Dear Friends:
Why is it still 7 October 2023 in Israel and for so many Jews around the world, too? What made the Hamas-led massacre of that day different from the many others massacres in Jewish history? We have asked these questions in the course of the past 500-days-plus at Friday night services, at Sunday morning discussions with Julian Resnick, and at Shabbat seminars. Well, in addition to the slaughter and the terror, we recognized that 10/7 broke the promise of political Zionism that a Jewish nation-state would provide a safe and secure home for its inhabitants, that never again would Jews feel defenseless. That’s what brought us to conclude in another discussion that 10/7 was the equivalent of America’s 9/11 when the natural boundaries of the sea to the east and the sea to the west failed to protect us from jet planes flying into the Twin Towers.
‘If 10/7 is Israel’s 9/11, is there an equivalent – not in scale but with respect to our physical vulnerability – of 10/7 for American Jews?’ was the question posed at services a month ago. For that, we can point to the shootings at the Tree of Life Synagogue on October 27, 2018, when a right-wing racist killed eleven worshippers because they were Jewish. The incident radically redefined the face of Jewish life in the USA. We can look to RSNS as proof. Not only do we have a guard present at the door during services and whenever we gather for meetings and programs, but our building has been made secure with bollards to stop vehicles and with bullet-proof glass and (newly installed) interior doors and with security cameras all funded by grants from the federal and state governments. at our doors, while the church that hosts her community theater group is completely open.
Sadly, last Friday night our discussion moved from Pittsburgh to D.C. The question of the evening: How did the attack in front of the Capitol’s Jewish Museum differ from the one at Tree of Life. The answer to that question was heard in what the gunman shouted when his identity was finally revealed: “Free, free Palestine.” We’ve heard these words at every anti-Zionist demonstration throughout America. As for the place, Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky were murdered not in shul on shabbes, but while attending a program sponsored by the American Jewish Committee on a Wednesday evening at a Jewish Museum. This time, the perpetrator’s motivation was political. With his outcry, he expanded the boundary of anti-Jewish violence to the far left. But was this not the action of just a single man? The perpetrator’s manifesto proves that it was no more the action of one anti-Zionist than the synagogue attack was the work of one racist. Both incidents give lie to the childhood chant, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” The racist litanies at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, and the dehumanization of Jews expressed at anti-Zionist rallies have provided ammunition for violence against Jews. No perpetrator of violence against Jews to our right or to our left are lone actors.
Oy, so where do we go from here? I don’t know. But I do know that we cannot afford to give in to despair.
The first interview that I heard following the murders of Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky was from an American Jewish Committee employee. “This tragedy will be compounded if we forget that Sarah and Yaron, both employees of Israel’s embassy, had come together for an AJC program that united Jews, Muslims, and Christians to address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.” Ben Samuels echoed this concern in his Opinion column in Haaretz the following day. He urged that we remember Lischinsky and Milgrim not as victims but as human beings who were dedicating their lives to pursuing a better future for those caught in the present intractable conflict. At his funeral outside of Jerusalem, members of Yaron’s family begged that he be remembered for his kindness, his intelligence, his commitment, and his patriotism, and not for his murder. He was perfectly paired with Sarah in attributes and in their common goal to do what they could to fix the world for the good of Jews and for people everywhere. Only by working to continue their task and bring their dream closer to reality will their memories be a blessing. May it be so.
With gratitude for their lives and with hope,
Lee
