The Conference of Presidents, one of our most right-wing pro-Israel groups, has managed to organize five Jewish religious denominations including the putatively-liberal Reform and Reconstructionists for a High Holiday rabbinic statement that lays the groundwork for the Israeli government’s march toward war with Iran. I always thought the High Holidays were a time of chesbon nefesh, when you contemplated in tranquility your weaknesses of the past year and resolved to do better in the coming one.
The joint statement does away with that concept–unless you believe that the past year in which the Obama administration attempted to engage Iran diplomatically was an error and the way to go in the coming year was to punish all Iranians with the type of universal sanctions invoked by the world against Saddam’s Iraq. These sanctions, by the way, contributed to the death of 350,000 Iraqi children from 1990-2000 as documented by scientific surveys. Now that seems like fine use of the High Holidays: urge rabbis and Jewish educators to tell their flocks that Iran is a danger to the world and must be stopped either by sanctions or any means necessary. And we’re willing to punish Iranian children to do it. Have we forgotten the concept of rachmanut especially during these Days of Awe when we repeatedly invoke God’s mercy?? Not to mention the fact that the Rosh Hashana Torah reading invokes the Akedah, Abraham’s near-sacrifice of his son, Isaac. Shall we put Iranian children up on that altar too? Who will save them?
Ori Nir of Peace Now told JTA that Iran sanctions targeting the average citizen and not specifically the country’s leaders and government were:
“…Not only morally wrong but…also strategically perilous.”
If you belong to a synagogue, PLEASE write to your rabbi and tell him or her that you disagree with this statement and urge that if any message is delivered from your shul’s bimah, it be carefully modulated and nuanced, rather than bellicose and jingoistic. If you are a rabbi, please express your concern and displeasure at this one-dimensional anti-Iranian statement issued in your name.
Here is the political agenda suggested by the Common Call which urges Jews to engage in:
…Mobilizing their communities; contacting their elected officials about the importance of divestment from Iran and tightening sanctions against banks and industries that do business with Iran; writing letters to the editor and op-ed pieces supporting diplomatic and financial pressure on Iran; and displaying signage on institutional and synagogue property urging that we prevent a nuclear Iran.
It is quite interesting that Israel advocacy groups like the Conference of Presidents, under the tutelage of the Israeli foreign ministry, are emphasizing the issue of divestment from Iran. It’s as if that crafty political bouncer, foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman decided that if Israel-Palestine peace activists were going to support a divestment strategy against the Occupation, then he’d turn around and use the very same strategy against Iran. The only problem with this is that the Occupation, like South African apartheid, has simmered for decades. Unlike the Occupation, the world does not yet share any consensus about how to deal with Iranian nuclear development, and divestment does not, and will not resonate until it does. The fact that Malcolm Hoenlein, Avigdor Lieberman, Bibi Netanyahu and a bunch of naive American rabbis are telling the world to divest from Iran means very little in the greater scheme of things.
What is disingenuous about the statement is that it purports to agree with Obama administration policy:
The organizations declare that they support President Obama’s diplomatic initiatives, but…
In other words, those who signed this ill-conceived statement don’t support the actual current policy. But they support what they would LIKE the policy to be: draconian sanctions, increasing isolation, and if all else fails–a military attack. I should be clear that nowhere in this statement are those two words used. There is no mention of what happens if sanctions don’t work (they won’t). But for Israel’s purposes there doesn’t need to be such a reference. When George Bush began the march to war against Iraq he too was careful to couch his regime of sanctions and UN resolutions in modulated diplomatic terms. But many of us knew where he was going then just as many of know where Israel would like to go now.
The question is how many American Jews will be duped by these tactics into believing Israel does NOT want to or intend to attack Iran. In 2002, there were millions of Americans who drank the Bush Kool Aid on Iraq. They believed in the mushroom clouds and WMD that Bush’s team sold us. But I say now in 2009 we must not drink this forbidden drink unless we’re prepared to go down the same road to war Bush trod in 2003.
One passage of the Call to Prevent a Nuclear Iran, quoting the rabbi who organized the statement, grieves me and should cause other rabbis to take offense:
The religious leadership of our Jewish community, with one voice, is urging our people to continue all efforts to confront the danger posed by a nuclear Iran.”
If you are a rabbi, is this “one voice” expressing what you believe? If it isn’t, it is incumbent on you to raise your voice in your High Holiday pulpit for a sane articulation of the issues.
There is more blather in the statement:
“This statement reflects a broad consensus within the Jewish community in addressing the danger of a nuclear Iran.
No, what this statement reflects is the agenda of the pro-Israel advocacy organizations which have been shrying about Iran for the past few years. Now, it seems that every Jewish denomination has fallen in with Chicken Little to cry that the sky is falling and unless we knock out Iran’s nuclear capability the world will be embroiled in a nuclear Armageddon. Well, pardon me if a few of us look up and see the sky seems to be doing just fine though a tad stormy.
The Conference of Presidents, in the statement, urges rabbis and their congregants to participate in the nationwide September 24th Stand for Freedom in Iran program. Though this program appears to be a motherhood and apple pie call for Iran to end its human rights abuses, we should review a bit of the Conference’s past anti-Iran activism to give of the real views of the Conference toward Iran.
Malcolm Hoenlein produced a video last year addressed to Iranians calling on them to free themselves from the clerical yoke. In other words, the Conference’s director supports Iran regime change. Now if you’re considering how to address this issue in your pulpit this High Holiday, ask yourself how regime change would happen? Do you believe Hoenlein is calling for peaceful change within Iran? Of course not, he’s calling for overthrow of the mullahs by whatever means necessary.
Malcolm Hoenlein believes that Iran is evil, that Iran wants to carry out a nuclear Holocaust against Israel, that Israel is justified in using whatever means necessary to protect itself. Do you? I say to any rabbi considering using this Call this High Holiday: know who your friends are. They may not be your friends or real friends of Israel either.
I am not arguing here that Iran does not present a danger or that Iran has not engaged in egregious human rights abuses. I am arguing that there is only one way to deal with Iran and whatever outstanding issues we have with them: negotiation. Sanctions, blockades, divestment, war–these are all tactics that will fail. Some will fail with a dull thud. And some, if tried, will fail spectacularly leading to the spilling of much blood: Iranian, Israeli, perhaps American.
You may be right about sanctions etc. The problem is negotiations don’t appear to have worked thus far either. They may yet, of course, but your arguments against the ‘bomb, bomb Iran’ campaign will be stronger if you are clear about what should be done if negotiations fail. If, on the other hand, you think that if negotiations fail we should live with Iran potentially obtaining a nuclear weapon, you should state that as well.
I don’t see any way other than to live with a nuclear Iran if that’s what it comes to. There are serious Israeli analysts who’ve already come to such a conclusion. What we really need is a long range plan to encourage Iranian liberalization & democracy through engagement & encouragement of reformist forces. If a new regime can take power then we might be able to negotiate the same deal George Bush stupidly turned down from Khatami in 2003.
I’d also say that if the Iranians knew that the West was prepared to live with them going nuclear, there wouldn’t be much incentive for them to negotiate. In that sense, perhaps it’s important to carry a big stick in the negotiations, even if ultimately it won’t be used because the consequences would be too horrific.
My fear, in fact my almost conviction, is that Israel isn’t carrying a big stick that it won’t use. It’s carrying a big stick which it’s fully prepared to use. You & I may find the consequences too horrific. But that’s what I thought about Lebanon & Gaza as well. Who could’ve imagined beforehand that Israel would really turn both places into a smoking ruin? I think that Bibi is perfectly well prepared to risk the abyss in attacking Iran. I think he’s been bitten by the same hubris bug which bit Bush before he invaded Iraq. Bibi believes the consequences will be manageable somehow.
It’s about time I saw someone truly neutral and attempting to help in a humane and sensible way….without all the hate mongering and one side has to kill all the others attitude.
Katherine Magdangal (I’m on FaceBook)
In light of all this holier-than-thou indignation about Iran producing a nuclear bomb, I find quite incredible the smug silence regarding American and Israeli possession of many such bombs, and Israel of course, being a light unto itself, is not a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Also, can you just imagine another Dick Cheney or two, secularists though they may be, in command of U.S. destiny, along with assorted literal-minded Biblical adherents of whatever persuasion with nuclear weapons at their disposal? May God, or somebody in supreme heavenly command, have mercy on us all.
Sorry to say, that what you imagine – worst nightmare – is likely to come about.
David Michale Green in this article argues that Obama will probably be a one-term president, and that he will probably be succeeded by a Palin, or a Palin-like creature. {How ’bout a Palin/Cheney ticket?}
“Obama was a complete fool if he ever believed for a moment that his campfire kumbaya act was going to bring the right along behind him. These foaming-at-the-mouth lunatics have completely lost all sense and proportion, and were bound to viscerally hate any president left of Cheney, let alone some black guy in their white house. Meanwhile, centrist voters in this country seem pretty much only to care about taxes and spending, and so he’s lost them, too, without the slightest rhetorical fight in his own defense. And he’s blown off a solid progressive base by spitting in their eyes at every imaginable opportunity, beginning with the formation of his cabinet, ranging through every policy decision from civil rights to civil liberties to foreign policy to healthcare, and culminating with his choice not to even mobilize his email database in support of his policies.
So if he’s lost the left, right and center, just who does he think is going to be clamoring to give him a second term three years from now.”
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/09/05-5
Oh, boy, Ellen, how I long to disagree with you and David Michale Green, but though I have an unfortunately active imagination, it still won’t permit belief in that comforting old Tooth Fairy. We are inundated with people of neo-con temperament, and, in their arrogant and maniacal belief system, they are quite pro-death, especially for others. I pray that as far as the Israeli lunacy goes Obama and crew will find the courage and political stamina and wherewithal to hold firm on the settlements – and I mean profoundly firm – and on other manifestations of Israeli Manifest Destiny, so that 1) we might survive some few more years in this 21st Century of ours and 2) Israel might also survive as an entity worthy of its propaganda.
Hi,
Not sure what you mean by “hold firm on settlements”.
Today’s headline: Israel to build 455 new apartments in West Bank.
By holding firm – do you mean – not increasing?
If so, interesting how the parameters of the conversation have been shifted.In fact, ALL settlements are illegal. The issue is not whether or not they are increased, the issue is they should all be dismantled.
As to “hold firm”, I simply meant that I hope Obama and team will not retreat from their stated defiance of settlement expansion in whatever form it takes. Yes, of course, there is the possibly larger picture of innumerable and ever-expanding unlawful settlements, already well established, one obvious bonus of which in the minds of the settlers and their enablers and fellow travelers is the destruction of a potential just peace – underscore “just”. But still, the old one-step-at-a-time approach, if indeed it is a large, solid determined, and uncompromising step, is sure a hell of a lot better than what’s been the modus operandi for too long now, to the ultimate detriment of Israel, the U.S. and the world, whatever else malevolent maniacs may believe. Wars and their concomitant violence have a way of metastasizing. Enough already!
It is asthonishing how much Israel and pro-Israelis want new wars and the arguments they use are mildly said absurd.
Surely Iran is no model of democracy, but compared to most Arab countries it is a much more democratic. So the democracy issue is not a very convincing propaganda tool for Israelis and Jewish organizations. In Iran over 60 percent of university students are women, so the women rights issue is not one the best arguments. When we watch the religious nature and behaviour of Israel, surely Israel and many of the Jewish organizations supporting the present order are the last to criticize other nations. To military Iran spends only a fragment of money Israel, Saudi Arabia etc use and has no equal military capacity like Israel has. It is Israel which constantly is speaking about bombing Iran, not vice versa.
The list of organizations leading and partners in Stand for Freedom in Iran is hilarious.
http://www.standforfreedominiran.org/participating-organizations.html
Do Jewish Community Relations Council of New York, Zionist Organization of America, The David Project,
United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, Young Israel etc really represent credible human rights advocates. Organizations which openly support religious dominance, settlements, ethnic cleansing and military occupation and harsh treatment of millions in Israel/Palestine are surely not best human rights advocates in other countries.
Reality is Israel is more of a nuclear threat than anyone else in the world at present and that includes Iran.One day the whole world is going to tire of Israels constant aggression towards its neighbors and what then I wonder?Masada complex any one?
i dont understand how most americans support Israel. its really ridiculous. there is no strategic benefit. they are a settler/colonial state STILL in the 21st century.
if americans didnt get their history from movies (hate Arabs, love Jews; Jews are always victims, Islam is a death cult) etc.etc.
but then again, we cant stop our own wars of aggression as well so its really as much our fault as it is the Zionists who perpetually use emotional blackmail and rhetorical games to stall/obfuscate/etc. any meaningful discussion that would enlighten the public