To My Palestinian Friends and Their Defenders

A few weeks ago, I put out an open letter to my non-Jewish friends explaining how many Jews feel about the present situation. Today I want to reach out to my Palestinian friends and to their would-be defenders. I want to say that particularly as a Jew, I resonate with your anguish. Of course, we must cultivate the ability to be able to feel the raw human pain of each other, even as we advocate for what we think is right.

Who can see the level of pain and destruction among Palestinian civilians and not have their heart ripped open? The first thing I want to affirm is that I grieve with you and for you. The second affirmation I need to assert is that I believe in you and I believe that there must be an ability for Palestinians to live with self-determination, in security and peace, but you will have to be able to do that alongside Jews, who also deserve to live in security, self-determination and peace. This means that in the same way that we Jews have to recognize the reality of Palestinian suffering and your rights to live in harmony there, in your human right to be able to determine your own future, so too I need to ask you to be able to acknowledge that same human right for us.

This week I have been inundated by hateful and violent antisemitic email and text messages telling me that I should go back to Germany (which I never came from). I should go back to Russia (which I was kicked out of). I should go back to wherever I should go back to, that we Jews have no rights to the land of Israel, that we are “colonizers,” even though there has been continuous Jewish living in the Land of Israel from 2,800 years ago. We possess stone documents speaking about Israel in our land from ancient Egypt (the Merneptah Stele), from the Moabites (the Mesha Stele), from surrounding Canaanite neighbors, from Greeks and Romans throughout the ages in an unbroken chain. We’ll soon be celebrating Hanukkah, when Jews in the Land of Israel resisted the tyranny of the Syrian Greeks—in the Land, our land.

If there is ever to be peace in the region, we need Palestinian determination and Palestinian defenders not to slip into antisemitic bigotry, vile and violence. We need Jewish determination and Jewish defenders to resist gross generalizations about Palestinians and Arabs that can slip into anti-Muslim bigotry and violence. We need to be able to learn to talk to each other directly. We need to be able to come up with a way to cohabit the land that we love and share. And we need to recognize that Hamas is a common enemy. This despotic group of terrorists is tyrannizing the Palestinian population. Not only have they murdered, raped and tortured Jews; they also have murdered Palestinians and deliberately put Palestinians in harm’s way for decades.

Most recently, setting up Hamas’s operations under hundreds of tunnels underground (“tunnels” makes it sound like something small but these are big enough to drive cars through). They’ve diverted millions and millions of dollars that should have gone to humanitarian support of Palestinian civilians and instead they locate themselves under hospitals, under apartments, deliberately putting civilians in harm’s way, even shooting at Palestinian civilians who attempt to flee toward greater safety. The war against Hamas must be understood as a war both for the right of Israelis to live in peace, security and self-determination, as well as a battle for Palestinian peace, security and self-determination.

I pray that the day will soon come when the region is rid of this despotic terrorist group and that Palestinians and Jews can resume the challenge of learning how to live together in peace.

Rabbi Dr Bradley Shavit Artson, a Contributing Writer to the Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles, holds the Abner and Roslyn Goldstine Dean’s Chair of the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies and is Vice President of American Jewish University in Los Angeles.