Don't Equate Israel with Hamas...

If you look at the language used in Parshat Eikev, you might notice that it emphasizes the role we are to have in the world.  Take a look at Chapter 10 verses 12- 19.  The relationship we have to G-d is related to spreading through our actions the concept of a G-d based morality.  You’ve probably heard our task described as “spreading ethical monotheism”.  As Telushkin and Prager wrote in their book, Why the Jews, “This means in essence that the Jews must make the world aware of two basic principles; ethics need G-d and G-d demands ethics.” In other words, although we are not in the business of converting others to Judaism, we should be in the business of attempting to influence the moral values of non-Jews, not through force but through standing up for goodness and opposing evil.

I think it is possible that such language might make many people uncomfortable, especially if it is felt that ethics are merely relative, depending upon one’s outlook on any given day.  The Torah does not leave us with that message.  It is very precise, the basic concepts found in the 10 commandments if followed by all, would provide humankind with a path for living that would display the moral order in the universe.  These values are designed to help repair the world.

When we speak about tikkun olam, the act of repairing the world, we seem to understand that possessing this role is also the very reason that we are so hated.  The role itself is designed to bring oneness (although not monochromatic oneness) to the world.  It is a role which is designed ultimately to bring peace among diverse groups. It is a role that is at odds with the end goals of tyrannical regimes, terrorist groups that demand oneness based on a value system devoid of morals. The oneness of tikkun olam  believes in the values of freedom and equality.  The oneness of tyrannical regimes does not!

For the world to approach the designs of a terrorist organization like Hamas as if it is morally equivalent to the moral designs of the Jewish nation is contemptible.  To describe Israel by comparing her to the Nazis in Poland is to ignore the fact that Israel is a democratic nation living in a neighborhood that is not.  For many in the world to attempt to forget that there is a fight going on for the very existence of a country whose declaration of independence states:

THE STATE OF ISRAEL will be open for Jewish immigration and for the Ingathering of the Exiles; it will foster the development of the country for the benefit of all its inhabitants; it will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel; it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions; and it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations

and to equate Hamas’ goals to be on the same moral high ground is disgusting.  It shows a lack of understanding what the charter of Hamas means when it says in article 7:

 “ The  Islamic Resistance Movement aspires to the realization of Allah's promise, no matter how long that should take. The Prophet, Allah bless him and grant him salvation, has said:"The Day of Judgment will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. “

As we watch the events unfolding in history, and see what appears to be an unleashing once again of anti-Semitism in the Middle East, many areas of Europe, and the rest of the world, perhaps we should take heed to the words of the French Catholic theologian,Jacques Maritain, “Israel….is to be found at the very heart of the world’s structure, stimulating it, exasperating it, moving it.  ….it gives the world no peace, it bars slumber, it teaches the world to be discontented and restless as long as the world has not G-d, it stimulates the movement of history…..It is the vocation of Israel which the world hates.” The Israel about which he speaks is not the State of Israel, rather Jews!

Joseph Telushkin and Dennis Prager, feel that Jews have played the role of being moral challengers for millennia.  Their analysis goes like this:  “The Jews might be described as humanity’s miner’s canary.  Just as the death of canaries warns miners of noxious fumes, so the death of Jews warns civilized nations of noxious moral fumes.”

What would happen if we Jews actually succeeded in disseminating our message that the world should be filled with goodness, freedom, and equality, as well compassion for those who have not? What would happen if we could actually influence the world to see that ethics are not relative; that they transcend our personal outlooks? What would happen if we could help the world realize that the religious massacres taking place in various locations on the globe are not the result of a belief in ethical monotheism?  Could we break the pattern of a world that has over the centuries disliked our role in history? We might not be around to know that answer, but I refuse to give up the hope that it can happen. We must not give up letting the world know that there is no moral equivalency between those who hope for a world at peace and those who desire to conquer the world through force.

Shabbat Shalom.