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Netanyahu once decried ‘daylight’ with Washington. Now he’s tolerating Trump’s glare.
WASHINGTON – When Benjamin Netanyahu met with Donald Trump in February, the Israeli prime minister’s first meeting with the president in his second term, he made clear that he hoped the days of “daylight” between the two countries were gone.
”When Israel and the United States don’t work together, that creates problems,” Netanyahu said then. ”When the other side sees daylight between us — and occasionally, in the last few years, to put it mildly, they saw daylight – then it’s more difficult.”
The dig was at President Joe Biden and the differences the Democrat and Netanyahu had over Israel’s conduct of its war with Hamas in Gaza.
Trump and his deputies have since then expressed their frustrations with Israel in language far more blunt and excoriating than Biden ever deployed. They have also put their finger on the scale in shaping Israeli leaders’ actions and words more than Biden ever tried to.
“Frankly, it’s baffling to me that somehow he continues to get away with it,” said Halie Soifer, the CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America.
Soifer noted that there was barely any pushback when Trump took actions that undermined Israel, including brokering a separate deal with the Houthi militia in Yemen that allowed it to continue attacking Israeli ships while allowing American ships to pass, and visiting Qatar, a backer of Hamas, but not Israel during a Middle East tour earlier this year.
She said what was striking about Trump’s actions were not necessarily the results, but the underlying assumption that he must be obeyed.
“He has actually pushed Netanyahu quite a bit and used a pretty sharp language in the process, which is not entirely a bad thing, but some of the extent to which he has either threatened or has threatened, I would say, is language that would be wholly unacceptable if it were a Democrat in any circumstance,” she said.
She offered an example: “He was emphatic in saying that Israel should not be annexing the West Bank. Now, it’s not that I disagree with that position, but he said Israel would lose ‘all support from the United States’ if it happened.”
Indeed, Netanyahu and his supporters have waged rebellions, and won concessions, over far less significant incursions against his authority. Yet the prime minister, who just over a year ago was deploying social media videos and a speech to Congress to criticize Biden, has been silent in the face of the blunt and at times vulgar broadsides he has endured from Trump and top deputies — and effusive in his continued praise of Trump.
Pro-Israel conservatives who were critical of how the Biden administration treated Israel say the difference is in how Trump’s tough love does not stint on the “love” component: Netanyahu is able to take the criticism because he knows it comes wrapped around goodies.
The United States in June joined Israel in its short war against Iran, the first such offensive U.S. role in an Israeli military action in the history of relations between the countries. Biden had provided Israel with logistical support in scuffles with Iran triggered by Israel’s war with Hamas, a terrorist organization that has for decades been allied with Iran, but did not directly involve the U.S. military.
“The amount of credit that this administration now has with the Israeli government is enormous,” said Jonathan Schanzer, the vice president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. “It’s amazing what happens when you bomb the Iranian nuclear program, how much goodwill that buys you.”
Michael Makovsky, president of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, a group that advocates for a robust U.S.-Israel military alliance, said Republicans are more likely to extract concessions from Israel because they have become the repository of support for Israel in the United States as Democrats have become increasingly disillusioned with the country.
“It makes it harder for Netanyahu to [buck] any pro-Israel Republican president, but especially Trump, who obviously would certainly hold it against him,” he said.
Vice President JD Vance, speaking to college students this week, further underscored the conundrum facing Netanyahu and pro-Israel voices when he emphasized that he did not see U.S. support for Israel as sacrosanct — and noted that Trump makes up his own mind when it comes to Israel.
“When people say that Israel is somehow manipulating or controlling the president of the United States, they’re not manipulating or controlling this president of the United States,” he said.
Joel Rubin, a former deputy assistant secretary of state in the Obama administration, said Netanyahu was in a bind because Republicans in Congress who in any other circumstance would confront a president who criticized Israel were afraid of Trump.
“They’re willing to fall in line if that’s what he wants,” Rubin said. “They may try to do their work [lobbying for Israel] behind the scenes.”
Democrats, having fallen out with Netanyahu because of tensions during the Obama and Biden presidencies, are not going to step into that breach, said Rubin, who was the Jewish outreach official during the 2020 presidential campaign of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, a strident Israel critic.
“Do Democrats want to take issue with that, that Trump is acting like he’s the prime minister of Israel, or do they kind of agree with some of that he’s doing?” he said.
It was during the June Iran war that Trump told the press outside the White House that Israel and Iran “don’t know what the f— they’re doing.” Last week alone, Vice President JD Vance called the Knesset “stupid” for voting to annex the West Bank, and Steve Witkoff, Trump’s top Middle East envoy, said the administration felt “betrayed” by Israel’s strike on Hamas targets in Qatar.
The remark evinced barely a whimper from Israel, a stark contrast with the weeks of agonizing that eventuated when an anonymous Obama White House official in 2014 called Netanyahu “chickens–t” for dithering on peace and on how best to confront Iran. The ensuing diplomatic turmoil culminated in an apology to Netanyahu from the White House and from then-Secretary of State John Kerry.
Trump famously not only does not do apologies, he has a track record of sacking anyone who works for him who does. He also doesn’t have to: Netanyahu is rolling with the punches, as long as they’re coming from Trump and co. Greeting Vance last week, Netanyahu said that the Israel-U.S. alliance has been “second to none” in Trump’s second term.
In fact, when apologies are forthcoming in the U.S.-Israeli relationship, they are from the Israeli side. In a White House meeting last month, Trump made a show of getting Netanyahu to apologize to Qatar’s prime minister for the strike.
Netanyahu’s far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, groveled in a televised apology for having advised Saudi Arabia to “keep riding camels in the desert” if the kingdom conditions a peace deal on a path to Palestinian statehood. The remarks infuriated the Trump administration, which is trying to bring the Saudis into the Abraham Accords, the normalization deals Trump brokered in 2020 at the end of his first term.
Netanyahu scrambled to tamp down the significance of the Knesset vote during Vance’s visit that called for the annexation of the West Bank, after Vance called the vote “a very stupid political stunt, and I personally take some insult to it.”
The vote, Netanyahu said, was “a deliberate political provocation by the opposition to sow discord during Vice President JD Vance’s visit to Israel.”
It was a striking contrast with the last time the Israeli right wing thumbed its nose at a visiting prime minister, when Biden visited Israel in 2010 to emphasize the U.S.-Israel friendship – and Israel announced plans to build in a disputed portion of Jerusalem.
Biden and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton rebuked Netanyahu – but in private, not on the Ben Gurion Airport tarmac, as Vance did. And Netanyahu deployed his diplomats and pro-Israel advocates in the United States to complain that the American reaction was over the top.
Trump gets a pass because he is family, especially now that he brokered the release of the last 20 living hostages held by Hamas, said Schanzer.
“When you have a close relationship with a friend and you’re able to take you know, as the Brits say, take the piss, you can take shots at somebody who you love and know and trust,” he said. Trump has the bandwidth with Israelis because he was able to bring home the hostages, Schanzer said.
“The Israeli right and the Israeli left cannot agree on the color of hummus right now, but they all agree that Donald Trump has done enormous good for the country,” he said. “The hostage families adore Trump and Witkoff and Kushner.”
Biden believed he had a close relationship with Israel and was in fact reluctant to press Israel hard as it retaliated against Hamas for its Oct. 7, 2023, massacre of close to 1,200 people in Israel, the event that triggered the war. The president came under fire from Democrats for not doing enough to leverage U.S. aid to contain Israel.
Makovsky of JINSA said Trump consistently couples the constraints he imposes on Israel with warnings that he is ready to unleash Israeli power if its enemies do not stand back.
“One of the most important things he said here is that if Hamas doesn’t agree to this agreement or abide by it, he will back Israel to do whatever they need to do,” Makovsky said, referring to the ceasefire Trump brokered in the Gaza war.
To the degree that Netanyahu has expressed unhappiness with tensions between Israel and the faction in the Trump administration led by Vance that seeks to roll back U.S. military alliances, including with Israel, it has been through leaks.
The Israeli satirical program “Eretz Nehederet” has noticed the difference in Netanyahu’s approaches to Biden and Trump and last week depicted Netanyahu as a supplicant to Trump, who was portrayed as a Roman emperor. “Donald Trump is emperor!” Netanyahu dances and sings in the sketch. “If you want an apology to [Qatar] you got it!”
Advocacy for “no daylight” between Israel and the United States stretches back decades and became an issue in Obama’s first year in office, when Jewish leaders pleaded with the new president to sustain the practice of keeping criticisms private.
The Republican Jewish Coalition’s Jewish community campaign on Trump’s behalf last year highlighted the phrase. The RJC did not return a request for comment for this story.
Some pro-Israel conservatives are wary of what they see as Republican distancing from Israel, although they are careful not to blame Trump. Mark Levin, the Jewish Fox News pundit, last month blasted White House insiders who criticized Netanyahu for tangling with movement conservatives like Tucker Carlson who are critical of Israel.
“They’re undermining the president,” Levin said of the officials leaking their criticisms of Netanyahu to the press. “They’re pushing a propaganda campaign. Not a word from the insiders about a single terrorist group or terrorist country. Just Israel and Netanyahu. This is a scandal.”
Yet daylight keeps creeping into the relationship – and some of its exponents are Jewish conservatives who have until now been among Israel’s most strident defenders.
Figures like Yoram Hazony, the Israeli-American philosopher who is close to Vance, do not criticize Netanyahu, but they are unabashed in criticizing Israeli lawmakers for endangering emerging ties between Israel and Arab nations.
“President Trump, VP Vance, and Netanyahu himself, are completely justified in thinking this behavior in the Israeli parliament is irresponsible, insulting, and tiresome — and in saying so in strong terms so the Saudis don’t just announce that the deal is off and walk away,” Hazony said last week.
Joel Pollak, a senior editor at the Trump-supporting Breitbart news, said in an op-ed that Trump’s role was to protect Netanyahu as the Israeli prime minister struggled to contain the far right.
“If Israel cannot stop its fanatics — some of whom regard the Israeli state as illegitimate — it will not survive,” Pollak wrote. “Yet Israeli leaders, including Netanyahu, have struggled to rein in that fringe — especially because the existential threat posed by terrorism made internal law enforcement politically fraught.”
Trump, Pollak said, is “making clear that there will be a high diplomatic cost for yielding to the fringe.”
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The post Netanyahu once decried ‘daylight’ with Washington. Now he’s tolerating Trump’s glare. appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Rabbi who coached Adam Brody for ‘Nobody Wants This’ calls him ‘ignorant Jew’ over Gaza ‘genocide’ comments
(JTA) — The rabbi who coached Adam Brody for Netflix’s “Nobody Wants This” has bashed him for saying that Israel committed genocide in Gaza.
Steve Leder, the former senior rabbi of Wilshire Boulevard Temple in Los Angeles, served as a consultant on depictions of Judaism for Season 1 of “Nobody Wants This,” a rom-com in which Brody plays a rabbi who falls for an agnostic non-Jewish podcaster.
Leder denounced Brody on Wednesday over recent comments in which the Jewish actor for the first time publicly expressed his views on Israel’s actions in Gaza. Brody told GQ, “Put me down as thinking it’s a genocide. Put me down as wanting a free Palestine.”
Leder said in an Instagram video that Brody’s statements were “truly shocking,” “flippant” and “disgusting,” asserting his own view that “there is no genocide in Gaza.”
“You, by your own admission, are a relatively ignorant Jew, and your ignorance really showed the other day,” said Leder. “If you’re going to use a word like genocide, you ought to know what it means.”
Leder appeared to be referring to Brody’s previous descriptions of his limited Jewish education. Brody has said he is an atheist who “barely got bar mitzvahed and retained nothing from it,” adding that he prepared for the role of rabbi Noah Roklov in “Nobody Wants This” by attending a Shabbat service and working through books, podcasts and documentaries about Judaism.
Brody played high-profile Jewish characters including Seth Cohen in “The O.C.” and Seth Morris in “Fleishman Is in Trouble” before “Nobody Wants This,” which returns for a third season on Oct. 22.
The show itself has conspicuously avoided the subject of Israel. “Nobody Wants This” creator Erin Foster — who converted to Judaism in Leder’s synagogue — told The Free Press last year that she made a deliberate choice not to deal with the issue.
“We never say Israel or Palestine in the show, and that’s intentional because I think it would be a distraction and that this is just not the show to tell that story,” said Foster.
Brody told GQ that the Gaza war, alongside other national and global crises in recent years, revealed that he and his Hollywood peers were not as “like-minded” as he previously believed.
“Between COVID, a second Trump term, Israel-Gaza, it’s really brought out some different beliefs that I was ignorant to, and then disheartened by,” he said.
Israel’s actions in Gaza have divided the entertainment industry — and Jewish stars. While celebrities such as Jerry Seinfeld, Gal Gadot and Amy Schumer have voiced support for Israel since the Hamas attacks on Oct. 7, 2023, other Jewish actors have said that Israel subsequently committed genocide, including Hannah Einbinder and Wallace Shawn.
The genocide accusation is heavily disputed. A United Nations Commission of Inquiry, along with international and Israeli human rights groups, has concluded that Israel’s actions in Gaza fit that description. However, the International Court of Justice has not yet issued a final judgment on allegations of genocide brought by South Africa against Israel. Israel rejects the accusation.
The post Rabbi who coached Adam Brody for ‘Nobody Wants This’ calls him ‘ignorant Jew’ over Gaza ‘genocide’ comments appeared first on The Forward.
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How Netflix’s ‘East of Eden’ handled its ‘Timshel’ problem for Hebrew speakers
The crux of John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, now a splashy Netflix miniseries, is a Hebrew word that doesn’t exist.
At one point in Steinbeck’s 600-page tome, as rife with biblical allegory as the Salinas Valley is with natural beauty, the character Lee offers a midrash on Genesis 4, and the moment God rejects Cain’s offering.
Speaking with Samuel Hamilton, the neighbor of the Trask family at the center of the generational drama, Lee said he was bothered by a passage where God says, in the King James Bible, “If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.”
Lee says he compared translations and finally returned to the source: Hebrew, by way of some learned Chinese elders who consulted a rabbi.
In the Hebrew, they found the word “timshel,” which they translate as “thou mayest. Thou mayest rule over sin.” (The word, the last one of Steinbeck’s book, is the title of the final episode of the Netflix series.)
“The American Standard translation orders men to triumph over sin, and you can call sin ignorance,” Lee tells Samuel, scholar to scholar. “The King James translation makes a promise in ‘Thou shalt,’ meaning that men will surely triumph over sin. But the Hebrew word, the word timshel — ‘Thou mayest’ — that gives a choice. It might be the most important word in the world. That says the way is open. That throws it right back on a man. For if ‘Thou mayest’ — it is also true that ‘Thou mayest not.’”
This interpretation, in a book about how sin may be transmitted from one set of Cain and Abel-like brothers to the next, is the core of Steinbeck’s philosophy. So central is it that he carved the word onto a wooden box containing the manuscript.
But as I am hardly the first to note, “timshel” is a corruption of “timshol,” תמשל, and it doesn’t mean “thou mayest.” It means something like “you will rule” — future tense, second person, a more complete thought.
That said, the sages did debate whether the word was truly determinative or implied a sense of choice. (Ramban and Rashi are among the ones to suggest free will factored into the equation.)
While quoting the whole phrase in English, Steinbeck evidently thought the word “timshol” only indicated how one might rule, and did not encompass the piece about the ruling. As our language columnist Aviya Kushner has written, Steinbeck’s explanation “reveals an ignorance of the basic fact that Hebrew is more concise than English.”
Steinbeck was writing for an English-speaking audience. Zoe Kazan released her miniseries on Netflix and to a global audience that includes around 9 to 10 million Hebrew speakers. How did they adapt the passage for the Hebrew subtitles?
In the show, the scene plays out much the same way. Lee (Hon Lee) and Samuel (Ciarán Hinds) are at the kitchen table of the Trask homestead in the valley.
The King James has God tell Cain “thou shalt” rule over sin. It sounds, as Lee says, like “a promise.” The American Standard Bible translates it as “do thou.” “More of an order” from the Almighty, says Samuel.
Lee said Jewish scholars in San Francisco found the original in “timshel,” which, as in the book, is translated as “thou mayest.”
In the Hebrew subtitles, the word is correctly rendered as timshol, תמשול. Netflix translated his reading as “thou mayest” as, literally, “a choice is in your hand,” which, while not actually what the word means in Hebrew, suggests it’s something a bit more layered than “thou mayest.”
(Netflix did not respond to a request for comment about how the Hebrew translations were decided on.)
Perhaps the spirit of it — if not the letter — is what matters. And indeed, the rejection of evil as an inborn element of human nature has more in common with Jewish tradition than the Episcopalian concept of original sin and agency linked to God that Steinbeck grew up with.
Lee reasons that “timshel,” a Steinbeckian invention, may be the most important word there is.
“It offers a choice,” he says. “Our future isn’t determined by God or by our past. Even Cain in his weakness and his filth at the murder of his brother can still choose his course. Because timshel. Thou mayest.”
It’s a worthwhile message that of course resonates. But, of course, thou mayest also consult Hebrew speakers.
Mira Fox contributed research and translation.
The post How Netflix’s ‘East of Eden’ handled its ‘Timshel’ problem for Hebrew speakers appeared first on The Forward.
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Even Adam and Eve weren’t satisfied
האָסטו אַמאָל געטראַכט: „ווען איך וואָלט נאָר געהאַט דאָס אָדער יענץ, אָדער ווען מײַן מצבֿ וואָלט נאָר געווען אַנדערש, וואָלט איך געווען גליקלעך…“?
עס איז זייער אַנטמוטיקנדיק צו גלייבן אַז עס פֿעלט אונדז דאָס וואָס מיר דאַרפֿן כּדי צו דערגרייכן אונדזערע צילן און צו זײַן גליקלעך. און נאָך מער: ווען מען קומט צו אַזאַ מסקנה, פֿילט מען זיך ווי אַ קרבן פֿון די אומשטענדן, אוממעכטיק צו בײַטן די מציאות צום גוטן.
אָבער איז עס טאַקע אַזוי?
אין טיפֿן איז דאָס אַ פֿאַלשער חשבון. פֿרייד איז ניט אָפּהענגיק פֿון דעם וואָס מיר האָבן אָדער האָבן ניט, נאָר פֿון דעם ווי מיר קוקן אויף וואָס מיר האָבן און אויף וואָס עס פֿעלט אונדז.
אין דער וואָכעדיקער סדרה, בראשית, לייענען מיר וועגן בריאת־העולם און איר שפּיץ — די באַשאַפֿונג פֿון אָדם און חוה.
וואָס קען זײַן אַ בעסערער בײַשפּיל, אַז גליק איז ניט אָפּהענגיק פֿון אויסערלעכע אומשטענדן, ווי אָדם און חוה אין גן־עדן?
האָט זיי עפּעס געפֿעלט? ניין.
און דאָך האָבן זיי אַליין באַוויזן צו פֿאַרפּלאָנטערן דעם מצבֿ.
עס איז געווען בלויז איין בוים, פֿון וועמענס פֿרוכטן ג־ט האָט זיי פֿאַרווערט צו עסן, און זיי האָבן זיך ניט געקענט אײַנהאַלטן פֿון עסן דווקא פֿון יענעם בוים!
און נאָך מער: לויט דעם תּנא רבי מאיר איז דער בוים געווען אַ ווײַנשטאָק. זיי האָבן זיך געדאַרפֿט אָפּהאַלטן פֿון זײַנע פֿרוכטן בלויז עטלעכע שעה, ביז שבת וואָלט זיך אָנגעהויבן; דאַן וואָלטן זיי געקענט מאַכן קידוש אויפֿן ווײַן און אַזוי אײַנפֿירן אַן אייביקן שבת.
פֿאַר וואָס האָבן זיי ניט געקענט זיך אײַנהאַלטן?
עס איז אַ טייל פֿון אונדזער נאַטור צו וועלן דווקא דאָס וואָס מיר קענען ניט האָבן, און ניט אָפּצושאַצן ווי געהעריג דאָס וואָס מיר האָבן יאָ.
עס קלינגט כּמעט אומגלייבלעך — כאָטש דאָס געשעט צו אָפֿט — אָבער ווען ג־ט קומט צו אָדם און פֿאָדערט בײַ אים אַן ענטפֿער פֿאַר וואָס ער האָט געגעסן פֿון בוים, באַשולדיקט ער „די פֿרוי וואָס דו האָסט מיר געגעבן צו זײַן מיט מיר“, ווײַל זי האָט אים געגעבן צו עסן פֿון בוים.
וואָס פֿאַר אַן אומדאַנקבאַרקייט!
ג־ט האָט אים געגעבן אַ פֿרוי, ווײַל ער האָט געזען ווי שטאַרק אָדם לײַדט פֿון זײַן איינזאַמקייט. און אַנשטאָט אָפּצושאַצן דעם אוצר וואָס ער האָט באַקומען, קריטיקירט ער זי און באַשולדיקט זי.
אין אַ בריוו צו איינעם וואָס פֿלעגט זיך אָפֿט באַקלאָגן וועגן זײַן לעבן, שרײַבט דער ליובאַוויטשער רבי — זכותו יגן עלינו:
„אין דער וועלט אין וועלכער מיר לעבן, געפֿינט זיך אין אַלע זאַכן אַ געמיש פֿון גוטס און שלעכטס. דער מענטש דאַרף אויסקלײַבן אויף וועלכן פֿון די צוויי צדדים ער וויל לייגן דעם טראָפּ, אויף וועלכן ער וויל טראַכטן, און וועלכן ער וויל נאָכגיין…
„ווי באַלערנדיק איז דאָס וואָס אונדזערע חכמים זאָגן וועגן דעם וואָס אָדם איז געווען אַן אומדאַנקבאַרער: נאָך איידער ער איז פֿאַרטריבן געוואָרן פֿון גן־עדן — ווען ער האָט זיך נאָך געפֿונען אין אַ ממשותדיקן גן־עדן — האָט ער זיך שוין באַקלאָגט וועגן זײַן מצבֿ.
„פֿון דער אַנדערער זײַט זענען געווען ייִדן, מענער און פֿרויען, וואָס האָבן געדאַנקט און געבענטשט דעם באַשעפֿער, און געזאָגט די ברכות השחר יעדן אינדערפֿרי, בשעת זיי האָבן געלעבט אונטער די שרעקלעכסטע באַדינגונגען אין די דײַטשישע קאָנצענטראַציע־לאַגערן.
„אין דער ווירקלעכקייט וועט דער מצבֿ פֿון יעדן מענטש זיך געפֿינען ערגעץ צווישן די צוויי עקסטרעמען.
„מײַן כּוונה איז ניט אײַך צו מוסרן, נאָר אונטערצושטרײַכן אַ מציאות: וואָס פֿאַר אַ לעבן מיר לעבן — אַ לעבן פֿול מיט צופֿרידנקייט און באַדײַט, אָדער פֿאַרקערט — איז אין אַ גרויסער מאָס אָפּהענגיק פֿון אונדזער ווילנסקראַפֿט, וואָס באַשטימט צי מיר וועלן לייגן דעם טראָפּ אויף דעם פּאָזיטיוון אָדער אויף דעם נעגאַטיוון.“
מיר זײַנען מסוגל זיך צו באַקלאָגן אויף די באַדינגונגען אין גן־עדן און צו פֿילן הכּרת־הטובֿ, דאַנקשאַפֿט, אַפֿילו אין די אוממענטשלעכסטע באַדינגונגען פֿון אַ קאָנצענטראַציע־לאַגער.
איינער פֿון די פּערזענלעכע געהילפֿן בײַם רבין, הרבֿ בערל ע״ה יוניק, האָט דערציילט, אַז דער רבי האָט אים אַמאָל פּריוואַט געזאָגט:
„איך האָב געאַרבעט אויף זיך צו זען שטענדיק די זאַכן אין אַ פּאָזיטיוון ליכט; ווען ניט, וואָלט איך ניט געקענט איבערלעבן.“
ווען מען ווייסט וויפֿל פּערזענלעכע ליידן פֿון פֿאַרשידענע מינים דער רבי האָט אַליין דורכגעמאַכט, אין צוגאָב צו דעם ווייטיק פֿון די המונים מענטשן וואָס האָבן מיט אים געטיילט זייערע פּערזענלעכע צרות, קען מען פֿאַרשטיין, אַז אַזאַ בליק אויפֿן לעבן איז גאָר ניט קיין קליינע דערגרייכונג.
דערפֿאַר איז די „ווערקצײַג“ פֿון דער וואָך צו טראַכטן וועגן די פֿאָלגנדיקע פֿראַגעס:
זענען די אומשטענדן פֿון דײַן לעבן גוט אָדער שלעכט אומאָפּהענגיק פֿון דעם ווי דו קוקסט אויף זיי — אָדער ווערן זיי פֿאַר דיר גוט אָדער שלעכט דווקא צוליב דעם ווי דו קוקסט אויף זיי?
ס׳איז דאָ אַ וואָרט וואָס מען האָט געהערט אין נאָמען פֿון דעם דריטן חב״ד רבי, דעם צמח צדק זצ״ל: „אַזוי ווי מען שטעלט זיך אַוועק שבת בראשית, אַזוי גייט אַוועק אויף דעם גאַנצן יאָר“. דריק איך אויס די האָפֿענונג אַז מיר זאָלן אין דעם אַלע מצליח זײַן און האָבן אַ גוט געבענטשט יאָר.
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