TIME FOR DIALOGUE IS NOT NOW
It was 20 years ago in Jerusalem when sirens went off and TV news ordered us to get our gas masks and head for safe rooms. The men at the breakfast table were former members of the Israeli Defense Force who kept slurping their coffee. Seeing my panic, they said, “Don’t worry. Same old, same old.”
So when we saw the news of missiles shot from Gaza into Israel last Saturday, our panic was a bit mild, especially since Israel’s highly regarded Iron Dome intercepts most mid-air rockets. But then our daughter messaged us on Facebook that her family living in Israel, including our four grandsons, cut short their Sabbath and holiday celebration and were huddled, terrified, in their safe room. It was obvious that this weekend was different, very different. This is all-out war.
Glued to my computer screen, I watched the thousands of rocket strikes, hostage takings and grisly videos of violence against Jews. It looked worse than the infamous 1967 Six-Day War on Yom Kippur, Judaism’s most holy day. That involved a coalition of Arab states including Egypt, Syria and Jordan. During Saddam Hussein’s 1991 Gulf War, Iraqi forces launched dozens of missiles into Israel. Iran’s funding of Hamas terrorism since the early 1990s has generated a proxy war for decades. It was clear that efforts to destroy Israel were regional, going far beyond the Palestinian-Israel conflicts.
Many date the violence to 1948 when the United Nations approved the creation of Israel as a Jewish state following the decimation of the Holocaust. Arab nations objected to Jewish claims to the land. But the reality is that Jews have been in the Holy Land since 2,000 B.C. When Assyrians conquered the Jewish kingdom around 720 B.C., they deported most Jews, beginning a massive diaspora where many would be confined to ghettos, banned from economic and social participation for centuries. For religious and ethnic reasons, Jews were barred from returning to the Holy Land until the UN recognized the Holocaust annihilation of 6 million Jews. Rights to the land were finally given back.
Taking a short break to catch my breath, I glanced at my file cabinet and noticed a book that I’d been commissioned to write more than 30 years ago, “Israel Dialogue with Christians and Jews.”
There were expectations that understanding different religious doctrines and historic policies about Israel would make dialogue more productive — and create options that would provide stability, if not resolution. Living in hope, I recently updated and republished the manual.
But the time for dialogue is not now, not as long as Hamas rules Gaza. Elected in 2006, Hamas has ensured there’s not been an election since. Backed by Iran and a constant threat, Hamas’ ISIS-like charter calls for destroying and replacing Israel with an Islamic Palestinian state.
We came together on Monday at the Jewish Federation to mourn the hundreds lost in the fighting, knowing that the immediate future will be deeply painful for Israelis and for Palestinians affected by Hamas terrorists who have built arsenals in their mosques, schools, hospitals and homes. Hopefully, there will be a dialogue in which religious leaders will join politicians with a determination to create stability. But that cannot happen if Hamas remains in charge of Gaza.
As in 9/11, this act of war is reverberating worldwide. It’s imperative that we create a different Middle East environment. That was the goal of negotiations between Israel and Saudi Arabia. So, please, advocate and lobby your politicians for that to happen. And urge religious leaders to help create models for a stable future. Chaos must lead to new beginnings.