Pinchas 5760

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Pinchas (Numbers 25:10-30:1 )

GOOD MORNING!  No words are strong enough to express the outrage of the despicable acts of arson and desecration in Israel lately. We, as a unified Jewish community, must unequivocally condemn these terrible and senseless acts. I think that the following article by Jonathan Rosenblum, a columnist for the Jerusalem Post, (which appeared in the Jewish World Review June 29, 2000, http://www.jewishworldreview.com/jonathan/rosenblum.html) will help shed light on what is happening in Israel.

CONVENIENT SCAPEGOATING OF 'FANATICS'

WITH EVERY PASSING DAY, awareness grows that violence has become endemic to Israeli society. Last week, we were left numb by one senseless murder after another: a toddler bludgeoned for disturbing the viewing of a TV soccer match, a man stabbed to death in a dispute over a beach chair, and another beaten to death over right of way on the highway.

The names of murdered spouses and girlfriends have all blurred by now -- too numerous to remember. And the major study of the Israeli school system reveals that exposure to repeated bullying and threats with lethal weapons are a fact of life for many of our schoolchildren.

The highly publicized arson of a Conservative synagogue in Ramot this past Saturday night raises again the question: What has become of us? The sight of scorched Jewish houses of worship arouses powerful memories of Kristellnacht and of thousands of pogroms in the collective Jewish unconscious.

If Jews can kill other Jews as cheaply as the residents of Harlem and Watts dispatch one another, perhaps it should come as no surprise that they can also torch houses of worship as well. But it does.

"Violence, any act of violence," to quote the fervently Orthodox Yated Neeman editorial on the subject, "must be condemned publicly with all the means at our disposal. When violence becomes a tool, there is no stopping it and no telling where it will end... We condemn the arson without qualification."

It is painful that as an observant Jew I feel that such a denunciation of violence is demanded of me. But, in the current climate, I stand accused.

The media has assumed that the perpetrators are observant Jews. Such assumptions are dangerous. (In this regard, David Bateman, rabbi of the burnt synagogue, is to be highly commended for cautioning against reading the incident as an expression of the "ultra-Orthodox community" as opposed to "some kind of lunatic fringe.")

Over a decade ago, there was a series of bus stop burnings in Jerusalem. Then too it was assumed that the perpetrators were fervently Orthodox Jews offended by the advertisements. Yet when the culprits were caught, they turned out to be secular youths who had found the opportunity for a doubly good "prank."

Three years ago, a Reform nursery school was torched in Mevasseret Zion. Again it was reported as a matter of fact that fervently Orthodox Jews were responsible, and the arson became the center piece of a huge Reform fundraising campaign in the United States.

Yet not one bit of evidence linking the religious to the crime was ever found. That arson was as likely the outgrowth of a long simmering dispute between poorer, veteran residents of Mevasseret and newly arrived, upscale Anglos.

Does that mean that the Ramot arson was not the work of anyone identified with the religious community? Only a fool would say so with absolute assurance. True, we have not yet read of an Orthodox wife-slayer or murderer (pooh, pooh, pooh). True, fervently Orthodox schools are almost violence free. But Orthodox society does not exist in a hermetically-sealed bubble protected from the influences of the outside world. It too has its hooligans and riff-raff.

Yet if the arsonist in Ramot turns out to be someone who has gone through the religious educational system, it will not be enough to simply dismiss his actions as those of a fringe character. We would still have to ask ourselves whether our children, for whom violence is something foreign, nevertheless understand why the Ramot arson was indefensible.

More importantly, we have to ask ourselves whether our children are ever conscious of our Sages interpretation of the verse in central Shema prayer, "You shall love the L-rd, Your G-d, with all your heart: ... You shall make the L-rd, your G-d, beloved to your fellow man." Have we placed the imperative of Kiddush Hashem, sanctifying the Divine Name in our everyday behavior, at the center of the education we provide our young?

A lot of soul-searching is needed, but not just by the religious. The Ramot arson was not an isolated event. The only thing unique about it was the vast media coverage it generated.

Manof, an Orthodox information center, has compiled a list of 32 attacks on religious institutions in 1997-98, many of them involving arson and damage in excess of that suffered by the Ramot synagogue.

Orthodox synagogues were torched in the Gilo and Ramot neighborhoods of Jerusalem and Neve Rotem; Torah scrolls and holy books burned or torn in shuls in Rosh Ha'ayin, Neve Rotem, Yaffa, Chazor, the French Hill and Neve Yaakov neighborhoods of Jerusalem, Ein Hod, and a government religious school in Tel Aviv; pages of Scripture covered in excrement at the Technion; and Mezuzos ripped down from shuls in Kiryat Gat and Haifa. Shuls were defaced with crosses and swastikas, and other anti-Semitic and anti-religious graffiti. During the same period, there were 39 physical attacks on religious Jews.

None of the above incidents made it to the New York Times; indeed only a handful were even reported in the mainstream Israeli press, even when accompanied by dramatic photos. The Prime Minister issued no statements, the head of the Jewish Agency did not come to tour the sites of the vandalism or conduct meetings there as a show of solidarity; there were no calls for national soul-searching; local mayors were not denounced for failing to arrive at the scene immediately; and the media was not filled with criticism of the police for their apathy.

The media showed no interest in the Orthodox as victims.

None of this, of course, makes the arson attack in Ramot one iota less contemptible. But the pious denunciations would carry far more weight if they came from those who treat similar actions with equal seriousness regardless of the identity of the victim.


Torah
Portion of the Week

Pinchas

In last week's Torah portion, Pinchas acted to stop a public display of immorality. He thus stemmed the plague of retribution which was killing the multitudes. He is rewarded by being made a Cohen -- by Divine decree.

The Almighty commands Moshe to attack the Midianites in retribution for the licentious plot the Midianites perpetrated upon the Israelites. A new census is taken of the Jewish people revealing that there are 601,730 available for army duty. G-d directs the division of the Land of Israel amongst the tribes. The Levites are tallied. The daughters of Tzelafchad come forward to petition Moshe regarding their right of inheritance. Moshe inquires of the Almighty Who answers in their favor.

CANDLE LIGHTING - July 21:

Jerusalem 7:03   Miami 7:55  New York 8:05
L.A. 7:44  Hong Kong 6:49  Singapore 6:58
Guatemala  6:16  Honolulu   6:57  J'Burg 5:17
Melbourne 5:06  Moscow 8:38  London 8:47
Atlanta 8:29  Toronto 8:36  Montreal 8:20


QUOTE OF THE WEEK:

Values are caught,
not taught.

Dedicated by...

In Loving Memory of
Rabbi Shmuel Yaacov Weinberg

and

Happy Anniversary
Ray & Dorothy Packouz

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