Igrot Hare’aya – Letters of Rav Kook: Jewish Art – The Positive and Halachic Care – part II

 #158 – part II

Recipient: The heads of the Betzalel organization for Jewish art. The head of Betzalel, Boris Shatz, had been a yeshiva student before studying sculpture, which puts the style of the letter in perspective.

Body: [Last time, we saw Rav Kook’s remarks about the reawakening of the Jewish spirit in Eretz Yisrael. He started to compare the people to a sick young girl whose emergence from deep illness began with asking for a doll.] 

Beloved Yerushalayim, the shoshana (rose) of the lowlands (see Shir Hashirim 2;1), the dear daughter of Tzion, this is the dear daughter, who has been sick with the disease of the bitter exile, which has been both long and degrading. Her sons forgot her, and many gave up on hoping and living for her due to a weakened heart. Now, a flow of life has made their tormented and sick bones tremble in a pleasant way. She demands beauty, art, and craftsmanship (parallel to the doll).

Those who calculate may say that the timing is inappropriate, as there are more pressing needs to attend to first. This may be, but the demand comes from the heart of Yerushalayim’s sons, from her spirit which she poured onto them. These demands are themselves a sign of life, hope, salvation, and consolation.

It is important to know that this sign of life is not devoid of actual content; it also has a productive benefit. The important field of the art of beauty can bring blessing and open the gates of a healthy livelihood for many families among our brothers who live on the holy soil. Thereby, “its fruit shall be for eating, and its leaves for medicine” (see Yechezkel 47:12).

It will also open the feeling for beauty and purity, in which the dear Sons of Zion are very talented. Art will uplift afflicted souls and provide them with a clearer outlook that is more full of light about the grandeur of life, nature, craftsmanship, and the honor of work and diligence. These are lofty principles that fill every Jew’s spirit with feelings of joy and grandeur.

These positive hopes, which we focus on due to your new, honorable movement, give me enough bravery to speak in your ears, respected sirs and beloved brothers. I refer to a different matter and realm, ostensibly very far from the field of beauty and art – rabbinics. However, I hope that what I will say will be beneficial. Simple information can remove a multitude of terrible stumbling blocks from our path. Then we can turn to the path of benefit and embellishing our spirit’s desires, for the glow of splendor and beauty, to overcome and appear on our nation in our Land and our holy city.

Regarding the general love of artistic beauty, which finds expression in actual human-made works, our nation always relates positively, but with limitations. We carefully avoid intoxication and exaggeration, even in the loftiest matters. Justice guides our path. Our holy sources say, “Do not be overly pious” (Kohelet 7:16). Wisdom is the light of our lives, and yet we say, “Do not be overly smart” (ibid.). “Eating an abundance of honey is not good” (Mishlei 25:27). This is the rule that encompasses all elements of our nation’s life. We will never be addicted to a specific idea to an extent that we will drown in its depths to the degree that we will be unable to give a boundary; we do not allow its hold to broaden endlessly.

When the limitations come to rein in good, innately lofty things, the limitations are gentle and soft, like a fence of roses (see Shir Hashirim 7:3), which suffices to prevent breaches (Sanhedrin 37a). Drawing a significant line is enough for Am Yisrael. This line holds the insignia of barriers for the honorable idea, considering that which is above it. It is sometimes enough that it reaches its desired spirit with one clear point without blemishing the special storehouse of the human spirit by applying metal chains.

We continue next time, be"H, with details on the limitations.

Spiritual growth and ‘mentschlechkeit’

by Rav Binny Freedman

There is a story in the Talmud about Rabbi Shimon ben Shetach who lived during the second Temple period and was the President of the Sanhedrin, the Rabbinic high court.

It seems he bought a donkey from a non-Jewish fellow and was riding back to Jerusalem when one of his students found a rare and valuable gem in one of the saddlebags. Halfway to Jerusalem, Rabbi Shimon, without thinking twice, immediately turned the donkey around and headed back to find the original owner of the donkey.

“But you bought the donkey with the saddlebags!” exclaimed one of his students. “Isn’t anything found in them rightfully yours?” “I paid for a donkey”, replied Rabbi Shimon, “I did not pay for such a valuable gem.”

After journeying back to their point of origin and restoring the priceless gem to its original owner, the non-Jew, clearly overcome by Rabbi Shimon’s integrity, exclaimed: “Blessed is the G-d of Rabbi Shimon ben Shetach!”.

The first time I came across this story, I couldn’t help but be saddened by the fact that, despite the obvious ethical excellence of Rabbi Shimon, his student, someone who was blessed to be studying Torah with no less than the great Rabbi Shimon ben Shetach, still wanted to keep the gem, assuming it so naturally that he was actually surprised that Rabbi Shimon wanted to return it.

I remember, as a boy, hearing my Rebbe, Rabbi Shlomo Riskin, relate one of the questions he used to ask when interviewing prospective rebbe’im (rabbinic teachers) for his yeshiva high school.

At a certain point in the interview, amidst a flurry of questions designed to test their knowledge of halachah (Jewish law) and Talmud, he would ask them what they would do (and what the halachic requirement would be), if after sending away for an electric shaver, the company accidentally sent back two shavers in the mail. He was amazed to see how many young rabbis would actually respond by delving into the question of whether, once the company sent the extra shaver, they were giving it to you, and whether the laws of theft applied equally to non- Jews.

Needless to say, he was only interested in hiring the minority of teachers who responded without thinking, that they would send it back!

Where is the balance between spiritual development and our quest to develop a deeper relationship with G- d on the one hand, and the importance of ethical excellence on the other? How can we ensure, not only in ourselves, but in our children and students and those we love, that spiritual growth does not come at the expense of simple ‘mentschlechkeit’: the value of being a good person?

This second part of this week’s double portion, Balak, gives us some valuable insight regarding this question, from a most unlikely source.

Open up any siddur and you will find, right at the beginning, a beautiful poem, which reads as a love sonnet to the Jewish people. Known as the ‘Ma Tovu’, which is traditionally recited as one enters the synagogue.

“Ma tovu’ O’halecha Yaakov, Mishke’no’techa Yisrael….”
“How goodly are your tents, oh Yaakov; and your dwelling places, oh Israel….” .

Ask any Jewish four-year-old child in any Hebrew school, and he or she will most likely be able to sing the opening words of the first stanza. Indeed, who has not heard of the ‘Ma tovu’? And yet, most people don’t realize the source of these beautiful verses. Three thousand years ago, these words were recited by a non-Jewish prophet, bent on cursing the Jewish people and seeing their destruction, who G-d caused to bless and praise them instead.

Fresh from its successes on the battlefield against the armies of Og and the Amorites (in the first portion of this weeks double portion, Chukat), the Jewish people are about to encounter a new and perhaps even more sinister challenge.

Balak, the king of Moab, realizes he can never defeat the Jewish people on the battlefield; their G-d is just too strong. But he has one card up his sleeve, and he approaches Bilaam, a non-Jewish prophet, who, after a series of conversations and initial hesitation, finally agrees to climb the mountain overlooking the Jewish camp and curse the Jewish people in the name of their own G-d. After all, reasons Balak, if this people, blessed by G-d, becomes cursed by G-d, then all their seemingly magical powers will disappear, and the Moabite armies will make short work of them.

The whole idea seems ludicrous, and yet the Torah seems to take this very seriously. At first, G-d does not want to let Bilaam go, but after some persistence on the part of Bilaam and Balak, G-d lets Bilaam go, on the condition that he will only say what G-d tells him to.

So Bilaam travels to the mountain range of Emor and climbs to the mountaintop ready to curse the Jewish people. Sacrifices are offered to G-d, the big moment arrives, and it seems that the fate of the Jewish people hangs in the balance; if somehow, we are cursed by Bilaam, that will spell doom, and the end of the great vision of a Jewish people as a light unto the nations and an ethical role model for the whole world.

Putting aside for the moment how this could possibly be, G-d performs a miracle and, in the end, as Bilaam opens his mouth to curse the Jews, beautiful words of blessing and praise pour forth, and the Jewish people’s destiny as a blessed nation is sealed forever.

Interestingly, Rashi quotes the Midrash (and many other commentaries echo this idea) that there was something G-d caused Bilaam to see that caused him to bless the Jewish people. In other words, it wasn’t that G-d just spoke through Bilaam’s vocal chords, because then it wouldn’t have been Bilaam blessing the Jewish people, it would have been G-d. Rather, Bilaam saw something that actually caused him to want to bless the Jewish people all on his own.

And what was this incredible sight that caused even an evil prophet like Bilaam motivated by bribery (Balak was willing to pay a huge sum of money for this curse) to want to bless the Jews? What about the encampment of the Jewish people was so beautiful, so magnificent, that the sight of it filled you with such awe and appreciation that you could not help but sing out blessings and praises?

Rashi relates that Bilaam noticed that amongst all the Jewish tents, there was not one single tent opening that faced another tent opening. In other words, no-one’s tent opening looked into anyone else’s.

Now, don’t get me wrong; this is a wonderful thing. I remember studying for the rabbinate and living in a tiny apartment in a very small student housing apartment building, appreciating the fact that no one else’s window (often just a few feet away) looked right into ours. Modesty and valuing someone else’s privacy is important, to be sure, but is this what caused Bilaam to bless us? And is this so important that it becomes the theme of the beginning of our prayers every day?

At first glance this seems like a fairly simple thing: to notice that not one tent opening faced anyone else’s, but in considering this, it is worth noting that the Torah tells us there were approximately 600,000 men between the ages of twenty and sixty (the census for the army) who left Egypt, and, depending on the average size of the Jewish family at the time, and adding all the people who were younger or older than this (military) age, that means there were probably millions of tents!

This leaves us wondering how Bilaam could possibly look at every tent, and be able to say that there was not a single tent that faced another’s opening? At 3,600 seconds in an hour, and 86,400 seconds in a day, and approximately two million six hundred thousand seconds in a month, by the time Bilaam would have gotten around to blessing (or cursing) them, the Jews would have already entered Israel!

Unless of course you think again: what is the easiest way to ensure that there is not one tent- opening facing another? (A circle would do it, but it would have been a circle hundreds of miles in circumference….) The answer: just have them all facing the same way. In other words, what Bilaam saw from that mountaintop were simply rows and rows of tents all facing the same direction, in rows that must have stretched on for miles. Which means they had to have a system when they encamped. And I suppose this must have been a new phenomenon, to have so impressed Bilaam.

I remember, one of the first times we ever set up our pup tents in an encampment in the army. The entire company (about 150 two-man pup tents) was making camp for the night, and we received the order, at last, to fall out and set up our tents.

We were still raw recruits in basic infantry training, so setting up the tents, pushing the stakes into the soft sands of the dunes we were in, and tying the ropes so the tents would stand straight was a comedy of errors, especially as it was two o’ clock in the morning and freezing cold to boot.

We finally got our tent to stand so that it wouldn’t fall on top of us (the stakes kept coming out of the sand), after which came the challenge of trying to get out of uniform and into a sleeping bag. These tents were the length of a sleeping bag, and the width of about two sleeping bags. You couldn’t sit up straight and there was barely enough room for one person to get undressed, let alone two guys, but if you were caught sleeping in your uniform, (which would have been the easiest route, especially as we only had about four hours to sleep) you could get in a lot of trouble.

Looking back, I am sure he saw the mess we were making of it all, but must have wanted us to learn a lesson, so he waited; abut ten minutes after I had finally gotten comfortable, (a term that must be used loosely under the circumstances!) our company commander came to inspect the tents and found them arrayed in complete chaos, facing every which way, with not even a semblance of discipline or order. (At two o’ clock in the morning who thinks about which direction your tent is facing?).

And wouldn’t you know it? As we scrambled out into the freezing open air, with our pants and boots hurriedly thrown on, amidst all the shouting, and tents falling over, it started to rain….

So it must have been a new phenomenon that an army, indeed an entire nation took the time to set up their tents facing a particular direction, to such an extent that it was visible to the naked eye from a distant mountaintop.

And perhaps this is why we recite these verses when we enter our synagogues, because three thousand years ago, a people entered the scene with a different set of priorities. And whenever they laid camp, they actually had a system designed to ensure that no one person’s privacy was compromised at the expense of another. It must have taken some thought, to set this up; millions of tents all facing the same direction (most probably by tribes, three on each side of a large square….). Maybe they set flags up when they encamped, and everybody faced the flags, but whatever the specifics, they had a system that took every individual’s feelings and respect into account, and this came before anything else.

It is easy, when entering shul to become so focused on the awesome challenge of developing our relationship with G-d, that we forget the person sitting right next to us. And it is equally understandable, with all the prayers in our hearts for ourselves and our loved ones, to forget what it is really all about. But a careful look at the beginning of the Jewish prayer book will make abundantly clear Judaism’s focus on our relationships with our fellow human beings.

The Talmud tells us that the second Beit HaMikdash was destroyed through blind, wanton hatred, or sinat chinam. It is difficult to understand how any hatred can ever be chinam, which seems to mean ‘for no reason at all’.

The Netziv (Rav Naftali Tzvi Yehuda Berlin, the Rosh yeshiva of Volozhin in the nineteenth century in Lithuania) suggests that this wanton hatred refers to disliking or even detesting someone because their views are different from yours, even if you know (or believe you know) that their viewpoint is wrong. This becomes critical because Rav Kook suggests that if the Temple was destroyed through sinat chinam then it will only be rebuilt through ahavat chinam, or wanton, baseless love. And this may mean that the secret to a better world and all that we dream of is simply learning to see the common ground and the beauty in someone else’s viewpoint and perspective, however different it may be from our own.

And so it is Bilaam, the most unlikely of sources, a non-Jew who seems to detest all that we stand for, who is given the opportunity to see things in an entirely different way.

And maybe this is why we do not traditionally recite the Ma Tovu, at home in private prayer, but rather when we enter the synagogue and join the community.

The Torah does not really tell us where we can find G- d, but it does tell us that every human being is created in the image of G-d. Allegorically, there is a little piece of G-d inside every human being, Jew or Muslim, Christian or Buddhist, even friend or foe. And if we cannot see the little piece of G-d inside the person standing next to us, we will have a hard time finding G-d anywhere at all.

Shabbat Shalom.

The Soros Succession

by Daniel Greenfield 

Millions of people watched the series finale of Succession, a show based on the Murdoch family succession drama, complete with shots at Republicans, conservatives and FOX News.

The real life succession drama of the Soros family was however greeted with a few media puff pieces including at Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. The passage of the $25 billion Open Society network which topples governments, uproots societies and funds the leftist internationale to the next generation of the Soros clan garnered media press releases.

But there’s plenty of succession drama in the family of the leftist billionaire.

As George’s firstborn, Robert Soros might have been expected to inherit the throne. A trader like his father, Robert was temporarily given the reins to Soros Fund Management before having them taken back, and then given back again. Robert’s marriage broke up after he allegedly cheated on his wife, who had cancer, with a nude model. The divorce case dragged on, threatening his finances, and he left to start his own Soros Capital Management.

Robert’s younger brother Jonathan, who had shared the role of chief investor with him, seemed like the likely heir apparent. Jonathan, like his father and unlike his older brother, had a much more ambitious political vision, getting down and dirty with the leftist groups his father backed.

Jonathan even carried the middle name of Tidavar: George’s antisemitic father, who charged Jews trying to escape the Holocaust “whatever the market would bear” and who had dispatched his son to participate in the confiscation of Jewish property to “cheer the unhappy lad up”.

The second Soros son could soon be found mingling at Democrat fundraisers and leftist organization meetings including those of the Democracy Alliance. Like his father, Jonathan had an ambitious program for transforming elections. But in 2021, the Soros finances took a beating, and, after an unstated break with his father, Jonathan Soros struck out on his own.

“We didn’t get on on certain points,” George Soros commented dryly. “That became evident to both of us, particularly to him.”

Of the two sons to whom George was planning to bequeath his empire in 2004, Robert and Jonathan, both were gone. The two heirs had been meant to rule the dual empire: Robert would handle the Soros money and Jonathan the political activism. But George’s relationships with his oldest sons, like most of his relationships with human beings, fell apart.

Soros was running out of sons to take his place and carry on his poisoned legacy.

Raised in what he had described as a “Jewish, anti-Semitic home”, George Soros, still in his late twenties, had begun dating his first wife, Annaliese Witschak, a German immigrant from Hamburg. His parents were overjoyed that his girlfriend wasn’t Jewish. With their approval, George Soros married Annaliese and moved out of their apartment and into hers.

But George was a cold and terrible person. By the late seventies, he was very wealthy and his family hated him. Harshly critical of his sons, he showed Robert and Jonathan little in the way of affection. And his marriage to Annaliese broke up after he refused to look for their daughter, Andrea, after she had stayed out too late.

The same day that George Soros left his family, the 48-year-old met a 23-year-old woman playing tennis. “How old are you anyway,” he later demanded. He may not have realized at the time that Susan Weber was Jewish. George’s mother hated her because of that. “My mother was quite anti-Semitic and ashamed of being Jewish,” he told an interviewer.

George’s mother did what she could to sabotage the marriage, including, in one memorable moment, calling him and screaming, “my son, everyone is going to think you are a homosexual.” But even without her, his second marriage was never going to be any happier. George had been too busy for his children from his first marriage and he had even less time for new ones.

Alex and Gregory were raised by Ping: a nanny from China. A family friend commentedthat, “he is the kind of father who can interact with a 15-year-old much better than a two-year-old.”

The second divorce left behind two more lost sons. Unlike Robert and Jonathan, Alex and Gregory had not been raised to succeed their absent father and had no talent for it.

Little is known of Gregory, the youngest, who has avoided the spotlight, but Alex grew up a “shy… chubby kid” and was generally overlooked in college. A few years after his parents divorced, Alex began working hard to lose weight and used his father’s wealth to hook up with models and fund massive parties filled with celebrities.

It wouldn’t take much of a psychologist to figure out what was the matter. Alex’s father had collected money and power, while his mother filled the hole by renovating houses and collecting art. Their son had dreamed of “being normal”, but that obviously was not going to happen.

“I was very angry at him, I felt unwanted,” Alex Soros complained. “He had a very hard time communicating love, and he was never really around.”

What connected Alex, like Robert and Jonathan, to their father was money and power.

In 2012, the New York Times ran its first major profile on Alex Soros headlined, “Making Good on the Family Name”.

The third son had discovered that the way to his father’s heart was through social justice and had revamped his trashy parties as fundraisers for political causes. The approach eventually paid off as a decade later, George Soros handed over his political empire to Alex Soros.

Alex Soros has the thinnest resume of his brothers. He lacks the financial acumen of Robert or Jonathan, and shows no apparent leadership skills or larger vision. But that may be exactly why he survived and his half brothers did not. With Robert and Jonathan, a breaking point eventually arrived and they struck out on their own, but Alex lacks the skills or the backbone for it.

“I carried some rather potent messianic fantasies with me from childhood,” George Soros confessed. The radical billionaire had compared himself to a deity over the years. How better to ensure that he could never be overshadowed by his sons than to pick the weakest of them?

That may very well be a major part of the Soros succession story.

“We think alike,” George Soros said of Alex. That is to say, Alex will serve as George’s undead proxy.

George, determined to control his empire even from beyond the grave, may have chosen a feckless party boy who would never challenge him, but just enjoy going to parties and posing with famous people. But there is also another element to the Soros succession story that strikes at the heart of the billionaire’s famously ugly tangled relationship with the Jewish people.

Alex, unlike Robert and Jonathan, is Jewish. And once he dived into political funding, he quickly set himself apart by playing a role in leftist Jewish groups like Jewish Funds for Justice and the Bend the Arc: Jewish Action PAC. His thesis was even titled, “Jewish Dionysus: Heine, Nietzsche and the Politics of Literature”.

“When I was six or seven years old,” Alex Soros related in an essay, George had sat him down and told him about how he watched the Holocaust play out, claiming that his grandfather had “helped save other Jews”.

In reality, Tidavar, otherwise a failure, had charged Jews “whatever the market would bear” and worked with Hungarian Nazi collaborators. George would later agree that he had “helped in the confiscation of property from the Jews.” Then denied any feelings of guilt. “It’s just like in the markets — that if I weren’t there — of course, I wasn’t doing it, but somebody else would.”

George Soros knew better than anyone else how much his parents had hated Jews. Yet, if we are to believe Alex, he told his first Jewish son a different version of the story in which he and his grandfather were heroes fighting Nazis, instead of collaborating with the looters.

“It was the first real bonding experience I ever recall having with him,” Alex Soros related.

There is something darkly fitting that George only bonded with his son at the advanced age of 7 by distorting his family’s actions during the Holocaust into something a child could be proud of.

George, as was his wont, traumatized his son, but also gave him something none of his siblings had. “As other members of my family remained in a kind of hiding, continuing to conceal their identities, I decided to get a bar mitzvah,” Alex later wrote.

Psychoanalyzing self-hating Jews is generally a waste of everyone’s time and the Soros clan is spectacularly malignant even by those standards. While Democrats claim that any critic of Soros is an antisemite, George Soros has spent much of his life hating Jews and defending antisemitism. And yet, having alienated his non-Jewish wife and sons, he is passing his political empire on to his only visibly Jewish son.

George Soros has lived a long time and he may yet change his mind. Alex may end up sharing the same fate as Robert and Jonathan. For now, Alex is working the party circuit: photos of him posing with Pelosi, Schumer, Obama and countless other Democrat figures the way that he once did with celebrities in the Hamptons define one difference between him and his father.

“I’m more political,” Alex Soros told a reporter. George Soros is abundantly political, but Alex’s politics are more conventional. Where his father had a grand vision but limited interest in spending time with politicians, Alex is a social butterfly. Where his father had theories, he has social networks, but that’s true of most politically active socialites.

The Soros networks will continue to do enormous damage but once George is gone, they will lack his ability to leapfrog rivals and nations. Instead they are likely to do more harm in another quarter. Alex’s Jewishness, such as it is, has already led him to fund leftist groups trying to undermine the Jewish community from within. Where his father funded big picture transformations, Alex is living out a fake family history in which his father and grandfather were heroes fighting Nazism, and he believes that is carrying on their legacy by attacking Jews.

Once the chain of succession passed from Robert and Jonathan to Alex, it became entangled in that big lie. The lie about what the Soros family did during the war was at the heart of George’s origin story, to Alex’s relationship with his father and now to the entire Soros network.

The Yishai Fleisher Israel Podcast: Mt. Arafat or Temple Mount?

SEASON 2023 EPISODE 25: Rabbi Yishai is joined by Malkah Fleisher to clear up confusion between Islam and Judaism as to where The Binding took place and who was almost sacrificed. Rabbi Shimshon Nadel on whether the Jewish sages studied science. Yifa Segal on Israel's internal conflicts. Yotam Eyal on why judicial reform. And Ben Bresky on Jewish vegetarianism. Also, Biblically-inspired volunteers come to Hebron and are heckled by Israel-haters!

On Seeing the Larger Picture

by HaRav Dov Begon
Rosh HaYeshiva, Machon Meir

Wicked Bilam was like his own name. He wished to swallow up (livloa) the Jewish People (Sanhedrin 105a). Yet against his will he saw Israel from a great and all-encompassing perspective, stretching from the nation’s start until its finish. He saw them, going all the way back to the patriarchs and matriarchs who were the roots from which the Jewish People sprang forth: “I see this nation from mountain tops and gaze on it from heights” (Bamidbar 23:9). Rashi explains: “I look at their origin and roots, and I behold them as strongly founded as yonder rocks and mountains through their ancestors and ancestresses.” He also saw them until their end: “I see it, but not now; I perceive it, but not in the near future” (Bamidbar 24:17). Bilam set out to curse Israel, and against his will he blessed them.

How much more so that we, who view the Jewish People positively to begin with, must study and teach and ponder them on a large scale, gazing at them deeply and comprehensively, from start to finish. We must know to recognize that our own generation is a link in the long chain of thousands of years, that we possess a glorious past and an even more glorious future. Only from such a perspective can we understand the present and everything that is happening now, in our own day, in a balanced and correct fashion. This approach will help us to overcome all of our present difficulties, obstacles and complications, as it says in the song of Ha’azinu: “Remember days long gone by. Ponder the years of each generation” (Devarim 32:7). Remembering days long gone by, helps us to understand our own generation.

From whom is it possible to learn and to receive the right information about our divine history from start to finish? “Ask your father and let him tell you, and your grandfather, who will explain it to you” (Ibid.). As Rashi explained, “‘Ask your father’ - these are the prophets. ‘Your grandfather’ - these are the sages.” Through the holiness of our prophets and sages we shall merit to see, with our own eyes, “a nation that rises like the king of beasts and lifts itself like a lion” (Bamidbar 23:24).

Looking forward to complete salvation,
With the Love of Am Yisrael and Eretz Yisrael,
Shabbat Shalom.

Yeshivat Machon Meir: The Decline of the Moavite Culture (video)

Three Questions

BS”D
Parashat Balak 5783
by HaRav Nachman Kahana

One
The parasha relates the episode of Bilam, the arch anti-Semite who was invited by Balak, King of Moav, to use his supernatural powers to curse the Jews who were threatening the Moabite nation. And it became apparent that Bilam hated the Jews even more than the threatened Moabites.

Bilam knows the secret of cursing. The Gemara (Brachot 7a) informs us that there is a split second each day when HaShem, as it would be, shows anger. Bilam was aware of this phenomenon and would synchronize his curses with HaShem’s moment of rage.

The Gemara continues:

אמר רבי אלעזר: אמר להם הקדוש ברוך הוא לישראל: דעו כמה צדקות עשיתי עמכם שלא כעסתי בימי בלעם הרשע, שאלמלי כעסתי – לא נשתייר משונאיהם של ישראל שריד ופליט;

Rabbi Elazar said: “The Holy One, blessed be He, said to Am Yisrael, ‘know you – how much compassion I had for you at the time of Bilam, when I refrained from that moment of anger; and if not for that, Bilam would have succeeded in destroying the entire Jewish nation.’”

Question: What motivated HaShem to refrain from His usual “routine” of momentary anger for the sake of Am Yisrael?

Two
Life After Death.

On the unanswerable eternal dilemma: Why did HaShem create this world and all the others before us and those after us?

There are Kabbalists who attempt to answer this question, but as the adage goes, “Every problem has a solution, and every solution creates a problem”.

One school of thought claims that the essence of HaShem is goodness (if we can speak of HaShem having an essence) and it is the nature of goodness to share the good with deserving entities.

HaShem, as the epitome, zenith, and apex of goodness, created our souls (neshamot) to rejoice in the pleasure of HaShem’s goodness in a spiritual realm compatible with these rewards; in the place we call Gan Eden. And this material world was created to purify our souls with HaShem’s mitzvot to determine the degree of spiritual pleasure and goodness that we shall be receiving in the eternal next world.

This also implies that those who do not deserve this good will suffer or return to nothingness, or as in the words of Mark Anthony in his inspirational speech given at the funeral of Julius Caesar in Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar”, The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones”.

Now, what is the spiritual reward that awaits a Jew after 120 years?

Three
No human being has ever had all his worldly desires fulfilled, as stated in Midrash Kohelet chapter one:

אמר ר’ יודן בשם ר’ איבו אין אדם יוצא מן העולם וחצי תאותו בידו

No man has left this world with even half his desires fulfilled.

Every person experiences the lack of some subjective desire. A car owner feels the need for a newer model, while a homeless beggar dreams of a tin roof over his head but doesn’t feel the lack of a new car. The Wall Street investor kicks himself for not having invested 50 million dollars in yesterday’s hot stock, something which the shamash in your shul does not feel. And that’s how it continues from individual to individual, each with his complaints to HaShem for not filling his “urgent” needs.

But despite the universal subjective feelings of deprivation, there is one thing that all people feel a lack of, from the lowest of society to the most prominent who don’t know where else to spend their money.

It is the need to feel true absolute sincere love. The opportunity to give total love to another who feels the same about you, true reciprocal love.

The kind that transcends logic, as in the case of Rachel, daughter of the multi-millionaire Ben Kalba Savu’a, who expelled Rachel from the family for marrying the lowly peasant, shepherd named Akiva ben Yosef, later to become – because of her – the illustrious Rabbi Akiva. Or our father Ya’akov who toiled 14 years under the miserable Lavan for the hand of his daughter, Rachel. Or men who would swim the largest ocean or climb the highest mountain for the love of his or her “beshert” (the one person whom an individual is divinely destined to marry).

The sort of feeling that some new couples share in the period of engagement and some married couples feel when standing under the chuppah. But the sad reality is that these intense feelings are limited in time, after which they turn into something less than passionate love.

Society is overflowing with love songs, love movies and love stories, which only demonstrate the lack of love.

Question: Why does the euphoria of passionate total love dissipate?

The Answer
The above three questions share the same answer.

Shlomo Hamelech in chapter 8 of Shir Hashirim (Song of Songs) speaks of the mutual love between the Creator and Am Yisrael in a metaphor of the unquenchable love and passion that a man and woman can feel for each other. So that whatever the gentile nations would do to us, or give to Am Yisrael in order to break the holy bond that HaShem and our father Avraham and all his future descendants entered into, would be totally rejected:

ו- שִׂימֵנִי כַחוֹתָם עַל לִבֶּךָ כַּחוֹתָם עַל זְרוֹעֶךָ כִּי עַזָּה כַמָּוֶת אַהֲבָה קָשָׁה כִשְׁאוֹל קִנְאָה

רְשָׁפֶיהָ רִשְׁפֵּי אֵשׁ שַׁלְהֶבֶתְיָה

ז- מַיִם רַבִּים לֹא יוּכְלוּ לְכַבּוֹת אֶת הָאַהֲבָה וּנְהָרוֹת לֹא יִשְׁטְפוּהָ אִם יִתֵּן אִישׁ אֶת כָּל הוֹן בֵּיתוֹ בָּאַהֲבָה

בּוֹז יָבוּזוּ לוֹ

Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm, for love is strong (absolute) as death, passion fierce as the grave.

Its flashes are flashes of fire, a raging flame.

Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it.

If one offered for love all the wealth of one’s house, it would be utterly scorned.

Olam Haba is a concept wrapped in a secret, covered in a dilemma and packaged in a mystery.

What can HaShem give to a tzadik for eternity without becoming boring, tedious, and drab?

And its mirror dilemma: What is the punishment for evil doers? What can Hitler and all the former murderers of tens of millions of Jews get in the world to come to equal their demented hatred?

The spiritual reward that HaShem measures out to the souls of the righteous is the profound and enduring feelings of absolute intense love. Feelings which are fleeting in our earthy world because they are totally spiritual in nature and cannot survive in the lowly impure place in this world.

Olam Haba is the never ending overpowering and reciprocal sense of love between the Creator and His chosen Am Yisrael. And conversely, the ultimate punishment for the evil doers are their eternal feelings of rejection, contempt, disgust, loathing, revulsion, abhorrence, repulsion, and abomination.

So, the single answer to the above three questions is:

1- HaShem did not have His moment of rage at the time of Bilam because of Hashem’s eternal love for the Children of Yisrael.

2- What awaits a Jew after 120 years is the intense feeling of mutual love with the Creator.

3- The euphoria of total love is the essence of Gan Eden and cannot exist in this material world.

Conclusion: If one wishes to know what has kept the Jewish nation alive for over three thousand years, while great and mighty empires came crashing down? Or our unprecedented return to our ancient homeland? The answer is the eternal love that the Creator has for His greatest creation – Am YIsrael and our unfathomable loyalty to Him.

Before reciting the three verses of the Kohanic blessing, Kohanim say a bracha:

ברוך אתה ה’ א’ מלך העולם אשר קדשנו בקדושתו של אהרן וציונו לברך את עמו ישראל באהבה.

Blessed are You HaShem King of the universe who has sanctified us with the sanctity of Aharon and commanded us to bless His (HaShem’s) nation Yisrael with Love.

The final two words “with love” are usually understood to mean that we Kohanim should utter these blessings not as an unemotional ritual but out of love for our fellow Jews.

But I would add an additional meaning to them: that we Kohanim are blessing the Jewish nation that they should all experience the ultimate love that awaits the Jewish soul in Gan Eden.

Shabbat Shalom,
Nachman Kahana
Copyright © 5783/2023 Nachman Kahana

Twice as Many Israelis Died in One Month of Biden as in One Year of Trump

by Daniel Greenfield

Each year that Trump was in office, fewer people in Israel were killed by terrorists while every year that Biden has been in office, the number of people killed by terrorists has increased.

2023 looks on track to be the deadliest year in Israel since 2015, under Obama, and the bloodshed is an eightfold increase in Israeli deaths since Trump’s last year in office.

The Biden administration restored Obama’s old policies and doubled down on them. And the death toll in Israel looks the way that it did under Obama. Under Biden, Israelis are dying at similar rates to the way that they did under Obama, but not at all as they did under Trump.

The foreign policy establishment claims that the Trump administration’s foreign policy toward Israel was a failure. And yet during Trump’s last year in office, when all the pro-Israel policies had been implemented, the fewest Israelis were killed in at least a generation.

In one of the least reported events in the region, the violence had all but ended with only three Israeli deaths in 2020. By contrast under Biden, 7 Israelis were killed in just January 2023.

Twice as many Israelis died in one month of Biden than in one year of Trump.

What was the secret to peace that had eluded every previous administration? Simple. The Trump administration stopped funding terrorists. And the terrorists stopped killing people.

This is not speculation. All anyone has to do is look at the death toll year by year.

The killings in Israel mostly held steady from Obama’s final year in office to Trump’s first year in office, but fell 18% in 2018 as the Trump administration began to pull away from the old failed policies of the Democrats and the Bush Republicans.

That was also the year that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo replaced Rex Tillerson and a Republican congress cut foreign aid to the PLO terrorists and the effects were obvious.

In 2018, Congress passed the Taylor Force Act: named after an Iraq War veteran studying in Israel who was stabbed to death by a terrorist in Jerusalem. The Taylor Force Act cut off a good deal of foreign aid to the Palestinian Authority which limited its ability to fund terrorist attacks.

In 2019, President Trump went even further with a nearly total cutoff of aid to the Palestinian Authority. And the number of terror victims in Israel declined by nearly a quarter.

Not only Israeli deaths were sharply reduced, but casualties among the ‘Palestinian’ terrorists and their human shields fell by more than half from 2018 to 2019.

In 2020, the first year that the cutoff was truly felt, only 3 Israelis were killed.

And only 30 casualties were experienced by the terrorists and their populations.

The Trump and congressional Republican cuts to foreign aid to the PLO terrorists and their political entity had sharply reduced the violence and saved lives on both sides.

Fewer Israelis and Arab Muslims living under Palestinian Authority rule were killed in 2020 than at any time since Obama took office. It wasn’t peace, but it was the closest thing to it.

What should have become a model for moving forward was instead ridiculed and discarded.

When Biden took office, he violated the Taylor Force Act and massively ramped up foreign aid and political support for the terrorists occupying parts of the West Bank and Gaza. And the number of deaths shot up from 3 to 17. Since then deaths from terrorist attacks have increased every year under Biden: nearly doubling by some accounts from 2021 to 2022.

As many Israelis were killed in the first two months of 2023 as in all of 2018. By April, as many Israelis had been killed as in all of 2017: the deadliest year under the Trump administration. As of now, more Israelis have been killed in 2023 than in all of 2018 and 2019 combined.

These numbers show what happens when you fund terrorists and when you stop funding them.

Beyond the raw casualty figures, the number of significant terrorist attacks increased 59% from 2021 to 2022. The number of shooting attacks shot up fourfold by over 200% (while stabbing attacks declined) indicating terrorists who were better armed and prepared.

But even as the bodies piled up, the Biden administration has doubled down on death.

In 2022, Biden met with PLO leader Mahmoud Abbas and boasted that, “when I came to office, I reserved the policy — I reversed the policies of my predecessor and resumed aid to the Palestinians — more than a half a billion dollars in 2021.” And promised over $300 billion more.

Money is the engine behind the violence and the Biden administration is providing the cash.

The PLO’s ‘Pay-to-Slay’ or ‘Martyrs Fund’ program rewards terrorists, regardless of their formal affiliation, including ISIS and Hamas members, with salaries and payments for their families.

Terrorists are paid based on the length of their prison sentence. That means successful killers can earn $2,000 to $3,000 a month in a part of the world where the average salary is around $700 a month. It’s five times more profitable to be a terrorist than a teacher.

“We will neither reduce nor prevent [payment] of allowances to the families of martyrs, prisoners and released prisoners, as some seek, and if we had only a single penny left, we would pay it to families of the martyrs and prisoners,” PLO leader Mahmoud Abbas had insisted.

“You sent a report to Congress that officially certified that the Palestinian Authority and the PLO… have not met the legal requirements for ‘terminating payments for acts of terrorism against Israeli and US citizens,’” Senator Ted Cruz challenged a State Department official.

“They are paying for terrorists to murder Americans and to murder Israelis. And nonetheless, this administration is bringing those terrorist leaders to Washington, is bringing them to cocktail parties to wine and dine political leaders.”

“We are working to bring pay-to-slay to an end,” Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Barbara Leaf insisted.

The way to end pay-to-slay is to stop sending money to terrorists. Any foreign aid sent into areas controlled by terrorists, whether in Afghanistan or the West Bank or Gaza, finances terrorism. And if you doubt that, just count the money and then count the bodies.

The Trump administration proved that cutting off money to the terrorists ends the violence and the Biden administration demonstrated that restoring the money also brings back the violence.

Peace in the Middle East is not a dream. Just stop funding terrorists and it can be a reality.

Hamas in Sweden

by Nima Gholam Ali Pour

• The European Palestinians Conference, held in Malmö, Sweden on May 27, had clear and strong connections with Hamas....
• When the Swedish media wrote about the connection between the European Palestinians Conference and Hamas, however, MPs, one by one, began withdrawing from the conference -- although, notably, without distancing themselves from Hamas.
• As Hamas is classified as a terrorist organization within the European Union and therefore also within Sweden, it would of course be embarrassing for these gentlemen to admit that they were prepared to participate in a conference with connections to Hamas, and that they only refrained because of negative media attention.
• The MP who did not withdraw... was Social Democratic Party MP Jamal El-Haj, who represents Malmö in parliament. El-Haj, who has Palestinian roots, has sat in parliament since 2016, and has a history of repulsive statements and activism concerning the Israel-Palestine issue.
• El-Haj, who has Palestinian roots, has sat in Sweden's parliament since 2016, and has a history of repulsive statements and activism concerning the Israel-Palestine issue. In 2018, El-Haj said in an interview, totally incorrectly, that Israel is an apartheid state that engages in ethnic cleansing. Despite this statement, the Social Democrats placed him on the parliament's foreign affairs committee....
• El-Haj has not made the situation easier for his party after this scandal. He actually defended his participation. In a social media post, he wrote: "This conference is about my mother's right to return to her home in Palestine. There is nothing in the world that can make me give up such a dream".
• What was left out, of course, is that the Arabs who stayed in Israel in 1948, and now number nearly two million, are still in their homes, with Israeli citizenship and equal rights. What took place was that five Arab armies attacked Israel on the day of its birth — and lost. The Arabs who fled during the conflict were perceived by the people in Israel who had not fled as disloyal fifth columnists, who had declined to stay and protect the country alongside them. Therefore, after the war, those Arabs were not allowed back. These are now known as Palestinians.
• Even after El-Haj's participation in the Hamas conference, he has been allowed to remain on the foreign affairs committee, which shows just how high the Social Democrats' tolerance level for extremists is.
• The Social Democrats' close relationship with Islamists has long been criticized in Sweden. There has been justification for the criticism. An agreement between the Social Democrats and Sweden's Muslim Council, written in 1999 but only revealed in 2014, showed that the Social Democrats had promised the council that Muslims would have greater influence in politics through more seats at local, regional and national levels.
• This dependency, which the Social Democrats have cultivated from the Arab and Muslim population, has been eroding general confidence in the party. If the Social Democrats prioritize their patron-client relationship with Arabs and Muslims at all costs, then in the eyes of the non-Arab public, the Social Democrats become a party for Arabs and Muslims.... Many in Sweden believe that the party is prepared to do anything for power.
• Considering the problems Malmö has with anti-Semitism... it is remarkable that the Social Democrats tolerate one of their most prominent representatives from Malmö taking part in a conference with connections to Hamas. It clearly shows that the Social Democrats are prepared to sacrifice the Jewish minority in Sweden to maintain their patron-client relationship with Arabs and Muslims.

It is remarkable that Sweden's Social Democratic Party tolerates one of their most prominent representatives from Malmö taking part in a conference with connections to the terrorist group Hamas. Pictured: A car burns following a riot in Malmö on April 17, 2022. (Photo by Johan Nilsson/TT News Agency/AFP via Getty Images)

The European Palestinians Conference, held in Malmö, Sweden on May 27, had clear and strong connections with Hamas, including through conference chairman Amin Abu Rashid. Before the conference, it was reported that several members of parliament from Sweden's Green Party, Left Party and Social Democratic Party would be participating in the conference.

When the Swedish media wrote about the connection between the European Palestinians Conference and Hamas, however, MPs, one by one, began withdrawing from the conference -- although, notably, without distancing themselves from Hamas.

Jakob Risberg, MP for the Green Party, who had planned to participate in the conference, wrote on social media that his refusal was due to the fact that "a number of Palestinian organizations and agencies have criticized the conference and there is too much obscurity in who is participating and whom they represent."

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Amalek

by Rabbi Pinchas Winston

Illuy Nishmas Yisroel Ya’akov ben Tzvi, z”l, whose yahrzeit is on Tammuz 7 of this week, b”H. May his soul have aliyah after aliyah, and may he always be a meilitz yoshar for his family whom loved him dearly and learned from him much, as well all of Klal Yisroel.

Friday Night
THE STORY OF Amalek begins, at least in the Torah, in Parashas Beshallach. That is where he first attacked the Jewish people and went down in history as the antithesis of the Jewish people and nemesis of God. Like most anti-Semites he did some serious damage, but eventually the Jewish army prevailed, and Amalek was almost completely destroyed.

Who was Amalek? Where did they come from? Why did they go out of their way to attack the Jewish people and earn the wrath of God? The Torah doesn’t answer those questions, but the Gemora does somewhat:

“What is the reason for [writing the verse], ‘And Lotan’s sister was Timna’ (Bereishis 36:22)? Timna was a royal princess…Wanting to become a convert, she went to Avraham, Yitzchak and Ya’akov, but they did not accept her. So she went and became a concubine to Eliphaz, the son of Eisav, saying, ‘I’d rather be a servant to this people than a mistress of another nation.’ From her Amalek descended who afflicted the Jewish people. Why? Because they should not have rejected her.”(Sanhedrin 99b)

Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face! It’s a troubling gemora because we can assume that Avraham Avinu, who lived to make “converts,” must have had a pretty good reason to reject Timna into the program. Yitzchak and Ya’akov too. And even if they had been mistaken about her, why should her union with Eliphaz result in the quintessential anti-Semite? If ever there was an example of Alillus…

You remember alillus, right, from last week’s parsha? That’s when God uses a pretext to fulfill a more hidden agenda, like the Jewish people being “strangers in a land that is not theirs…for 400 years” (Bereishis 15:13). Ever since God told Avraham about that we knew it was coming. We just didn’t know that the sale of Yosef was Divinely-arranged just to make it happen.

Therefore, it is a safe bet that Amalek was Divinely-destined to live and be Amalek, and that Timna was meant to approach and be rejected by the Avos so that she would “marry” Eliphaz and give birth to him. But when it comes to God there is always method to the “madness,” just as there was in the sale of Yosef. The sale of their brother may have led to the fulfillment of the prophecy of 400 years of exile, but it also built Yosef into the leader he had to become for the rest of the family. However, what did the Timna story add to the historic narrative of the Jewish people?

Shabbos Day
THE ZOHAR EXPLAINS that the combination of the names of Balak and Bilaam provide the letters for two other words: Bavel (Babylonia) and Amalek. This of course is not random gematria, but a hint to the spiritual origin of both characters, and how their unholy alliance actualized the reality of Amalek.

It’s like taking two inert chemicals and combining them to make an explosive. Balak and Bilaam on their own were bad enough. But together, they could have destroyed the entire Jewish people had God not neutralized them. We thank God to this very day for that great miracle.

But then again, who brought Balak and Bilaam together in the first place if not God Himself? That took a different kind of “miracle”:

“But did they not always hate each other, as it says, ‘who defeated Midian in the field of Moav’ (Bereishis 36:35), when Midian came against Moav in battle? However, because of their mutual fear of the Jewish people they made peace with each other.” (Rashi, Bamidbar 22:4)

It is somewhat wondrous that two nations that hated each other so much could temporarily bury the hatchet to destroy the Jewish people. But as the verse says, “This is from God, that which is wondrous in our eyes” (Tehillim 118:23), implying that it had been God who had unified such mortal enemies.

And how did God do it? Hashgochah Pratis. It was Divine Providence that made Moav turn first to Balak to be their king, and then to Bilaam to be their savior. Furthermore, both Balak and Bilaam became who they were because of all the Divine Providence that shaped them. All of it was just for their encounter with the Jewish people in this week’s parsha.

To what end? To shake up the Jewish people to avoid complacency? To give Zimri and his 24,000 followers a chance to blow everything and die in the process? To provide Pinchas with his chance to rise to the occasion and save the day…and become Eliyahu HaNavi along the way? Yes, yes, and yes…and more, as in a Plan B. Plan A may have failed miserably, but Plan B had a disastrous impact, resulting in the deaths of 24,000 from the tribe of Shimon by plague, and the 176,000 by capital punishment for idol worship.

And it didn’t end there. In fact, their original plan had really been to hold off the final redemption. They knew, as did Amalek, that once redemption happens, evil will be gone for good. With only a partial redemption, not only does evil still exist, it must exist. So the real success came later when the tribes of Reuven, Gad, and the half-tribe of Menashe chose to stay outside of Eretz Yisroel, and push off the final redemption for millennia to come.

It may have been Balak and Bilaam who engineered that, but it was the Amalek within them that made it work. More specifically, it was the union of Timna and Eliphaz, and we need to know why.

Shalosh Seudot
IT’S KIND OF like milk and meat, or wool and linen. On their own, milk and meat are no problem. Wearing wool or linen is perfectly fine. It’s the combination of the two that creates the prohibition. Not every mixture is a safe combination, and some can even be deadly.

The combination of Timna and Eliphaz was one such example of the latter. In fact, Timna was not only the concubine of Eliphaz, she was also his illegitimate daughter from an adulterous relationship with the wife of Seir. That certainly makes it more understandable why the Avos rejected her, despite their conversion program at that time.

It is one thing to be a mamzer, as Timna technically was. But as a “gentile”—it was still before Mt. Sinai—mamzeress, she could have lived a relatively “normal” life. It was not like being a Jewish mamzer, who can only marry another Jewish mamzer. In those days, most people probably wouldn’t have cared about her spiritual status. When she went ahead and had a child from her own corrupt father however, that was a choice she herself had made and the spiritual perversion was compounded and resulted in an embodiment of it, Amalek. This made him the very antithesis of the Jewish people.

As the Midrash reveals and Rashi brings down, Bilaam not only rode his donkey for transportation, it was also his female companion, a tremendous Amalekian perversion. Balak had his own Amalekian tendencies, which is why he had no problem prostituting his own women to trap the Jewish people in sin. And when these two perversions of man came together, they compounded the spiritual distortion, like Timna had done when she chose to become Eliphaz’s concubine.

This is why Amalek will always show up on the scene, just before the Jewish people are going to accept another level of Torah. What makes a ba’al teshuvah stronger in some respects than a person who has been righteous all their life is that they know, firsthand, the evil that Torah fights against, of which Torah is the opposite. Amalek epitomizes spiritual impurity, but Torah is the basis of kedushah.

As the expression goes, “there is nothing worse than a reformed sinner” because that is what they are, someone who previously sinned and left it behind. It tends to make them more vigilant against sin everywhere (which is why others often find them annoying). This is why Amalek was destined to be an integral part of Jewish history, regardless of what the Avos did, until Moshiach comes.

Ain Od Milvado, Part 56
I LEARNED A lot from Yisroel Ya’akov ben Tzvi, z”l, whose yahrzeit is this week, b”H, and not just because he was my father, but because he was also my employer.

It didn’t happen often, but we had times when things were tense in the office, which I managed. It could have been a downturn in the economy, which is felt first and usually hardest in the building industry, of which we were a part. Or it could have been a client who had a temper tantrum and sued us because that is what people do in the business world to get what they want.

Whatever the reason, there were times when I felt like panicking, and it was my father, z”l, who was usually the calm one and reminded that God would take care of us. And He always did. I don’t think I ever saw my father panic once while working with him, which has had a calming effect on me to this very day, over 10 years since his passing.

Somehow, despite his upbringing and all that he had to go through to reach the level of success he did in his profession, ain od Milvado was part of his daily outlook on life, whether he realized it or not. Problems for him really were just solutions waiting to be discovered, challenges ready to be met. And as he told me many times over the years, he was able to do so because God always helped him out.

I’m better at dealing with panic these days than I was in my younger years, partly because I am old enough now to recall how many times God has bailed me out too, sometimes literally at the last second. After a while, you feel immature for not hanging in and waiting for Him to do so, even as time seems to be running out.

But the other part of my growth in ain od Milvado has to do with, what I gained from my father over the many years together, for which I am eternally grateful. Some of it came through long philosophical discussions about life, and some just through osmosis. For all I know, he’s still helping me grow in the right direction from above to reach even higher levels of ain od Milvado. One thing is for certain and worth remembering: it is amazing how much a parent’s attitude towards trust in God can spill over to their children.

US-Israel relations: deterioration or enhancement?

by Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger

This expansion responds to mutual threats and challenges, such as Iran’s Ayatollahs, Sunni Islamic terrorism, the vulnerability of all pro-US Arab regimes, and the need to bolster the US’ global, technological competitive edge. Facing these threats and challenges, the US is leveraging Israel’s unique defense and commercial capabilities, which have contributed to the US economy and defense – in dollar terms - more than the annual US “foreign aid” to Israel.

The mutually-beneficial US-Israel partnership has been a derivative of the following factors:

1. US-Israel relations transcend the reality of international relations, in general, and US foreign relations, in particular. US foreign relations are usually determined by the State Department establishment and the “elite” media, streaming in an up-bottom manner to the public.

However, in the case of the US policy towards Israel, the direction of the policy has been determined by the general public’s state-of-mind – which has prevailed since the Early Pilgrims and the Founding Fathers - streaming in a bottom-up manner to elected officials in the House, Senate and White House. Moreover, US elected officials are accountable to their constituents, who expect them to faithfully represent their worldview (including their pro-Israel sentiments), or “we shall remember in November.”

2. While the White House tends to adopt the State Department’s worldview – which opposed the establishment of Israel in 1948, and has criticized Israel since then – both chambers of Congress (which are the most authentic representatives of the US constituency in the 435 Districts and 50 States) welcomed the newly-established Jewish State in 1948, and have always favored enhanced US-Israel cooperation. Furthermore, the US Congress is the world’s strongest Legislature, co-equal and co-determining to the President, capable of blocking, altering and initiating policy, as demonstrated by a litany of precedents, such as:

*Congress overruled Nixon and Reagan, ending the US military involvement in Southeast Asia (1973), Angola (1976) and Nicaragua (1984);
*Congress prevailed over Nixon (1974), forcing the USSR/Russia to allow free emigration;
*Congress overrode Clinton, Obama and Trump (1996-97, 2011, 2013, 2017), imposing sanctions on Iran, Egypt and Russia;
*The Senate did not ratify the 2015 nuclear accord with Iran (JCPOA), which enabled Trump to withdraw from the accord;
*Congress substantially expanded US-Israel strategic cooperation, in defiance of the Bush/Baker opposition (1990-1992);
*Etc.

3. The roots of Israel’s favorability among most constituents – and therefore among most legislators – are linked to the legacy of the Founding Fathers, who were inspired by Moses and the Exodus in shaping the Federalist Papers, the US Constitution, Bill of Rights and the Federal system (e.g., separation of powers and checks and balances).

They considered the colonies and the emerging USA as “the modern day Promised Land” and “the New Israel.” Hence, the bust of Moses facing the Speaker of the House of Representatives; statues and engravings of Moses and the Tablets in the halls of the US Supreme Court; over 200 monuments of the Ten Commandments throughout the USA; and Biblical names of well over thousand sites in the US, such as Jerusalem, Salem (the original name of Jerusalem), Shiloh, Bethel, Zion, Boaz, Moab, Gilead, Pisgah, Canaan, Rehoboth, Sharon, Hebron, Bethlehem, Joshua, Hephzibah, etc. While the attachment to the legacy of the Founding Fathers is waning, it is still consequential among most constituents and legislators.

4. The dramatic, demographic transformation of the US through waves of immigration from Latin America, Africa and Asia has eroded the attachment to the legacy of the Founding Fathers. For example, in 1990, there were 20 million Americans, who were foreign born; the number surged to 45 million in 2023. This dramatic demographic transformation has yielded cultural, ideological and political transformation, increasingly distancing the US population from the legacy of the Founding Fathers, adversely impacting the appreciation of Israel; thus, facilitating presidential pressure on Israel.

5. Presidential pressure on Israel – which has been fended off on many critical occasions - has been a frequent feature of US-Israel relations since 1948, when Truman and then Eisenhower attempted to force Israel to withdraw from areas within its pre-1967 boundaries, including the whole of West Jerusalem. Presidential pressure on Israel, as currently exercised by the Biden Administration, clouds US-Israel relations whenever the State Department dominates foreign policy making, irrespective of its systematic failure in the Middle East at-large. The aim of the current pressure is:

*To prevent a large scale Israeli military operation, intended to obliterate the infrastructure of Palestinian terrorism, which is also a potential threat to every pro-US Arab regime;

*To forestall an independent Israeli military assault on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, which is a clear and present danger to the “Great American Satan” and every pro-US Arab regime;

*To induce Israel to retreat from the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), and facilitate the establishment of a Palestinian state, while ignoring the volcanic nature of the Middle East and the rogue Palestinian intra-Arab track record, as well as the lethal impact (of the proposed Palestinian state) on the pro-US Hashemite regime in Jordan, and the devastating ripple effect on the oil-producing, pro-US Arab regimes, as well as on the US economy and national security.

However, simultaneously with 75 years of presidential pressure on Israel, the mutually-beneficial US-Israel strategic cooperation has surged to a startling level.

6. Contrary to conventional wisdom, the US does not extend foreign aid to Israel, but makes an annual investment in Israel, which yields to the US taxpayer an annual Return-on-Investment of several hundred percent.

For example, Israel has served as the cost-effective, battle-tested laboratory of the US defense and aerospace industries, sharing with them operational lessons, which have been integrated as upgrades into the US products; thus, sparing the US mega-billion-dollars of research and development, enhancing US competitiveness in the global market, which results in mega-billion-dollar exports, and expanding the employment base.

The US commercial industries benefit in a similar way through some 250 research and development centers in Israel, owned by US high-tech giants, and leveraging Israel’s brainpower for the benefit of the US commercial industries.

The Israeli battle-tested laboratory has also contributed to the battle tactics of the US armed forces, as has the flow of Israeli intelligence (worth five CIAs according to former Chief of Air Force Intelligence, General George Keegan), which exceeds the intelligence shared with the US by all NATO countries combined. Israel has been “the largest US aircraft carrier,” which does not require any American on board, deployed in a critical area for the US economy and defense. If there were not Israel in the Middle East, then the US would have to manufacture and deploy a few more real aircraft carriers to the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean, in addition to several ground divisions, which would cost the US taxpayer $15-$20 BN annually.

7. The mutually-beneficial US-Israel two-way street is shaped by shared history, values and geo-strategic interests, much more than by the worldview of the State Department.

The Palestinians No One Talks About

by Bassam Tawil

• Even if the anti-Israel activists are made aware that Palestinian students living under the Palestinian Authority are being hauled off and tortured by their own leaders, they are not likely to speak out because there is no way to blame Israel or hold it responsible.
• The Palestinian Authority crackdown on students is also being ignored by the international media and human rights organizations that regularly attack Israel but indefatigably refuse to see any wrongdoing on the part of Palestinians. Many foreign journalists covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict make it their business actually to hunt for any story that reflects badly on Israel.
• If these activists really cared about Palestinians, they would be speaking out against the arrest and torture of Palestinian students at the hands of Palestinian security forces, the need for better education, jobs and above all better, less corrupt governance for Palestinians. They would also be insisting on freedom of speech and of the press for Palestinians, and protesting the reported forcible closing of human rights groups such as Lawyers for Justice, instead of denouncing Israel day and night.
• The crackdown is part of an ongoing effort by the Palestinian Authority to silence and intimidate its political rivals and deter others from speaking out against Abbas and senior Palestinian officials.
• In May, the Islamic Bloc won the elections for the student council at Birzeit University, defeating the Palestinian Authority-affiliated student list.
• The Palestinian Authority, plainly speaking, which is rapidly losing credibility among its youths, appears to have difficulty accepting the results of the elections in which its supporters were defeated. That is most likely the real reason the newly-elected chairman of the student council was arrested.
• Hassan, in recent weeks, was not the only student from Birzeit University to be arrested by the PA security services. At least another four students have been taken into custody for unknown reasons: Yahya Qassem, Fawzi Abu Kweik, Omar Kiswani and Obaida Qatouseh.
• [S]he noticed bruises all over his body.... "My son told me that he has been warned not to tell anyone about the torture [in Palestinian prison]...." — Mother of Yahya Qassem, Twitter, June 17, 2023.
• Lawyers for Justice, a Ramallah-based independent Palestinian organization, reportedly now being forcibly shut down by the PA, said that it has documented 20 cases of arbitrary arrests by the Palestinian security forces since the beginning of June.
• "Additionally, [the Palestinian security forces] have endangered the rights of detainees by fabricating new charges against them or re-detaining them under the pretext of review or appeal. In addition, the group has observed the presence of signs of torture on the bodies of many detainees...." — Lawyers for Justice, Facebook, June 18, 2023.
• It is time to call out the anti-Israel activists on US campuses for their hypocrisy and lack of respect for Palestinian human rights. By ignoring the plight of their Palestinian colleagues who are being arrested and tortured by fellow Palestinians, the anti-Israel activists are in fact proving that they are also anti-Palestinian.

While anti-Israel activism on US campuses has increased over the past two years, no one seems interested in what is happening on the campuses of Palestinian universities in the West Bank. Students are being arrested and tortured by the Palestinian Authority security forces. (Image source: iStock)

While anti-Israel activism on US campuses has increased over the past two years, no one seems interested in what is happening on the campuses of Palestinian universities in the West Bank. Students are being arrested and tortured by the security forces of the Palestinian Authority (PA). The activists leading the anti-Israel campaigns in the US appear so blinded by their hatred for Israel that they are unwilling to help the Palestinians whom they so profess to care about by commenting that the PA security forces are cracking down on Palestinian university students. Even if the anti-Israel activists are made aware that Palestinian students living under the PA are being hauled off and tortured by their own leaders, they are not likely to speak out because there is no way to blame Israel or hold it responsible.

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Rav Kook's Ein Ayah: Focuses of Prayer as an Individual and as Part of a Congregation

(condensed from Berachot 5:18)

Gemara: The following was the practice of Rabbi Akiva: when he would pray with the congregation, he would finish up relatively quickly because of the inconvenience of the congregation, and when he would pray by himself, one would leave him in one corner and find him in another corner. Why did he move that much? Due to bowing and prostrating.

Ein Ayah: Specific intent for the words one is saying is certainly a critical element of prayer. Deep contemplation of the Divine [referred to by the previous gemara as “focusing his heart on the heaven”], is certainly an added advantage. On the basic level, understanding what one is saying includes a basic level of relating to Hashem, to whom the prayers are obviously directed. To heighten the general focus on the Heaven to a deeper level is of critical importance when one is in the introspective context of private prayer. In contrast, when one prays with the community, it is proper to make his thoughts in line with the level of the community. Since the congregation as a group could not possibly reach the deep spiritual visualizations of a holy man like Rabbi Akiva, he quickened his prayers and sufficed with intention for the specific meanings of the words. This is sufficient because joining with the community is itself a matter of a very high level and overrides the high level that an individual can reach.

As far as the meaning of the words is concerned, it is hard to discern between the level of a normal person and that of a great one, as the gradations are more subtle. However, in regard to the more general level of connectedness to Hashem, this is a matter of wisdom of the heart and great spiritual attainments, where one person’s level can be palpably much higher.

Clearly, the fuller the appreciation of Hashem’s greatness, the more a person will view himself as subservient to Him. This frame of mind is demonstrated by bowing down. Therefore, it is appropriate that specifically during private prayers, Rabbi Akiva would bow down many times. Again, despite the power of such spiritual rapture, being part of a community is so great that it justifies having a shorter prayer to avoid inconveniencing the community.

Mashiach and the Ingathering of the Exiles

by HaRav Mordechai Greenberg
Nasi HaYeshiva, Kerem B'Yavneh

The concept of the Mashiach has its source in our parsha, according to the Rambam (Hil. Melachim 11:1):

Mashiach is destined to rise and to return the Davidic dynasty to its former state, to its initial rule. He will build the Temple and gather the dispersed Jews ... Whoever does not believe in him, or does not wait for his coming, denies not only the other prophets, but rather the Torah and Moshe Rabbeinu, since the Torah testifies about [the Mashiach], as it says: "Hashem, your G-d, will bring back your captivity and have mercy upon you, and He will gather you in ... If your dispersed will be at the ends of Heaven ... Hashem, your G-d, will bring you back to the Land" (Devarim 30:3-5) ... It is also mentioned in the parsha of Bilaam, and there he prophesied about the two Mashichim: the first Mashiach, who is David, who delivered Israel from their enemies, and the final Mashiach, who will rise from his descendents, who will deliver Israel in the end. There [Bilaam] says, "I shall see him, but not now" (Bamidbar 24:17) -- this is Dovid; "I shall look at him, but it is not near" -- this is the Mashiach.

We need to understand the Rambam's statement that one who denies the coming of the Mashiach denies the Torah, "since the Torah testifies about him, as it says, 'Hashem, your G-d, will bring back your captivity.'" Where do we find in the Torah a connection between the return to Tzion and the Mashiach, so that one who denies the ingathering of the exile is considered as denying the Mashiach?

Furthermore, where in the Torah do we find that there is a special mitzvah to await the coming of the Mashiach, and that belief that he will come is insufficient?

On this pasuk, "I shall look at him but it is not near" (ashurenu velo karov), which speaks about the Mashiach according to the Rambam, Sha'arei Ora cites Rashi's comment on the pasuk, "kenamer al derech ashur" (Hoshea 13:7). Rashi explains the word ashur here does not refer to the place, Ashur (Assyria), but rather it means "I will lie in wait, or lurk" (like a leapord I will lurk on the road), as in "ashurenu velo karov." Thus, the word ashurenu has the connotation of lying in wait, like an ambush who awaits the person who is supposed to pass by. So, too, ashurenu -- I will await this event consistently and with diligence.

Thus, the meaning of ashurenu is anticipation to see something -- in our context, eager anticipation towards the coming of the Mashiach.

Rav Tzvi Yehuda Kook zt"l pointed to a further connection between Mashiach and the ingathering of the exiles. In Parshat Shemini there is a list of unkosher birds, "the tinshemet the kaat and the racham" (Vayikra 11:18). The Gemara (Chulin 63a) identifies the racham as the shrakrak. "R. Yochanan says: Why is he called racham? When the racham comes -- rachamim (mercy) comes to the world." The Gemara explains that if it stands on ground and whistles (shorek), it is a sign that the Mashiach is coming, as it says, "I will whistle to them and gather them." (Zechariah 10:8) Thus, the ingathering of the exiles is connected to the coming of the Mashichim, and the two are interdependent.

Rav Kook adds the Tur (O.C. #286) writes that in Ashkenaz the practice is to say in Shabbat Musaf, "Tikanta Shabbat ratzita korbenoteha." This prayer is based on the backwards aleph-bet of TaSHRaK signifying the redemption, as it says, "I will whistle (eshreka) to them and gather them." The Beit Yosef explains that the redemption will ultimately come in the merit of Shabbat, as it says, "The barren ones who observe my Shabbat ... I will bring them to My holy mountain." (Yeshaya 56:4-7) The inverted aleph-bet of TaSHRaK indicates backwards order, since the order of the redemption will raise many strong questions.

Rav Teichtel zt"l writes about this in Em Habanim Semeichah:

Why will this be, to herald the greatest news that we await for with eager anticipation specifically through unkosher birds? ... The truth is, as Iyov already said, "Can you achieve an understanding of G-d?" (Iyov 11:7) Who can achieve and who can understand His ways? "[Only] G-d understands its way" (28:23), why He accomplishes his errand through this creature, and what issue do you have with these Divine secrets?! ... Our saintly Rebbe, in the holy work, Noam Elimelech calls the wicked of Israel "unkosher birds," and writes based upon the Kabbalah that they are the unkosher birds mentioned in the Torah [who will herald the redemption].

Rav Kook on Parashat Balak: Eliminating Idolatry

The Worship of Peor
After failing to curse the people of Israel, Bilaam devised another plan to make trouble for the Jewish people. He advised using Moabite and Midianite women to entice the Israelite men into worshipping Baal Peor.

How was this idol worshipped? The word 'Peor' means to ‘open up’ or ‘disclose.’ According to the Talmud, the worshippers would bare their backsides and defecate in honor of the idol. The Talmud (Sanhedrin 64a) illustrates the repulsive nature of this particular idolatry with the following two stories:

“There was once a gentile woman who was very ill. She vowed: ‘If I recover from my illness, I will go and worship every idol in the world.’ She recovered, and proceeded to worship every idol in the world.

When she came to Peor, she asked its priests, ‘How is this one worshipped?'

They told her, ‘One eats greens and drinks strong drink, and then defecates before the idol.'
The woman responded, ‘I'd rather become ill again than worship an idol in such a [revolting] manner.'

Sabta, a townsman of Avlas, once hired out a donkey to a gentile woman. When she came to Peor, she said to him, ‘Wait till I enter and come out again.'

When she came out, he told her, ‘Now you wait for me until I go in and come out.'

‘But are you not a Jew [and do not worship idols]?’ she asked.

‘What does it concern you?’ he replied. He then entered, uncovered himself before it, and wiped himself on the idol’s nose.

The acolytes praised him, saying, ‘No one has ever served this idol so consummately!'”


Illustration image: ‘Idolatry with Baal-peor’ (The Phillip Medhurst Picture Torah 586)

Exposing the True Nature of Idolatry
What was the point of this most odious idolatrous practice?

In truth, Peor was not an aberrant form of idolatry. On the contrary, Peor was the epitome of idolatry! Other forms of idolatry are more aesthetic, but they just cover up the true ugliness of idolatry. The Golden Calf was the opposite extreme, a beautiful, elegant form of idol worship. But Peor, as its name indicates, exposes the true nature of idolatry. All other forms of idolatry are just branches of Peor, with their inner vileness concealed to various extents.

The repulsive service of Peor contains the key for abolishing idolatry. When the prophet Eliyahu fought against the idolatry of Baal, he taunted the people: “If Baal is God, then follow him.” The people, in fact, were already worshippers of Baal. What was Eliyahu telling them?

Eliyahu's point was that Baal is just a sanitized version of Peor. If Baal is God, then go all the way. You should worship the source of this form of worship — Peor. Eliyahu's exposure of Baal as just a cleaner version of Peor convinced the people. They were truly revolted by the scatological practices of Peor, and instinctively responded, “Hashem is God! Hashem is God!” (Melachim I 18:39)

Historically, the uprooting of idolatry will take place in stages. The allure of Peor, the purest form of idolatry, was shattered after Moshe rooted out those who worshipped Peor at Shittim. That purge gave strength to the men of the Great Assembly who subdued the temptation of idolatry in the time of Ezra (Sanhedrin 64a). The final eradication of idolatry’s last vestiges will take place in the end of days, through the spiritual power of Moshe, whose burial place faces Beit Peor. This obliteration will occur as idolatry’s innate foulness is exposed to all.

Why is idolatry so intrinsically vile?

The source of idolatry’s appeal is in fact a holy one — an impassioned yearning for closeness to God. Ignorance and moral turpitude, however, prevent this closeness, blocking the divine light from the soul. The overwhelming desire for divine closeness, despite one’s moral failings, leads to idol worship. Instead of correcting one’s flaws, these spiritual yearnings are distorted into cravings for idolatry. The unholy alliance of spiritual yearnings together with immoral and decadent behavior produces the intrinsic foulness of idolatry. Instead of trying to elevate humanity and refine our desires, idolatry endeavors to debase our most refined aspirations to our coarsest physical aspects. This is the ultimate message of Peor’s scatological practices.

True Victory over Idolatry
The Great Assembly in Ezra’s time conquered the temptation of idolatry by generally diminishing spiritual yearnings in the world. They did not truly defeat idolatry; rather, they subdued its enticement. In the words of the Midrash, they cast the temptation of idolatry into a metal cauldron and sealed it with lead, “so that its call may not be heard.” Thus we find that the Talmud (Sanhedrin 102b) records a dream of Rav Ashi, the fifth century Talmudic sage. In his dream, Rav Ashi asked the idolatrous King Menasheh, “Since you are so wise, why did you worship idols?” To which Menasheh replied, “Were you there, you would have lifted up the hems of your garment and sped after me.”

The true cure for this perilous attraction, however, is through greatness of Torah. The highest goal of Torah is the appearance of inner light in the human soul, as divine wisdom is applied to all the spheres that the soul is capable of assimilating — be it in thought, emotion, desires, and character traits.

Even nowadays, poverty in Torah knowledge results in a weakness of spirit, similar to the spiritual darkness caused by idolatry. The world awaits redemption through greatness of Torah. Then idolatry will be truly defeated, and not merely subdued in a sealed metal cauldron.

(Gold from the Land of Israel, pp. 271-273. Adapted from Shemonah Kevatzim VIII: 132; IV: 56 by Rav Chanan Morrison)