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A leading Religious Zionist rabbi says Israelis have reconnected with Judaism after Oct. 7. He hopes it will stick.
(JTA) — A woman from a secular kibbutz on the Gaza border shouts the Shema as she celebrates the release of Israeli hostages. Hundreds of sets of ritual fringes — hanging off combat-green garments — are distributed to soldiers on the front. The mother of a rescued hostage attributes her return to a challah ritual she performed the previous day.
To Rabbi David Stav and others across Israel, those anecdotes and more demonstrate that, in the wake of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and the ensuing war, Jewish Israelis who are not observant have been turning to their religion and marshaling it to create a sense of solidarity during the fighting. Stav, a leading liberal Religious Zionist rabbi, has dedicated much of his career to making Jewish ritual more accessible and appealing to secular Israelis. The war, he thinks, may be a turning point in that mission.
But speaking last month to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Stav said he worries that the day after the war, Israel will fall back into the acrimonious political divisions that defined 2023 before Oct. 7. And for him, that concern is secondary to the worry he feels for his seven sons and sons-in-law currently serving in the Israeli military.
Stav is the co-founder and chairman of Tzohar, a liberal Israeli rabbinic association. He is also the rabbi of the central Israeli town of Shoham and ran unsuccessfully for chief rabbi of Israel in 2013. His goal, he said, is to promote a “normal” Judaism that is less dogmatic and more accepting of the varied ways many Israelis practice the religion.
His professional focus in large part is on drawing secular Israelis closer to their Jewish identity, and that was what he stressed when he spoke to JTA. But the religious revival extends beyond secular Israelis, he said: He also sees Religious Zionist Israelis coping with wartime by filling synagogues and adding onto their prayers.
That embrace of Judaism, Stav hopes, will lead Jewish Israelis to come together and stay united. By the same token, he worries that a widespread lack of faith in the government may draw Israelis back into the sparring ideological camps they recently inhabited.
“I think the past month has created a significant crisis of faith regarding the government, the state, the army, but it has also raised very foundational questions in terms of defining our identity,” he said. “And we’re seeing more and more people who understand that the concept of being a Jew has a meaning they’d forgotten.”
This conversation has been translated from Hebrew and edited for length and clarity.
JTA: What message do you hope to send to American Jews?
Stav: I think that the message that I want to send here is, first and foremost, after an argument lasting almost a year that split Israeli society and almost broke Israeli society apart, we see a different spirit: a spirit full of solidarity, full of love of Israel, full of willingness to sacrifice.
But there’s something deeper: Israeli society is in the midst of very difficult questions about defining its identity. What are we more: Israelis or Jews? I think the events of Oct. 7 demonstrated to Israeli society, first, the mutual support between Israeli and world Jewry. But second, and no less, [it showed] that regarding our enemies — Hamas and its partners — there’s no difference between right and left, religious and secular. We’re all Jews, and given that we’re all Jews, we are obligated to feel like Jews, to identify as Jews.
I believe that for many Israelis, that’s a moving experience because many of them thought that we were enlightened, Israeli, western — and suddenly they realize that before they’re western and Israeli, they’re Jewish.
It’s not just one instance. It’s thousands of instances. I can’t even tell you how many stories I’m talking about… More important than all that is people’s willingness to talk in the language of Judaism.
What message do you hope to take back with you to Israel?
Israelis must understand that what happens in Israel doesn’t just influence Israel. It influences the United States, and antisemitic incidents here are a direct result of what happens in Israel. Just like American Jews know that if in Israel it isn’t safe it won’t be safe here, we need to understand that also, that what happens to us influences not just us.
Many, many Israelis felt in recent years that they were more Israeli than Jewish, that their Judaism has no meaning. They were Israelis because they were born in Israel, so their connection to the Jewish Diaspora or to the Bible was incidental, random, not meaningful.
Now we understand that it’s much deeper than that. Suddenly we see the lone soldiers [soldiers, often from abroad, without close relatives in Israel] who have been killed in Israel. Now the story is much more Jewish than Israeli. To a great extent, the fact that Hamas killed men and women, right and left, lovers and haters of Palestinians, cast the story in a new light.
What do you see as the role of Religious Zionist rabbis like yourself in this moment?
The central role, first of all, is to strengthen unity in Israeli society — not to accuse this person or that person, not to ask the state or the army to do something unrealistic.
What do you mean by that?
To demand right now to rebuild Gush Katif [the Israeli settlements in Gaza that were evacuated in 2005] — even if it’s a moral or religiously justified claim, even if it’s right, and I’m not sure it is, would split Israeli society. It would break it now. We need to bolster our unity, to strengthen Israeli society, to believe in our ability, in our vision, in our morality, in the need to break Hamas, to destroy it. Not to make demands that will tear the state apart again. We suffered enough from division — part of which was created by the Religious Zionist community because of the judicial reform. Enough is enough.
What are people in your community struggling with?
I’ll start with worry. When I speak to my family, our family, every family is worried about its kids. That’s the first thing every family is worried about: their kids in the army.
We should also say honestly — the situation now, the crisis is so great that even if God willing we win… no one knows how it will end, no one knows what will happen in the north with Hezbollah and no one knows what will happen with the Palestinians and no one knows how the state will manage the issue of Gaza.
The second worry of course is economic worry. The crisis in Israel is creating an economic crisis in Israel. Hundreds of thousands of people [in the military reserves] aren’t working. If they’re not working they don’t make money. I was in Ben Gurion Airport — when you see Ben Gurion empty, it’s great for people who are flying because there are no long lines… but you understand it’s a problem. It’s a tourism problem, it’s a problem for the industry.
The third problem is a feeling of a general lack of trust in the government and the state’s institutions. That really troubles people, who don’t feel there’s a unifying leadership. We would have expected the leadership to broadcast unity, empathy, sensitivity. There’s a problem with that.
How do you address that?
Israel society has demonstrated spirit, volunteerism, initiative and action at the highest levels. Regarding the worry about our kids, we’re increasing our prayers. The number of prayers spilling forth in Religious Zionist synagogues is incomparable to what was in the past. Many synagogues say [the High Holiday prayer] Avinu Malkeinu, this prayer, that prayer. There’s a lot of people waking up to prayer because we understand that we need salvation.
In addition to worrying about the safety of your sons and sons-in-law in the army, what keeps you up at night?
Beyond that, the crisis of Israeli society, the crisis of faith in the state and in its institutions, and the fight that will be here between each side. Each side accuses the other of being culpable for what happened: The left at the right, the right at the left, supporters of Bibi to opponents of Bibi. I worry that the war is tamping this down but the day after the war — I always ask myself, what can we do so this doesn’t happen?
How do you plan to celebrate Simchat Torah, the holiday when Hamas’ attack occurred, next year?
I want to take this question off the agenda — not because we don’t need to think about how to celebrate Simchat Torah next year, but because now we’re focused on how to win the war. Then we’ll talk about Simchat Torah.
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The post A leading Religious Zionist rabbi says Israelis have reconnected with Judaism after Oct. 7. He hopes it will stick. appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Drexel University Professor Stole Signs From Synagogue, Police Say
Illustrative: People pass a cluster of signs outside a pro-Hamas encampment at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill. on April 28, 2024. Photo: Max Herman via Reuters Connect
A Drexel University professor allegedly participated in a mass theft of items from a synagogue in a suburb outside Philadelphia, a local NBC affiliate reported on Tuesday.
Mariana Chilton, 56, a professor of health management and policy at Drexel, has been accused of stealing pro-Israel signs from the Main Line Reform Temple in Lower Merion Township, traveling there from her neighborhood of residency, Wynnewood, Pennsylvania. Chilton allegedly drove the getaway car while two other accomplices, Sarah Prickett and Sam Penn — who is from New York — trespassed the synagogue and absconded with the loot.
“We are just taking them because we feel like it is a representative of genocide,” Chilton told law enforcement after being caught in the act, the report stated. She then, after offering to “just put them back,” refused to identify herself and comply with other lawful orders.
Video evidence provided by a local resident placed Chilton and her accomplices at the scene of the crime, and a Main Line Reform Temple official identified the signs recovered from her car as the temple’s property. That was enough for law enforcement to charge her with several offenses, including conspiracy and theft. She is also charged with driving without a license and not registering her vehicle.
Drexel University has not responded to The Algemeiner‘s request for comment for this story.
Experts have told The Algemeiner in the past academic year that while the conduct of anti-Zionist students should be reported on, the role of faculty in fostering and engaging in antisemitic acts should be closely scrutinized. Last semester, anti-Zionist faculty attached themselves to anti-Israel, pro-Hamas demonstrations, sometimes breaking the law by preventing officers from dispersing unauthorized demonstrations and detaining lawbreakers.
At Northeastern University in Boston, professors formed a human barrier around a student encampment to stop its dismantling by officers, and at Columbia University, anti-Zionist faculty at the school, as well its affiliate Barnard College, staged a walkout in support of the demonstrations and demanded the abeyance of disciplinary sanctions against anti-Zionist students — dozens of whom cheered Hamas and threatened more massacres of Jews similar to Oct. 7 — who violated school rules.
Chilton’s case is unlike any other reported in the past year, however. While dozens of professors have been accused of abusing their Jewish students and encouraging their classmates to bully and shame them, none are alleged to have resorted to stealing from a Jewish house of worship to make their point.
Mass participation of faculty in pro-Hamas demonstrations marks an inflection point in American history, Asaf Romirowsky, an expert on the Middle East and executive director of Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, told The Algemeiner in April.
Since the 1960s, he explained, far-left “scholar activists” have gradually seized control of the higher education system, tailoring admissions processes and the curricula to foster ideological radicalism and conformity, which students then carry with them into careers in government, law, corporate America, and education. This system, he concluded, must be challenged.
“The cost of trading scholarship for political propagandizing has been a zeal and pride among faculty who esteem and cheer terrorism, a historical development which is quite telling and indicative of the evolution of the Marxist ideology which has been seeping into the academy since the 1960s,” Romirowsky said. “The message is very clear to all of us who are looking on from the outside at this, and institutions have to begin drawing a red line. The protests are not about free speech. They are about supporting terrorism, about calling for a genocide of Jews.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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White House Cites Biden Clash With Netanyahu Over Iran as Proof of President’s Mental Fitness
US President Joe Biden hosts the 2023 Teacher of the Year event at the White House in Washington, US, April 24, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
Amid growing concerns over US President Joe Biden’s mental fitness, key White House officials are suggesting his foreign policy discussions with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, including a clash over how to respond to Iran’s unprecedented military attack on the Israeli homeland earlier this year, serve as evidence that he is still capable of leading from the Oval Office.
Biden and Netanyahu engaged in a heated back-and-forth in the immediate aftermath of Iran launching a massive missile and drone salvo at Israel in April, according to a new report by the New York Times. The US and other allies helped Israel shoot down nearly every drone and missile. The attack caused only one injury.
However, the Times revealed that while Netanyahu initially wanted to respond to Iran in a forceful way, Biden threatened to withhold US support in the event of a major Israeli retaliatory strike, arguing it would risk sparking a regional conflict in the Middle East.
“Aides present in the Situation Room the night that Iran hurled a barrage of missiles and drones at Israel portrayed a president in commanding form, lecturing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by phone to avoid a retaliatory escalation that would have inflamed the Middle East,” the Times reported. “‘Let me be crystal clear,’ Mr. Biden said. ‘If you launch a big attack on Iran, you’re on your own.’”
“Mr. Netanyahu pushed back hard, citing the need to respond in kind to deter future attacks,” the report continued. “‘You do this,’ Mr. Biden said forcefully, ‘and I’m out.’ Ultimately, the aides noted, Mr. Netanyahu scaled back his response.”
Israel’s military response was small and appeared aimed at minimizing the risk of escalation.
The Times report, headlined “Biden’s Lapses Are Said to Be Increasingly Common and Worrisome,” came on the heels of Biden delivering a widely-panned presidential debate performance last Thursday against former US President Donald Trump. Biden’s performance, which oftentimes appeared incoherent and muddled, set off alarm bells in Democratic circles, sending the president’s allies scrambling to extinguish concerns over his age and mental acuity.
While highlighting rising concerns, the news story also noted instances in which, according to aides, Biden appeared coherent and capable, citing the exchange with Netanyahu and his handling of the Iranian missile attack more broadly as one such example.
However, an anonymous Biden administration official told the Times that they are unsure whether Biden could hold his own against adversarial foreign leaders such as Vladimir Putin of Russia.
On Wednesday, the White House directly attributed quotes to Netanyahu in which the Israeli premier reportedly said he found Biden “very clear and very focused” during his visit to Israel following the Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas. According to a White House spokesperson, Netanyahu also reportedly cited the “more than a dozen phone conversations, extended conversations with President Biden” as evidence of the commander-in-chief’s vitality.
“Some White House officials adamantly rejected the suggestion of a president not up to handling tough foreign counterparts and told the story of the night Iran attacked Israel in April,” the New York Times reported. “Mr. Biden and his top national security officials were in the Situation Room for hours, bracing for the attack, which came around midnight. Biden was updated in real time as the forces he ordered into the region began shooting down Iranian missiles and drones. He peppered leaders with questions throughout the response.”
During its first direct attack on Israeli territory, Iran in April launched roughly 300 missiles and drones at the Jewish state.
Leading up to the attack, Iranian officials had promised revenge for an airstrike on Iran’s consulate in Damascus, Syria that they attributed to Israel. The strike killed seven members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), a widely designated terrorist organization, including two senior commanders. One of the commanders allegedly helped plan the Hamas terrorist group’s Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel.
Israel has neither confirmed nor denied involvement in the incident.
“After it was over, and almost all of the missiles and drones had been shot down, Mr. Biden called Mr. Netanyahu to persuade him not to escalate. ‘Take the win,’” Mr. Biden told the prime minister, without reading from a script or extensive notes, according to two people in the room. In the end, Mr. Netanyahu opted for a much smaller and proportionate response that effectively ended the hostilities,” the article added.
Days later, Israel responded to the Iranian aggression by launching a modest missile attack on an airbase near Isfahan. The Jewish state sought to show that it could effectively target key strategic locations in Iran while not escalating the conflict any further. Netanyahu insisted on launching a retaliatory attack against Iran, arguing that ignoring the Iranian strikes would incentivize more attacks against the Jewish state.
IRGC Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh said that Iran is waiting for “the opportunity” to launch a new round of strikes against Israel, Iranian media reported on Tuesday, potentially boosting Netanyahu’s argument that a smaller response would invite further attacks.
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Journalist at US-Based Nonprofit Promoted Stabbing Israelis, Depicted Rescued Hostage as Pig Drinking Blood: Report
Palestinian terrorists ride an Israeli military vehicle that was seized by gunmen who infiltrated areas of southern Israel, in the northern Gaza Strip, Oct. 7, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Ahmed Zakot
A journalist at a US-based nonprofit posted tutorials on how to commit stabbing attacks and depicted a rescued Israeli hostage as a pig drinking blood, according to newly surfaced social media posts.
Eitan Fischberger, a communications analyst and former Israel Defense Forces (IDF) staff sergeant who first broke the story on X/Twitter, alleged that Mahmoud Ajjour, a correspondent for The Palestine Chronicle, posted disturbing images and videos to his Instagram page.
Fischberger posted screenshots and screen recordings of the posts.
According to The Chronicle‘s website, Ajjour is a photojournalist and correspondent for the outlet, which is a US-based 501c3, or nonprofit organization.
One of the posted images depicted Noa Argamani — an Israeli who was kidnapped from the Nova music festival during Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attacks in southern Israel, and then rescued in an IDF special operation last month — as a pig drinking blood from a Coca-Cola bottle.
Here, for example, Ajjour posted a picture of Israeli hostage Noa Argamani, portrayed as a pig drinking the blood of Palestinians.
Noa, as you recall, was freed by Israeli forces in the same rescue operation in which Ajjour’s terrorist colleague was killed pic.twitter.com/oiLCqekxbl
— Eitan Fischberger (@EFischberger) June 30, 2024
In Oct. 2015, Ajjour posted a picture of a masked Palestinian holding up a knife, with the caption, “I declare it a revolution.”
That time — from approximately Sept. 2015 to June 2016 — was referred to as the “knife intifada,” as there was an uptick in Palestinian terrorist attacks, particularly using knives, against Israelis in Jerusalem, along with other parts of Israel and the West Bank.
Ajjour also seems mighty fine endorsing stabbing attacks pic.twitter.com/xi2MnZVddl
— Eitan Fischberger (@EFischberger) June 30, 2024
During that same month, Ajjour also reportedly posted a two-part tutorial on how to carry out stabbings with the caption, “May Allah protect them,” likely referring to those who were engaging in such attacks.
So much, in fact, that he uploaded a two-part instruction video showing off some best practices for stabbing Israelis pic.twitter.com/Z12rVo4Enx
— Eitan Fischberger (@EFischberger) June 30, 2024
Then, in 2023, after the son of a Hamas preacher was killed when a device he was trying to launch at Israel exploded, Ajjour mourned his death on Instagram. “Your father’s legacy is proud of you,” he wrote alongside a picture that included what appeared to be a Hamas flag.
And here, Ajjour mourns the death of Bara’a al-Zard, son of Hamas preacher Wael al-Zard.
Silly Bara’a died in an explosion caused by a device he was trying to launch at Israeli forces near the Gaza security fencehttps://t.co/vZR6IW0shF pic.twitter.com/ipQw55BYd7
— Eitan Fischberger (@EFischberger) June 30, 2024
This is not the first time a journalist from The Palestine Chronicle was alleged to have either supported or partaken in terrorism.
Abdallah Aljamal, who was a correspondent for The Chronicle, allegedly held three Israeli hostages in his home, according to the Israeli government. He was killed during a raid that rescued four hostages, including Argamani. After the allegations came to light, The Chronicle changed Aljamal’s status on its website from a correspondent to a contributor.
The Palestine Chronicle did not respond to a request for comment for this story.
Fichberger wrote that he wants the US House Ways and Means Committee to investigate The Chronicle for what seems to have become a pattern.
“If The Chronicle is let off the hook for employing an actual terrorist hostage-taker, it would prove that the American counter-terror legal apparatus really is irreparably broken,” he wrote.
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