Why have I, over the last 35 years, devoted myself to Jewish outreach – educating Jews who are assimilating, unaffiliated and who have little, if any, Jewish background?
I do outreach to educate Jews what it means to be Jewish. I raise money so we can have a team devoted to this mission. My Rebbe, Rabbi Noah Weinberg of blessed memory, said to make yourself obsolete by teaching people your job and then go on to the next big thing. Over the years many Aish LA rabbis have created their own outreach organizations, and we bless and release them because we need an army. They are not competitors, rather brothers-in-arms. Instead of making myself obsolete, I have replicated myself. Works either way.
Rule number one: Jews will make their own educated choices. Rule number two: Jews cannot be convinced of anything. That is why we set a buffet table and say please eat/learn, what you like. Spinach or candy or both. We lay out a curriculum that includes Jewish history from a Torah, time-tested perspective. The kind that is never taught in high schools, universities or anywhere else for that matter. We want our students to understand the purpose and direction of 5786 years of human history, aided by venerable Jewish wisdom, so to make wise decisions for themselves and G-dwilling the families that we help them create.
It is often said that if you don’t know history you are condemned to repeat it. And if you do know history, you are condemned to watch it get repeated!
For most people, their history lessons go back only two generations in time because they know their parents and grandparents. For example, how well do you know about World War II vs. World War I vs. the Civil War vs. the Revolutionary War? Exactly! How well do the young voters in New York know about 9/11, which happened a generation ago? Can you believe it’s been that long? It’s not their reality. So what if their new mayor reminds us of a highjacker?
What got Zohran Mamdani (Mohammed in Ugandan dialect) elected was the youth vote. Who voted for him amongst the Jews? Young Jewish, liberal voters. Who voted against him? Older conservative, more traditional Jewish voters. There is a Talmudic saying, “When the young say ‘Build,’ do not listen to them. But when the old say, ‘Destroy,’ listen to them.”
Using Microsoft Copilot, here is some astonishing information.
Mamdani received 50% or 900,000 votes. We all know he wants to arrest Netanyahu, is a Jew-hater, (let’s dump the word “antisemitism,” it sounds too clinical and technical) and is pro-Hamas.
Cuomo received 41% or 738,000 votes
Sliwa received 7% or 136,000 votes.
If Cuomo had Sliwa’s votes he still would have lost by 36,000 votes. One-third of all the Jews in NY voted for Mamdani. That’s 105,000 votes.
But the difference between Cuomo (without Sliwa) and Mamdani was 162000.
Which means if 82,000 of those 105,000 Jews had not voted for Mamdani, we would not have a socialist Jew-hater running the most important financial center in the world. Those Jews needed to be educated what it means to vote for such a leader. Can you imagine one-third of the Muslims in NYC voting for an Islamophobe, former IDF soldier candidate? Neither can I.
Assimilated, mostly unaffiliated, college-educated young Jews without any historical moorings buying into movements that are anti-Jewish, anti-Israel, anti-capitalism, and that will become anti-democratic is a reality unless we can deter it. And what will become of the American experiment and a Jew’s place in the world? Can this happen in LA?
So, in short, that is why I do what I do. Want to join me?
Rabbi Aryeh Markman is Executive Director, Aish LA and Jewish American Summit.
