Reaching Across America's Ideological Divide—Some Dos and Don'ts

       

About a month before the Presidential election, someone named Scott posted on my Facebook page, informing me that he was a classmate of mine from the Class of 1968 at Glenbard West High School in Glen Ellyn, IL and now lives in Arizona, (that turned out to be true, though I didn’t remember him).  Scott wrote that he found my fervid rhetorical attacks on President Trump to be overwrought and wrong-headed. Scott believes Trump has been a superb president with a sterling record of delivering upon his promises and giving millions of Americans like himself a sense of a renewed sense of hope.   

I checked out Scott’s Facebook page, and saw that he identified himself there as “an old American who cares deeply for his, family, friends, countrymen, and the good old USA!” Scott’s profile picture, in which he is holding a sign expressing his love for the Arizona Cardinals professional football team is superimposed over a larger photo of a gigantic American flag that covers the entire length of the football field at Cardinals stadium.   

As many of my readers know, I have been involved for the past 15 years in building ties of communication and cooperation between grass roots American Jews and Muslims.  Nowadays, Muslims and Jews alike are keenly aware we face an urgent challenge to reach across the ideological barricades and find a way to build productive relationships with folks who are avid supporters of a President who has demonized Muslims and, augmented an atmosphere of xenophobia threatening to both our communities. Perhaps I could start with outreach to Scott. We have our Midwestern boyhoods in common and both dig pro football.  Perhaps we could find some common ground.

Unfortunately, I quickly made a botch of my subsequent attempt to establish a constructive relationship with Scott on Facebook. Throughout the last heated month of the presidential campaign, I found myself trying in vain to convince him and others who posted on his page with compelling arguments as to why Trump was an abomination and a deadly peril to American democracy; while he lashed back  that I was a brainwashed leftist possessed by TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome). Amidst our fierce back and forth, I forgot that the main point of my outreach to Scott was supposed to have been about identifying commonalities.

After Scott put up photos on Facebook showing himself and family members  with faces unmasked and exalted at a Trump rally in Arizona a couple of weeks before the election, I wrote that I prayed  he and his loved ones  would be spared from COVID but argued they had been  irresponsible  concerning their own health and that of many others by attending a “super-spreader event” for a president who deliberately put the lives of his own supporters at risk. Scott pushed back at my finger-wagging; explaining that he normally took precautions in his daily life to prevent getting COVID; but there was a special, uplifting energy at the outdoor rally Trump that led him to feel safe and at home.  

A few days before the election, Scott told me that he feared my “head would explode” on November 3 when Trump inevitably won. On November 7, he put up a post that he was “deeply disappointed” Biden appeared likely to prevail, but then went on to enthusiastically thank Trump for all the wonderful things he had done for America. A few weeks later, however, I gingerly renewed the dialogue; letting him know that I had suffered on many occasions when my side lost, and his sharp pain too would be dulled with time. Unfortunately, we again quickly slipped back into vitriol; with me giving voice to my outrage that Trump was falsely denying that he lost the election. Scott wrote that there likely had been fraud, and Trump had every right to investigate.  

On December 1, Scott put up a heartfelt Facebook posting entitled “The Days Ahead Will Be Trying For the Entire Nation.” In it, Scott looked back to the verities of his youth secure in the conviction conveyed in the newscasts of Walter Cronkite and Huntley and Brinkley that “ I was watching people who informed us, exposed us to the world, and literally taught us about business and life through the transfer of information.” However, flash forward to 2020, when amidst “media vitriol and doom and gloom” Scott found himself watching “segments of our population tearing down statues of our Founding Fathers and destroying the hard work and livelihoods of Americans coast to coast”. Scott wrote that it felt like “waking up and learning that your mate of 50 years was not the person you loved. They have a dark side that is scary. They have an agenda that is unsettling.”

Unexpectedly, after pondering Scott’s words, I felt able to empathize with him for the first time.  Like him, I started life with a powerful burst of optimism, impelled by the millennial dreams of the 1960’s to believe we were in the process of building a vibrant new America in which cooperation would replace competition;  racism and exploitation would finally be ended, and we would learn to live in harmony with nature. 50 years on, in my darker moments, I feel like all of my youthful hopes  have been torn to shreds and the bad guys have largely won—with calamitous consequences that could include the very extinction of life on Earth due to human-caused climate change.

So, Scott and I share an acute awareness of being two 70-year-old men with youthful dreams cruelly torn asunder.  I totally relate to Scott’s image of waking up and learning that a big section of America—Scott’s own side—has a dark and unsettling agenda. Tragically, each of us fears and loathes other Americans; whom we believe are out to destroy everything we believe in. As the old Pogo cartoon said, “We have met the enemy and it is us.”  

And there’s the rub; neither of the two Americas is going anywhere and neither seems inclined to give way to the other without a fierce fight; one that could easily spin into violence. Like it or not, we occupy the same physical space, so unless we are ready to fight a second Civil War, we Reds and Blues are going to have to find a way to communicate without tearing each other apart. 

To be sure, we must first make sure that Trump's brazen attempt to steal the election through Supreme Court is turned back--otherwise we will have to go to the streets to ensure the survival of democracy itself. But assuming America gets past this scary moment relatively unscathed, the only way to secure democracy long term is for millions of people on both sides of the divide to reach out to each other.  

How to do that? Let’s start from the premise that we are each vulnerable human beings; presently feeling hurt and scared. Maybe we can find a way to reassure each other that neither is the devil, but, rather, a fellow American who wants to leave a livable and uplifting society for our children and grandchildren. Can we not agree to disagree on political issues yet still connect on a human level and gain insights from each other? 

Scott, sorry it has taken me quite a while to be able to say this, but I very much feel your pain. After a lot of lashing out on Facebook, I’ve come out of my protective crouch and my hand is outstretched to you.

The Passing of a Giant Bent on Keeping Hope Alive Against Overwhelming Odds

In terms of keeping hope alive, I can think of no one who worked harder for longer to accomplish that than veteran Palestinian peace negotiator Saeb Erekat, who passed away this week from COVID-19 and other illnesses. Tragically, despite his protean efforts Erekat did not accomplish his dream of creating an independent Palestinian state, living in peace alongside Israel, but on a personal level he role-modeled a standard for Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation that will hopefully serve as an inspiration for a future coming together of the two peoples. 

In the short run, I must acknowledge, the loss of Erekat feels like the flickering out of one of the last rays of hope that illuminated the long ago 1990's when in the wake of the Oslo Accords, Israeli-Palestinian peace seemed imminent. I remember on a visit to Jerusalem in the summer of 1999. calling Erekat to see if I could set up an interview with him for an American Jewish newspaper and receiving a gracious invitation from him to come that very day to interview him in his lovely house in in his hometown of Jericho. The interview was upbeat and optimistic--Labor's Ehud Barak had just defeated Netanyahu and hope was again in the air after a three year stretch of Likud rule. Erekat was urbane, charming and totally won me over on a personal level. 

Erekat discussed the political scene on both the Israeli and Palestinian sides in an incisive and, I thought, surprisingly manner, but he told me that he was even more excited about the growth in people-to-people ties between everyday Israelis and Palestinians, introducing me to his then-teenage daughter Dalal, who had taken part in the Seeds of Peace camp in Maine a few years before that and formed close friendships with Israeli teens, which they had maintained after returning to Israel and Palestine. Dalal, who was then about 18 and, if I recall correctly, a university student, invited me to join her and other Palestinian and Israeli Seeds of Peace alums at a meetup the following day at a mall in Mevasseret Tziyon, west of Jerusalem. That proved to be a memorable and inspiring encounter---to see the warm friendship between the young people and to feel that the sense of hope, possibility and warm humanity they evinced was the wave of the future. 

Unfortunately, it was not. The peace process crashed and burned just over a year later after the failure of the Camp David Clinton-Arafat-Barak Summit, Arik Sharon's inflammatory walkabout on the Temple Mount and beginning of the Second Intifada. I won't go into that sad history now, only to mourn the lost opportunity of the late 1990's and to wonder why too few people on both side were ultimately able to live up to the humanism, decency and passionate desire for an end to the conflict evinced that day by Saeb Erekat, Dalal Erekat and her Israelis and Palestinian friends. They had come to know the other side deeply and could not longer hate. They had understood in their bones that the only solution that would work was one that accorded justice, security and peace to both sides. 

I saw Erekat for the last time a year ago at the annual J Street conference in Washington, where he gave a passionate speech denouncing the Trump-Kushner Middle East peace plan (the so-called 'Deal of the Century') as an insult to the Palestinians and utterly unacceptable and still holding out hope that a fair two-state solution could somehow be revived. I'm not sure if he really believed that was possible anymore given the huge number of Israeli settlements that had sliced and diced the West Bank to the point where a contiguous Palestinian state seemed impossible--but he was clear that a one-state solution in the present dynamic was a recipe for apartheid, oppression and escalating violence. I was impressed not only by how affectionately he was received by the J Street crowd, but that he could still come to Jewish audiences in a warm and open-hearted way, even after all of the crushing disappointments he had endured. 

What can I say--it totally sucks the way things have turned out in Israel- Palestine, It’s been a personal tragedy for me--I can only imagine what it felt like to Saeb Erekat. I hope he took consolation in his last months of life that he gave his all to the vision of a Palestinian state at peace with Israel, and helped lay the groundwork for a day when Israelis and Palestinians live side by side in peace, equality and mutual affection--whether in one state or two. We owe it to his memory to keep working to finally bring Erekat’s vision to fruition.

We Have Saved American Democracy--All the Rest Is Commentary

 

At this portentous moment, I recall the gist of a dispatch by the renowned American journalist William L. Shirer, who eye witnessed the ascent of Nazi Germany as a correspondent during the 1930’s, conveying his emotion at hearing the news on April 30, 1945 that Hitler was dead and Germany was on the edge of capitulation. I cannot now locate the exact quote from Shirer I was looking for, but the gist of what he wrote that day was that while evil would certainly go on existing in the world, at least the particular form of evil represented by Hitler and Nazism had been vanquished and would no longer be able to cause massive death, genocide and destruction, At least Hitler was dead and gone from the world, and, with his evil ideology crushed, there was a chance for healing and better days to come.

I feel a similar sense of profound relief and renewed hope at the news that Biden has narrowly vanquished Trump and denied him another term in the White House. I realize the parallels here are far from exact. No, Trump is not Hitler, and has not yet committed genocide; though he is similarly a fascist impelled by a lust for absolute power and contempt for democratic governance. An equally important difference is that Trump and Trumpism have not been destroyed in 2020 as Hitler and Naziism were in 1945. On the contrary, Trump only narrowly lost the election and maintains the fervid loyalty of close to half of the American electorate despite his hateful demeanor and evident bigotry; his tearing immigrant children away from their parents, selling out the country to Putin and readiness to imperil hundreds of thousands of lives by irresponsibly holding unmasked super spreader rallies from the country.

Despite, his threats to overturn the results of the election through the courts, Trump will almost certainly be evicted from the White House on January 20. Nevertheless, he will almost certainly continue to claim he was cheated out of victory and will seek to mount a comeback for 2024. With or without Trump in the White House, Trumpism is unfortunately alive, well and deeply toxic. We have a long road ahead of us in terms of outreach to disaffected Americans who voted Trump and have been deluded by his siren song of white, working class empowerment.

And yet, consider how infinitely worse things would have been if Trump had held the position he had achieved on Election Night, and had prevailed in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Georgia and Arizona. That would have led in short order to the extinguishing of American democracy. All of Trump’s authoritarian instincts would then have been on steroids and fully enabled and we could have looked forward in short order to his using the full power of the state to punish and arrest his political enemies; to the extinguishing of the power of the legislative branch, the snuffing out of the free press and so much more. In the streets, Trump’s heavily armed Brownshirts, the militias, Proud Boys, QANON, etc. would have been given full reign. Any hope of retarding the rush to incinerate our precious planet would have been lost.

It is indeed a heavy blow not only that Trump almost won the election but that the GOP Senate majority will likely be maintained, making incremental gains for humane, desperately needed reforms. Obamacare stands in dire peril of being overturned by the Trumpian majority on the Supreme Court, with tens of million slated to lose health coverage in a pandemic. Roe v. Wade may now be reversed. And yet, thanks to the hard work and deep commitment of so many progressive and moderate activists; thanks to the courage and moral integrity of the Republican ‘Never Trumpers’; thanks to the fundamental decency of many who voted Trump in 2016, but realized their mistake and switched to Biden in 2020, we no longer have to fear waking up in a totalitarian America in 2021.

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris deserve great credit for an intelligent and dignified campaign, embodying empathy and elemental decency, and the coalition that supported them managed in the end to push them through and give our children and grandchildren a fighting chance for a decent future. As my friend Maggie Siddiqui, an American Muslim activist and Director of the Faith and Progressive Policy Initiative at the Center for American Progress. said in a conference call yesterday bringing together progressive interfaith activists of the Prayerful Democracy network; “Working together, we fought voter suppression and empowered each other,…united in our commitment to the premise that every human being has worth. We have a very long way to go, but we remain committed to the dream of building an inclusive democracy.”

What we finally achieved was Keeping Hope Alive. I spent the hours of 11 pm-5 AM on Election Night in a state of existential despair, fearing I was about to witness the snuffing out of human freedom for the remainder of my own lifetime. Despite having a wonderful life partner, a beautiful family and a lovely new home, I wasn’t sure I would find enough of a sense of consolation for the abolition of democracy to sustain my spirit. I felt I couldn’t bear to live in a 21st Century version of Orwell’s 1984; a place where I would have to fear that the consequences of whatever I write on Facebook might be midnight knock on the door from the police. Then I woke up from a fitful sleep around 7;15 AM to find that the vote from my wonderful college town of Madison, had flipped Wisconsin to Biden and there was still hope that we might yet escape Trumpian doom.

72 hours or so later, I can’t say I am feeling elated—I’m too exhausted for that—but simply, infinitely relieved. I now have a future worth living in and so do my loved ones and all our children and grandchildren. America has dodged the totalitarian bullet and we, as a society have saved ourselves for now—by the skin of our teeth. To paraphrase Rabbi Hillel, that is the essence of the matter and, at least for the moment, all the rest is commentary.

A Benediction on Election Day

Sending out deeply felt psychic vibrations—aka prayers—to my beloved country and citizens that we succeed to summon the strength to defeat fascism, save our democracy and begin the process of wound-binding and reconciliation.

So far, we have truly risen to the occasion with 100 million already having voted despite Trump’s sustained effort to demonize early voting, to sabotage the post office, and a million other tactical efforts to steal the election. We as a society have so far responded effectively to those efforts and it has been inspiring to watch. In that context, I was uplifted yesterday by Judge Andrew Hanen of Texas—a George W. Bush appointee who rejected an outrageous GOP appeal to invalidate 127,000 votes in Harris County that had been cast through drive-in voting—making clear that at least some Republican judges will have the courage and integrity to stand in the way of transparent efforts to wrongly strip Americans of their franchise and deep-six democracy.

Obviously, there will be more such efforts in the coming days and we may need to go into the streets in our millions to demand a fair and full counting. Deeply grateful to Joe Biden, who has run a decent and politically adept campaign; standing up to the bully and highlighting effectively what is at stake. Those of us to the left of Biden—including Bernie and AOC—have stayed disciplined and on-message; showing understanding that the imperative of the moment is to vanquish Trump and capture the Senate—internal debates come later.

Whatever happens in next few days we must remain calm and non-violent in our response, remembering that we will need to reconcile with our fellow citizens, many of whom are decent human beings who have been triggered and deluded into supporting Trump. Remember the enemy is Trump and fascism, falsehood, greed and rapacity, not our fellow Americans. Many of them will begin the process of healing once the Trumpian fever is decisively broken.

A tall order indeed, but I am guardedly optimistic this morning, based on the experience of the past few months that we will pass the test—and in the process save our country and help save the planet; giving our children and grandchildren a fighting chance at a decent future. Ain Breira—we have no choice—-but to accomplish all of the above. Let’s do it.

Here Is How We Win The Election And Save America, While Keeping Hope Alive

 Friends, the question of the hour is how to save America from a full bore effort  by Donald Trump—aided and enabled by the Republican Party—to snuff out our democracy and replace it with a kleptocratic fascist dictatorship. The answer to that question is quite clear: We must organize like hell while keeping hope alive.

Trump’s various gambits over the past few weeks; including his threats to impose ‘law and order’ with the help of his praetorian guard of DHS and ICE paramilitary; praise for the heavily armed bully-boy militias that flooded into Portland and Kenosha as “great patriots”, attempted kneecapping of the U.S. Post Office, and a frenetic and utterly mendacious campaign to convince Americans that mail-in voting is fraudulent; all have the intent to overpower the opposition with his ability to employ shock and awe techniques calculated to confuse and demoralize. Trump aims to make us feel hopeless and helpless in the face of his unchecked power.       

How do we fight back? By joining together in the two months between now and November 3 in coalitions of like-minded activists, and working our collective tachatim (Hebrew for butts) off for Joe Biden. That means writing post cards, phone banking, mass texting, writing articles and op-eds…any possible way we can make ourselves of use to the sacred cause of defeating Trump decisively and driving him out of the White House; a symbol of democracy he has so defiled.

Here is a list of resources complied by our able team at JAMAAT (Jews, Muslims and Allies Acting Together), http://bit.ly/Election-2020-WaysToGetInvolved. I personally plan over the next few weeks to get involved in writing postcards to voters—mainly Black and Hispanic---dropped from the voting rolls for spurious reasons by Republican state officials in states like North Carolina and Florida; urging them to re-register in time for the deadline through an organization called Reclaim Our Vote  (https://actionnetwork.org/forms/reclaim-our-vote-signup). I also will plan to make myriad phone calls to undecided or unmotivated voters in swing states.

All of the above is what millions of us must do to win the election. Yet we also need to be aware that Trump is almost certainly ready and willing to employ any technique at his disposal to stay in power illegitimately; including prematurely declaring victory on Election Night and then sabotaging or shutting down the counting of mail-in ballots, the vast majority of which will presumably be for Biden. As David Brooks wrote in the New York Times today, each of us needs to have a plan as to what we will do personally in that eventuality.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/03/opinion/trump-election-2020.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

I agree with Brooks that in case this nightmare, but all-too-likely scenario takes effect, simply taking part in a few demonstrations won’t cut it.  Each of us will have to resolve to take to the streets for weeks at a time and essentially shut the country down through civil disobedience for weeks at a time in the hope that civil authorities—buttressed , I hope, by the U.S. military that Trump has recklessly denigrated as “suckers” and “losers” will step forward and drag him kicking and screaming out of the  executive mansion, hopefully to a decidedly less posh prison cell.

All of the above; including massive political organizing over the next two months and potential emergency civil obedience mobilization if Trump tries to steal the election, are difficult and for many, including myself, will involve stretching ourselves personally in ways we have not done before.  It will mean putting many facets of our lives on hold for the time being; including personal, family and career considerations.  Yet we must step up now for our own sake and those of our children and grandchildren. American democracy is a deeply flawed inheritance, but it will be infinitely harder to repair if we lose it altogether.

I used to feel contempt for the “good Germans” who seemingly submitted so easily to Nazism in 1933, and kept their heads down in the ensuing years as Hitler committed genocide and plunged the world into war. Little did I imagine that the same fate might envelope American in my own lifetime. Trump’s ability to survive over the past four years despite evident criminal wrong-doing; including accepting the help of Russia to get elected in 2016 and  brazenly trying to pressure Ukraine to play a similar role in 2020, shows how hard it is to drive out a monster once he has successfully stormed the gates of power.

How much more difficult it must have been for decent Germans to make a stand against Hitler after April 1933, by which time he had shut down opposition parties and created a full-throttle police state. To oppose the Nazis after that was literally to risk imprisonment, torture, and likely decapitation in Dachau or another concentration camp. Maybe Trump wont need to go that far once if he succeeds in being fraudulently re-elected; perhaps settling for the Putin model of poisoning high level opposition leaders with Novichok in order to remind the rest of the population not to get too far out of line. Whichever model he chooses, Trump has shown that he has the will and the requisite number of willing accomplices to transform the good old USA into a totalitarian state in which he can happily serve as dictator for life. 

There will be plenty of time for historians to debate how we could have come to such a pass in the so-called Citadel of Democracy. Right now, we have a more immediate task; to organize like crazy and fight against Trump together; Jews, Muslims, Christians and non-believers; Black, White, Hispanic, Asian, Gay and straight; all of the wonderful human elements of America’s glorious mosaic. The struggle won’t be easy and may well be dangerous, but it will be uplifting for all who engage in it. Let’s get to it!

The Two State Solution Is Over and Bibi Killed It

Herzl's Beautiful Dream May Be Over--Where Do We Go From Here?

There is a ‘hiding in plain sight’ corollary to the heartfelt debate in the Jewish community over Peter Beinart’s recent New York Times opinion piece “I No Longer Believe In A Jewish State”. The inconvenient and oft-overlooked truth that Israelis and Jews of varied political persuasions seem unable to wrap their minds around is this: ‘If the vision of an independent  Jewish state, first articulated by Theodor Herzl at the First Zionist Congress in 1897, is being  laid to rest in 2020, it is Bibi, not Beinart, who is snuffing it out.’

In his article, Beinart persuasively points out that massive Jewish settlement of East Jerusalem and the West Bank has deep-sixed any realistic possibility of a two state solution; whether or not Israel moves ahead with annexation of much of the West Bank as advocated by Prime Minister Netanyahu. Given that bleak assessment, shared by majorities of both Israelis and Palestinians, liberal Zionists must now adapt and struggle instead to achieve what most of us hitherto considered to be the lesser of two evils; namely, a one state solution based on equal rights for all its inhabitants, as opposed to an ‘apartheid’ one state solution with the Jewish half of the population repressing the Palestinian half. To sweeten the deal, Beinart floats the vision of a confederation known as Israel-Palestine, in which each of the two component parts enjoy cultural autonomy and a good measure of self-government. Yet he acknowledges that sovereignty would ultimately be shared.   

Predictably, Beinart has been excoriated by self-proclaimed Zionists from hard right to center-left for having renounced the cause of Jewish statehood. Yet, it was not longstanding believers in liberal Zionism who snuffed out the dream, articulated in Israel’s national anthem Hatikvah (The Hope) of a free Jewish state in its ancestral land.  Instead, it was the Israeli right that ensured there would be no sustainable Jewish state by flooding  East Jerusalem and the West Bank with 650,000 Jewish settlers, deliberately mixing them with the Palestinian population so as to make  separation all-but-impossible.

Given that history, it takes enormous chutzpah for Netanyahu and company to wrap themselves in the Star of David and accuse the Jewish center-left of being anti-Zionist. They themselves destroyed the dream of a viable Jewish state and should not be allowed to project that sin onto the rest of us.

I write this essay as someone who devoted nearly 50 years to advocacy for Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation which would allow Israel to survive and flourish as a Jewish state. I was advocating for a two- state solution by the early 1980’s; more than 10 years before Israeli officially accepted that position—at least for a time--by signing the Oslo Accords in 1993. I felt in my gut for most of my life that if Israel were ever, God Forbid, to be destroyed, I would not want to go on living. Therefore I take umbrage at the Israeli right accusing me of being anti-Zionist; usually contemptuously throwing in that extra-sweet appellation ‘self-hating Jew’. Dear reader, I ask who is the real self-hating Jew: the person who devotes his or her life to the fulfillment of the vision of a democratic, Jewish state or someone sets out purposely to destroy it?    

It is admittedly hard for most of us—including myself---to fully absorb the implications of the very real premise that the chief culprit in the demise of Zionism is the Jewish state itself. Yet successive Israeli governments of Israel dating back to the 1970’s deliberately erased the Green Line and flooded the area they renamed ‘Judea and Samaria’ with Jewish settlers. To be sure, Palestinian rejectionism and violence played an important role in convincing many Israelis to oppose surrendering the occupied territories. Yet neither Hamas, the PFLP or Fatah compelled Israel to create even one settlement. We did that to ourselves.

So how to explain why successive Israeli governments seemingly took leave of their senses and sabotaged the existence of an independent and sovereign Jewish state? The answer, I believe, is that adherents of these policies deluded themselves into believing it would be possible to sustain an enlarged Israel with a Jewish majority by inducing large numbers of Palestinians to emigrate, or by forcing them out. Yet that strategy failed to anticipate that deteriorating conditions across the Middle East and drastic limitations on immigration in many western countries would sharply limit the ability of Palestinians to emigrate, even if they desired to do so. In the absence of large scale Palestinian emigration, the only solution the Israeli right has to the demographic dilemma of maintaining a Jewish state in a bi-national space, is to deny citizenship and basic rights to the Palestinians and keep them under perpetual occupation.

That policy is not only immoral and un-Jewish but impossible to sustain over the long term. An occupier cannot successfully absorb a piece of land without providing for the rights and well-being of the people who live there, nor prevent an eventual growing together of constituent communities living side by side within one polity. Increasingly, we see ever-greater cultural and economic integration of so-called Israelis Arabs, and the birth of a palpable new Israeli-Palestinian identity among Arabs and Jews alike. A similar dynamic will take place over time in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza, as growing numbers of Israelis and Palestinians build a vibrant network of NGOs and individuals dedicated to improving the quality of life for all, while strengthening inter-communal ties of friendship and trust.

Might the two-state solution be somehow revived? Sadly, it seems decidedly unlikely, given the Israeli government's fixation on settlement and eventual annexation; but miracles do happen and if this one does, no one will be happier than I. In the meantime, it is incumbent for those of us who care about both peoples to focus on nurturing conditions in which Israelis and Palestinians are able to live side by side in equality and peace. Whether it turns out to be one-state, a confederation or two states, we are duty- bound to fight so that it doesn't turn into apartheid.   

Rather than falling into despair and mourning what should have been, let us therefore embrace a different, but equally uplifting dream: working to ensure that all the people of Israel-Palestine share equally—and rejoice together in—our precious Common Land. 

Why I Decided to Write This Blog—to Help Keep Hope Alive in a Time of Peril and Transformation

A few of you reading this may remember my lively blog published from 2006-2008 entitled Ruby Jewsday in which I ruminated on issues I covered in those days as a freelance writer for the New York Jewish Week, New York Daily News, and other media; especially the Russian Jewish community but much more. I summarized it as "Walter Ruby's Riffs On Russian Jews, Israelis and Palestinians, American Politics, the Meaning of Life and Whatever Else Is On My Mind."

You can check out the old blog here: http://rubyjewsday.blogspot.com/

A lot changed in my life around the time I stopped writing Ruby Jewsday. Around that time, I had taken a new position as Muslim-Jewish Program Director at the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding (FFEU) and went on to a subsequent career at FFEU and beyond working to strengthen ties of communication and cooperation between Muslims and Jews across the U.S. and around the world. I am presently preparing to publish a book with co-author Sabeeha Rehman entitled We Refuse To be Enemies: How Muslims and Jews Can Make Peace One Friendship At A Time to be published in April 2021 by Arcade Publishing. And I have re-engaged the situation in Israel-Palestine through my work as coordinator of Project Rozana Greater Washington Chapter. Project Rozana works to save the lives of desperately ill Palestinian children by arranging their transportation to hospitals in Israel, and to strengthen the health care infrastructure inside Palestine with the support of Israeli and international NGO’s. At the moment, we are working at the request of the PA to get desperately needed ventilators to overstretched hospital ICUs in the West Bank and Gaza to combat a spike in COVID-19 cases.

Learn more about it at https://projectrozana.org

I also recently turned 70 and am increasingly coming to grips with the idea that I may turn out not to be immortal after all and might not even fulfill the wonderful Jewish imprecation that each of us should live to be 120. I have a lot to share with the world and a limited amount of time to do it. So, I have decided to start a new blog provisionally entitled Walter Ruby: Keeping Hope Alive. Folks, I realize that Keep Hope Alive—a slogan popularized by civil rights movement icon Jesse Jackson—is an idea that has been around for a while and may not be the sexiest slogan in the world. Yet at this moment of plague and grave peril to our democratic system and the very survival of our planet, Keeping Hope Alive is the essential element in equation that will give each of us the strength to make vitally important contributions to tikkun olam (repairing the world and making it whole). Without hope that we can change the present disastrous trajectory of things, all will truly be lost. Therefore, we must summon all of our strength to believe that if we act now, we can help to ensure a sustainable, and hopefully radiant, future for our children and children’s children.

What do I have to contribute to this transformation and affirmation of hope at this point in my life? I want to share some of the experiences and lessons I have learned—and my co-author Sabeeha has learned-- by taking part in a wonderful movement over the past decade and a half in which thousands of Muslims, Jews and allies have come together to build ties of friendship and trust. I want to affirm the promise of America, a country I have come to love ever more deeply even as it has struggled against powerful forces sowing fear and division—including one presently encamped in the White House. located exactly two miles down 16th Street in Washington D.C. from the small apartment I share with my life partner Tatyana. That elemental promise of America is that all human beings are created equal and endowed with inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It also contains the premise that America is a welcoming nation of openness and diversity, where people of all races, religions, ethnicities, orientations etc. should co-mingle fruitfully, cherishing our differences while embracing our shared Americanness and celebrating our common humanity. And that we should love one another. To cite immortal words recorded by Anne Frank in her diary at an even darker moment than this one:

“In spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can’t build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death. I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness, I hear the ever approaching thunder, which will destroy us too, I can feel the sufferings of millions and yet, if I look up into the heavens, I think that it will all come right, that this cruelty too will end, and that peace and tranquility will return again.”

Like Anne, I too retain the conviction that the vast majority of human beings are good at heart; something I witness every day in the harried but kindly faces of people on the streets of Washington as they struggle to stay afloat and protect themselves and their loved ones from the plague and attendant challenges—including the small children they clutch by hand. I am not sanguine—I see the enormity of the challenge we face as a species--- but I also see the seriousness of purpose of the younger generation to redeem the future, which is powerfully evocative of the millenarian optimism of the 1960’s counter-culture in which I myself took part. I believe that if we step up now as individuals, Americans and human beings, we can overcome fear and bigotry and heal our sacred Earth. Yet to succeed in that existential struggle, we must keep hope alive. As long as I am around, I plan to make a contribution to that effort.

Finding Hope and Inspiration in a Native American Wetu

Sitting and weaving on a bed covered with animal furs in a wetu (wigwam) in Plimoth Plantantion,, the brilliantly recreated rendering of Plymouth and adjoining Wampanoag Indian settlement in 1627, seven years after the creation of the colony, a Wampanoag woman from a nearby reservation who has meticulously studied the history of her people, spoke poignantly to Tanya and I about Wampanoag history and culture.

Seated between her husband and niece, she spoke of the arrival of the Pilgrims and the eventual devastation of her people and all the tribes of New England despite the vital aid the Wampanoags had rendered the Pilgrims, memorialized with the first Thanksgiving, which literally saved the Pilgrims from starvation. Yet when I asked her how she sees the future of America, she expressed optimism, saying that we are presently going through the birth pangs of a new consciousness in which all Americans including the First Nations and African-Americans “ finally have a full and equal seat at the table.” She said that this time of transformation and renewal is foretold In the ancient prophecies of her people and that the Wampanoags and all Native Americans have a huge amount to contribute—especially the ability to live in harmony with nature—to the healing of our shared society.

Indeed in downtown Plymouth today near the site of Plymouth Rock, where the Pilgrims landed exactly 400 years ago, alongside all the memorials to the courage and valor of the settlers, is a plaque noting that for many Native Americans Thanksgiving is now observed as a Day of Mourning for the devastation they have endured in the four centuries since. Yet 2500 Wampanoag still exist, mostly on southern Cape Cod and Martha’s Vineyard; they have managed to bring their nearly extinct language back to life, teaching it in their schools, and now are hopeful for the future.

For me, it was a deeply moving and uplifting encounter. If the Wampanoags can believe in a radiant future, after all they have endured, who am I to despair? Let all the children of this diverse and vibrant land reach out and embrace each other.. Let us heal America at last.