1) As a Gentile and an advocate for Israel I would not make judgments for those more enlightened than myself. I am more of the opinion that I should respectively offer assistance. If it is declined, move on. If it is accepted, ask if our help is wanted. Then finally, if offered and accepted, learning where I am ignorant about the needs where I am offering assistance and asking the big question. What can I do to help? Is there a Torah-prescribed way to offer assistance to others especially in Israel so that we don't offend people and become another resentful, disrespectful American?

Mark Douglas Obenour

Dear Mark,

I appreciate the sensitivity behind your comments and concur that advice stemming from ignorance is likely to fall flat at best and be damaging at worst. However, as a Jew, I believe that my relationship with Israel is different than my relationship with other nation states in the world, despite close cultural similarities such as those held with Canada or Great Britain. I have feelings and opinions about China in regard to its treatment of Tibet and concerns about the Sudanese in regard to Darfur. I speak about these issues as an American and as a Jew. Yet those relationships are categorically different than my role as a member of the Jewish family when it comes to Israel. Israel is a sovereign state called into existence by both historical and contemporary Jewish communities. The fact that any Jew can automatically receive citizenship in Israel is part of the state’s fundamental DNA. Her national anthem speaks to the ongoing hope of the Jewish people and not just of her citizens (a challenge for a different conversation). As long as Israel acts and speaks in the name of the Jewish people, I am compelled to offer my perspective both from my understanding of the Torah’s values and from where I sit in the Jewish world. I strongly suggest all who care about Israel to share their hopes, their dreams and when necessary, their honest, intelligent and caring critiques.

2) Thank you for enlightening us with your wonderful, educational articles. I enjoy learning from reading them.
Now, I have a rather uneducated question.... How did Israel come to be a state? Zionists and Jews from around the world worked tirelessly to make statehood become a reality. But my husband also insists that after World War II and the Holocaust, the world needed a place for the remaining and surviving European Jews to have a home, a place to go in addition to immigrating to other countries. What is the truth to his argument that the UN had a major role, based on this reasoning? If that is so, why didn't we also reconstruct Germany for the Jewish survivors?

Celia Saunders
Dallas, TX

Dear Celia,

Ask a rabbi a question, get a rabbinic response. You and he are both right. Fundamentally, the goal of creating a Jewish state in the land of Israel predates World War II by almost fifty years. In 1897, Theodore Herzl gathered Jewish leaders from around the world in Switzerland for the first World Zionist Congress and launched the process that led to the creation of Israel. Writing in his diary the night of the opening plenary, Herzl reflected on the fact that it might take five, ten or even fifty years but a Jewish state was inevitable. Over the next few decades, Jews began returning to Israel to make real this dream, creating the kibbutz movement, the city of Tel Aviv and institutions such as the Hebrew University and a vibrant Hebrew press. As important, a proto-government was developed as an outgrowth of the World Zionist Organization, which established a framework for governance, elections and other institutions essential to a democratic civil society. When Israel declared her independence in 1948, these various initiatives were in place, ensuring the success of the young state.

It is also true that World War II and the Holocaust served as catalysts for the nations of the world to support and enable the creation of a state for the Jews. The newly founded United Nations was interested in reducing strife and violence around the globe. The UN was also particularly committed to supervising the reorganization of the former colonial map into nation states that would use diplomacy rather than conflict to resolve their differences. The British, who had served as custodians of mandatory Palestine from the end of World War I, asked the UN to resolve the competing interests between the Zionist and the Arab leaderships. On November 29, 1947, the United Nations voted to accept a partition plan that would create a Jewish State and an Arab State in this territory. The Jewish community accepted the decision and established the State of Israel on May 14, 1948, the day that the British departed. The Arab community, for many different reasons, including rejecting that the United Nations had the authority over the land, chose to not accept this plan and has been stateless ever since.

Two final comments. Some in the anti-Israel camp make the claim that the Palestinians have been forced by the world to pay the price for what was done to the Jews by the Germans during the Holocaust. In addition to the more than 3,000 year history of connecting Jews and the land of Israel, numerous documents demonstrate that the Jewish State was well on its way prior to the ascendance of Hitler in 1933. The other comment is that if Israel had come into being just ten years earlier, Jewish life in the twentieth century would be dramatically different.

1) Call this the perspective of a retired woman who has observed and participated for many years in one way or another. I'm not much interested in Israeli politics per se, but with the wisdom that can be garnered from Jewish learning which leaders might apply to every day decisions. At the same time, I hypothesize that it would be rare that a prominent Israeli politician would also be a scholar of Judaism, committed to its application. Historically, Israeli leaders have risen from the military. So, how shall the two be integrated in Israel?

Suzon R. Gordon
Altoona, WI

Dear Suzon,

The early Zionist leadership was very Jewishly knowledgeable. While rejecting traditional religious and halachic dimensions of Judaism, many had grown up in observant homes and had profound Jewish knowledge. David Ben Gurion, Israel’s first Prime Minister, was well known for his love of the Bible. The older generation (e.g. Shimon Peres) and religious politicians are still like this. Mainstream secular politicians may not have Jewish tradition as their explicit frame of reference, but sacred texts and Jewish historic experience do play a critical role in shaping public consciousness, debate and thinking. Today I participated in a Conference for educators. Dan Margolit, a famous Israeli journalist, spoke about the recent wave of corruption scandals in Israel. He was optimistic, saying that the firmness of the public prosecutor, the comptroller and other public figures would have a powerful effect in creating a new climate in the future. A secular man who is not Jewishly learned per se, Margolit closed his remarks by saying: “We may not become a kingdom of priests and a holy nation (directly quoting Exodus 19:6), but we will see a huge improvement in public standards.” He tacitly acknowledged that, while unattainable in its pure form, the goal is indeed the biblical vision.

2) I have heard that Americans are resented in Israel. Is that American Gentiles, American Jewry or just any American?

Mark Douglas Obenour

Dear Mark,

I hope that most Israelis will not have preconceptions of what a particular American they meet may be like. Some Israelis, like many people around the world, do have an ambivalent relationship with America, the country. Israelis might simultaneously respect, admire and want Israel to be like America, yet also resent, think poorly of and feel intruded on by America. These attitudes are based on stereotypes and an inability to recognize that America is a society with diverse views, sensitivities and values. Intercultural differences also play a role because in many respects, Israeli and American cultures are very different. Perceptions are divided roughly this way: to us, we are warm, direct and friendly, and you are distant, untruthful and shallow; to you, we are brash, rude and overbearing and you are respectful, discrete and sensitive. As to the Jew-gentile issue, a colleague was surprised when conducting research into why Israeli students might want to meet Jewish Americans traveling in Israel. He discovered that Israeli students would prefer to meet non-Jews (“real Americans”), but since only Jewish Americans were available, they were the next best thing. After the meetings, he discovered a change in attitude; the students felt a real bond with their Jewish American peers.