Whistling in the dark

Shana Tova everyone – Some food for thought via the emailed letter from the director of Rabbis for Human Rights in Israel:

Dear Friends and Supporters,

The High Holy Days are upon us and we wish “Ramadan Kareem” to our Muslim readers, I wish I could write to each of you personally, but must be content to write to all of you collectively.

…

Below you will find some of my thoughts on Rosh HaShana Eve, however, I must unfortunately begin with an urgent funding appeal. We have been “victims of our own success” this past year. Our successes have required unbudgeted expenses. Because of the generous financial component of the Niwano Peace Prize we had sufficient funds for this year. However, next year our projected income falls some $160,000 short of what we need just to maintain existing programming. There is a very direct and harsh relationship between cutbacks on our part and peoples lives:

Our lawyer in Hadera preserves the economic lifeline of the poorest and weakest Israelis whose support is threatened by the Israeli Wisconsin Plan. We were just asked if we could run a similar program in Ashkelon. However, our lawyer does not have enough hours to represent everybody who needs her in Hadera. A lack of sufficient hours translates directly into more Israelis going hungry or literally reduced to begging in the street.

Our Olive Tree Campaign allows Palestinians to access lands they had not been able to reach for years. In order to fulfill our obligations to the expanding list of villages that ask for our help, we are going to go $20,000 over budget this year on transportation alone. Again, the formula is harsh. When we are not present, people do not get to their land. When we are not present, people get hurt.

There is a waiting list of pre-army academies who want us to run a year long course on Judaism, democracy and human rights based on Tractate Independence. Each of our students will be a soldier who will face moral dilemmas in the course of his/her service.

When our legal department intervenes, home demolitions are prevented and complaints about settler harassment are taken seriously by the police. This in turn translates into a change in settler behavior. If our lawyers aren’t available, more homes will be demolished and more Palestinians will be harassed.

The true test for RHR may be our impact on policy, but our successes this year changing the State Budget and winning a High Court victory regarding agricultural access are directly related to our grass roots work in Hadera and in the olive groves.

Your financial support (In the U.S. tax deductible through RHR-North America) directly and concretely translates both into policy change and making people’s lives better. If you can make a gift now it will influence our planning and budgeting discussions over the next few months.

Two thoughts for Rosh HaShana:

1. On Saturday night the slikhot service where I prayed was one of the most beautiful and moving I can recall. However, I couldn’t help but notice that most of the prayers and piyutim were asking God to intercede and wipe out our sins. We recited the rote vidui (confession), but there was no commitment to changing our ways or rectifying the wrongs we have done to our fellow human beings. (The Rosh HaShana prayers will address the changes we need to make, and Yom Kippur even more so.)

I don’t know whether the authors of the slikhot services were more interested in pardon than in genuine change, or whether they felt that our sins are so overwhelming that there was no possibility of sufficient change and therefore the only hope was begging for mercy.

Many of the prayers implore God to hear us. I couldn’t help but wonder, with all of the thousands of words that many of will pray through Yom Kippur, whether we will find the time to hear God. I hope that, as overwhelming as the changes are that we need to make both on the individual level and the societal level, these coming days will be a time of clarification for us. I pray that we will come through this period with a clearer sense of what we must and CAN do to effect tikkun (repair.)

I hope and pray that we will neither run from the words of the Makhzor (High Holy Day prayer book) nor let them get in the way.

May each of our souls be open to hearing the God of justice and compassion.

May we feel that we are a part of God’s Unity that unifies all human beings and all creation.

May we utilize these precious days to gain a clearer vision of how we can give that Unity _expression in our personal relationships, in our relationship to the earth, and in the way we build a society that honors the dignity and human rights of all.

May we be God’s partners in making this a sweeter year for those Israelis forced into the Israeli Wisconsin Program, for the Dari family and all the others living with the daily fear of their house being demolished, for foreign workers being forced to work in reprehensible conditions, for the women forced into prostitution, for the growing number of victims of the resurging nfor Palestinian farmers kept from their land because of the Separation Barrier or settler violence and army collusion, for the residents of unrecognized villages and the S. Hebron Hills being threatened with expulsion, and for the single parents, elderly and others whose pensions and allocations are far from what is needed to live with dignity.

May our commitment to giving _expression to this Unity lead us to sweeten the lives of those whose neighborhoods became killing zones this year in Israel, Lebanon, Gaza and so many other places around the planet.

2. Humility. This has been an amazingly successful year for RHR and an extremely difficult year for the Middle East.

In the past year RHR made significant changes in Israel’s state budget improving the lives of many of the poorest and weakest Israelis. RHR and our coalition partners opened an office in Hadera, allowing us both to impact on the public debate on the “Israeli Wisconsin Plan” and to help individual Israelis to preserve economic safety net. RHR, along with ACRI and local councils, won a major High Court appeal regarding the state’s obligations to provide and protect the access of Palestinians to their agricultural lands. (See the following links regarding just how important this victory was: Haaretz Article 1; Haaretz Article 2 (link to Akiva Eldar column in Hebrew from August 29th, see second subject)

Our Olive Tree Campaign is now helping over 30 villages. RHR’s legal project has changed the behavior of both police and settlers. Our educational programs continue to expand and influence a widening circle of Israelis, many of whom find themselves in key positions in Israeli society or the army. Our work received recognition through the prestigious 2006 Niwano Peace Prize.

I speak of our successes with a sense of humbleness. Although I continue to believe that the human rights work we work on at the micro level affect the macro issues of peace in our region, we saw this summer how the macro can overwhelm us, overshadow and even reverse in an instant achievements slowly attained after years of hard work. I thought of the old Spike Lee film, “Do the Right Thing,” in which the relations between the residents of an African American neighborhood and the white pizza parlor owner who had stayed long after all other white people had fled, unravel in an instant. As we prayed on Tisha B’Av in a Kiryat Bialik bomb shelter and then handed out toys to children, we were reminded that no one individual or organization can control all events or effect Tikun Olam by themselves.

For this reason, our High Holy Day liturgy envisions us forming Agudah Ekhat L’Asot Ratzonkkah BaLevav Shalem, “A United Community of Faith and Purpose dedicated to doing Your Will with all our heart.”

At this time of crisis, when much of what we have dreamed and prayed and worked for is being called in to question, I am urgently asking for your renewed and strengthened commitment to a United and Powerful Community of Faith and Purpose dedicated to building the Israel we believe in. In light of the tremendous expenses of this war and recovery, the promises to allocate additional resources to the poorest and weakest Israelis are being forgotten. We must be a Community of Faith and Purpose to ensure that the poor are not forced to disproportionately bear the burden. Our High Court achievement held out great promise, but the post-war national mood is likely to be much more tolerant of settler violence, home demolitions and the prevention of Palestinian access to their lands. We must be a Community of Faith and Purpose ensuring that the missiles that rained down on us dם not continue to explode in our hearts, destroying our humanity and our ability to honor the Image of God in all. In a country searching for answers, our Community of Faith and Purpose must be able to reach as many Israelis as possible through our educational programs, especially those for soldiers and those about to enter the army.

We are more aware than ever that we need a partnership with you, our members, volunteers and supporters, in the pursuit of our common dreams.

If you believe that we must be an Agudah Ekhat, please, as indicated above, make an extra effort this year to support us financially as generously as possible. However, please also make an extra effort to write letters when we call upon you, and to join us here to harvest and plant. Please invite me or another RHR representative to your community. If you are a rabbi, I hope to see you at RHR-NA’s rabbinic conference on Judaism and Human Rights December 10-12 in NYC.

For a Sweet New Year United in Faith and Purpose, Shabbat Shalom, and Ramadan Kareem to our Muslim supporters,
Rabbi Arik Ascherman
Executive Director
RHR

Additional information about The First North American Rabbinic Conference on Judaism and Human Rights For Rabbis, Cantors, and Rabbinic and Cantorial Students – December 10–12, 2006 / Kislev 19–21, 5767

Rabbis for Human Rights – Yom Kippur Vidui

Donate money to Rabbis for Human Rights

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