22 Kislev 5778
Dear Friends,
Like all of us, I've been thinking a lot about Jerusalem this week. In my case, I've been thinking in particular about the intersection of Yanovsky Street and Albeck Street in Jerusalem's Talpiot neighborhood.
Who were
Daniel Yanovsky
and
Hanoch Albeck,
after whom those streets were named?
Daniel Yanovsky (1918-1977) was a Revisionist Zionist leader in Jerusalem prior to the establishment of the State of Israel, and for many years thereafter he worked for the municipality. Hanoch Albeck (1890-1972) was a great Talmud scholar who published a widely-used edition of the Mishnah.
Yanovsky Street and Albeck Street intersect at the southeast corner of the green rectangle on this map of Talpiot:
This is a really nice neighborhood. If you've ever been to Jerusalem, you've probably walked on the Tayelet, the beautiful promenade overlooking the Old City of Jerusalem. That's just to the east of Albeck Street. And just to the south is a warm and friendly shul, "Mayanot," which Elana and I attended when we lived there. It's a nice, middle-class neighborhood in Jerusalem that holds fond memories for me.
Why am I telling you all this? Well, I love the city of Jerusalem. I love to walk its streets, and I love the stories behind the names of those streets. Where else in the world, after all, are streets named for Jewish scholars or Jewish political leaders who worked on behalf of the Jewish people?
But I have a particular reason for mentioning this just now.
Take another look at that green patch to the north and west of the intersection of Yanovski and Albeck Streets. That green patch indicates a large plot of vacant land. It's been vacant for quite some time. Why, you may ask, has it been vacant, given how valuable land is in the area, and how much building has been going on there during that time?
Well, although that parcel sits in the city of Jerusalem, about thirty years ago control over its use was granted to the United States. The land was leased to our government for $1/year, with the intention that it would be the site, eventually, of the United States embassy in Israel, should it ever be relocated to Jerusalem. That's right: for quite some time, both governments have been considering relocating the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem.
In several respects, the site is ideal. Note that it is on the western side of what had been the 1949 armistice line dividing Israeli territory from the "No Man's Land" that divided the Israeli and Jordanian forces in Jerusalem between 1949 and 1967. The parcel, therefore, is considered part of "West" Jerusalem, i.e., indisputably part of pre-1967 Israel. And it is therefore a less controversial site for a future U.S. embassy than if it were sitting on the eastern, Arab side of the city.
With our President's announcement on Wednesday afternoon, many people in the area began to wonder whether the time had finally come for the site to become a construction zone.
But within a few hours came word that the parcel might, in fact, not ever become the site of a new embassy. Given increased concern over security since the 1980s (in particular, the need for ever-larger setbacks from adjacent streets), this parcel just may not be appropriate for a U.S. embassy.
In spite of the purposeful and ambitious rhetoric, it seems then as though no one really knows for sure whether, when, or to where the American embassy will ever be moved.
* * * * *
Nevertheless, President Trump's bold announcement on Wednesday was very significant. As we listened to it, I am sure that many of us were full of conflicting emotions. On the one hand, our President was saying words that many Israelis -- and many Jews worldwide -- understandably longed to hear for many, many years.
On the other hand, many of us have been asking ourselves: Why is this happening? Why is it happening now? What role does this play in America's overall policy toward Israel and the Middle East? How will it help Jerusalemites, both Arab and Jew, address the many contentious issues that they confront each and every day?
And we don't have clear answers to those questions.
Ever since Wednesday, several people have asked me (and I've been asking myself): Nu? Is this a good thing, or not? Or, as the old punchline used to put it, "Is this good for the Jews, or bad for the Jews?"
These aren't easy questions to answer. It's easy enough to say that the announcement was long overdue. After all, as the President noted, Jerusalem is Israel's capital. All of the official buildings, and many of the judicial, legislative and executive functions of government take place there. And this has been true for almost 70 years. SEVENTY YEARS! That's an awfully long time.
One could also, though, say that the announcement was premature. After all, if the U.S. (and Israel, for that matter) were able to wait for seventy years, both nations could certainly have waited longer. This long-overdue recognition could have been announced as part of a broader understanding or agreement. And perhaps that would have given it a greater, more positive impact in the region.
As we consider these questions, I find the response of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks very apt. He said the following:
I welcome today's decision by the United States to recognise as the capital of Israel, Jerusalem, whose name means "city of peace." This recognition is an essential element in any lasting peace in the region.
Unlike other guardians of the city, from the Romans to the Crusaders to Jordan between 1949 and 1967, Israel has protected the holy sites of all three Abrahamic faiths, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and guaranteed access to them. Today, Jerusalem remains one of the few places in the Middle East where Jews, Christians and Muslims are able to pray in freedom, security and peace.
The sustained denial, in many parts of the world, of the Jewish connection with Jerusalem is dishonest, unacceptable and a key element in the refusal to recognise the Jewish people's right to exist in the land of their origins. Mentioned over 660 times in the Hebrew Bible, Jerusalem was the beating heart of Jewish faith more than a thousand years before the birth of Christianity, and two-and-a-half millennia before the birth of Islam.
Since then, though dispersed around the world, Jews never ceased to pray about Jerusalem, face Jerusalem, speak the language of Jerusalem, remember it at every wedding they celebrated, in every home they built, and at the high and holiest moments of the Jewish year.
Rabbi Sacks captures something very important that is too often ignored: We Jews have long been in love with the city of Jerusalem. We've long yearned to return to it and to restore it to its former glory.
It's interesting, though, that when I think about the parts of the city that I most love, I don't think about the Old City. I don't think about the Dome of the Rock, nor about the Kotel (the Western Wall). I think about the newer neighborhoods that were built once Zionists began returning to the Land of Israel in the 1880s, places like Ben Yehuda Street or Kikar Tsiyon (Zion Square) in downtown Jerusalem, streets named after people like Daniel Yanovsky and Hanoch Albeck. I think about the homes and workplaces of those who built the modern state of Israel, and who are still building it today. I think about the miracle of the restoration of Jewish life, culture and, yes, sovereignty in the land of Israel, and the symbols of that miracle.
Of course, we're not the only ones who care about Jerusalem, both as a holy destination and a city of day-to-day neighborhoods. Others too are part of the tapestry of the city, and their needs, aspirations and longings inhabit the city as well, and must be duly considered and honored.
Whether our government's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital was a good idea or not I will leave it to the pundits and the prognosticators. (If you're interested in reading a selection of responses to the President's speech, please scroll to the bottom of this email.)
One more recommendation: if you would like better to understand the significance of Jerusalem in the history of Zionism and the modern State of Israel, please join our iEngage Israel class on Tuesday evenings. In a remarkable coincidence, during the coming weeks we'll be discussing the contemporary significance of the city of Jerusalem.
Let me conclude by sharing with you the words of Isaiah.
Speaking of Zion, or the city of Jerusalem, he prophesies that:
''In all my sacred mountain,
Nothing evil or vile shall be done."
Rather:
"... out of Zion shall come forth learning and wisdom (Torah),
and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem,"
and as a result,
"They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore."
May those words one day come true! May Jerusalem one day fulfill its promise to be a true source of wisdom and holiness for all humankind. And may all nations come to learn -- from examples set in Jerusalem -- how to live in peace with one another.
Sincerely,
Rabbi Carl M. Perkins
P.S. Are you interested in reading what people around the world think about our President's recent decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital?
If so, read on. Many thanks to Mark Berch, of Washington, D.C., for compiling and annotating the following selection of citations:
REACTIONS TO THE DECISION TO MOVE THE U.S. EMBASSY
Some solid background on the issue of Trump's embassy decision:
Jeremy Ben-Ami: "Truly settling the status of Jerusalem demands less posturing and overblown rhetoric and more efforts to reach a two-state solution through negotiation." Bradley Burston: "Political considerations forced Netanyahu to stump for the fulfillment of a promise neither Trump nor the prime minister himself really wanted to see fulfilled." T'ruah: "This unilateral move sends a strong signal to the world that the United States is relinquishing its position as a peacekeeper". Daniel Kurtzer, U.S. ambassador to Israel under George W. Bush: "inexplicable from the perspective of our diplomacy and our foreign policy, and it's self-defeating". Michael J. Koplow, policy director of the Israel Policy Forum, sees clear harm to peace process.
Organizational support from e.g. StandWithUs, Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, Hadassah, Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations in America, American Jewish Committee, AIPAC, ADL plus opposition from J Street and Americans for Peace Now
A lot of negative reaction from foreign countries:
David Horovitz sees the proclamation as being issued in a vacuum with no specific peace plan, and partially prejudges a key final status issue, but it does not negate Palestinian claims, but "it is highly unlikely to bring Abbas running to the negotiating table." And similarly, Eric Cortellessa reports that experts see no context or endgame for the announcement. But Alan Dershowitz praises the move as a perfect response" to Obama's "benighted ... cowardly decision" at the UN.
Carolina Landsmann advocates for the "two-embassy solution" --- one in both Israeli west Jerusalem and Palestinian east Jerusalem, so "Trump would be fulfilling two promises: transferring the embassy and advancing the resolution of the conflict."
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