{"id":2935,"date":"2015-10-16T08:09:31","date_gmt":"2015-10-16T13:09:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/?p=2935"},"modified":"2015-10-16T08:09:31","modified_gmt":"2015-10-16T13:09:31","slug":"its-the-occupation-stupid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/theatheistrabbi\/2015\/10\/its-the-occupation-stupid.html","title":{"rendered":"It&#8217;s the Occupation, Stupid"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><div class=\"getty embed image\" style=\"background-color:#fff;display:inline-block;font-family:'Helvetica Neue',Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#a7a7a7;font-size:11px;width:100%;max-width:594px;\">\n<div style=\"overflow:hidden;position:relative;height:0;padding:66.666667% 0 0 0;width:100%;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/embed.gettyimages.com\/embed\/492434136?et=npL2Fs8KT91u5XDby_LtIQ&amp;viewMoreLink=off&amp;sig=pOzKe6lLLQT47-rbW4aT64PBDsCj0CAr69nhVoCwaaA=&amp;caption=true\" width=\"594\" height=\"396\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"display:inline-block;position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p style=\"margin:0;\">\n<\/p><div style=\"padding:0;margin:0 0 0 10px;text-align:left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/492434136\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">View image<\/a> | <a href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">gettyimages.com<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>I\u2019ve mentioned before that I\u2019m still a paid-up member of the Reform movement\u2019s Central Conference of American Rabbis. Because of this I get to lurk on the Facebook page and hear what\u2019s on the minds of Reform rabbis.<\/p>\n<p>Yesterday I learned that some of the major lights of the movement have opinions about the latest wave of terror in Israel that I find stunning.<\/p>\n<p>I won\u2019t mention any names here \u2013 that would betray the closed nature of the group \u2013 and I won\u2019t quote anyone extensively.<\/p>\n<p>But just to give you a sense of what I\u2019m reading, I can tell you that the rabbi of one major congregation has directed his ire solely and only at the PA and Mahmoud Abbas, noting that the world is silent when Jews are killed. After disparaging the \u201cdespicable\u201d New York Times, he closed by writing, \u201cShame! Shame!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Another responded to this\u00a0post by commenting, \u201cBRAVO!!!!!\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.haaretz.com\/blogs\/west-of-eden\/.premium-1.680466\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">In a column in Haaretz, Chemi Shalev made an interesting observation<\/a> about how American Jewish groups (like the Israeli government) respond to the violence. Referring to statements issued\u00a0by the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations, the World Jewish Congress, the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee, he wrote:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>They all condemn Mahmoud Abbas. They all cite Palestinian incitement as a major cause of violence. None of them mention 48 years of direct Israeli control over the Palestinian people, in the West Bank and, yes, in East Jerusalem as well.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Not a single one of them mentions the one word\u00a0\u2013 occupation \u2013 that sums up those 48 years of control:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>If you utter the explicit word, it seems, you stand accused of justifying the terrorists and if you don\u2019t, you\u2019re not culpable in any way.<\/p>\n<p>\u2026So the stabbings and the shootings are a product of Palestinian \u201clies\u201d about the Temple Mount; the result of the Palestinian Authority\u2019s outrageous agitation; the consequence of inflammatory textbooks and rabble-rousing religious leaders; the manifestation of a culture of hate and terror that is spreading throughout the Middle East; another chapter in the long saga of Muslim rejection of Jews in Palestine that\u2019s been there since time immemorial. All valid points, perhaps, but all pale in the shadow of occupation.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Two weeks ago when Rick Jacobs, president of the Union of Reform Congregations, <a href=\"http:\/\/urj.org\/about\/union\/pr\/2015\/?syspage=article&amp;item_id=118701\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">issued a statement that addressed the violence<\/a>, he was pummeled by his colleagues for also including a call to\u00a0end settlement building.<\/p>\n<p>Reform rabbis are on record opposing settlements, but this\u00a0didn\u2019t stop one of them from characterizing Jacobs\u2019\u00a0condemnation\u00a0of the settlements\u00a0as \u201cpeace pabulum.\u201d Others pointed\u00a0out that there\u2019s no connection between the settlements and the violence.<\/p>\n<p>For some rabbis, it seems, there is no connection between their brains and reality.<\/p>\n<p>Reform rabbis are arguably the most social justice minded and liberal clergy in Jewish history. The Reform movement has always been on the right side of social justice issues. When some of them can no longer understand the damage that almost a half-century of occupation has done to both Israel and Palestine, I fear that progress is even further away than I\u2019d hoped.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>View image | gettyimages.com I\u2019ve mentioned before that I\u2019m still a paid-up member of the Reform movement\u2019s Central Conference of American Rabbis. Because of this I get to lurk on the Facebook page and hear what\u2019s on the minds of Reform rabbis. Yesterday I learned that some of the major lights of the movement have [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2281,"featured_media":2866,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[4,20,21],"class_list":["post-2935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blogentries","tag-american-jews","tag-israel","tag-israeli-palestinian-conflict"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>It&#039;s the Occupation, Stupid<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"View image | gettyimages.comI\u2019ve mentioned before that I\u2019m still a paid-up member of the Reform movement\u2019s Central Conference of American Rabbis. 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