continued on page 8
guest column
Taking Sides on Israel’s Crisis
of the Judiciary
A
merican Jews, you
have to choose sides
on Israel,
” declared
Thomas Friedman (3/7/23) in
the New York Times for all the
world to read. He adds, “Israel is
facing its biggest internal clash
since its found-
ing, and for every
rabbi and every
Jewish leader in
America to stay
silent about this
fight is to become
irrelevant.
” While
I agree with
the opinion writer that Jewish
leaders must speak against the
government’s efforts to under-
mine the judiciary, we must also
ensure that the “side” on which
all of us fall is on the side of the
success of the Jewish State of
Israel.
Friedman calls Prime Minister
Netanyahu’s efforts to limit the
role of the judiciary a “putsch.
”
Israeli scholar Yuval Noah
Harari calls it “an antidemo-
cratic coup” (Washington Post,
2/23/23). In fact, many of Israel’s
leading thinkers are marching
in protest alongside hundreds
of thousands of others. Most
recently, in an unprecedented act
of resistance, Israeli reservist Air
Force pilots are refusing their
call to service if the Netanyahu
government continues its assault
on the Supreme Court.
Personally speaking, many of
my Israeli teachers and friends
— Torah scholars and dedicated
citizens — are outspoken in their
condemnation of the proposed
changes that would, in effect,
eliminate, impugn, or threaten
the rights of Israeli citizens and
especially its minorities. After all,
in teaching the world that each
person is created in God’s image,
Jews were the first to affirm the
dignity of every human and the
subsequent notion of inalienable
rights. What Israelis are also pro-
testing are the coalition politics
that empowered extremists to
gain significant ministry posi-
tions and influence the policies
of a nation-state whose major-
ity voted against them. I share
my teachers’ and friends’ fears
and thus their objections, and I
believe similarly that we should
condemn extremist behavior and
rhetoric whenever and wherever
we see it.
Friedman demands that we
choose sides, but it’s unclear
between which two sides he is
demanding we choose. Though I
might disagree with policy deci-
sions of the current coalition and
express those concerns to my fel-
low Jews, I will continue to travel
to the Jewish State for my own
learning and spirituality, and I
will continue to bring children,
teens and adults there to benefit
from the powerful mark Israel
leaves on the souls of all who
open themselves. What does it
mean to “choose sides” when I
believe that a positive relation-
ship with Israel is vital to Jewish
life and that Judaism demands
we perpetuate the well-being
of the first Jewish state in 2,000
years?
Moreover, someone once
said that to be a Jew is to live
with your passport at the ready.
Jew-hatred is rising dramati-
cally in the U.S. While we hope
that America is different and
while the post-World War II era
Rabbi Aaron
Starr
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