My new article on Linkedin “Israel’s Hopeless Fight against Terrorism”

Recently, we learned that the US government and the Palestinian Authority have resumed their economic talks after a five-year hiatus. According to the State Department, the talks will revolve around infrastructure development, access to US markets, US regulations, free trade, financial issues, renewable energy, and environmental initiatives. In Israel, some people are concerned that the funds will not go to their stated goals but to fund terrorist activities, while others hope that a higher standard of living for Palestinians will reduce their propensity for terrorism. I think that terrorism stems from hatred and the political goals of those who promote it. Therefore, more or less resources will have no effect on its intensity or frequency.

Look at Iran, Syria, Lebanon, and all the governments in the Near and Middle East. For them, terrorism is a tool, a means to gain power and further their goals. The Palestinians are pawns to be sacrificed when circumstances make it advantageous. For leaders in the Middle East, terrorism is a legitimate means to pressure rivals and enemies, a way to gain control. It is a dirty business, as is the business of funding it.

As for Israel, we have only ourselves to blame, since our internal division weakens us and emboldens our enemies. There is only one thing we can do to protect ourselves: solidify our cohesion, social unity, mutual responsibility and solidarity.

Instead of worrying pointlessly about what others are doing, we should rekindle the spirit of connectedness among ourselves. Otherwise, our “neighbors” will soon oust us. The social rules of the State of Israel must be those that guided us until the ruin of the Temple: mutual responsibility and solidarity. When Maimonides repeatedly emphasizes in his commentaries on the Mishnah that “All of Israel are friends,” he means it not as a metaphor, but to affirm the basis of our nationhood. Without it, we are strangers who have no place on this land since we are not a nation.

The only law that should apply in the State of Israel is “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Since we are still unable to live by it, we should at least strive for it. Our progress toward it will justify our presence here.

When we strive for unity and cohesion, we are “a light unto nations.” When we bicker and slander each other, we spread poison and bile throughout the world, for which the world then hates us.

We can make any hostile government or regime behave favorably toward us or the other way around. We do not need to cajole or cajole anyone into accepting us. All we need to do is work on our internal unity. The example we will set will earn us the recognition of the world and make our presence in our country welcome in the eyes of the world.
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Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “An Israel That the World Would Love”

Among the many divisions that plague the Israeli society, one of the fiercest is the dispute between those who want to define Israel as a nation state for all its citizens and those who want to define it as the nation state of the Jews. Currently, the chasm between them seems irreconcilable. There is a way to resolve it in a way that benefits both sides and which the world embraces, but to do that, we must revive the original spirit of Judaism.

Maimonides writes in Mishneh Torah that in ancient Babylon, Abraham discovered that a single force governs nature, but it divides into the two opposites that we experience as day and night, winter and summer, cold and hot, male and female, and so forth. He also discovered that when you realize that the opposites come from a single source, you see how they complement each other and together create our reality and maintain its balance and harmony.

Abraham told what he had discovered to anyone who took interest in his words. In those days, Babylon was in a social crisis and tensions and violence grew among its people. The book Pirkei de Rabbi Eliezer details the conflicts that Abraham observed: “They wished to speak each other’s language” as before, but “they did not know each other’s language. What did they do?” asks the book, “They each took his sword and fought one another to death. Indeed,” concludes the book and describes the inevitable outcome: “half the world died there by the sword.”

When Abraham introduced his idea that differences are inherent in nature and complement one another rather than compete with one another, many people in Babylon took to it and Abraham began to garner followers. Gradually, people from all over Babylon united around him. When he moved out of Babylon and headed for Canaan, still more people joined him along the way.

Isaac and Jacob, continues Maimonides in his description in Mishneh Torah, followed in Abraham’s spiritual footsteps. Under their leadership, the alien individuals became a nation united by the idea that opposites complement rather than compete.

These were the ancestors of the people of Israel. They were individuals who came from countless tribes and nations, cared nothing for each other, had no relation or affinity for one another, but believed in the tenet that opposites complement rather than compete, and this is the secret to nature’s vitality and harmony; this is the secret of life.

Eventually, they were called Jews for two reasons: One was that they settled in Judah, and the other was that the Hebrew word Yehudi [Jew] comes from the word Yechudi [united/unique]. The unity-above-oppositeness that they had attained made them a nation and gave them their strength.

Over time, Jews often fell from their sublime perception. When they were overcome by competitiveness and hostility, they became divided and weak, and other nations conquered and tortured them. When they restored their unity above oppositeness, they regained their strength and other nations venerated them.

The current State of Israel is rife with division and replete with clashing opposites. There is no Abraham to tell them to unite above their disputes, that opposites complement rather than compete, and that one-sidedness is their worst enemy. But if we want the State of Israel to persist and for the world to appreciate it, we must nevertheless return to our core tenet of complementary opposites.

Currently, the world hates us because instead of demonstrating how to make opposites complement, we are exporting high tech weaponry and cyberwar software. If we want peace to prevail, we must do it the way we teach Israeli officers to lead: by personal example.

Only if we realize that no one will win the argument over defining Israel as a nation state for all its citizens or only for the Jews since we are meant to complement these opposites rather than win the argument, only then will we be able to make peace among ourselves. And as we do so, we will find that the world welcomes our newly found unity and embraces the idea of unity above divisions. If, however, we insist on division, the world will divest from us, boycott us, and sooner rather than later, the country will dissolve.
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Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “Trump Calls a Spade a Spade”

The anger of many American Jews over Donald Trump’s remarks about American Jewry comes as no surprise to anyone. In a recent interview with an Israeli journalist, Trump quoted his father’s words that Jews used to have “a great love of Israel” but it had “dissipated over the years.” To this he added his own words: “I must be honest. It’s a very dangerous thing that’s happening. People in this country that are Jewish no longer love Israel.” He has said it before, and I think he is absolutely right when he says that the chasm between the State of Israel and American Jewry is very dangerous, not only for Israel, but also for American Jewry.

Many American Jews support anti-Israel movements such as BDS and Jewish Voice for Peace not only because they believe in the values that these entities purport to stand for. They support them because they are anti-Israel, and they are anti-Israel because they are ashamed of their own Jewishness. Every day, they move further away from Judaism until eventually they lose all connection to it.

When I say that they shun their Judaism, I am not talking about Jewish customs. I am sure many of them observe those, and still shun Israel. The shunning of Judaism has to do with rejecting the core of Judaism—the unity and mutual responsibility that Israel is obligated to show the world. Instead of caring for their brothers, they show concern for the enemies of their own tradition thinking that by doing so they are showing true Jewish values. Someone should tell them that their Muslim “friends” are not buying that. Muslims will not love them any better when they decide to wipe out the Jews.

This is the same type of Judaism that aroused the most intense hatred in the Nazis, and today’s American Jewry is going to great lengths to form a sequel. The few who understand this are moving out, some to Israel and others elsewhere. However, unless we unite above the chasms in our nation, there will be no safe haven for Jews.

When it comes to anticipating trouble, we have never been wise. We tend to bury our heads in the sand or sink into hubris and complacency. When trouble starts, it invariably gets worse and worse until there is a cataclysm. Only afterwards is there relief. It is all too bad that for all the times we have been through this scenario, we never seem to learn.

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Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “Among All Tensions – the Worst Is the One between the US and Israel”

Come December, we start thinking about the year that has passed and what we can look for in the coming year. When 2020 was coming to a close, people were optimistic that with Covid and all, 2020 was the worst we could have, and now that we have vaccines, things would be all good again. But by mid-January, memes started circling on social media saying “We’ve seen the sample, thank you, we want 2020 back.” Since then, matters have gone from bad to worse. If I had to sum it all up in one word, it would be “extremes.” 2021 has been a year of extremes. Yet, there is one peril that is destined to be more extreme than all, though it is still slightly undercover: the tension between the US and Israel. The former allies are on track to becoming hostile.

In the current US administration, there are people who not only disagree with Israel, but in my opinion, they disagree with Israel’s existence, though at this point, they will not admit it. I do not like it, but I cannot blame Americans for hating Israel. Through our own actions, we are turning our lives from pleasant and peaceful to painful and bloody. And because it will be so for us, it will be so for the entire world, as well.

Israel is at the center of the world. I do not say this because I live in it or because I am Jewish. It is at the center because of objective reasons, and history proves it. Mark Twain noted in “Concerning the Jews,” “…The Egyptian, the Babylonian, and the Persian rose, filled the planet with sound and splendor, then faded to dream stuff and passed away. The Greek and the Roman followed and made a vast noise, and they are gone. …All things are mortal but the Jew; all other forces pass, but he remains. What is the secret of his immortality?”

Similarly, John Adams, the second president of the United States, wrote in a letter to Francis Adrian Vanderkemp, “If I were an atheist, and believed in blind eternal fate, I should still believe that fate had ordained the Jews to be the most essential instrument for civilizing the nations. If I were an atheist of the other sect, who believe … that all is ordered by chance, I should believe that chance had ordered the Jews to preserve and propagate to all mankind the doctrine of a supreme, intelligent, wise, almighty sovereign of the universe, which I believe to be the great essential principle of all morality, and consequently of all civilization.”

Not only those two, but most people who study history acknowledge the centrality of the people of Israel in world events. There is a good reason for it, and one of the wisest people in contemporary Jewish history, Rav Kook, beautifully articulated it. In his book Orot HaRaaiah, he wrote, “Humanity deserves to be united into a single family. At that time all the quarrels and the ill- will that stem from divisions of nations and their borders shall cease. However, the world requires refinement, whereby humanity is perfected through each nation’s unique characteristics. This deficiency is what the Assembly of Israel will complement.”

Indeed, the role of the Jewish people, and the reason for its survival against all odds, is to bring the nations’ unique characteristics into a comprehensive wholeness and unity. Every nation that suffers from division blames it on the Jews because every person who feels hatred toward others subconsciously feels that the Jews are causing it. People cannot pinpoint the reason for their hatred of others—that it is because the people who were chosen to bring the light of unity to the world are squabbling among themselves—but they feel very clearly that somehow, the fact that they hate their neighbor is the Jews’ fault.

Meanwhile, the Jews are oblivious. Instead of working on our unity, we wallow in division and bond with our enemies in order to oust political rivals. When the world points a blaming finger at us, we point to our collaboration with our enemies as proof of our innocence.

But the world does not need our adulation toward enemies; it needs us to connect among ourselves. Internal unity and solidarity are the “refinement” that Rav Kook referred to in his words. This is the deficiency that we must satisfy. The world is looking for us to set an example. The mere fact that it is blaming us for its woes proves that it pins its hopes on us. If we show the way to unity, the world will follow. If we keep fighting, the world will fight, as well, and it will begin with fighting against us.

Yet, the world will not be better off if it decides to “punish” us for our sins the way the Nazis did. It will resolve to do it if we avoid our calling, but it will not make life easier on humanity. In the end, the relics of our nation, who remain after the near annihilation, will have to do what we can do now, before the storm breaks out.
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Question: Why does the special force contained in The Book of Zohar allow a person to reveal his true state and wake up faster?

Answer: Because The Book of Zohar causes us to look at the upper world through our world, see it in us, lay upon ourselves all the objects of the upper world, and be able to perceive everything that really exists. Now we perceive only a small part of the creation that is revealed to us. But how can we attain the hidden part?

Through this world, The Book of Zohar reveals the external world to me, and then I feel that what I perceived before was really just a dream.

Question: Our distorted perception of the world gives us the feeling that the world is outside of us. Does a person actually reveal all these levels inside?

Answer: In myself and only in myself. Today we feel the world inside of us.

Do you exist? I feel that you exist. Whether you really exist outside of me, I do not know. This is a question that science, psychology, and philosophy engage in.

Kabbalah answers it very simply and The Book of Zohar allows you to see it and feel it with your own eyes.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Individualist” 1/15/10

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The UN has issued another statement condemning Israel. However, we must understand that the main reason for the hatred of Jews is the fact that we are not fulfilling our purpose in the world, which is to explain to all nations how to achieve good connection and peace; otherwise, the world will slide further down its downward spiral.

The growth of antisemitism comes from the general law of development of humanity. If humanity has to develop and we do not sweeten this development through our correct behavior, then we cause hatred toward us. This is a law of nature.

Therefore, antisemitism will grow, and there is only one solution, which was described in the wisdom of Kabbalah and in the Torah thousands of years ago. We will not be able to escape from our mission. We have nowhere to hide. There is no place on Earth where we would be able to exist if we do not establish correct relationships.

Then it will influence all the nations of the world and they will look at us differently. Everything depends on the good and correct connection between Jews because the people of Israel were assembled from representatives of all the nations of the world. Only in this form can we oblige all nations to good association and connection, and then peace and tranquility will come to the entire world.

We are holding the key to happiness for the entire world. I cannot express how painful it is for me to see how people suffer and do not find solutions because they do not understand in what form nature operates and what interconnections exist in it. Yet, there is a solution. According to what the wisdom of Kabbalah and the Torah say nothing is required except for one thing: to bring the people of Israel to unity, and we will thus cause all the nations of the world to unite.

Unfortunately, it is easier for Jews to unite with their enemies and haters than with each other. After all, uniting with each other belongs to correction, and uniting with haters belongs to corruption. Our stony heart is drawn to corruption.

While we do not do that, nature will be beating us. Two days ago, more than hundred people died as a result of a tornado in the US state of Kentucky. In a few seconds, the city turned into ruins, an apocalyptic scene. And nature is already preparing more tornadoes.

It is possible to stop all natural disasters by uniting people. Let’s try. Maybe it will help right now. The force of unity of people is more powerful than any tornado, any natural disaster. It is even stronger than the upper force.

Any disaster—a hurricane, a financial crisis, a viral epidemic—all these are blows of nature in response to the lack of unity between people. The connection between people is the most internal force in the world, and if it is not sufficient, then nature reacts with blows.

Yet, people cannot unite because there is a group in humanity called Jews. This group is mandated to come to unity first and thus awaken the feeling in all the nations of the world that unity is the cure for all troubles.

Therefore, the nations of the world need to turn to the Jews and demand that they start working on their unification. This is what the United Nations is for. Instead of condemning the State of Israel, let them protest against the people of Israel all over the world for not working on unification in order to prevent natural disasters in all corners of the world in any form.

It does not matter in which country a Jew lives, in Russia, in America, or in Israel, whether he is rich or poor, any Jew who does not work on unification causes disasters in the world. Therefore, time is running out, we need to unite right now. Only if we show the entire world an example of unity, will we fulfill our purpose.
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From KabTV’s “Conversation with Journalists” 12/12/21

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Question: People in Israel have a short fuse that causes a conflict of desires and heightens anger. What is the right way to respond to anger?

Answer: This is due to lack of education. People simply have no patience and cannot control themselves. They are spoiled because we let our children do whatever they want, which is forbidden.

We need to teach and educate children how to cope with different hardships in life from a young age.

Question: We want to educate our youth to respond to anger correctly. What are we supposed to teach them?

Answer: We must teach them how to stop their anger.

Question: Is it better to run away instead of responding to the person in front of me?

Answer: Of course it is better, but we know how hard that is.

Question: Many marriage counselors say that it is important to know how to fight. How do you fight correctly?

Answer: That is correct. There is no getting closer and no peace without quarrels, but they have to go in tandem. We must learn how to set an example for one another.

I set an example by making an effort to overcome myself, and although I am angry, I relate to the other with love: “Love will cover all crimes.”

Question: Is it possible to relate to our partner with love when we quarrel?

Answer: It is a matter of practice.

Question: Where do you bring love from when someone is mad at you and hates you?

Answer: It is simple, we cover the rage and anger with love, but the love is inside so it is a matter of balance between the two.

The more I can play with either one, the more I must constantly play with them. I must not totally identify with the feeling of anger or of love but only have the two feelings operate in me so that I control these two ends together.
From KabTV’s “Conversation with Journalists” 12/12/21

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Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “The World’s Only Harm-Doers”

As I wrote some three weeks ago, last Thursday the UN passed the final resolution regarding its support for the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine (UNRWA). The tally, in a record vote, was 164 in favor of the resolution, and 1 against—Israel. The resolution was one of several votes, all of which condemn Israel very sharply, and one even declares that “the Palestinians are entitled to their property [since 1948] and to the income derived therefore in conformity of equality and justice.”

Two days prior, “expressing outrage over Israel’s continuing harassment of human rights,” the UN Human Rights Council has resolved to set up “an international, independent commission of enquiry to investigate, ‘all alleged violations and abuses of international human rights law leading up and since 13 April 2021.’”

If the entire world, not figuratively but literally the entire world, tells us that we are evil, that we are the only harm-doers, and we see no fault in our actions, shouldn’t we at least ask why the false perception? Could it be that it is our perception that is false? How come we never ask ourselves these questions and automatically reproach the entire world of being antisemitic? If it is antisemitic, and if it wants our destruction, why did it give us a country in the first place? And if it gave us a country, why does it now want to take it away?

It is not that Israeli copywriters are worse than their Palestinian counterparts, or that Israel does not allocate enough resources to explain its position. The simple truth is that in the eyes of larger and larger portions of humanity, we are the only harm-doers in existence. It makes no difference what we say or how we say it, since if we are the only ones to blame, then there is no one else to blame but us for everything that’s wrong with the world.

If this is the case, we should ask ourselves why the world thinks so. It does not think so because there is a Jewish state, since during the Holocaust or during the expulsion from Spain there was no Jewish state, but still we were regarded as the only harm-doers in the world. The world does not think so because of the libel that we pollute wells that cause pandemics, since the world hated us before and after the pandemics. The world also does not hate us because of anything that has to do with Christianity, since Muslims and even complete atheists readily hate us. Finally, the world does not hate us because of our race since there was antisemitism long before there were Nazis and racism.

The world changes its pretexts for hating Jews faster than the seasons change, but our own sages never change their minds, not once. They, too, think that we are the only harm-doers in the world, or as they put it, “No calamity comes to the world but for Israel” (Yevamot 63a). However, they also tell us why they think so, and their reasoning has never changed.

The only purpose of our people is to serve as “a light unto nations.” Once we united “as one man with one heart” and established our nationhood, we were tasked with setting an example to humanity. We, the nation that emerged from an assortment of strangers who hated one another, became a proof that with great resolve, people can rise above their hatred and unite.

Through our unity, we formed a society based on mutual responsibility and loving our neighbor as ourselves. We fell out of unity and rose back to unity, and along with our ups and downs, we lost and regained our sovereignty in the land of Israel. Accordingly, our sages never pinned our downfalls on foreign tyrants; they always attributed them to our disunity. For instance, they did not write that Titus destroyed the Temple, but rather, “The Second Temple … why was it ruined? It was because there was unfounded hatred in it” (Yoma 9b).

We should have no qualms about it: If we maintain our division, the resolutions of the UN will grow increasingly hostile and increasingly emphatic toward the Jewish state. Soon, the nations will declare, by a huge majority if not unanimously, to give Palestine to the Palestinians and that Resolution 181, to divide the land between Jews and Arabs, was an unfortunate mistake.

As long as we are not being what Jews are meant to be—people who unite above their division—the world has no need for us. Once it gives up on our ability to set an example of unity, it will resolve to eliminate the Jewish state and expel its Jewish residents.

If we care about our future more than about the pleasure of righteous indignation, we should muster the resolve to show the world that Jews who hated one another just a moment ago can truly be as brothers.
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My new article on Linkedin “We’ve Turned Ourselves into Temporary Residents”

A few days ago, the United Nations General Assembly passed a (yet another) resolution denying Jewish ties to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Instead of referring to it by its Jewish name, Temple Mount, after the Temple that King Solomon built there 3,000 years ago, as well as by its Muslim name al-Haram al-Sharif, it will now refer to it only by the latter. I cannot blame the world for doing so. When we turn ourselves into temporary residents, shun our historic task and obligation to the world, we cannot complain that the world wants to evict the seditious tenants.

We keep looking for better diplomatic ways to explain Israel’s position, to show that we’re valuable to the world and that we have a historic right to live here. We don’t understand that the world does not see things the way we do. It does not care about history, and it does not care about the “startup nation” we have built here. It sees us as a belligerent, invasive nation that has taken what doesn’t belong to it by exploiting the world’s remorse over the Holocaust.

We are arrogant and patronizing to think that the world owes us something. The world doesn’t think so, and the fact that we are not even asking why, but keep “explaining” to the nations our position, which they are clearly reluctant to hear, illustrates what conceit can do to a nation’s sense of judgment.

The thing we are getting absolutely wrong is our obligation to the world. We were placed here to build “a national home for the Jewish people,” just as the Balfour Declaration says. Regrettably, instead of building our home together, we are fighting one another. We’ve come to a point where we care more about destroying each other than about defeating the enemy. If we are not doing what we are meant to do here, then we have no reason for being here. This is how the world sees it, and the sooner we realize it, the better.

The current UN resolution focuses on Jerusalem and the West Bank. But more UN resolutions are on the way, and they will obviate our right to sovereignty on any part of the country that was not given to us in the 1947 UN Partition Resolution. Not long after, the UN will declare that Jews are an alien entity in Palestine, and that Palestine is where Israel used to be.

As long as we are here, we can reverse the trend, but we haven’t got much time. The only way to change the world’s view about Jewish presence in the Middle-East is if the Jews begin to act as they are expected. We were sent here to rebuild our nation, to reestablish our union, which formed a remarkable nation out of complete, and often hostile strangers who had decided to unite under the motto, “as one man with one heart.” This is our legacy, and only if we are true to it will the nations welcome us here, including the Arabs.

If we wish to work on our unity, then we have every right to declare that this is our goal in being here and that we will not allow anyone to interfere with our efforts. Not only will the world respect this declaration, it will support it.

Here are two examples of how two notorious antisemites relate to Jews when Jews set an example that the world wants to see and follow. Ukraine born Vasily Shulgin was a senior member of the Duma, the Russian Parliament, before the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution. He was also an avid antisemite. In his book What We Don’t Like About Them…, he complains that “Jews in the 20th century have become very smart, effective, and vigorous at exploiting other people’s ideas. However,” he protests, “this is not an occupation for ‘teachers and prophets,’ not the role of ‘guides of the blind,’ not the role of ‘carriers of the lame.’” In another essay, Shulgin becomes almost poetic as he describes where the Jews can lead humanity if they rise to the challenge: “Let them … rise to the height to which they apparently climbed [in antiquity] … and immediately, all nations will rush to them. They will rush not by virtue of compulsion … but by free will, joyful in spirit, grateful and loving, including the Russians!”

A more terse example comes from none other than Henry Ford, who, when not building cars, dedicated much of his time to writing damning essays about Jews. In his infamous composition, The International Jew — The World’s Foremost Problem, Ford writes, “Modern reformers, who are constructing model social systems on paper, would do well to look into the social system under which the early Jews were organized.”

Ford’s grandson, by the way, made it a point to build one of the company’s plants in Israel as a token of support for the Jewish state. Symbolically, that plant is now closed. Unless we begin to work on our unity and strive to set the required example, the fate of our country will resemble the fate of Ford’s plant, and Israel’s Jews, who have turned themselves into temporary residents, will be evicted.
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My new article on Linkedin “No One Loves a Nation Whose Members Hate Each Other”

I have been told that the problems in supply chains afflicting the global economy have gotten so bad, and the prognosis is so dire, that some countries are considering shutting down international trade and trying to become self-sufficient. It is clearly an impractical idea, but it shows how desperate some countries have become, and how pessimistic they are about the future. There is a solution, but it involves reciprocity and consideration of others, and no one wants to go that way. So, for the time being, we will continue to suffer.

Look at what we have done to our planet. We have polluted it, corrupted it, and depleted it of resources and much of its beauty for the illusion of power and control. We could have achieved so much more with a fraction of the effort and a fraction of the resources we have drained from the planet, but for this, we would have to work shoulder to shoulder with each other, and no one wants that.

Regrettably, the situation will continue to worsen until everyone points their finger at the Jews and blame them for everything that is wrong with the world. Around this, everyone will be happy to unite, and not around anything else.

It is not only the world, but many Jews feel guilty, too. Look at how many Jews justify Jew-haters! Moreover, Jews who do so are not treated as traitors, as they would be anywhere else, but as progressive, justice-seeking people. Why are we like that? It is because deep down, we feel that the world is correct in its accusations, that we really are responsible for the world’s troubles. We cannot rationalize it, but we feel it nonetheless. Even if we do not admit it, our meek resentment to the most absurd allegations proves that we do not feel innocent.

Especially now, when the world has become such an interdependent, closed system where everyone affects everyone else, anything bad that someone does immediately impacts the entire world. We, Jews, are expected to correct the world. Since the world is broken, in the eyes of the world, as well as in our own eyes, it is our fault.

Think about it, no nation has conceived such a notion as Tikkun Olam [correction of the world], certainly not as one of its core values and goals. No nation has pinned its entire essence on love of others, to the point where one loves one’s neighbor as oneself. No nation has made mutual responsibility such a deeply rooted principle that its members feel entitled to demand it of each other. And finally, the sages of no other nation blame their defeats on unfounded hatred among the members of the nation, instead of on external enemies.

Even with regard to the nations of the world, our calling has always been a positive one. As soon as we became a nation, we were designated as a chosen people—chosen to exemplify those core values just mentioned: Tikkun Olam through love of others and mutual responsibility. Is there anything the world needs more than these?

Yet, instead of living up to our vocation, we have become the opposite. We are a display of self-loathing, inner division, and mutual derision. We are arrogant, but we have nothing to be proud of since people don’t need technology; they need to love and be loved, and we are denying them their needs through our negligence in our duty.

No one loves a nation whose members hate each other, all the more so when that nation was forged to be the trailblazer toward unity. If we reject our calling, who will pave the trail?

We are an assortment of members of nations from all over the Near and Middle East, who once united “as one man with one heart.” Because of our unique example, we must lead the way for the unity of the world, and the only way to do it is through our example.

Each of us is a descendant of those members of the nations. The nations will not be able to unite without our example. Our ancestors were “ambassadors” of the nations, and we are their heirs; it is incumbent upon us to carry out our ancestors’ legacy: to be a light unto nations and redeem the world of hatred. If we unite among us, the world will follow through. If we shun one another, the world will shun us.
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