Below please find a listing of the entire Centurion lecture series, along with the appropriate links to the webpages where you may listen and/or download each shiur:
The Jewish Week, a publication that I have not read since canceling my free subscription over a decade ago, published an article last week by one Irwin Mansdorf castigating an unnamed but “well known New Jersey rabbi” (i.e., me) for accusing Israel’s Foreign Ministry of “not being able to explain the Jewish right to Israel.” This, of course, referred to an article in Makor Rishon that I already referenced here (https://rabbipruzansky.com/2011/06/23/1107/).
The Jewish Week piece was sent to me. Mansdorf writes:
“They have a hard time explaining the right to Tel Aviv” he is quoted as saying. “They have no answers. They can’t explain why we are here.”
Of course, the esteemed rabbi is in Teaneck and not in Tel Aviv, but he
needs to look closer to home before sounding off against people who actually
live in, and fight and sacrifice every day for Israel.
One wonders why an intelligent, educated Orthodox rabbi needs the foreign
ministry to explain to him why Israel has a right to exist, but if he does not
know why, he is not that different from many of the young men and women living in his community.
Well, of course, I didn’t question “why Israel has a right to exist,” but rather why the Jewish people have a claim to a state in the land of Israel. And, of course, I can explain it but was rather perturbed to encounter some (by no means all) people in the Foreign Ministry who could not explain it. And if they can’t or won’t explain it to a group of rabbis, how do they hope to influence anyone ? He went on to say that Israel’s claim has to be rooted in law, rights, and the resolutions of the San Remo Conference in 1920 (how’s that been working out ?) and those should be taught and publicized throughout the world. And, to be precise, I never claimed that the totality of Israel’s statecraft should be grounded in the Bible, but rather that the Bible has to be the starting point, the foundation on which all other claims rest.
I sent a letter to the Jewish Week (after being informed of the article) which, typically, they did not see fit to print. Here it is:
To the Editor:
Irwin Mansdorf castigates an unnamed New Jersey rabbi for his criticism
of Israel’s Foreign Ministry and the failure of some officials to base the
Jewish people’s right to the land of Israel on the Bible, all the subject of a
recent article in Makor Rishon.
Alas, he spoke too hastily. Several days after the initial article, Makor Rishon published an interview with Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon in which he joined that criticism of his own ministry, admitted the previous failure of Israel’s diplomats to emphasize our Biblical rights, and stated that the rabbi “touched on the right point.” He added that he and Foreign Minister Lieberman have attempted to rectify this, and he himself asserts our Biblical rights in every forum he addresses.
Had Mr. Mansdorf read more carefully, he would have noted that the
original article never stated that Israel’s diplomacy should focus exclusively
on our Biblical rights, but rather it must start from that premise. It is the
religious idea that animates true support for Israel among Christian
evangelicals, Israel’s most fervent advocates in American life (and therefore
plays well in both Teaneck and Peoria), and it is the religious claim that is
at the heart of the conflict. His contention that the modern world will be
persuaded by the declarations of the San Remo Conference is, to be kind,
wishful thinking, and basing Israel’s claim in the amorphous “historic rights”
of the Jewish people (similar in kind, I suppose, to that of the Navajo, the
Incas and the Aztecs to their ancestral lands) has not and will not persuade
anyone. Perhaps that is why Israel’s rights are being delegitimized across the
globe, and perhaps it takes someone living out in the world to call attention
to a feeble argument, expose its weaknesses, and suggest one more persuasive.
Unfortunately, living and working in an echo chamber does not usually
afford one the capability of re-evaluating and, if necessary, discarding failed
approaches to statecraft. Deputy Minister Ayalon deserves praise and support
for overcoming this malady and making important changes to Israel’s diplomatic posture.
One question that arises is: why would the Jewish Week print an op-ed by an obscure writer about an issue raised in an even more obscure Israeli publication in Hebrew, something that the average Jewish Week reader either could not or would not read ? The answer that presents, based on experience, is that someone in the Foreign Ministry unofficially commissioned this article in order to undermine the initiative of the unnamed rabbi and those supportive of it.
But what most interests me here is the persistence of some Israelis (usually the ones without real answers) in inserting into any discussion of policy or strategy the fact that I, and some other “critics,” do not yet live in land of Israel. Snarkiness aside, the point being made is that we do not have the right, and should not have the gall, to comment on Israeli affairs or to offer suggestions that will not impact our lives but will endanger others. (Some American olim adopt this stance within minutes of receiving their identity cards, and even before they have left Ben-Gurion Airport.)
That obvious attempt to avoid a substantive discussion (akin to a patient telling an oncologist “if you don’t yourself have cancer, then don’t tell me what to do!”) fails to convince for several reasons that I outline here, hoping that that particular tactic is forever retired from public discourse.
Why do Jews throughout the world have the right to comment on Israeli affairs ?
We are educated that all Jews are one, and that we are all bound to each other by fate and destiny. Therefore, the survival and security of Jews in Israel matters to me, as does the survival and security of Jews wherever they live in the world.
I have children and grandchildren, sisters and brother-in-law, nieces and nephews, and cousins who live in Israel. Several have served in the IDF, and one fell in battle. I certainly have a right and interest in seeing to their well-being in any way I can.
We are educated that all Jews have a share in the land of Israel. I have an obligation to preserve my share, regardless of whether I am physically present at any moment in time.
Israelis, when it suits them, have consistently requested that American Jews become involved and outspoken about all Israeli affairs. Among them are Ariel Sharon, Yitzchak Shamir, and Benjamin Netanyahu, who have personally spoken to me, and requested my involvement – each at different stages of their careers, and when it advanced their interests. Some have changed their tune when it did not suit them. Thus their objections are clearly situational and not categorical. One who never changed his tune was the late, sainted Chief Rabbi Avraham Shapira, who insisted to me that the battle for the hearts, minds, and support of Americans is critical to Israel, and for now, that was my battlefield that I could not abandon.
Israel solicits tourism from America and across the world, and a number of American tourists have been murdered by Arab terrorists in Israel. Obviously, then, Americans who visit Israel should be allowed a voice in matters that affect them, such as security.
The battle against Arab-Muslim terror has gone global. It is no longer a domestic Israeli problem, and when Israel shows weakness – in Lebanon, Gaza, and elsewhere – it emboldens all terrorists and makes all Jews and Westerners more vulnerable.
Finally, and forgive my snarkiness: as an American, three billion dollars of my tax dollars are provided to Israel annually. If you don’t want my advice, then take your hands out of my pocket. The same goes for the numerous Israeli politicians of all stripes who come to solicit American-Jewish dollars for their causes.
These seven reasons should put to rest once and for all that lame contention of lazy thinkers that only seeks to stifle debate. Indeed, sometimes external critics can be more logical and cogent, as their analysis is not colored by the wearisome circumstances of “living under the gun” that often produces wishful, delusional thinking that engenders impetuous and reckless actions, also known as the Oslo process, the Gaza expulsion, etc. But Israelis should also know that what is uttered by foreign Jewish critics of our affiliation is said with love, respect, and a desire for Israel’s security and prosperity. It is motivated by love of the Jewish people and of the State of Israel.
Obviously, foreign critics lack the means to fully influence policy in Israel, but it is hard to argue that the average Israeli has any means of influencing policy in Israel, especially given the propensity of politicians to dramatically alter their convictions after they are elected.
Equally obviously, my critics are rights. I should live in Israel. But in dispensing advice or in trying to influence matters for the good, such a point is simply not relevant to this discourse. It is a tired argument that adds nothing to the dialogue and obfuscates rather than elucidates.
It should be given a speedy burial.
This past Sunday the Yankees held their annual Old Timers’ Day, one of the great rituals in sports owing to the Yankees’ status as baseball’s most illustrious franchise. By coincidence of sorts, I attended at the same time a personal version of Old Timers’ Day: a reunion of our yeshiva elementary school class in celebration of the 40th anniversary of graduation. Besides the obvious distinctions – we haven’t yet produced a Hall of Famer – there were others, and similarities as well.
The Yankee fans greeted most of the Old Timers warmly. There were some players who weren’t “Old Timers” in any meaningful sense; the stars of the 1990’s championship teams are all younger than I am, and some looked still fit to play. Others – an elderly and frail Yogi Berra, a Whitey Ford who is truly white, a clownish but white-haired Joe Pepitone – had aged dramatically. Some received raucous applause – Bernie Williams, Joe Torre, David Wells, et al. But why? Is it simply gratitude for past performance? Certainly, the fans relate to the players more personally than the players relate to the fans. The players, after all, are performers, like actors. Yet, it is hard to imagine cheering wildly for a great actor or actress because of a role played thirty or forty years earlier. Actors move on to other roles, and baseball players come and go. The Yankee fan – like fans of other teams and in all sports – root their allegiance in the team first and in
individual players second. The team has moved on, like all teams do, even if it
properly acknowledges the past. So why are people touched by these events, by
seeing familiar but wizened faces long past their prime ?
Count me as skeptical at first about our class reunion – unusual because no recent class in our school had such an event and possible only because of the gargantuan efforts by the event “organizer,” his wife and sons, and our hosts. Such events usually require at least one person who is “meshuga ladavar,” passionate and indefatigable. We had it. And skeptical also because I am in touch with several classmates with whom I have a relationship, clearly not missing those with whom I do not. Nor am I moved by empty nostalgia; too often people
reminisce over the “glorious” past when they do not have much of a life in the
present and not many hopes for the future. Even my memories of those years had somewhat faded. And yet…
Fully two-thirds of our class attended. Most who did not either live in Israel or were attending other events on a busy Sunday in late June. Seeing these familiar faces – some of which I did not recognize but for the name tags they wore – brought a rush of memories. A trivia game – with details painstakingly compiled by the organizer, and to which I assumed I would have little to contribute precisely because I thought I remembered so little – reawakened long-forgotten names, places, events and experiences. It was then I realized the attraction of these events – whether held at Yankee Stadium or equally posh accommodations in suburban New Jersey: by re-living the events of youth we get to feel young again, but without the anxieties and uncertainties of the impending future. And the memories are almost all pleasant, and even more pleasant than the events actually were long ago.
The fans cheered their former heroes, not only for what they had done and for the thrills they had provided but primarily because in seeing them, our joyful
youth once again came alive. Seeing Graig Nettles reminded me of the time I
missed a home run of his at Yankee Stadium because I had to walk my date to the rest room. (I married her anyway.) Rick Cerone inevitably evoked images of the deceased Thurman Munson, whose position he filled the year after Munson was killed in a plane crash on Tish’a B’Av in 1979. And the presence of Berra,
Ford, Moose Skowron and others reminded all of those fixtures of youth who have passed away – Mantle, Maris and the rest. A now 60 year-old Ron Guidry and many other were living reminders of the passage of time for all of us.
Unlike these players, whose primes ended long ago and whose achievements are mainly in the past, our class revived our younger years but marveled at the present – the children and grandchildren we have spawned, the careers (the gamut of today’s Jew – lawyers, doctors, businessmen, Rabbi) we have entered – and how especially our present was shaped indelibly but subtly by those experiences of forty years ago. In the flood of memories – of faces, teachers, classes, and special events – the past lived, and we were all reminded of how our formative years do mold us in ways that are not apparent for years to come. I, designated speaker, even referenced the Gemara (Avoda Zara 5b) that states that “one does not fully comprehend the words of one’s teacher until after forty years.” It is then that, matured and formed, even occasionally hardened by life’s tragedies, we realize the influences of bygone years were not bygone at all, but an essential part of our being, personalities and world view.
We don’t often get to re-live the past. Old Timers’ Day – baseball and personal – affords that opportunity to escape the present, to embrace what seems to be a perfect and idyllic past, and to momentarily re-enter what was at least a simpler time. We confront our youth but from the perch of adulthood, like looking down from the mountain to the place from which we ascended. I was moved to see old classmates, to bask in their successes and to recognize that even if we have grown apart our formative experiences forever bind us together. You can’t go home again, but you can sometimes glimpse the past more clearly through the prism of the present. And we become conscious that who we are today is the fruit of seeds planted many years ago by rebbeim, teachers, and, yes, classmates, that has ripened and blossomed over time.
That realization engenders a moment of gratitude that unleashes feelings of joy notwithstanding the wistfulness, and the bonds of a shared history with others that, apparently, can never be severed and will always be cherished.
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In an interesting week, I have been both attacked and defended by employees of Israel’s Foreign Ministry. What a strange turn of events, which tale follows.
Last month, I was part of a delegation of thirty rabbis who spent several days in Israel as guests of the Foreign Ministry, under the auspices of the World Zionist Organization. It was the result of a suggestion made by the new head of
the WZO (the first religious head of that organization founded by Theodor Herzl)
to the Foreign Minister that Israel should utilize the services of natural ambassadors – the pulpit rabbis across America – to get its message out. The usual channels do not work, and the pressure on Israel, cynical as it is, is intensifying. Israel is the only country in the world that has to defend its right to exist, defend its right to self-defense, and defend its right to its homeland – all to
a world that is losing interest in the Jewish national story and whatever
sympathy it once had.
Our group numbered ten from each stream, and many of the non-Orthodox rabbis (almost all creatures of the left) saw a side of Israel they had not seen before: Israel under siege, Israel struggling for peace, Israel willing to accommodate, and the aftermath of all the withdrawals of the last decades. It was a productive and rewarding week.
There was one question that I kept asking to the variety of speakers we met: why are you here? What right do the Jewish people have to the land of Israel ? I was shocked – but not surprised – by the number of Foreign Ministry officials – paid to explain Israel’s case to the world – who could not answer that question, which, of course, leads back to the Bible and the Creator of the Universe. Some did – of course – the religious bureaucrats, to be sure, and Minister Uzi Landau, an unabashed member of the old guard of Herut who heads a different ministry. They all base our right to the land of Israel in the Bible, in the fact that G-d
apportioned this parcel of real estate to the Jewish people for all eternity. One
even said he regular cites the first Rashi in Sefer Breisheet that states this
unequivocally. It is a point that I have harped on for months, that at least
frames the issue in dispute, and that – if uttered proudly – would at least
give Israel a credible argument in the world community. Otherwise, what the UN
giveth the UN can taketh away.
A number of FM honchos could not bring themselves to speak in those terms, likely for the best of reasons: they are secular and don’t believe in the Bible. And so they really have no answer to the question of “why are you here?” and can no more defend their right to Tel Aviv than to Hebron.
I spoke about this publicly, and a visitor from Israel present related this to a reporter for Makor Rishon, a religious-Zionist newspaper in Israel, who interviewed me two weeks ago, and then wrote in a banner headline on June 17, 2011, that “Israel’s Information Ambassadors do not believe in our rights to the land.” And he continued that, quoting me, that “many Rabbis were disappointed…they had no answers.” The visit failed in its objectives, and that I was “disappointed” that no one in the Foreign Ministry can justify Israel’s right to exist in the land of Israel. He also reported that I had been “attacked” by a ministry official, Martin Feld-Fleks.
He continued: “The Foreign Ministry did not like Pruzansky’s criticism,” and each defended their particular arguments. Yigal Palmor (ministry spokesman, and a fine and dedicated official) said he answered all questions, and does not remember being asked that. Fleks just countered with sarcasm that he does not need to be lectured by “Zionists” from Teaneck, New Jersey. (He is American by birth.)
Well. Sad to say (because these are my ideological soul mates), Makor Rishon got it partly right, and mostly wrong. Journalists are journalists, and truth always takes a backseat to whatever agenda the reporter advocates. If truth is the first casualty of war, it has been murdered again and again by journalists.
I wrote to him (and I trust it will be printed in this Friday’s paper) that he was much too negative, whereas the visit was mostly important and positive, and successful – well-conceived and well-executed. I don’t think most Rabbis were disappointed; certainly the non-Orthodox had other issues that were more important to them. There were a few officials who steadfastly refused to entertain the idea that we have a divine claim to the land of Israel, but Yigal Palmor was not of them. He was not asked “my question” because in his introductory remarks he already stated that we trace our claim to the Bible.
As for Flecks, a diehard secular, he didn’t “attack” me. We did have a sharp exchange when he asserted that “Israel has only two options; either create a Palestinian state or disappear.” I mentioned a third option (there are ten others) – grant legal resident status to those Arab residents of Judea and Samaria who accept Israeli sovereignty, much as you find in the United States where there are millions of legal resident-aliens who do not vote but are allowed to live, and designate the others of hostile elements to be treated as nations treat hostile enemies in their midst. (The US, of course, is unique; even illegal aliens are entitled to free health care and education, etc. but that is for a different essay.)
Fleks belittled that approach, to which I responded that he should not say
there are no other options but surrender (defeatism, in other words). When he
said that he would not want to play that hand in Vegas, I responded tartly that
the hand he did play – Oslo – destroyed 20,000 lives, engendered the loss of
substantial portions of the land of Israel, and left Israel more vulnerable
than before. He had no answer to that, which is why he chose the route of disparaging the “Zionists from Teaneck.” Of course, the questions stand, regardless of the provenance of the questioner, and the appalling inability to respond also stands, notwithstanding the position in the Foreign Ministry held by the answerer.
In the article, Fleks engaged in the gamesmanship of the diplomat, asserting that the “legal resident” status in the US that I mentioned refers to residents of Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia who are US citizens but cannot vote in Presidential elections. He is wrong on a number of counts, but surely he knows that I was referring to legal aliens (holders of Green Cards) who are not US citizens.
Here’s the interesting twist: a few days ago, Makor Rishon interviewed Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon (with whom we did not meet) and he said that, indeed, the Ministry has failed to emphasize our rights to the land of Israel, and that was one of the changes instituted by Foreign Minister Lieberman when he took office (obviously to the chagrin of some of the professional bureaucrats, who always know better and haven’t yet received that memo). Informed of my remarks and their rejection by his Ministry, Ayalon disagreed with his own ministry and stated that Rabbi Pruzansky “touched on the correct point” (naga ba-nekuda ha-nechona, in his words). “We do not emphasize enough our rights to the land… [but] I do that in every forum with which I am involved.”
Is the Ministry on the same page, all imparting the same message ? Obviously not, and in that sense it is an accurate reflection of the state of Israeli society. If you wonder sometimes why Israel’s message is incoherent, it is because it speaks
with different voices – even in official circles. Israel is the only country in the world where the Minister of Trade offers opinions on military matters, and
the Minister of Foreign Affairs on agriculture, and the Minister without Portfolio
on every other portfolio. Apparently, we were deprived of a national existence
for so long, that literally everyone has something to say about everything – including cabdrivers in Tel Aviv and even Zionists from Teaneck.
But peace can only come from pride, from knowledge, and from strength. Respect from the international community can only from pride, knowledge and strength. Strength derives from knowing our roots, and weakness oozes from the rootless. That is why it was so important that Prime Minister Netanyahu spoke with such passion and fervor, and showed a little backbone in the Oval Office.
It is only when we speak the language of rights that we can also claim justice, and only then will we have the inner strength and fortitude to overcome our enemies and usher in days of redemption and peace.
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