January 18, 2023

Of all the great cities in which I have lived, only in Tel Aviv do I fully experience the sweet delusion of being freed from history. My most recent visit, in November 2022, centered around the launch of my Russian poetry collection “Stikhi iz aipada” (“Poems from the iPad”) at Babel Bookstore on Allenby Street, one of the main coordinates of Israel’s Russophone cultural life and, since the outbreak of the War in Ukraine, increasingly a publisher of Russian books in exile.

In the course of four very full days, I did research about my ancestor, the early Israeli writer Batya Kahana who wrote in Russian and published in Hebrew; purchased an Italian-made dress for my wife from an Iranian-born shopkeeper (a ritual); gorged on a conversation with my father’s first cousin David Sharir, a visual artist born in Tel Aviv in 1938 to immigrants from Ukraine; drank vodka with my close friend Maxim Krolik at an outdoor Ukrainian restaurant as we celebrated his deliverance from Putin’s Russia; and visited the dairy farm that the family of my maternal grandfather’s sister had started in the 1940s at Be’er Tuvia. I had only one day for the Tel Aviv version of dolce far niente, and this day resulted in an anthropological discovery.

On the late morning of that day I strolled to a coffee shop on Ben Yehuda, then cut across to the beach on Trumpeldor Street, thinking of the last words of the one-armed Shiva of Zionism who died while defending a Jewish settlement from an attack by an armed band from Jabal Amila in Southern Lebanon. “It’s sweet to die for one’s country.” Did the dying Joseph Trumpeldor utter a tongue-twisting Russian damnation to the enemies of Israel or a Horace-infused line in Hebrew? It was Erev Shabbat on the Tel Aviv waterfront. I paid the machine and handed a ticket for a beach chair to a man who spoke no English and practiced strong gestural Hebrew. Another Russian-speaker, a tall tanned fellow in skimpy shorts, appropriately asked me if I was from “Ukraine or something,” and was amused to learn that I was from Moscow by way of thirty-five years in New England. He claimed to know the Moscow neighborhood where I grew up near the Kurchatov Institute of Atomic Energy. The idler told me that he went swimming every morning and that life in Tel Aviv was “honey cake.”

All around me, strands of Russian speech interwove with Hebrew, French and English, forming a tetralingual braid of Tel Aviv locals, tourists and recent repatriates. Easily one fourth of the November beachgoers and definitely a majority of the autumnal swimmers were Russian speakers, although their accents betrayed not only members of the Moscow intelligentsia (from the ranks of those who only left when Putin and his henchmen started pumping the last gallons of freedom from Russia’s atmosphere) but also refugees from war-ravaged Ukraine. Prior to fleeing home, some of the Ukrainian repatriates had learned for the first time what Israelis live with: the sound of missiles of hate and despair. And yet the afternoon in Tel Aviv was so peaceful and serene that it seemed that nothing would ever harm this young city and these “Russian” and “Ukrainian” escapees basking in the November sun like prodigal children of the Levant.

It was then, in the midst of this happy, unthreatening place, the term “Tel Aviv syndrome” entered my mind, and I’ve since been finding more and more evidence of its validity. Did I invent the term? Perhaps I did, but I cannot be sure. An extensive literature review revealed no evidence of the term’s prior existence. Features of “Tel Aviv syndrome” include: hedonism, denialism (or is it denihilism?), gourmandism, beachfrontism, casual athleticism, and nonmilitant secularism. The false if comforting sense of carpediemism, characteristic of those with Tel Aviv syndrome, may be defined both oppositionally—in contrast to the amply-described Jerusalem syndrome—and as essential to the city and its aura.

Psychiatrists and cultural historians have been aware of Jerusalem syndrome for quite some time. The term refers to obsessive and/or delusional behavior associated with visiting Jerusalem and experiencing its special hyperreligious and densely layered historical atmosphere. In “Jerusalem Syndrome,” a 2000 case report published in The British Journal of Psychiatry, Dr. Yair Bar-El and colleagues state that “since 1980, Jerusalem’s psychiatrists have encountered an ever-increasing number of tourists who, upon arriving in Jerusalem, suffer psychotic decompensation.” In “Jerusalemski Sindrom,” a more recent article published in Psychiatria Polska, Drs. Katarzyna Prochwitz and Artur Sobczyk define the syndrome as “an acute psychotic state observed in tourists and pilgrims who visit Jerusalem. The main symptom of this disorder is identification with a character from the Bible and exhibiting behaviors which seem to be typical for this character.” Dr. Bar-El et al. expected the number of those carrying Jerusalem syndrome to grow in the new millennium. The eleven months following the start of the War in Ukraine have amply corroborated their forecast while also throwing into sharper relief the prevalence of another urban Israeli syndrome.

I have become especially aware of the existential reality of Tel Aviv syndrome as the “emergency aliyah” has flooded the gates of Israel. My good colleague Mark Tolts of Hebrew University, a leading demographer of post-Soviet Jewishness, recently pointed me to the most current Israeli population data: As of December 2022, of the total of 73,000 repatriates, over 60,000 had come to Israel from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. While the geography of the wartime olim is as diverse as Israel herself, and certainly encompasses the north with Haifa and Upper Galilee and the south with Ashdod and Ashkelon, the newly arrived, trend-setting “Russians” fall into Jerusalemites and Telavivians as they embody salient features of Jerusalem syndrome vs. Tel Aviv syndrome.

I have become especially aware of the existential reality of Tel Aviv syndrome as the “emergency aliyah” has flooded the gates of Israel.

I was hardly surprised when Alisa Nagrodskaya, a friend of my Soviet youth who came to Israel in 1990 from then the not yet un-re-renamed Leningrad and settled in Jerusalem, decided to riff on the subject of Jerusalem syndrome. Mother of twin girls completing their IDF service, a blogger with a following, and an inveterate Jerusalemite, on 24 May 2022 Nagrodskaya published a short and piquant Russian-language manual-cum-intro to her city’s gestalt. Since its publication on Facebook, Nagrodskaya’s explication of Jerusalem syndrome for the newly-arrived Russian speakers has received over 1000 likes and has been shared more than 50 times: “Well, the most important thing, perhaps, is that each denizen of Jerusalem is proudly wrapped in a plume of being slightly messed-up. And, truth be told, not always slightly. … Jerusalemites like difficult paths. … Material flashiness isn’t our thing. … One can’t for the life of it determine the status of our city based on clothes. … So if you’re weird and low-maintenance, our city joyfully awaits you” (my literal translation).

In Nagrodskaya’s presentation, Jerusalem’s viscous intensity is juxtaposed to Tel Aviv’s glitter, vanity and lightness. In her analysis, bearers of Russian culture would immediately recognize the trappings of the old St. Petersburg-Moscow rivalry—and here I speak as a product of both the Moscow lore and the St. Petersburg mythology. What Fyodor Dostoevsky wrote about the Venice of the North applies so well to Jerusalem: “the most abstract and deliberate city on earth”; “the most fantastical city.” In contrast, recall the opening chapters of “Anna Karenina” and think not just of Moscow but also of Tel Aviv. Dostoevsky’s greatest competitor, Leo Tolstoy, evoked the bustling yet cozy atmosphere of old Moscow, to which Levin ascends from his country estate. I keep imaging poor Levin driving in a pickup truck to Tel Aviv from a moshav in central Israel, hopeful as he is yet burdened by the fear of Kitty’s rejection.

Born to a Muscovite mother and a father from Leningrad (St. Petersburg), I’m familiar with the museumist atmosphere of St. Petersburg, an atmosphere that I reexperience while spending time in Jerusalem. But I also know the native Moscow vibe of being on the cutting edge and nonchalant about it, and when I return to Tel Aviv, I feel more and more like a former Muscovite regaining a home rather than a Bostonian losing one. Please don’t get me wrong: I love Jerusalem. I feel a sense of transcendent relief when I press my forehead to the Kotel, and this feeling is akin to what I used to experience while visiting family graves at the Preobrazhenskoye Jewish Cemetery in St. Petersburg. Still, it’s not in Jerusalem but in Tel Aviv that I retire in my brightest fantasies. Being here infallibly accords a sense of sudden and, perhaps, unjustified calm in view of history’s calamities. I call this condition “Tel Aviv syndrome.”

Maxim D. Shrayer is an author and a professor at Boston College. His recent books include “A Russian Immigrant: Three Novellas” and “Of Politics and Pandemics.” Shrayer’s new memoir “Immigrant Baggage” is forthcoming in 2023.

Listening is more difficult than it sounds. As individuals and as communities, we’re usually bad at it. We skim news stories for headlines or highlights, or we rant on social media and over meals. We dismiss the cries of pain from our marginalized siblings. We form hasty judgments about people who don’t match our expected standards of behavior.

Here in Los Angeles, hate violence and incidents increased by 23% in 2021, especially targeting Black, Asian, Jewish and trans folks. As identity-based hatred continues to burn in communities across the U.S., leading to violence and grief, it feels easier to turn inward, to keep to our respective tribes. And then, when we actually want to make meaningful change to repair the harm of racism, anti-Black hate speech and violence, antisemitism, Islamophobia, anti-LGBTQ rhetoric or any of the other awful realities that tear at our social fabric, we find ourselves filled with passion and drive but lacking the allies and connections that we need to put it to use.

For each of the writers of this piece, a Black Muslim man and a Japanese-American Jewish woman, identity is key. In 2010, we participated in a professional fellowship program run by NewGround: A Muslim-Jewish Partnership for Change. The fellowship trains a group of Muslim and Jewish leaders from LA to strengthen their listening, facilitation and storytelling skills over a nine-month program.

Sometimes it’s as simple as telling the other person what you heard and asking if you got it right. Once people feel heard, it gives them the capacity to hear you as well. “Did I get it right?” leaves space to be corrected; the speaker can feel that they’ve been truly heard the way they want to be—a rare gift we can offer each other. NewGround’s methodology doesn’t shy away from the hard stuff; instead, they dive into the most tangled and painful parts of our lives, as well as the most beautiful and joyful parts, that drive our decisions and actions.

Beyond the skills of listening and facilitation, NewGround focuses on the power of relationships to effect change. The program trained us to think about our circles of influence, the networks we move in and how we can bring those together in powerful ways. As we work together, our differences may bring us into conflict with the very people we need to work alongside. Conflict is inevitable, but being stuck is a choice.

We got to know each other deeply during the fellowship, learning the texture and complexity of our experiences and stories. We learned how to slow down our conversations, to understand why we responded with powerful emotions to trigger words, and how to lean on the relationships and trust we had built before reacting or making assumptions. We felt transformed, learning so much through both inter- and intra-faith dialogue and relationship building.

We’ve maintained those relationships in the years since. We hit the streets to drive voter engagement. Maya showed up and brought her community to support I.L.M. Foundation’s Humanitarian Day, a project that brings a host of organizations together to serve LA’s unhoused residents. Both of our faith traditions emphasize social responsibility, through the Jewish value of tikkun olam and the Muslim teaching in Surah 49:13. We use our power to help build peace, one small step at a time.

Umar says that NewGround’s model of dialogue is like open-heart surgery for communities: profoundly vulnerable, sometimes necessary to save a life, and an essential step on the long road to healing. When we have conversations that cut so deeply to the core of who we are, it can be so hard that we want to walk away from the table. Polarization is a vicious cycle: The more we argue, the further apart we drift and the more we find things to argue about. And as we’ve been so painfully reminded, again and again, as polarization festers it can escalate into physical violence. But berating each other doesn’t fix anything. Cutting through polarization requires compassion.

After the first year of the COVID pandemic, the rising cry for justice for Black Americans made it clear that we needed this kind of intervention. NewGround created the Courage Accelerator program, inviting a select number of alumni from their fellowship program to deepen our skills and focus our dialogue on confronting racism in our own religious communities. Both of us were eager to participate.

It was exactly what we needed. Talking about individual and institutional racism is really hard. Each of us has a different window of experience. For some, like Umar, that experience was direct and raw. For others, like Maya, it was indirect but very close to home. We dove into stories, because stories are more powerful than statistics when it comes to driving change. By exercising our empathy, we moved from listening into action, opening space for these incredibly challenging conversations in our communities.

At one point when we were talking about intervening in conversations on racism and bias, Umar commented that we are “holy infiltrators.” We shouldn’t sit on our training, waiting for change to happen. We can make it happen, one small step at a time. Story by story, surgery by surgery, conversation by conversation. It’s slow, and it’s often painful. But it’s a crucial step on the long road to healing. As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Men often hate each other because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don’t know each other; they don’t know each other because they can not communicate; they can not communicate because they are separated.” We hope you’ll take a moment today to think about conversations that require your courage, and will consider what voices need your ears, your hands, your heart.

It was a remarkable educational moment with regard to the true reality of Israel’s Supreme Court: Just a few months after completing her tenure as the President of the Court, the Hon. Dorit Beinisch paid a visit to California. I was a part of a small group of rabbis from across the community the local Israeli Consulate invited to meet with her. With not many other rabbis in attendance, it presented an opportunity for personal interaction.

After the formal presentation, I approached the Justice, quietly asking her, “Why did you invalidate the Tal Law?” Some years earlier, Tzvi Tal, a distinguished Orthodox Israeli Supreme Court Justice, crafted the “Tal Law.” Like many laws, it was a political compromise, attempting to find a middle ground in the continuous issue of Yeshiva students serving in the IDF by creating an avenue to mainstream more students to the army and work. During the last months of her tenure as President of the Court, Chief Justice in the American parlance, Beinisch led the court in invalidating the Tal Law. 

This pushed Israel into a major political conflict, and was a catalyst for the fall of the government. Officially, the court invalidated the law based on their version of “equality,” an ideal that is lofty but not always wise. Their ruling was a result of a left-wing group who argued that it was not fair that some serve in the IDF and others do not. While this is a persuasive argument, the real question is how we create societal change in the Haredi community. Will the sledgehammer of judicial fiat set back the goal of integration? If you follow the numbers, that is exactly what has happened since the Beinisch ruling — fewer Haredim are joining the army. (Personally, I attended a Chabad Yeshiva that supported serving in the IDF. The majority of students received deferments during their studies and then joined the army later.)

I wondered what kind of legal reasoning Justice Beinisch would give me. I was astonished with her simplistic yet telling answer. “We made the ruling because it was not working.” In other words, according to her assessment, the Tal Law was not successful in creating a larger integration of Yeshiva students to the Army and society, so she struck it down. I remained stoic, respectful, not revealing my astonishment.

In a moment of emotional honesty, she had revealed her inner thoughts. She didn’t like what was going on; the Yeshiva students were not moving fast enough along the road to participating in the army or working. She was going to give them a push. There is a place for this kind of assessment in a democracy, but it’s in the Knesset. While I said nothing, I recalled the words of the U.S. Supreme Justice that I had once heard, “It is not our job to change the law. If you want to, cross the street and have congress vote a new law.”

In Washington, the Supreme Court and the Congress are just across the street. The same is true in Jerusalem. The role of the legislative body is to deliberate, find compromise and solutions. The role of the court is to evaluate if the legislature has acted callously and trampled on the rights of another, or broken the law. If Beinisch would have given me a legal argument, then one could evaluate if it had merit or not. But her true reason for the ruling had nothing to do with law. “It was not working.” I wondered why Beinisch didn’t resign her position in the court, and run for the Knesset.

Israelis have been watching the court slide from being a bastion of justice to a culture of leftist legal supremacy. The seeds of the present crisis go back to the original establishment of the court, when Justice Minister Pinchas Rosen blocked the appointment of Gad Frumkin. He had been the longest serving jurist in Palestine and a member of the British Mandate Supreme Court. Rosen rejected him because he was not a Mapai (Labor Party) supporter. Ever since then it’s been “one friend brings another” until Aharon Barak. He propelled the court to a point where leftist activism is its culture. Yes, there will be token religious or conservative Justices like Tzvi Tal or Menachem Alon. Both confided to me in separate conversations that they felt at odds with dominant ideology in the court.

Cases can be brought even if you have no standing or relevance to the case. The court has used the concept of “reasonableness” — in other words “we don’t think that’s a good idea” — and then ordered government ministries to change their policies or even dictating to the military because the justices on the court thought they were a better judge of policy. No American court uses these guidelines; clearly it’s a case of judicial overreach. 

Judaical reform is essential for Israel to remain a vibrant democracy. Just one segment of society, the liberal elites, cannot continue to impose their worldview. They claim that modifying the present legal systems will “endanger democracy,” which is just a way of saying, “the law must be my way, otherwise it’s not democracy.”

One also has to wonder why some U.S. liberal Jewish groups have been lobbying against any reform. Would they agree with a U.S. court that operated like one in Israel? Would they support the Conservative-leaning U.S. Supreme Court selecting its successors? The Israeli justices have used the court repeatedly to impose their beliefs on Israeli society. When the city of Afula decided that just one of the many concerts they fund will be for Haredim with separate seating, the New Israel Fund supported the case to ban it. NIF and similar groups have skillfully brought many cases, using judicial fiat to enforce their views. With a balanced court, that will be challenging. Are they really concerned for democracy, or do they want to protect the court so it can advance their political goals that they cannot win in the ballot box?

This issue must be approached with delicacy and serious deliberation. Clearly the methodology of selection judges must be modified. The court should only judge cases where the litigants have standing. While consideration should be made for an override clause, in my personal view, this should be carefully evaluated to ensure that it not be abused. Judicial reform is essential in Israel. But it must be done with careful deliberation — a scalpel is needed, not an axe.

A society with people of diverse viewpoints — and as we know most Israelis have strong opinions — must find a way to coexist. That comes with political compromise and respect for the person with whom you do not agree. 

A society with people of diverse viewpoints — and as we know most Israelis have strong opinions — must find a way to coexist. That comes with political compromise and respect for the person with whom you do not agree. As the Sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneerson, wrote to a group of Yeshiva students, “You should spread Judaism in a way of peace, you should seek the good in another and the weaknesses in yourself.” At the same time, a fair court is essential to help the society strike that balance. It must be a lighthouse of justice and evenhandedness to ensure the rights of all Israelis, despite their differences.

Rabbi David Eliezrie is the president of the Rabbinical Council of Orange County. His email is rabbi@ocjewish.com.