40% Foolish on Iran
Your account of the J Street poll that reports 40% of American Jews would favor an American attack on Iran if it were on the verge of going nuclear is no less disturbing than any other bad news we’ve heard recently (“Israel, U.S. Pursue Divergent Path on Iran,” April 3).
Does this 40% really believe that the quagmire of two wars abroad should be joined by a third? Or that Israel’s interests — or anybody else’s — would be protected by a Mideast conflagration fiercer than anything yet seen there?
Berel Lang
Riverdale, N.Y.
Who Poured the First Cup for Miriam?
Aurora Mendelsohn’s April 3 opinion article on the history of two feminist rituals that have become part of the Passover Seder traces the origins of Miriam’s Cup to 1989 and a Boston Rosh Hodesh group (“Raising Cups, Dropping Oranges”).
For the sake of the historical record, I would like to share my experience with this ritual.
E.M. Broner and Nomi Nimrod co-wrote “The Women’s Haggadah” in Israel in 1975. The next year, Broner, together with four other “Seder Sisters,” held the first feminist Seder in New York City. I joined them in 1977 and became one of the Seder Sisters.
We recall singing Miriam’s praises from the very beginning. Instead of “Eliyahu Ha’Nevi” we sang “Miriam, Ha’Neviya.” We had a Miriam’s Cup on our floor (because we never had a table large enough to seat all the women, the floor became our Seder table). We don’t recall the exact year when Miriam’s Cup was moved to the head of our table, but we know that we had it there in the early 1980s. In the beginning we filled Miriam’s Cup with wine; later the decision was made to fill it with water.
Lilly Rivlin
New York, N.Y.
Travelers or Builders?
Recent research showing the weak connection of Taglit-Birthright Israel alumni to the Jewish community highlights a serious question for the vitality of North American Jewish life: What does it take to help people create a substantive and durable Jewish identity?
The research team from the Cohen Center at Brandeis University notes that many emerging adults in the Jewish community are acting more like tourists to Jewish life rather than citizens, which bodes poorly for a voluntary community like that of today’s Jews. We can’t afford for young people to think that Jewish life is a nice place to visit, but not a place they would want to live.
In their April 3 opinion article “Empowerment, Then Citizenship,” researchers Fern Chertok, Theodore Sasson and Leonard Saxe move beyond a description of the problem to prescribe a middle path they call “traveler,” suggesting that if citizenship is too high a bar, at least we can offer opportunities for the next generation to embark upon a serious Jewish journey — the ideal destination of which, Wizard-of-Oz-like, is home.
The study provides some important insight. Young Jews are looking for authentic ways to express their values and sensibilities, their perceived role in the world and the terms upon which they relate to one another. These are some of the reasons that we’ve seen rapidly growing interest in Jewish-sponsored service programs, especially those that are universalistic in scope. We’ve seen many thousands of young Jewish adults plant seeds to fight hunger in the developing world, help rebuild lives in the Gulf Coast’s devastated communities or commit to intensive work in America’s cities. And long after their experiences end, they want to do more.
It is counter-productive to wring our hands over the fact that 10 days in Israel won’t automatically translate into synagogue attendance. We need to provide more opportunities for young adults to link Judaism with their desire to positively shape the world they’ve inherited. We must also realize that in a society of excessive materialism — the excesses of which have had negative results on a global scale — we’ve raised a generation that craves depth, substance and the opportunity to serve others. That is an accomplishment worth celebrating.
Today’s young Jewish adults have boundless energy, creativity and leadership ability. They are also dramatically effective at organizing. Once the Jewish community devotes more attention and resources toward empowering younger Jews to be the kinds of people they want to be — and to helping us be the kind of community we want to be — these young people can and will connect the dots. Rather than tourists or travelers, we suggest that repairers and builders might be the right way to think about the role of the Jewish people’s rising generations. Their only question to us is whether or not we are willing to share the tools.
Ruth W. Messinger
President
American Jewish World ServiceRabbi David Rosenn
Executive Director
AVODAH: The Jewish Service Corps
New York, N.Y.
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So forty percent of Jewish responders would suggest an attack on Iran.
Do these forty percent know what they're talking about? Are they thoughtful people? Are they mindful of the pros/cons or just full of bravado?
So we need polls like this?
Perhaps a little education on the possible consequences of an attack would be helpful. Perhaps a discussion of factors we cannot know but would have to know, to make such a decision...would be helpful.
Renee - No one really knows what is the right thing to do. No one knows what the true intention of Iran is. It could be that they wish to attack Israel with nuclear weapons, intenting to wipe out her population. It's a real possibility. In such a case, American Jewry will again go into mourning, saying: "Oh, why didn't we do more to encourage our government to act in time?" (I say "again", referring to the Holocaust, when American Jewry really was politically inactive). It could be the opposite. Perhaps Iran has no genocidal intentions towards Israel, and an attack on her will only initiate an unnecessary war. Who knows?
I don't understand Iranian culture, religion or political thinking. I don't know their language, nor have I ever visited Iran. I'm rather certain that you, too, don't know anything about Iran and its Shi'ite Islamic regime, its motivations, its decision-making process. So, I agree with you that the forty percent do not know what they are talking about. But I imagine that the other 60% wouldn't have a clue as to what makes Iran tick. This would include J Street and Berel Lang (whose letter to the editor appears above). I can't imaine that J Street people could even write their own names in Farsi, let alone actually analyze the workings of the Iranian regime.
Yes. Qol, I agree. So...why a nonsensical poll asking people to offer opinions about a situation--about which none of us know what to do!!! Yes, there are people in Iran who DO want to wipe Israel off the map. How many Iranians support that, we do not know. But true, if God forbid Iran launched a nuclear attack on Israel, we would say a lot of things. We'd be wrong about most of them, too. How about Let's actually THINK of what our government CAN do. Or SHOULD do. What does a responsible government do about a rogue government? This is an age-old problem. Let's study the situation. What do you mean by: "Why didn't we encourage our government to act in time?" Hello? What does "act" mean? Act HOW? Or do we just want to rant and rave. Does it occur to anyone that our government might actually already be doing quite a lot? That's possible too.
"Acting in time", Renee, means actual results - preventing the completion of an Iranian atomic weapon. Real sanctions, including a blockade of Iranian oil exports, would hurt the Iranian economy so badly that they would not be able to complete the nuclear project. Sadly, it's not going to happen. Next year, we will be facing a whole new situation.