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August 14, 2007
Israel Office
SHATIL
Weekly Message
The romantic vision of Israel as a political and social paradise has long faded. External threats, internal divisions and growing economic gaps all contribute to the complex landscape. Yet, even as the complicated nature of Israeli society is increasingly acknowledged and internalized by the vast majority of Jews, there are still those who fear that drawing attention to Israel's flaws will compromise the state's potential for survival.
I was reminded of this phenomenon as I was listening to a discussion triggered by the reading of one of the "dark" sections of this past week's Torah portion. Deuteronomy chapter 13, verses 13-19 instructs the Israelites, after proper investigation, to kill all the inhabitants of a city of evil-doers. To our modern sensitivities, such collective and consequential punishment seems barbaric and violative of core human rights principles.
How do we respond to such passages? We can skip over them, much as my teachers did when faced with the prospect of teaching about rape or incest as described in the stories of Genesis. We can accept the interpretation of the Talmudic rabbis that, given the difficulty in proving the case of an evil city, the prescribed punishment was never applied in an actual case. Or we can grapple with the reality of a text that is difficult and acknowledge that parts of these formative texts require that we confront the realities of thousands of years of historical evolution.
From my perspective, the strength of our tradition is that, even when faced with difficult texts, historical realities or contemporary problems, we do not run away from them, but confront them in a manner that allows us to improve our societies and the world we inhabit. Thus, as someone committed to Israel's survival and to engaging traditional Jewish texts, I am proud of the role that the New Israel Fund plays in acknowledging Israel's problems and supporting those who are trying to solve them.
The existence of these "dark" sections of the Bible should also make us wary of those who select portions from the sacred texts of other traditions as a way of delegitimizing them. For example, too many Jews these days are quick to denounce Islam based on a warped reading of the Koran, without making the effort to understand and engage the text, as many Islamic scholars are now doing.
In this week's NIF News, we report on new measures announced by the Israeli government intended to end the humiliating treatment of non-Jewish passengers at Ben Gurion International Airport. We also report on an appeal to the Supreme Court against police roadblocks in Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem. SHATIL highlights its new UN status, its promotion of a fair national budget and its support of a new think tank formed in response to the privatization of the Israel Electric Corporation.
