SERMON     Parashat Pedukei    March 15, 2024

Rabbi David Edleson   Temple Sinai, S. Burlington, Vermont

ISRAEL THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS

 

We all know Lewis Carrol’s Alice Through the Looking Glass where a young girl’s is mysteriously transported through a mirror into an upside world of absurd characters and parodies of power.  Tim and my trip to Israel felt to me like coming back out of the looking glass into a world that made sense and fit reality as I know it, and honestly, with that plane ride, it is a bit like travelling to another dimension.

 

When we got off the plane at Ben Gurion airport, we stumbled blurry eyed and exhausted down the long ramp to passport control, and here was our first glimpse of this other world.   All along the ramp were photos of each hostage.  When you get through, and look up, there are messages about the hostages everywhere.  

When you get to Tel Aviv, in the cultural center of the city, the Lincoln Center of Israel, there are letters over 20 feet high all in lights on the front of the Israeli  Philharmonic Hall that say BRING THEM HOME. 

 

When you go to the Museum of Art, the plaza in front is now called Hostage Square, you see the original empty Shabbat table is there, but there are also set up replicas of Hamas tunnels, lined with messages of love and hope for those still in captivity.   There is a big tent where survivors and the families of those held hostage sit and talk to whoever comes day after day, talk painfully and honestly for more than 150 days now. 

All of Dizengoff Circle, the hub of Tel Aviv, is a spontaneous display of messages, photos, candles, dolls, and other expressions of hope that the hostages come on, and all along Dizengoff, the 5th Ave of Israel, on the many many benches that line that street, there are human size teddy bears strapped and blindfolded,smeared with mud and blood and to each is attached a picture of a hostage. 

Everywhere you go, on buses, at all night convenience stores, on banners from apartments you see them: “Bring them Home.”  “No Winning without their return” “Get them out of Hell.” 

And it’s not only in Tel Aviv.  It is all over the country, everywhere you go. 

Here, through the absurd looking glass we have somehow fallen into, the hostages have become invisible, and actually worse than that:  they are now accused of having deserved what happened simply by nature of their being Israeli, of being Jews.   There, what is foremost on the minds of everyone we spoke to was the hostages.  There are people knitting around the clock to make a scarf that will reach from Gaza to Jerusalem, there are hand-crocheted yellow banners around countless trees.    If you don’t know the Hebrew word “Chatufim” hostages - you won’t understand the news, the radio, the conversations of people passing by.    It is palpable and the families are everywhere making sure they remain the focus.   To me, that felt “right-side up.”

 

I was invited to help lead prayer services and sing-a-longs at Hostage Square by my friends in the Conservative Movement that have organized daily Minchah services, and at each one, people came, Israelis, Americans, Canadians, French people.   For me the most moving part was singing songs like Lu Yehi or Ani V’Atah or Eli Eli with a spontaneous collection of Jews from around the world.  It felt so right.  Or hearing group after group go into the Tunnel installation to chant Acheinu Kol Beit Yisrael.   

 

Another thing that became immediately clear to us was that while here in Burlington, many people are shocked that we were going to Israel, once we there, it was clear just how many groups and mission are currently in Israel.  The daughter of a dear friend of ours works for an organization that does tours with the Reform Movement, and they had over 20 groups on the ground.   As soon as I put on Facebook that we were there, my phone blew up with all sorts of people that were there at the same time on a mission with their synagogue, or the Federation, or JNF, or the  URJ – any of a long list of organizations that have groups coming to Israel in solidarity and to learn what is happening there away from the through-the-looking glass versions we are fed on American news and on social media. 

 

And it wasn’t only Jews.  There were many Christian groups there. I also spoke to several Palestinians, some who owned stores where we shopped, others that were Uber drivers, others that came to events to release the hostages, and they were clear that they are Israeli, that they support the nation and that the rest of the world doesn’t understand what a threat Hamas and Iran are.  

 

I asked a couple of them if they felt Israel was Apartheid.   One laughed and said in Hebrew, “I own a store and sell to all sorts of people.  If Israel is Apartheid, they are failing at it.”   Another, put on the brakes or the cab, turned around in his seat and said, “If Israel is Apartheid, then what I am doing here?  What am I? What is my life?  It’s ridiculous.”  

It was also very comforting to have intelligent, vigorous conversation and debates with my old activist and leftist friends there.  There is tremendous rage at Netanyahu, but there is also absolute consensus that the war must continue.   Not one person I met supported a cease-fire unless it was temporary and for the release of hostages.  Every agreed that going into Rafah was absolutely necessary.   And these are very lefty peace activist people.  

 

They described that Israel itself had fallen through some sort of looking glass during the pass 15 years when everyone just became used to living with sirens going off, with regular missile attacks, and that they had become numb to a status quo that was not sustainable and they hadn’t really realized it.  For them, October 7th was a jarring, traumatic awakening from just accepting the status quo, the occupation, and the clear signs that trouble was coming. 

 

One friend, Professor Dalia Marx who we spend the first Gulf War with in a sealed room with gas masks on, and who recently edited the new Reform Siddur in Israel, had just gotten back from teaching in Germany.  What she noticed was that on the news there, all that they showed were pictures and videos of the destruction in Gaza and of Gazan suffering.  She pointed out that in Israel, they do not see nearly enough of those images because the media in Israel is supporting the troops.  She agreed there needed to be more, but also she said that what she saw was so obviously chosen to manipulate people emotionally and it was so constant and pervasive, that it was really clear to her that the media had a story they wanted to sell, and that facts and details were secondary to emotional messaging.   

 

We watched the Israeli news every night, and I noticed it as well.  There were images of the destruction, but also images in Gaza where things are still in tact. There were smart analysis of the actual numbers being reported by the Hammas Health Ministry in Gaza.  There were interviews with Palestinians from Gaza and in Gaza, there were stories of Israeli troops helping Gazans -  and there were very loud debates about the war and how it was being waged and about Netanyahu’s guilt in all this.  It was a much more intelligent and reasoned debate than almost anything I’ve seen here. 

Since I got back, I can’t watch American news because it is so obviously meant to manipulate, not inform.  There are some very upsetting interviews and articles with Jewish journalists from the Times, AP and elsewhere sharing how much the news is driven by the ideological agenda of the agency.  My friend who was the head of the AP in Israel for over a decade, shared the same thing.  That is what has been upsetting me most, to be honest.  The news is not news; it is ideology. 

 

I also found that in all the debates, whether my friends or on the news, from the right to the left, everyone agreed that the war had to continue and that Rafah had to be attacked.  Thirty to forty percent of Hamas fighting battalions are in Rafah so there is no way Israel is going to just leave that so they rebuild to attack Israel again, as they have said over and over they will do. What Israelis now agree is that they can’t live under constant threat of attack.  To some that means more military.  To others it means working toward some end to the occupation.    But we should know that regardless of what Biden, or Schumer might say, Israelis are absolutely united that Hamas as an active threat has to go.  We need to be prepared for that.

 

So while there is great anger at Netanyahu, it is not so much about how the war is being waged, but about his tearing the country apart before the war and his government’s absolute and abject incompetence and failure in security.  

Since I got back, I’ve had Jewish people tell me that Israel is now a fascist authoritarian country.   While it is absolutely true that there are some clear restrictions on the media about supporting Hamas, there are also signs against Netanyahu and his government everywhere.  On buses, on bus stops, in giant billboards and kiosks there are pictures of Netanyahu with the words “You are in charge.  You are guilty.”  

I can’t imagine posters against Putin in Russian or against the Ayatollah in Iran, and certainly not against Hamas in Gaza or the West Bank. Israel is flawed and it is rowdy, but fascist and authoritarian?   Only people that have never met Israelis would think that is even possible.  Remember, everyone serves in the army, so what the military does is widely known and discussed.  When Israel was accused of firing on Palestinians looking for food, more than a day before new outlets took back that accusation, I knew what had happened from Israeli friends who children are in Gaza.  There are no secrets in Israel. 

 

Far from being about any cease fire, the most vigorous debate in Israel was and is about the Ultra-Orthodox exemption from army service.  There is a groundswell of rage at the Ultra Orthodox from claiming their study at Yeshiva also protects the country, and if there is one thing likely to bring down the government during the war, it is the intense political pressure to make mandatory service in the army mandatory for everyone, including the Ultra Orthodox.   Israelis all know and accept that there must be a war in the North in the next year, and that requires everyone to share the burden.  Israel needs soldiers.   Already, combat and tank units of women are getting lots of celebrity, media attention, and music videos.   

 

Another thing that was comforting and “right-side up” was the overwhelming sense of unity and shared responsibility, and a profound sense of betrayal at how the world has reacted, particular mass protests accusing Israel of genocide before a single bomb had been dropped, and while Israel was still fighting terrorists inside the country.  One of the sad things about the leftist reaction to the massacre of October 7th is that it has only served to reinforce the Israeli Zionist narrative that only Jews can be counted on to defend Jewish lives, and that when it comes down to it, the world will turn on us and blame us for our own suffering.  That is what got the Zionist movement going in the late 1800’s with the Dreyfus Affiar,  and it is a narrative that cuts deep, especially in Israel. 

Sadly, while I don’t totally agree with that, I fear that they are more accurate there with their pessimism than we are here with our eternal optimism.   

When people would ask us why we were there, and we would tell them, they said over and over, “Thank you” and then something like “We have to protect one another because no one else is going to help us.”  And then “Am Yisrael Chai”.   People everywhere called one another “Achi” my brother, including women calling other women that, and Israelis calling Palestinians and Druze that. 

And Israelis are deeply aware of the levels of antisemitism we are facing.  In part this is because it fits their Zionist worldview, but it is also because so many people there are from other places, particularly the US, Canada, France, England and yes, South Africa.  People said we are all fighting the war; we here with Hamas and you there with antisemitism.   

As Tim and I were walking down a street in Tel Aviv, Aretha Franklin came blaring out of one of the stores and we started singing along.  A guy behind us ran up and in American English asked us where we were from.  We said Vermont, and he said, “I’m so sorry about what you are dealing with.  Can I give you a hug?”  It turns out his father is a professor at Columbia who said for decades that antiZionism wasn’t antisemitism, but has been calling him since Oct 7 and literally crying about how wrong he was. 

On a Temple Sinai note, we caught up with the parents of our former members Adam and Clelia Samowitz.  Adam’s parents just made Aliyah and said it was the best decision they could have made.  We have a lovely Shabbat dinner with them and Adam’s Sister who is VERY pregnant and her husband, Dodi.  When we Facetimed with Adam, I asked when they were moving and he said, “Believe me, I’m working on it.”

 

The last thing I want to share is the soundtrack in Israel.  I’ll do a class on this soon, but tonight let me just say that popular music is as central to Israel as it is to the US, maybe more so, and since Oct 7,  songs from the Yom Kippur war have been remade and sampled, and there is so much music everywhere and people sing along to it.  There are angry vengeance rap songs like Harbu Darbu, and trance dance songs about the Nova festival by Omer Adam and the famous producer  “Infected Mushroom.”  

There are also songs that are profoundly spiritual.  I think one of the unexpected results of October 7th is that there is a new spiritual religious awakening that started at least a decade ago but now is much wider.  Young very secular Israelis now will join in on prayers, and play deeply religious music on their radios.  One song that played over and over and over is a beautiful song from before the war, but that has taken on a new potency since.  It is called “My Heart” and is by Ishay Ribo but released as a duet with Omer Adam. 

They played it at the rally in DC and it is the background to tons of commercials on TV.   It is absolutely beautiful, and since there is no way I can sing it, I wanted to play it for you.  [LINK]

My teacher, Yehuda Kurtzer, said something very wise  about music.  He said that where debate and the news push us to pick a side, make up our mind, and have an opinion, music allows us to stay in the complex emotions and feelings of what is happening.   I think this song really captures that insight.  Music  is the magic that lets us stay in the looking glass, not on one side of the other, but to feel the pull and the promise of both.

 

 Shabbat Shalom.