DÉJÀ VU: AMERICAN JEWISH LEADERSHIP
DÉJÀ VU: AMERICAN JEWISH LEADERSHIP
The irony of President Barack Obama summoning American Jewish leadership for a chit-chat in the Roosevelt Room at the White House recently was certainly not lost on students of Jewish history.
To American Jewry, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the beloved president of the community: they adored him, voted for him, and could see no wrong doing in his actions. The Jewish community today, or about 80% of it, has embraced Barack Obama with the same vigour as their predecessors embraced FDR. But there is a slight difference: I believe that in Obama’s case, there is also an element of fear present.
When President Obama summoned the Jewish leaders to the Roosevelt Room, he was quite clear about whom he wanted present, and whom he wanted excluded. Similarly, President Roosevelt had a Jewish invitation list made up of primarily one, Rabbi Stephen Wise. Rabbi Wise was, in the historical sense, a court Jew. He was the most famous Reform Rabbi in the United States during World War II and, at the same time, was considered the most influential Jewish and Zionist leader in the country. Historically, there were court Jews who put themselves on the line in order to advocate for issues which directly affected the security and safety of the Jewish community. These court Jews would plead with kings, bishops, and princes to rescind orders which negatively affected the Jewish community, to remove heavy burdens of over-taxation which became oppressive and unbearable, and would even intervene to try and stop edicts from being proclaimed which were detrimental to the very welfare and existence of the Jewish people. Rabbi Stephen Wise did not fall into the same category as these court Jews.
For as millions of Jews were being massacred in Europe, Rabbi Wise, during his meeting with FDR, had tea and chatted about the weather, sports, and other issues of American concern. He refused to press the President to act in order to try to save those Jews who were condemned to die in the Holocaust. A protest from the United States declaring that those responsible for the genocide of the Jewish people would suffer serious consequences when the war was over, might have given the Nazi killers some pause. But Stephen Wise did not ask and President Roosevelt kept silent.
Jumping to the recent meeting with President Obama, the attendees collectively reflected a Jewish communal leadership that was intent on supporting the President, no matter what he was pushing for. From the description provided by those in attendance, this is exactly what happened.
There was no strong voice present calling for a united Jerusalem, the eternal capital of Israel, or for the inalienable right of Jews to live in their ancestral homeland, including in Judea and Samaria. There were no voices that called the notion that Jews in Judea and Samaria should be forcibly removed from their homes so that certain areas become Judenrein by its true adjective: obscene. There was also no one to tell the President that such an exercise was recently tried in Gaza and resulted in massive failure and terrorist training camps where Jewish communities had once thrived.
At this point, it is interesting to note that just as Obama recently did, FDR denied many Jewish organizations access to his tea party with Rabbi Wise. The Bergson group, led by Hillel Kook, and a delegation of the Irgun Zvai Leumi, that was rousing American Jewry from their slumber and warning of the killing machine in Europe, were both denied entry by President Roosevelt. Nationalists from the Jabotinsky movement and the Orthodox Vaad Hatzalah, who were involved in various rescue efforts at the time, were also shut out of the meeting. These organizations were to march on the streets and fill Madison Square Gardens, but no tea with the President and Rabbi Wise.
Today, the organizations that were excluded from Obama’s private tea party have been thrust into the spotlight and given the responsibility to advance the opinions of what may appear, at first glance, a minority but, I believe, will rapidly become the majority among American Jews. It will be up to B’nai Brith International, the Young Israel Movement, and the Zionist Organization of America to lead the American community in the cause of proclaiming Jerusalem as the united capital of the Jewish people and, at the same time, to assert that Jews have a historical right to live throughout Eretz Yisrael. No dictate from the White House, Moscow, Tehran, or, for that matter, any other place in the world will change the Biblical Covenant that the Jewish people have that gives them the religious, historical, and legal rights to settle their own land. The Jewish Aboriginals have reclaimed and rebuilt their national home according to the road map laid out in the Old Testament, the foundation of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
Sadly, the one individual who, more than any other, failed in his moment of trial was Steven Savitsky, President of the Orthodox Union. It was his challenge to speak on behalf of the Orthodox Zionist world and to clearly articulate to President Obama the position of this significant component of the Jewish community. Rabbi Yaffi, the Reform leader, clearly had the time to make known the position of his movement which, not surprisingly, was in total support of President Obama’s policies. On the other hand, Mr. Savitsky apparently did not feel he had enough time to argue the case for Jerusalem and object to the edicts of the President. Mr. Savistsky would be well served to review Megillat Esther where Mordechai reminds Esther when she is afraid to intervene with the King that G-d will still save his people, but only Esther will lose her place in history. Sadly, Mr. Savitsky missed that message.
Rabbi Stephen Wise
Tags: American Jewish Leadership, Jewish Leadership, President Obama
August 10th, 2009 at 5:32 pm
I noticed the recent press release concerning awards recently bestowed by the President and now have received a link to this blog post in an e-mail from Jewish Canada.
Three thoughts:
1. When did it become the mission of B’nai Brith Canada to comment on US politics?
2. I think the parallel you attempt to draw between the good that could have been done had the Holocaust been avoided or made less murderous, on the one hand, and advocacy for, among other things, the settler movement, on the other hand, is misconceived.
3. More broadly speaking, and thinking of recent examples of Israel in the news in Canada, I don’t think it should be B’nai Brith’s core mission to advocate for Israel. The good thing about Zionism is that an Israel exists, complete with embassies and consulates. Should you not let the Government of Israel (and, where applicable, the IDF) be the official voice of Israel?
August 10th, 2009 at 7:02 pm
Frank, your comment is well served. I was just wondering why there was no protestations from the American Jewish community at large - knowing President Obama only had a few calibre Jews who agreed with his every political policy on Israel. Surely there were American Jews and non-Jews who saw through this facade and were angry, where were their voices? Even high profile leaders like presidents get away with what the vast majority allow them to get away with. Sure we have a plethora of blogs on the internet commenting on our pleasure and displeasure and that is part of a problem today. Why? Because instead of organizing mass protests so that it gets media attention, and in turn falls on the President’s ears, we all blog individually and the anger and/or frustration is there, but not in numbers. There is no focus, no optics, no call for attention en masse. Therefore, your calling for Jews to unite as a SHOW OF FORCE, to be counted makes so much sense.
August 10th, 2009 at 8:29 pm
In the same way, inspite the single voice meeting of Roosvelt with Rabbi weiss, the community of nations declared the partition of Palestine the 20th of November 1947 and the state of Israel was born in the 5th day oy yihar next year, I think that palestinean mentality/reality, and arab interests, will finish by convincing Obama about the sad reality of his dreams for peace in the middle east!
We jews dont have to do a big effort to change his mind! Palestinians of all factions will do the job by themselves! The Arab world is not interested in a Palestinian state dominated by muslim extremism…
We dont have to be pesimistic to believe that Jerusalem will be divided again! Neve Yaacov, Ramot, Gica Tzorfatit, Ramat Eshkol and Pisgat Zeev are there to stay! I have no doubt about it!
August 11th, 2009 at 7:19 am
Savitsky also failed when he maligned North American olim 5 years ago:
http://shilohmusings.blogspot.com/2004/11/insult-justification.html
Congrats on the blog. Welcome
August 18th, 2009 at 8:02 pm
[...] DÉJÀ VU: AMERICAN JEWISH LEADERSHIP– Fresh Frank Dimant …. [...]
March 27th, 2010 at 9:21 pm
The Antisemitism that can’t be mentioned because by doing so will create powerful enemies. Here I am referring to the upper echelon of the gas and oil industry. While you might be spending a lot of time decrying the dissemination of anti Jewish hatred by the extreme left, these individuals wield little influence. However, For Jews the oil and gas magnets are a highly dangerous group precisely because they are so very powerful . Jews who are represented so widely in most sectors of industry and finance are completely shut out of the upper levels of energy. Now there is no official bar but Jews are not wanted. They don’t fit into the culture. This has been an unspoken truth for many years and it is time it was exposed, So much of North American trade and commerce is driven by energy related enterprise. The political clout that this sector exerts is profoundly felt. It might be fashionable to criticise the Saudi and Gulf oil Shieks but you would never can say or write anything negative about their North American and European partners, who are decidely non Muslim. A very hidden form of antisemitism as found in executive suites dealing with energy and located in such places a Texas is of long standing and seems to be immune from any criticism. Now where is B’nai Brith in confronting this most powerful foe?
June 30th, 2010 at 5:00 pm
I am not quite sure from what planet Marky Mark is from, but it is the fundamental and Torah duty of all Jews and Jewish organizations to champion not only the entire Jewish population of the world, but Israel as well. It’s this self serving self preserving outlook that has once again brought the Jewish nation to the brink of the genocide intentions of our enemies.
Dissemination of the Jewish population is not meant to lead to alienation of our common heritage and spiritual goals. Islam defeats us through its unity of over a billion and a half people while we who share and have the most talented and able bodied international community on the planet, cant organize and coordinate thirteen and a half million people into something that could even begin to resemble a defence of who and what we are. Our personal success and achievements are what is leading to our downfall.
Until Jews learn to unit as a single entity in defence of Israel and ourselves, we will remain on the losing end of the geopolitical spectrum, we remain marginalized as long as we are a divided people who lack a combined single voice. It’s uncanny that with all the brain power and talent we have within our community, just how easily we negate the horrors of our past and the similarities from then to now, with a 40% recorded increase in Antisemitism in Canada alone and the huge rise in islamofascist hatred towards Jews internationally all the warning signs are there and are being ignored.
This malfeasance against the state of Israel and the world’s Jewish population is not going away anytime soon, and until we confront it and make it so our position weakens by the day. G-d has provided us the intelligence and the tools to deal with any and all threats against us and Israel, it’s entirely up to us to use them, from procrastination will come demise.