Yesterday, we talked a bit about J Street, the new, pro-peace lobbying group that seeks to act as a counterweight to AIPAC. Their introduction left me thinking a bit more about my own history with the issue, and that led to a slightly more personal column on the topic:It didn't seem particularly sinister. An invitation from my rabbi inviting me to a reunion of my grade school Hebrew class? Normal enough. It was surprising, upon arrival, that he'd chosen to reunite multiple classes together, cramming us into a small room in the back of the temple. But there was off-brand soda, and pretzels, and bad jokes about baseball, and I felt bored and restless and inescapably at home, as I always had in Hebrew class.I can't recall now if it was the Jenin incursions or the riots at the Temple Mount that set my rabbi off. Or perhaps he was just enraged by one of the obscure convulsions of violence that occur with such regularity as to virtually mark time in the Middle East. What punctures the haze of memory is when he transitioned from sports to politics, telling the assembled alumni that the Jews would be within their rights to forcibly deport and displace the entire Palestinian population. I objected, and we began shouting at each other as my classmates looked on in annoyance. I stormed from the room and it was the last time I set foot in that temple. In my temple.The article continues on in that theme. For progressive and conservative Jews alike, there's a wrenching dissonance between a religion that has long been deeply invested in human rights and social justice, but that is increasingly defined by a brutal, grinding conflict that forces violations against both. That's true whether you're an optimist on the value of negotiations, as I am, or you're a pessimist, as others are. As I said, this column is a bit more personal, and is not attempting to represent itself as a definitive experience, nor even offer much in the way of policy recommendations. It's just one experience, and take, of many. And I'd like to hear from others. (Image used under a Creative Commons license from Vad Levin.)
