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New York Times Finds a Way to Israel-Bash Even When Recommending the Talmud
The New York Times building in New York City. Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Is there no Jewish subject the New York Times can touch without somehow connecting it back to Israel-bashing?
The Sunday New York Times Magazine features a regular “letter of recommendation” column devoted usually to unreserved endorsements — baseball on the radio, Danish butter cookies. The latest one is about the Talmud. Actually, not quite about “the Talmud,” as the Times headline somewhat misleadingly puts it, but about the “Daily Dose of Talmud” emails published by My Jewish Learning, which are not bad, but which are something different from the full and complete text of Talmud itself, even in translation.
Anyone who expected the Times to treat the Talmud with the same unalloyed positivity and enthusiasm that it applies to cowboy boots, practicing the saxophone outdoors, or other “letter of recommendation” topics is in for a bit of a surprise, because the Times describes the Talmud as useful largely as medicine for the writer’s guilt about Israel’s “brutal” bombing campaign.
“In the days immediately following the attacks of Oct. 7, the Talmudic rabbis felt like a comforting reminder of Jewish resilience. But in the later weeks and months, as the horrors of Oct. 7 gave way to a brutal Israeli bombing campaign, my relationship to the Talmud began to curdle,” the Times article says. “I tried hard to disentangle Daf Yomi from the bombs, from my grief and anger at those who seemed to value retribution over the sanctity of human life and the pursuit of peace.”
The article goes on: “A year later, now, with much of Gaza in ruins and tens of thousands of people killed — tens of thousands of worlds destroyed — I’m still struggling with these questions. Most days, frankly, the only answer I have is to keep reading, to keep returning to the text no matter how angry or ashamed or grief-stricken I might be.”
I guess it’s somewhat reassuring that the Jewish Times writer feels personally connected enough to Israel to be “ashamed” by its actions, rather than entirely disconnected from it. And dealing by studying the Talmud, even a version of it mediated by emails, is better than protesting against Israel on campuses or in the streets.
Yet it takes a certain level of vanity and obtuseness for an American Jew, while Israeli soldiers are risking their lives in Gaza and Lebanon and while Israeli civilians are crowded in bomb shelters to protect against Iranian missile attacks, to be publicly handwringing in the New York Times about his feeling of being “ashamed” by “a brutal Israeli bombing campaign.” The idea that the campaign is about “retribution” rather than itself about the sanctity of life and the pursuit of peace is misleading and simpleminded.
The Times writer, Michael David Lukas, was last noticed in the New York Times back in 2018, publicly proclaiming himself a pork-eater, professing his “fondness for Bernie Sanders,” and denouncing Hanukkah as “an eight-night-long celebration of religious fundamentalism and violence.” At least it’s not just contemporary Israeli violence that bothers Lukas; he didn’t like it when the Maccabees defended Israel, either.
Lukas’s social media feed is full of retweets of non-Zionist and anti-Zionists writers and publications such as Peter Beinart and Jewish Currents and extreme anti-Israel activist groups such as If Not Now.
Leave it to the New York Times to let an article recommending the Talmud drift into an expression of vicarious shame for Israeli brutality. If I drafted such an article as an anti-New York Times parody, people would think it was over-the-top.
So often at the New York Times, in academia, or in mainstream book publishing, though, Israel-bashing is, for Jews, the required price of admission. Lukas, who not only writes for the Times but also teaches at San Francisco State University and is a book author, appears all too willing to perform the public role of American Jew ashamed of Israel. Maybe by the time he finishes the page-a-day cycle a few years from now he’ll wise up. Or maybe by then the Times editors will find some way to write about the Talmud without using it as a vehicle for more Israel-bashing.
Ira Stoll was managing editor of The Forward and North American editor of The Jerusalem Post. His media critique, a regular Algemeiner feature, can be found here.
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Israel to Issue 54,000 Call-Up Notices to Ultra-Orthodox Students
Haredi Jewish men look at the scene of an explosion at a bus stop in Jerusalem, Israel, on Nov. 23, 2022. Photo: Reuters/Ammar Awad
Israel’s military said it would issue 54,000 call-up notices to ultra-Orthodox Jewish seminary students following a Supreme Court ruling mandating their conscription and amid growing pressure from reservists stretched by extended deployments.
The Supreme Court ruling last year overturned a decades-old exemption for ultra-Orthodox students, a policy established when the community comprised a far smaller segment of the population than the 13 percent it represents today.
Military service is compulsory for most Israeli Jews from the age of 18, lasting 24-32 months, with additional reserve duty in subsequent years. Members of Israel’s 21 percent Arab population are mostly exempt, though some do serve.
A statement by the military spokesperson confirmed the orders on Sunday just as local media reported legislative efforts by two ultra-Orthodox parties in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition to craft a compromise.
The exemption issue has grown more contentious as Israel’s armed forces in recent years have faced strains from simultaneous engagements with Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Houthis in Yemen, and Iran.
Ultra-Orthodox leaders in Netanyahu’s brittle coalition have voiced concerns that integrating seminary students into military units alongside secular Israelis, including women, could jeopardize their religious identity.
The military statement promised to ensure conditions that respect the ultra-Orthodox way of life and to develop additional programs to support their integration into the military. It said the notices would go out this month.
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Influential Far-Right Minister Lashes out at Netanyahu Over Gaza War Policy
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich attends an inauguration event for Israel’s new light rail line for the Tel Aviv metropolitan area, in Petah Tikva, Israel, Aug. 17, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich sharply criticized on Sunday a cabinet decision to allow some aid into Gaza as a “grave mistake” that he said would benefit the terrorist group Hamas.
Smotrich also accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of failing to ensure that Israel’s military is following government directives in prosecuting the war against Hamas in Gaza. He said he was considering his “next steps” but stopped short of explicitly threatening to quit the coalition.
Smotrich’s comments come a day before Netanyahu is due to hold talks in Washington with President Donald Trump on a US-backed proposal for a 60-day Gaza ceasefire.
“… the cabinet and the Prime Minister made a grave mistake yesterday in approving the entry of aid through a route that also benefits Hamas,” Smotrich said on X, arguing that the aid would ultimately reach the Islamist group and serve as “logistical support for the enemy during wartime”.
The Israeli government has not announced any changes to its aid policy in Gaza. Israeli media reported that the government had voted to allow additional aid to enter northern Gaza.
The prime minister’s office did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. The military declined to comment.
Israel accuses Hamas of stealing aid for its own fighters or to sell to finance its operations, an accusation Hamas denies. Gaza is in the grip of a humanitarian catastrophe, with conditions threatening to push nearly a half a million people into famine within months, according to U.N. estimates.
Israel in May partially lifted a nearly three-month blockade on aid. Two Israeli officials said on June 27 the government had temporarily stopped aid from entering north Gaza.
PRESSURE
Public pressure in Israel is mounting on Netanyahu to secure a permanent ceasefire, a move opposed by some hardline members of his right-wing coalition. An Israeli team left for Qatar on Sunday for talks on a possible Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal.
Smotrich, who in January threatened to withdraw his Religious Zionism party from the government if Israel agreed to a complete end to the war before having achieved its objectives, did not mention the ceasefire in his criticism of Netanyahu.
The right-wing coalition holds a slim parliamentary majority, although some opposition lawmakers have offered to support the government from collapsing if a ceasefire is agreed.
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Australia Police Charge Man Over Alleged Arson on Melbourne Synagogue
Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese speaks to the media during a press conference with New Zealand’s Prime Minister Christopher Luxon at the Australian Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, Aug. 16, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Tracey Nearmy
Australian police have charged a man in connection with an alleged arson attack on a Melbourne synagogue with worshippers in the building, the latest in a series of incidents targeting the nation’s Jewish community.
There were no injuries to the 20 people inside the East Melbourne Synagogue, who fled from the fire on Friday night. Firefighters extinguished the blaze in the capital of Victoria state.
Australia has experienced several antisemitic incidents since the start of the Israel-Gaza war in October 2023.
Counter-terrorism detectives late on Saturday arrested the 34-year-old resident of Sydney, capital of neighboring New South Wales, charging him with offenses including criminal damage by fire, police said.
“The man allegedly poured a flammable liquid on the front door of the building and set it on fire before fleeing the scene,” police said in a statement.
The suspect, whom the authorities declined to identify, was remanded in custody after his case was heard at Melbourne Magistrates Court on Sunday and no application was made for bail, the Australian Broadcasting Corp reported.
Authorities are investigating whether the synagogue fire was linked to a disturbance on Friday night at an Israeli restaurant in Melbourne, in which one person was arrested for hindering police.
The restaurant was extensively damaged, according to the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, an umbrella group for Australia’s Jews.
It said the fire at the synagogue, one of Melbourne’s oldest, was set as those inside sat down to Sabbath dinner.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog went on X to “condemn outright the vile arson attack targeting Jews in Melbourne’s historic and oldest synagogue on the Sabbath, and on an Israeli restaurant where people had come to enjoy a meal together”.
“This is not the first such attack in Australia in recent months. But it must be the last,” Herzog said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the incidents as “severe hate crimes” that he viewed “with utmost gravity.” “The State of Israel will continue to stand alongside the Australian Jewish community,” Netanyahu said on X.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese late on Saturday described the alleged arson, which comes seven months after another synagogue in Melbourne was targeted by arsonists, as shocking and said those responsible should face the law’s full force.
“My Government will provide all necessary support toward this effort,” Albanese posted on X.
Homes, schools, synagogues and vehicles in Australia have been targeted by antisemitic vandalism and arson. The incidents included a fake plan by organized crime to attack a Sydney synagogue using a caravan of explosives in order to divert police resources, police said in March.
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