My new article on Linkedin “The Crime of Being Jewish”

“Dirty Jew,” shouted a man in New York’s Times Square while he punched, kicked, and pepper-sprayed a young Jewish man who ended up in the hospital as result of the recent unprovoked attack. “I would do it again” said the pro-Palestinian aggressor after being arrested and briefly held in custody, according to prosecutors. That is today’s America. Rampant widespread antisemitism aggravated by the latest escalation of the Israel-Gaza conflict. It is a turning point for the Jewish people to either wait for the worst to happen or unite and survive and live happily and safely.

As humanity progresses and becomes more enlightened, hatred of Jews becomes less logical and at the same time expands and deepens. Hatred no longer belongs to a people or to a transient union of peoples, but it is spreading throughout the entire global world almost at once. Never has the condemnation of Israel and hatred of the Jews been as open, unequivocal and extensive as it is today. If once hatred was hidden, except in times of particular outbursts, today it roams shamelessly in the streets; Jews are brutally beaten simply for being Jews and no one seems to even try to stop it.

What would be considered inconceivable in the past is now a reality: American Jews are afraid to wear yarmulke in public, as confirmed by the Jewish Federations of North America. Unfortunately, history has shown us that our enemies will leave no stone unturned until they fulfill their goal: to cause harm or annihilate Jews wherever they are. To hide, assimilate, and try to become like everyone else will not help.

Why? Because Jews are not like everyone else. We must carefully study our history and exemplary sources and stop repeating the same mistakes of continually minimizing the threats with blind and unconscious stubbornness that brings us murderous blows.

The people of Israel are different because they are not a group of people born in a common region. We do not share a common culture, mentality, and similar tendencies. We are a collection of people from every nation, descendants of Mesopotamia, ancient Babylon, who gathered around the ideology developed by our ancestor Abraham: a connection between human beings over differences that divide us.

Abraham came up with the idea of unification from the deep confusion and discord that prevailed in the kingdom of Babylon. Abraham trained us to unite as one man with one heart, not only to discover the positive, good and benevolent power that would improve our lives between us, but to become a model of a reformed society that would pass the idea of unity and in this way to radiate light into the nations, the peoples of the world. This is our fate; we have no other purpose and no possibility of escaping from it.

This is why the Jews in the Diaspora will not be able to assimilate into their homelands no matter how hard they try. And we in Israel must not think that we are any different or more united than them. We are also in exile. Not in body, of course. We are physically on the land of Israel, but the spirit, the mentality, the thought, are all completely in exile.

“Exile” is first and foremost a departure from the commandment to connect, a flagrant disregard for our destiny. When Jews live an egotistical routine, for their own benefit only, they become the greatest egoists in the world, exactly against their potential to be pioneers of the global connection.

In this mission there is no difference between us and the Diaspora Jewry. We all have one fate and we are currently very far from it. Everything can change at the speed of light. Change depends on a modest understanding that life has a purpose and it does not end with corporeal achievements, which only are accompanied by suffering and war. A little understanding that we were not born just to survive around seventy years in perpetual existential fear and then die, will help us to live differently, safely, peacefully, happily, purposefully. Only a little understanding, a subtle inclination, a good thought toward connection between us, will make a huge difference toward a more promising future for us and our children.

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My new article on Linkedin “There Is a Purpose to the Israeli Palestinian Conflict”

The conclusion of Operation Guardian of the Walls marked the end of yet another round in what seems to be a never ending conflict. After every round, we get some rest, but it is always shorter than we’d like, and the relentlessness of the enemy is tiring and wearing down our motivation. At the same time, we have nowhere to go, so we cannot afford to pack up and leave; it is a battle we cannot afford to lose.

While it seems like there is no end to the conflict, in fact, there can be an end to it, and it depends on us. First, we need to realize that neither military operations nor peace treaties will solve the problem. Dividing the land among Palestinians, Jews, Bedouins, and whoever else wants a piece of it will not solve anything and will not end the violence, since the conflict is not over territory, religion, or nationality.

It is an essential conflict whose purpose is to bring all of humanity to recognize the purpose of creation, the purpose of our own existence, and the purpose of the existence of nations, countries, religions, cultures, and races. This conflict is at the core of reality. This is why it seems inscrutable and insoluble.

When we solve the Palestinian Israeli conflict, we will balance the entire world, all of reality. Subconsciously, people feel it, which is why this conflict and this region are always at the center of attention. People rightly feel that their own well-being depends on what is happening in the Middle-East, and specifically between Israel and its neighbors. When we balance our relations here, it will resolve every other imbalance the world over.

The balance that we need to find will connect us to one another, and subsequently to the origin of creation. This origin, which we may call God, Allah, or any other name, has created all the contradictions in reality. However, it created them balanced and harmonious. Day and night, ebb and flow, winter and summer, male and female, attraction and rejection, birth and death, everything is balanced and the existence of one supports and is dependent upon the existence of the other.

We, humans, have disrupted this balance because we only focus on taking and receiving, and we strive to give nothing in return. This is why we exploit natural resources indiscriminately, even at the expense of the future of our children. This is also why we conquer, humiliate, and enslave other nations. In our effort to feel good about ourselves, we denigrate, patronize, and belittle others in order to make ourselves feel superior. Indeed, all our troubles come from the imbalance within us.

The Jews, whose nationhood was established uniquely through the oath to unite “as one man with one heart,” were the first to rise above the natural human predisposition for selfishness. This is why they were appointed to be the “light unto nations,” to set an example of unity and thereby show other nations how to unite above their inherent self-centeredness, balance themselves, and subsequently lead the world to balance.

Indeed, throughout history, when Jews united among themselves, the nations supported them. When they divided among them and became belligerent, the nations disparaged and reviled them. In the days of the First Temple, Nebuchadnezzar II conquered the land of Israel and destroyed the Temple only after Jews became spiteful toward each other and “stabbed each other with the daggers in their mouths” (Yoma 9b). Later, when they united while in exile, King Cyrus gave them back the land and helped them rebuild the Temple.

During the period of the Second Temple, when Jews were united, the nations would “go up to Jerusalem and see Israel … and say, ‘It is becoming to cling only to this nation’” (Sifrey Devarim, 354). When they divided and wanted to become like the Greeks, in whose kingdom they lived, they broke into war, the Seleucids conquered the land, and they freed it only after they united under the Hasmoneans.

But the Hasmoneans, too, did not maintain their unity as power struggles drove them apart, which brought upon us the Roman rule. The latter conquered the land and made Judah a Roman province. However, the Romans, too, would have been completely content to let us lead our lives according to our way, had it not been for the inner struggles among us and the corruption of our leaders that forced them to appoint their own procurators (governors). Finally, we broke into a full blown civil war and sought nothing but to exterminate one another. The end result of that war was the destruction of the Second Temple, and the exile of the remnants of the nation, and the slaying of the majority of their coreligionists.

Today’s Palestinians are doing what the nations have always done with regard to Israel: They are pressuring us to unite and become the example we must be—not for our sake, but for the sake of the world. This is why the world supports them. Since it is indeed our duty to unite and become the world’s example of unity, where all the opposites are balanced, the Palestinians are right to be angry with us. Nothing we will say or do for them will pacify them until we do what we must: unite among ourselves and thereby become a light unto nations.

Our choice is simple: Set an example of unity and win the world’s favor, or keep nurturing mutual hatred until the world expels us once again and executes us like the Nazis.

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My new article on Linkedin “Where Have All the Workers Gone?”

Although economies are reopening in many countries as more and more people are vaccinated, a crucial part of the job market is still struggling to restart: workers. The customers are there; the businesses are open, the employers are hiring, but the workers seem comfortable staying at home. In some countries, and in some occupations, the situation is so dire that job applicants are interviewing potential employers instead of the other way around. There are even bizarre cases where employers actually pay applicants just to come to a job interview!

When Covid-19 just started, I wrote that when humanity comes out the other end of the pandemic, it will be a different humanity. It seems like we are seeing it unfolding. Some people say that people got too much money as Covid relief, but I think it runs much deeper than that: People simply do not want to work. They realize that their jobs were a type of slavery and they have opted out. This is what is happening.

I think it’s better for everyone that this is happening. There is less pollution, less exploitation of people, animals, and natural resources, and everyone is gaining besides the tycoons, who want to keep piling up billions, but for what purpose?

Our jobs, and even more so career jobs, used to determine our self-esteem. But many people don’t care about this anymore. They don’t care what people think; they want to rest and pass their time in peace, and it is better for everyone that they do, especially for our poor planet.

The more idle we are, the less contradictory we are to nature. Take any animal, and you will see that when it doesn’t search for food, shelter, or tends to its young, it rests peacefully. Until now, we haven’t been like animals. We spent every moment working more hours, making more money, or spending our money and making other people work more hours. The result was that we have polluted and nearly ruined our planet. If people lived like animals, working only when they need to, we wouldn’t create all the problems we’ve created for ourselves, we wouldn’t be exhausted, and we wouldn’t be stressed.

It is in our interest to be lazy, and it is in the interest of tycoons that we will work as hard as possible. This is why they sell us the notion that our job title defines who we are. But when we don’t really care what people think of who we are, then we have no reason to impress them with fancy job titles. We can finally rest!

Now that we have more free time, we will gradually find more meaningful things to do with our time. We will ask why we are here, and we will discover how our presence here relates to the presence of all the other people in the world and to the world around us. We will see that the world is one system; we will find our place in it; and we will be happy and at peace. This is why I’m grateful for this new trend of not working needlessly.
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My new article on Linkedin “Pariahs”

All over the world, and on every social media platform, antisemitism is thriving. What’s more, no one seems to want to stop it. Had Jews expressed themselves this way toward people from other ethnicities or countries, they would have been expelled, banned, boycotted, and possibly tried as criminals. But when it comes to bashing Jews, it’s open season. Why have we become pariahs?

To answer this question, we must remind ourselves of our origin and our vocation. In the prologue to his book A History of the Jews, Christian historian and novelist Paul Johnson eloquently describes the sense of purpose that pervades the Jewish people, and to which he, as a Christian historian, was very receptive: “No people has ever insisted more firmly than the Jews that history has a purpose and humanity a destiny. At a very early stage in their collective existence they believed they had detected a divine scheme for the human race, of which their own society was to be a pilot. …The Jewish vision became the prototype for many similar grand designs for humanity, both divine and man-made. The Jews, therefore, stand right at the centre of the perennial attempt to give human life the dignity of a purpose.”

Indeed, from the very beginning, Jews were not as the rest of the nations. We didn’t come from anywhere in specific. Rather, we came from everywhere to follow a specific ideology that the son of a Babylonian priest by the name of Terah had conceived. The son’s name was Abraham, and the message he conveyed was clear and simple, though hard to carry out: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

At the time when Abraham began to preach for mercy and camaraderie, his countryfolk were in the midst of a wave of growing egoism. The Babylonian empire, where Abraham was born and raised, later became known as the “cradle of civilization.” But while Abraham had lived there, its people could not tolerate the idea of mutual responsibility and care for others that he had taught. They were enthralled with glorifying themselves and sought to build a tower that would reflect their greatness. Abraham, who criticized them sharply, ridiculed their beliefs and culture, and broke his father’s idols, was therefore persecuted and eventually expelled from his homeland. Thus, Abraham became the first Hebrew pariah.

Wandering westward across the Near and Middle East, Abraham continued to speak about unity and love of others wherever he went. Many of those who agreed with him joined him and gradually formed a group made of strangers who began as alienated, and often hateful strangers, but who nevertheless believed in unity above animosity.

Generations of trials and tribulations had solidified Abraham’s group until they were declared a nation at the foot of Mt. Sinai, named after the Hebrew word sina’a [hatred], which they had overcome in order to become a nation. But the nation of the Jews was unique. Since they did not have a common origin, but consisted of people from all over the ancient world, whenever they could not maintain unity above their estrangement, their different roots emerged within them and pitted the members of the nation against each other. As a result, in order to maintain their nationhood, they had to constantly reinforce their unity and solidarity. And since their roots were from many foreign nations, yet they had proven that cohesion among strangers was possible, they became a role model of peace among the nations.

This was their vocation, the purpose that Johnson had so perceptively observed. The ancient Jewish society became a pilot for a plan to establish peace on earth, harmony among all nations. When they were united, they were a living proof that such a feat was possible, thus carrying out their task to be “a light unto nations.” But when they succumbed to division and enmity, they proved that humanity was hopeless and doomed for eternal warring.

This is why whenever Jews show hate toward each other, the world hates them, too, and treats them as pariahs. Conversely, when they unite, they become the world’s favorite. Since the roots of the members of the Jewish people lie deep within each nation that emerged from the ancient cradle of civilization, the enmity or unity among the Jews reflects itself directly in relationships among the nations. This is why they blame the Jews for the wars among them. They cannot explain it rationally, of course, but they feel that their hatred for each other is the fault of the Jews. As history has proven, no rational argument will convince them otherwise.

This is also why when Jews unite under the pressure of the nations, the nations’ animosity subsides. Inadvertently, the unity of Jews eases the world’s hatred toward them since their unity increases the unity of the world, even if they do not mean to do this and are unaware of it. If Jews were even slightly more conscious of their ability to help the world unite, I have no doubt they would pursue it heart and soul. The problem is that they insist on denying their uniqueness, their vocation and purpose, and that their society must once again be a pilot for world peace. Until the Jews accept this, they will continue to be pariahs.
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My new article on Linkedin “Full Speed in the Wrong Direction”

The Palestinians’ cheers of victory, and the hesitant sigh of relief that Israelis let out at the start of the ceasefire are both genuine. Israel won the battle but it is losing the war, and the Palestinians know it. With each campaign, our grip on the land weakens while theirs grows stronger. We may win future battles, too, but the world is with the Palestinians. If we continue battling them only on the physical level, we will eventually lose the war and the land we live in.

The only way that we can win is on the ideological level. If we grasp why we are here and what benefit our presence here brings to all of humanity, we will win the world’s support. Otherwise, the nations have no need for a country whose people hate each other so profoundly that their 120 members of parliament are splintered across dozens of parties. The sense of mutual loathing this tiny country discharges is so caustic that the whole world is troubled by what is happening in this tiny piece of land, which is roughly the size of Connecticut. We are making great efforts to strengthen and fortify ourselves, but we are going full speed in the wrong direction.

We must remind ourselves over and over that our strength lies in our unity, and only in our unity. Nothing else will hold for long. Defense systems such as the Iron Dome are good for only so long, but permanent protection comes to the people of Israel when we think of each other instead of ourselves.

Our ancestors founded our nation on the basis of mutual responsibility and love of others. We conceived the commandment, “Love your neighbor as yourself” and made it our foremost tenet. Without living it out, we are not true to our legacy, to the basis of our peoplehood, so we are not really Israel. And since we are not really Israel, we have no claim on the land of Israel. This is what the Arabs feel, as does the whole world.

For our claim on the land to be valid, we must be true to our vocation: to be “a light unto nations.” As long as we are divided, they feel that we are bringing them nothing but darkness. They feel that we are the cause of all that is wrong with the world, and it is precisely because of our hatred for each other. Therefore, if we rise above our hatred and unite, the world will be with us, including the Palestinians. If we give in to division, the world will kick us out of here.

The Book of Zohar (Aharei Mot) wrote about the significance of our unity many centuries ago. In the words of Rabbi Shimon, “‘Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to also sit together.’ These are the friends as they sit together and are not separated from each other. At first, they seem like people at war, wishing to kill one another … then they return to being in brotherly love … and by your merit, there will be peace in the world.” May we follow the advice of our sages and avoid the punishments of our ignorance.

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My new article on Linkedin “Jews Are Sitting on a Powder Keg”

There is a sense of imaginary peace after the Israel-Hamas ceasefire, but abroad, the fuse of antisemitism is again lit and flaming. Jews both in Israel and basically anywhere in the world are in a constant war for their lives, looking to their backs, keeping an eye on their surroundings because danger can arise at any given moment from both obvious and unexpected places. What else do we need to face up to in order to understand that the world has a problem with Jews? Both Israel and the Jewish people are basically standing alone. Therefore, the only place to find a solution to the hatred is between us, in our willingness and capacity to unite.

Since the beginning of Operation Guardian of the Walls launched by Israel to defend its population from thousands of missiles attacks from Gaza, there has been a sharp spike in antisemitic incidents around the world, as well as international condemnation of the Israeli military response. The perpetrators of these antisemitic attacks deliberately singled out and targeted synagogues and Jewish institutions. The incidents occurred in broad daylight and included verbal and physical aggression against Jews in the plazas, restaurants, and streets of major cities across the United States, Europe, and Latin America, among other locations.

American Jews say they fear to identify themselves publicly as Jews. Some have taken off their Star of David necklaces, some have considered removing the mezuzot from their homes, and some even hesitate to walk to their synagogues.

So one may ask why is it that Jews are taking the hit for Israel’s actions which have been judged as wrong and unjustified by the world? Very simple. People have a problem with Jews in general. Therefore, they lash out against the State of Israel, against the Jewish people, and will be happy to erase both completely.

Our enemies point out very precisely that what needs to change can be found with us, within the worldwide Jewish community. We need to reconnect to and strengthen our common identity as a people whose existence is eternal because we were given a special role to carry out in the world: to unite in love above all differences and to help others do the same.

Within this united amalgamation, our differences will remain, as they are an integral part of the fabric of who we are, but rising above them is mandatory. We can either annihilate the threats against us by establishing unbreakable connections above whatever separates us, or our enemies will annihilate us without mercy.

Foremost Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam) wrote about the tendency of the Jewish nation to draw closer together when danger lurks: “It is the common suffering that each of us suffers being a member of the nation. This has imprinted within us a national awareness and proximity, as with fellow-sufferers. This is an external cause. As long as this external cause joined and blended with our natural national awareness, an odd kind of national love emerged and sparked off this jumble, unnatural and incomprehensible” (The Nation). But now, we see that even in times of trouble we are not banding together!

Until there is a need for a connection between the factions we have built in our far flung Jewish community, and until we transcend the conflicts and arguments that incite hatred between us, the external wars will not stop. They will only become more intense.

Many Jews in the Diaspora are trying to disassociate from Israel, and by doing so, they increase the pressure on us inside Israel and cause the realization that we stand completely on our own. Each community will stand alone then if that’s what they want. They can unite and take care of themselves for their own sake. And those living in Israel will have to do the same until we reach the critical integration necessary to face our existential threats.

In the final analysis it comes down to this: The more we indulge in indifference to our only mission—the crafting of the unity subconsciously expected of us by all the nations of the world—the easier it will be for our enemies. Our enemies will not even have to fight with weapons; they will need no rockets or missiles. What for, since all of humanity is ready with its forces, systems, and fronts to fight together with Hamas against Israel? All of humanity—from America and Russia to faraway China—everyone. In every country in the world, in every government, there are enough people who will be happy to abolish the legitimacy of the State of Israel and the people sitting in it and to wipe us off the face of the earth.

It is difficult for us to hear that the source of the problem lies with us; it is difficult to realize the enormity of our role and the responsibility placed on us, the reason for all this hatred directed at us. It tends to enter one ear and exit from the other. But we must listen and act with all haste. The heart of the Jewish nation is very broken, shattered, and grounded within egoism, but there is no choice but to strive at every moment to reach the connection between us until our collective heart begins to awaken and beat. Once we realize our mission and unite in love, we will discover that sitting on a powder keg need not be our destiny. Instead, our loving unity will create a peaceful garden around us where we can calmly sit.
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My new article on Linkedin “Guardian of the Walls – the Day After”

Ceasefires are illusory in the Middle East. Everyone realizes that the hiatus in hostilities between Israel and Hamas will last only until the first provocation occurs. In the coming months, hundreds of millions of dollars will flow into the Gaza Strip, which will rebuild its military infrastructure that the IDF so skillfully destroyed with surgical precision to minimize civilian casualties after Hamas deliberately positioned its most critical assets in high-rise buildings, hospitals, and kindergartens. Israel’s hope that it will take Hamas years to rebuild its power has no grounds to stand on. With the entire world behind it, it will refurbish its arsenal and reconstruct its military infrastructure in no time, and at no cost to itself, since the world will readily finance it. And when Hamas feels strong enough, it will rain another barrage of rockets on Israel’s civilians, and no one will blame Hamas for it, but rather Israel.

I don’t know how the next round will unfold, but I know that as much as we don’t want it, we will be compelled to partake in it, since we don’t call the shots, but rather Hamas. In the eyes of the world, no reasoning justifies our presence here since reason is meaningless when it comes to feelings, and the feeling that pervades the world when it comes to Israel is hate.

The only way we can avoid future standoffs with our neighbors, and in the process turn the world’s opinion in our favor, is to understand why things go against us and how we can change it. First, we need to understand that reasonable arguments don’t convince anyone. We can employ the most eloquent speakers, the most knowledgeable pundits, and the most successful models and actors to present Israel’s case, but no one will buy our story. Since they don’t believe a word we say, it makes no difference who speaks or what they say. Second, we need to understand that appeasing the Arabs’ demands will not pacify them. On the contrary, it will only embolden them. We must understand that they do not want a piece of this land; they want all of it, but even more than that, they want us dead.

Third, in light of the first two, we should stop looking at what we can do for the world, and start looking at what we can do for each other. This is the battlefield we have neglected for too long. Among each other is where we will find our strength, and where we should have focused all the time. I understand why it made more sense to try to convince the world that we want peace, but now that this strategy has failed entirely, it’s time to reroute and see how we can build our inner strength.

Historically, our strength came from one and only source: our unity. Our ancestors did not evolve into a nation as do other nations: through natural multiplication of biologically affiliated people. Jews, on the other hand, had to weld their nationhood consciously and laboriously, since their nucleus consisted of members of just about every tribe and clan in the ancient world. These foreigners were initially so alienated from each other that unless they united, they would have slit each other’s throats, as indeed they did in times when enmity defeated unity.

However, when unity prevailed, a miracle unfolded before the eyes of the world: People from all the nations lived together in harmony, mutual responsibility, and loved their neighbors as themselves. Indeed, the ancient Jewish people was a proof of concept, a role model that presented an alternative to the bloodshed that was the everyday reality of people in antiquity.

Whenever Israel’s internal unity prevailed, the nation thrived and achieved greatness. Whenever division got the better of us, the nations tormented, persecuted, and banished us from our land or from among them.

History seems very consistent when it comes to this aspect of our history. Under Joseph in Egypt, we were united and thrived. When he died, we aspired to assimilate and the Egyptians enslaved us. When we united in the desert after fleeing from Egypt, we were declared a nation that was not only “legitimate,” but was tasked with being “a light unto nations,” namely set an example of unity and cohesion to the whole world.

While our unity prevailed, over crises and strives, we went from strength to strength. We even conquered the land of Canaan and built the First Temple. But when our unity waned, Nebuchadnezzar II banished us out and sent us out to Babylon. In Babylon, we wanted to be as the Babylonians and brought upon us Wicked Haman, the “archetypal” Hitler. But when we united, following Haman’s intention to annihilate us, we prevailed and earned the Cyrus Declaration, which sent us back to the land of Israel with gold, silver, lots of food, and the support of an empire to build a Second Temple.

When we divided, became Hellenists, and sought to become like the Greeks, war broke out among us and the Temple was burned. When the Maccabees managed to reunite the people, even if only briefly, we won the Temple back and drove out the Seleucid empire, who took the treacherous priest Menelaus and put him to death for inciting them against the Jews.

When we divided once again, the Romans came and put a siege on Jerusalem. Here, they waited for us to decide, and we opted for civil war, killed each other indiscriminately, burned each other’s food supplies, and the Romans finished the job and exiled us from here for two millennia.

History has never deviated from the correlation between our inner division or solidarity and the world’s enmity or affinity toward us. Currently, Israel’s precarious situation requires that we notice this pattern and employ our ancient tactic: unity against calamity, or as the Talmud states it: “Either friendship, or death” (Taanit 23a).

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My new article on Linkedin “We Lost the War – in Our Spirits”

Israel has always known how to pull together when the guns roared. Not this time. It has been creeping in for several years now, but in this campaign, the malice in our midst has defeated the necessity for unity. As soon as the rockets were launched on our cities, politicians from all sides broke out in a war of words, blaming each other of incompetence, indecision, and opportunism. As the days passed and Israel’s military tactics proved successful, these same politicians scrambled to attribute the success to themselves and deny it of their rivals. And all the while, each faction of the nation sided with its own politicians and chided their dissenters on social media, news media, and anywhere they could.

Socially, we lost the war as soon as it began, and if we lost the war on our solidarity, we’ll lose the land, as well. The Talmud writes (Yoma 9b) that shortly before the ruin of the Second Temple, the people of Israel, but mainly the leaders of the country, were so spiteful toward each other that they would “eat and drink with one another, [yet] stab each other with the daggers in their tongues.” This, according to the Talmud, is among the key reasons that Nebuchadnezzar II conquered Israel and exiled its people to Babylon. We are well on our way to a similar fate.

If we are to avoid the fate of our ancestors, we mustn’t wait for our leaders to save us. They are immersed from head to toe in their power struggles. They will not listen to us, just as they do not listen to each other. When you watch them on TV, it is obvious that they are there to talk, and for no other purpose. They speak the whole time they are on the air, cut into each other’s words, and in the resulting cacophony, you cannot understand a word. I cannot watch them anymore.

Therefore, we have no one to rely on but ourselves—the unity of regular people who understand that division means destruction of the country. Only if we begin to work on our unity, above all our many differences, our so-called leaders will gradually understand that they, too, must move in this direction, too.

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My new article on Linkedin “No Ceasefire Will Put Out the Flames of Hatred Between Us”

There is never a dull moment for Israel. Even though a ceasefire is the talk of the day, the public has no confidence that the heavy barrages will come to a halt for long. Threats persist in both the south (from Hamas in Gaza) and the north of the country with rockets launched by Hezbollah from Lebanon into Israeli territory. So the question that arises again is, when will the aggression end once and for all? The ball is in our court, in the court of the Jewish nation.

The hatred towards us never stops. Israel is constantly under siege, with pressure and repeated attacks, not only from Hamas and Hezbollah, but from Iran and other hostile elements all over the world. It is said, “The heart of ministers and kings is in God’s hands,” so even when the United States and other nations put pressure on us to reach a ceasefire, the real, heavy pressure comes from a deeper source, from the depths of nature.

We live in an integral system and are organized in a network that binds together the entire human race and operates according to strict laws of nature. The main hub in all this interconnected global traffic is the people of Israel.

“The Israeli nation had been constructed as a sort of gateway by which the sparks of purity would shine upon the whole of the human race the world over,” wrote foremost Kabbalist Rabbi Yehuda Ashlag in his article “The Arvut” (Mutual Guarantee.)

In other words, the Israeli nation has a significant role to play in the lives of everyone in the world. We were given a task from the day we stood at the foot of Mount Sinai, united as one man with one heart, when we signed a mutual guarantee and agreed to be a light unto the nations. From that moment on, we received the Torah, the light, the method for uniting the world—the wisdom of Kabbalah.

Since then, the function of the Jewish people has been redefined in the inner workings of reality: as long as the people of Israel are united above their opposite views, then the power of internal connection between them ignites sparks of light, a positive force that is projected to all the nations of the world in the global network. On the other hand, if the Jewish people succumb to egoism—self benefit at the expense of others—and mutual hatred, it is as if they block the pipeline of oxygen for all of humanity, cutting off the sparks of light.

The blockage is not visible, but it is felt keenly in the hearts of people and nations. Animosity against Jews conquers and suffocates the people of the world until it breaks out as antisemitic hate speech and actions. The more the lack of light and frustration intensifies in the nations of the world, the more it obliges them to take action, to seek to annihilate the Jews wherever they are.

So it is not a matter of principle that we should be the first to publish a spectacular picture of victory, nor will it help if we increase the deterrence mechanisms or increase retaliatory actions if we do not take great care to be united from within—not “united” as we are now because outsiders pressure us to embrace each other as we huddle in the shelters, but united in a true heartfelt and lasting unity.

If we just try to obscure the pressure on us, arming ourselves with a variety of fair arguments and adorning ourselves with eloquent information for the eyes of the global media, we will not solve the problem; to date, we have failed in these tactics. We need to listen to the world’s internal and underlying demand from us: Jewish unity.

The first step to calming down the attacks upon us must begin with acknowledging and agreeing that the fire rains down on us because we are not being a cohesive people. Literally. The international pressure on us should be used to increase our awareness of our obligation: to bring into the world the method of connection, to exemplify and preach to humanity anew the great rule of the Torah, “love thy neighbor as thyself.” Only from love will peace flourish in the world.

If we understand the gap between our current situation and the desired situation that the system of natural laws demands of us, we will understand that we must first bring about a ceasefire in the relationships between us as Jewish people. Then, we will cause the world to treat us kindly, with friendship and sympathy, and we will be filled with joy because, as it is written: “In Israel is the secret to the unity of the world,” Rav Kook (Orot HaKodesh).
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My new article on Linkedin “The “Holier Than Thou” Mantle Won’t Help Jews”

Just recently, following the outbreak of yet another round of violence between Hamas controlled Gaza and Israel, a group of 250 odd Jewish employees of Google signed a letter urging its CEO to recognize “the harm done to Palestinians by Israeli military and gang violence.” Moreover, the signatories “object to the conflation of Israel with the Jewish people,” declare “that anti-Zionism is not antisemitism,” and demand, among other things, “the review of all Alphabet [Google’s mother company] business contracts and corporate donations and the termination of contracts with institutions that support Israeli violations of Palestinian rights, such as the Israeli Defense Forces.” But perhaps the most notable point about this letter is the fact that the signatories identify themselves as Jews and have submitted the letter as such.

We have already seen this phenomenon in the past; it never helps. In February 1953, Ilya Ehrenburg, a Jewish Soviet journalist and historian, wrote a letter to comrade Joseph Stalin. In the letter, Ehrenburg suggested various steps “to combat American and Zionist propaganda.” He stated that the solution “to the Jewish question … is complete assimilation, the merging of people of Jewish origin with the peoples among whom they live.” He also referred to Zionists as “enemies of our Motherland” (USSR). Just weeks later, Ehrenburg, along with all the Jews in the Soviet Union, would have been sent to pre-prepared concentration camps in Birobidzhan, Siberia, had Stalin not miraculously died one day before the beginning of the execution of the plan.

In 1993, applying the same appeasing attitude, then Prime Minister of Israel Shimon Peres signed the Oslo Accord with head of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Yasser Arafat. The two men received the Nobel Peace Prize for their feat, but where did it lead the two sides? Has there been any peace in the region since then?

Now, the Jewish Googlers are applying the same approach, and it will bring them just as much “success.” Playing “holier than thou” over Israel will not win them the sympathy of the world. It will win them its contempt and hatred. Just as establishing the Association of German National Jews to support the rise of the Nazi party to power did not save German Jews from the gas chambers, fawning to antisemitic organizations and movements will not save American Jewry.

The only thing that will help American Jewry, Israeli Jewry, and Jews the world over is to rise above the loathing that clearly pervades the relationships among us. “The prime defense against calamity is love and unity. When there are love, unity, and friendship between each other in Israel, no calamity can come over them,” states the book Maor VaShemesh.

Currently, we are nurturing the opposite of love and unity. Each community cares for its own interests in the narrowest, most self-centered manner. We are completely indifferent to the fate of Jews in other communities. In fact, we prefer to see them gone so that the world’s attention will turn elsewhere from the Jews.

It will not help us. We are in the spotlight because we are held responsible for everything that’s happening in the world, that is, everything that’s wrong with it. It does not matter that we can prove that we are not responsible for anything because in the eyes of the world, we are, and reason does not change people’s views.

The only thing that changes people’s views is feelings. And the only feeling that can change how the world views us is unity—our own unity. If we unite, the world will change how it feels about us. In 1929, faced with growing antisemitism in Germany, Dr. Kurt Fleischer, leader of the Liberals in the Berlin Jewish Community Assembly, stated, “Anti-Semitism is the scourge that God has sent us in order to lead us together and weld us together.” How tragic that his Jewish countryfolk did not act on his insight.

Fleischer’s contemporary, but worlds apart from the Liberal Jew, Rav Kook, who later became the Chief Rabbi of the Jewish settlement in Israel, wrote, “The construction of the world, which is currently crumpled by the dreadful storms of a blood-filled sword, requires the construction of the Israeli nation. The construction of the nation and the revealing of its spirit are one and the same, and it is one with the construction of the world, which is crumbling in anticipation for a force full of unity and sublimity, and all that is in the soul of Israel.”

Indeed, this is our only way out of trouble: to reconnect and create a force full of unity. Assimilation will not help, and neither will fawning or appeasing. Our only hope is our togetherness, since “The prime defense against calamity is love and unity” in the people of Israel.
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