Last week I was completely inspired to write a sermon after watching Magic & Bird, an incredible documentary that traces the rivalry between these two players from their earliest days playing against one another in the NCAA finals.  These two phenomenal players, both leaders in their own unique way changed the NBA forever.  I had this great idea to use Bird and Magic as different types of leaders and Aaron and the selection of the Cohenim.

But I digress.

I am a Lakers fan through and through.  I remember the rivalry and through the magic of memory only recall the Lakers being victorious.  I know the starting five.  Magic, Kareem, James Worthy, AC Green, and Byron Scott.  Michael Cooper was brought in whenever a three-point shot was required (or as the shooting guard).  I know that these players had personal faults and flaws.  As a young kid, it didn’t matter.  They flew through the air and seemed to make baskets from nowhere.

In fairness, I remember plenty of the Celtics players, too.  Bird, Ainge, Parish, McHale and someone else.  Four of five isn’t bad.

I highly recommend that you see Magic & Bird.  It is an inspiring story of two players who got to the top of their game through practice and even found friendship when the spotlights were turned off and it was just Larry and Earvin.  If you’re not convinced yet, just watch it and then talk to me.

Oh and GO LAKERS!

——

Speaking of a Lakers v. Celtics rivalry…  I think the Celtics have a new littlest fan who was born on Friday to Rabbi T.  and Dr. America.  All are healthy!

Though it isn’t as big of a deal in North America as pretty much anywhere else, it is world cup time!  The US team isn’t a favorite and the Canadian team didn’t even qualify.  Here are 2 interesting articles from Slate about the games and the differences between the US and I think Canada and the rest of the world.  I definitely plan on watching soccer and I don’t have a favorite team.  Do you?

The Loneliness of the American Soccer FanThe world’s most popular sport is on the rise in the United States—and my neighbors still couldn’t care less about the World Cup.

By Daniel GrossPosted Thursday, June 10, 2010, at 12:38 PM ETBeing a soccer fan at World Cup time in America is a little like being Jewish in December in a small town in the Midwest. You sense that something big is going on around you, but you’re not really a part of it. And the thing you’re celebrating and enjoying is either ignored or misunderstood by your friends, peers, and neighbors. It can be a lonely time. But the World Cup is much bigger than Christmas. After all, only a couple of billion people in the world celebrate Christmas; the World Cup is likely to garner the attention of a much larger audience. Yet in the world’s largest and most important sports competition, the American team, and the American audience, is a marginal, bit player. And for those of us who love the game of soccer and the World Cup, and for the few of us who followed the ups and downs of Landon Donovan’s career, these next couple weeks are likely to be bittersweet.

Of course, it’s getting less lonely. The United States has a growing soccer culture, thanks in part to the rise and growth of MLS. The atmosphere at games in Seattle and Toronto is quasi-European, with crowded stadiums and singing fans holding up scarves. A huge, partisan crowd showed up for the U.S. national team’s final send-off game against Turkey in Philadelphia. But as a rule, the world game remains a niche product here. Television ratings for MLS and U.S. national team games are minuscule. When Team USA plays World Cup qualifiers at home, it’s common for American fans to be outnumbered and outshouted by Costa Ricans, Mexicans, Guatemalans, Hondurans, whoever. Truth be told, there hasn’t been all that much to cheer for. In the 2002 World Cup, the United States made it out of its four-team round-robin group and whacked archrival Mexico in an exhilarating 2-0 game before going out to Germany in the quarterfinals. But the 2006 World Cup campaign essentially ended before it began, with the United States falling behind the Czech Republic in the fifth minute in the first game.

Because of the nation’s historical incompetence at international soccer, Americans generally look at the World Cup the same way they look at other foreign phenomena like sovereign wealth funds, Bollywood, and China—as a potential marketing bonanza. The Wall Street Journal and other organs of the financial press have been filled with articles about the opportunities for consumer products, brands, and media. The international soccer community, likewise, sees America less as a budding soccer power than as a potential financial bonanza—why else would FIFA consider giving the United States the World Cup for a second time?

As a result, if you’re interested in the game, and particularly interested in the U.S. team, you really don’t have that many people talk to. At a recent soccer practice, one of the other dads noted that his son wanted a jersey for some guy whose name he couldn’t remember but who might play for a Spanish team. “Lionel Messi?” I asked. From the lack of recognition on his face, I realized I may as well have said “Lionel Trilling?” I wanted to shout: “You know, the best player in the world? The mite from Argentina who moves faster with the ball than without it, whose low center of gravity lets him ride off tackles from much larger defenders, who schools the opposition the way Michael Jordan used to, who in April scored four goals against Arsenal—against ARSENAL, for god’s sakes!—in a Champions League game, who plays for Barcelona, possibly the most awesome and elegant club in the world, a team that gives its shirt sponsorship to UNICEF rather than selling it to some awful corporation? You mean that guy?” But what was the point? Talking with my neighbors about Lionel Messi would be like trying to engage a group of Amish farmers in a discussion about the merits of the 2011 Porsche Carrera.

Oh, sure, you can find other enthusiasts. A few Slate colleagues pass around YouTube links to the latest sick goal. Urban hipsters are obliged to show some interest the game, the same way they do in CSAs, and facial hair (for men) and yoga (for women). On the Internet, there’s the high-brow crew over at the New Republic, (which features an ad for a book from Cornell University press on Spartak Moscow), the fine blogs No Short Corners and Yanks Abroad, and a rising volume of press coverage. But there’s nothing like the volume and sophistication of stuff our frères at Slate.fr are doing. If you want to follow the game, wince with every missed shot, and question coach Bob Bradley’s personnel choices, you’ll have to venture into the fever swamps of BigSoccer.com. There you will find some people who live and die with status updates of defender Oguchi Onyewu’s knee. But they’re only avatars.

Following the U.S. national team in the World Cup is a somewhat solitary endeavor in part because the scheduling doesn’t lend itself to social or family watching. Unlike the Olympics, the World Cup is not scheduled or televised according to U.S. preferences—the last time the quadrennial tournament was staged in the Western hemisphere was 1994. To watch the United States’ opening game in the 2002 World Cup, I had to go to the Irish pub across from my New York apartment at 4 a.m. This year the schedule is only slightly better: this Saturday against England at 2:30 p.m. ET, Friday, June 18, against Slovenia at 10 a.m. ET, then Wednesday, June 23, at 10 a.m. ET, against Algeria. Yes, pubs and sports bars will be showing the games. But how many people will leave work, or take the day off, or skip the Little League game or pool party, to sit indoors and watch a soccer match? My guess is that when the U.S. plays England, the bars in New York and Los Angeles will be like Condé Nast in the 1990s—overrun with Brits.

I won’t be there. On Saturday afternoon, I’ll be at a family gathering, one at which I’m confident nobody will be checking scores or talking about the potentially epic matchup with England. I’ll have to tape it and watch it later, most likely alone. At least I’m confident none of my close friends or family members will call, e-mail, or text me with scores or updates, and that I can safely listen to the radio without the result intruding. On the other hand, I might have to shut off my Twitter feed. I follow a few foreigners.

——

The True Story of American SoccerFrom The Thinking Fan’s Guide to the World Cup.

By Dave EggersUpdated Thursday, June 10, 2010, at 6:55 AM ETThe 2010 World Cup marks the U.S.’s sixth consecutive appearance in the world’s pre-eminent soccer tournament. Four years ago, Dave Eggers asked why the game hasn’t quite captured America’s imagination, examining soccer’s history and status in this country through his own experiences following and playing the sport. The original article is reprinted below.

A German goal at the World CupWhen children in the United States are very young, they believe that soccer is the most popular sport in the world. They believe this because every single child in America plays soccer. It is a rule that they play, a rule set forth in the same hoary document, displayed in every state capital, that insists that 6-year-olds also pledge allegiance to the flag—a practice which is terrifying to watch, by the way, good lord—and that once a year, they dress as tiny pilgrims with beards fashioned from cotton.

On Saturdays, every flat green space in the continental United States is covered with tiny people in shiny uniforms, chasing the patchwork ball up and down the field, to the delight and consternation of their parents, most of whom have no idea what is happening. The primary force behind all of this is the American Youth Soccer Organization, or AYSO. In the 1970s, AYSO was formed to popularize soccer among the youth of America, and they did this with startling efficiency. Within a few years, soccer was the sport of choice for parents everywhere, particularly those who harbored suspicions that their children had no athletic ability whatsoever.

The beauty of soccer for very young people is that, to create a simulacrum of the game, it requires very little skill. There is no other sport that can bear such incompetence. With soccer, 22 kids can be running around, most of them aimlessly, or picking weeds by the sidelines, or crying for no apparent reason, and yet the game can have the general appearance of an actual soccer match. If there are three or four coordinated kids among the 22 flailing bodies, there will actually be dribbling, a few legal throw-ins, and a couple of times when the ball stretches the back of the net. It will be soccer, more or less.

Because they all play, most of America’s children assume that soccer will always be a part of their lives. When I was 8, playing center midfielder for the undefeated Strikers (coached by the unparalleled Mr. Cooper), I harbored no life expectations other than that I would continue playing center midfielder until such time as I died. It never occurred to me that any of this would change.

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But at about age 10, something happens to the children of the United States. Soccer is dropped, quickly and unceremoniously, by approximately 88 percent of all young people. The same kids who played at 5, 6, 7, move on to baseball, football, basketball, hockey, field hockey, and, sadly, golf. Shortly thereafter, they stop playing these sports, too, and begin watching these sports on television, including, sadly, golf.

The abandonment of soccer is attributable, in part, to the fact that people of influence in America long believed that soccer was the chosen sport of Communists. When I was 13—this was 1983, long before glasnost, let alone the fall of the wall—I had a gym teacher, who for now we’ll call Moron McCheeby, who made a very compelling link between soccer and the architects of the Iron Curtain. I remember once asking him why there were no days of soccer in his gym units. His face darkened. He took me aside. He explained with quivering, barely mastered rage, that he preferred decent, honest American sports where you used your hands. Sports where one’s hands were not used, he said, were commie sports played by Russians, Poles, Germans, and other commies. To use one’s hands in sports was American, to use one’s feet was the purview of the followers of Marx and Lenin. I believe McCheeby went on to lecture widely on the subject.

It was, by most accounts, 1986 when the residents of the United States became aware of the thing called the World Cup. Isolated reports came from foreign correspondents, and we were frightened by these reports, worried about domino effects, and wondered aloud if the trend was something we could stop by placing a certain number of military advisers in Cologne or Marseilles. Then, in 1990, we realized that the World Cup might happen every four years, with or without us.

At the same time, high-school soccer was booming in the suburbs of Chicago, due in large part to an influx of foreign exchange students.

My own high-school team was ridiculously good by the standards of the day, stacked as it was with extraordinary players from other places. I can still remember the name of the forward who came from, I think, Rome: Alessandro Dazza. He was the best on the team, just ahead of Carlos Gutierrez (not his real name), who hailed from Spain and played midfield. Our best defender was a Vietnamese-American student named Tuan, and there was also Paul Beaupre, who was actually from our own WASP-filled town, but whose name sounded French. We were expected to win State, but we did not come very close. Homewood-Flossmoor, we heard, had a pair of twins from Brazil.

These are the words of Yehudah haLevi and these days I confess I am thinking even more about Israel and reminiscing (I’ve quoted the poem at the end of this post). Then I saw this editorial in the NYT.

Israel Without Clichés

By TONY JUDT

Published: June 9, 2010

THE Israeli raid on the Free Gaza flotilla has generated an outpouring of clichés from the usual suspects. It is almost impossible to discuss the Middle East without resorting to tired accusations and ritual defenses: perhaps a little house cleaning is in order.

Yossi Lemel

No. 1: Israel is being/should be delegitimized

Israel is a state like any other, long-established and internationally recognized. The bad behavior of its governments does not “delegitimize” it, any more than the bad behavior of the rulers of North Korea, Sudan — or, indeed, the United States — “delegitimizes” them. When Israel breaks international law, it should be pressed to desist; but it is precisely because it is a state under international law that we have that leverage.

Some critics of Israel are motivated by a wish that it did not exist — that it would just somehow go away. But this is the politics of the ostrich: Flemish nationalists feel the same way about Belgium, Basque separatists about Spain. Israel is not going away, nor should it. As for the official Israeli public relations campaign to discredit any criticism as an exercise in “de-legitimization,” it is uniquely self-defeating. Every time Jerusalem responds this way, it highlights its own isolation.

No. 2: Israel is/is not a democracy

Perhaps the most common defense of Israel outside the country is that it is “the only democracy in the Middle East.” This is largely true: the country has a constitution, an independent judiciary and free elections, though it also discriminates against non-Jews in ways that distinguish it from most other democracies today. The expression of strong dissent from official policy is increasingly discouraged.

But the point is irrelevant. “Democracy” is no guarantee of good behavior: most countries today are formally democratic — remember Eastern Europe’s “popular democracies.” Israel belies the comfortable American cliché that “democracies don’t make war.” It is a democracy dominated and often governed by former professional soldiers: this alone distinguishes it from other advanced countries. And we should not forget that Gaza is another “democracy” in the Middle East: it was precisely because Hamas won free elections there in 2005 that both the Palestinian Authority and Israel reacted with such vehemence.

No. 3: Israel is/is not to blame

Israel is not responsible for the fact that many of its near neighbors long denied its right to exist. The sense of siege should not be underestimated when we try to understand the delusional quality of many Israeli pronouncements.

Unsurprisingly, the state has acquired pathological habits. Of these, the most damaging is its habitual resort to force. Because this worked for so long — the easy victories of the country’s early years are ingrained in folk memory — Israel finds it difficult to conceive of other ways to respond. And the failure of the negotiations of 2000 at Camp David reinforced the belief that “there is no one to talk to.”

But there is. As American officials privately acknowledge, sooner or later Israel (or someone) will have to talk to Hamas. From French Algeria through South Africa to the Provisional I.R.A., the story repeats itself: the dominant power denies the legitimacy of the “terrorists,” thereby strengthening their hand; then it secretly negotiates with them; finally, it concedes power, independence or a place at the table. Israel will negotiate with Hamas: the only question is why not now.

No. 4: The Palestinians are/are not to blame

Abba Eban, the former Israeli foreign minister, claimed that Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. He was not wholly wrong. The “negationist” stance of Palestinian resistance movements from 1948 through the early 1980s did them little good. And Hamas, firmly in that tradition though far more genuinely popular than its predecessors, will have to acknowledge Israel’s right to exist.

But since 1967 it has been Israel that has missed most opportunities: a 40-year occupation (against the advice of its own elder statesmen); three catastrophic invasions of Lebanon; an invasion and blockade of Gaza in the teeth of world opinion; and now a botched attack on civilians in international waters. Palestinians would be hard put to match such cumulative blunders.

Terrorism is the weapon of the weak — bombing civilian targets was not invented by Arabs (nor by the Jews who engaged in it before 1948). Morally indefensible, it has characterized resistance movements of all colors for at least a century. Israelis are right to insist that any talks or settlements will depend upon Hamas’s foreswearing it.

But Palestinians face the same conundrum as every other oppressed people: all they have with which to oppose an established state with a monopoly of power is rejection and protest. If they pre-concede every Israeli demand — abjurance of violence, acceptance of Israel, acknowledgment of all their losses — what do they bring to the negotiating table? Israel has the initiative: it should exercise it.

No. 5: The Israel lobby is/is not to blame

There is an Israel lobby in Washington and it does a very good job — that’s what lobbies are for. Those who claim that the Israel lobby is unfairly painted as “too influential” (with the subtext of excessive Jewish influence behind the scenes) have a point: the gun lobby, the oil lobby and the banking lobby have all done far more damage to the health of this country.

But the Israel lobby is disproportionately influential. Why else do an overwhelming majority of congressmen roll over for every pro-Israel motion? No more than a handful show consistent interest in the subject. It is one thing to denounce the excessive leverage of a lobby, quite another to accuse Jews of “running the country.” We must not censor ourselves lest people conflate the two. In Arthur Koestler’s words, “This fear of finding oneself in bad company is not an expression of political purity; it is an expression of a lack of self-confidence.”

No. 6: Criticism of Israel is/is not linked to anti-Semitism

Anti-Semitism is hatred of Jews, and Israel is a Jewish state, so of course some criticism of it is malevolently motivated. There have been occasions in the recent past (notably in the Soviet Union and its satellites) when “anti-Zionism” was a convenient surrogate for official anti-Semitism. Understandably, many Jews and Israelis have not forgotten this.

But criticism of Israel, increasingly from non-Israeli Jews, is not predominantly motivated by anti-Semitism. The same is true of contemporary anti-Zionism: Zionism itself has moved a long way from the ideology of its “founding fathers” — today it presses territorial claims, religious exclusivity and political extremism. One can acknowledge Israel’s right to exist and still be an anti-Zionist (or “post-Zionist”). Indeed, given the emphasis in Zionism on the need for the Jews to establish a “normal state” for themselves, today’s insistence on Israel’s right to act in “abnormal” ways because it is a Jewish state suggests that Zionism has failed.

We should beware the excessive invocation of “anti-Semitism.” A younger generation in the United States, not to mention worldwide, is growing skeptical. “If criticism of the Israeli blockade of Gaza is potentially ‘anti-Semitic,’ why take seriously other instances of the prejudice?” they ask, and “What if the Holocaust has become just another excuse for Israeli bad behavior?” The risks that Jews run by encouraging this conflation should not be dismissed.

Along with the oil sheikdoms, Israel is now America’s greatest strategic liability in the Middle East and Central Asia. Thanks to Israel, we are in serious danger of “losing” Turkey: a Muslim democracy, offended at its treatment by the European Union, that is the pivotal actor in Near-Eastern and Central Asian affairs. Without Turkey, the United States will achieve few of its regional objectives — whether in Iran, Afghanistan or the Arab world. The time has come to cut through the clichés surrounding it, treat Israel like a “normal” state and sever the umbilical cord.

Tony Judt is the director of the Remarque Institute at New York University and the author, most recently, of “Ill Fares the Land.”

There is so much media coverage about Israel these days.  I like this editorial because it goes straight through the narishkeit and reminds the reader of what is really going on here.  One correction of course, Israel doesn’t have a constitution.  It does have a declaration of independence.

Here’s the poem.

My heart is in the East – Yehuda haLevi

My heart is in the East, and I am at the ends of the West;

How can I taste what I eat and how could it be pleasing to me?

How shall I render my vows and my bonds, while yet

Zion lies beneath the fetter of Edom, and I am in the chains of Arabia?

It would be easy for me to leave all the bounty of Spain —

As it is precious for me to behold the dust of the desolate sanctuary.

Because it might make you regurgitate.

Israeli Women’s Prayers Hit Reactionary Wall

By Michele Chabin

WeNews correspondent

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

A woman wearing tefillin touches the Western Wall. Women in Israel are prohibited from wearing tefillin and prayer shawls at the Western Wall.

Women’s rights activists say extremists in the haredi community are forcing their fervent brand of religiosity on the Israeli public and that one of their tactics is to marginalize women.

“In any patriarchy, when you want to embrace power you must make someone feel inferior,” said Naomi Ragen, a best-selling American-Israeli novelist whose books (“The Saturday Wife,” “The Covenant”) feature strong Jewish women fighting for equality in the Orthodox world.

Several haredi leaders have succeeded in banning female performers from many municipal and national events. Due to their influence, a police station in the coastal town of Ashdod no longer employs female workers and the same is true for a handful of Jerusalem health maintenance organizations and a post office.

Ragen said haredi extremists have succeeded in segregating many public buses by gender.

Ragen, who co-petitioned the High Court to ban segregated bus lines after she was harassed for refusing to sit at the back of a bus, said she recently encountered a haredi man with a small child on a very crowded bus.

“The child sat next to him. When an elderly woman boarded he refused to place the child on his lap. He didn’t want a woman to sit next to him,” she said.

It’s not that he didn’t care about the woman, the author emphasized. “It’s that he wanted to be a holy person. In the process, he and others are overriding the Torah’s precepts of being decent to people.”

Religious Extremists Emboldened

Seth Farber is a modern-Orthodox rabbi and the director of ITIM, a Jerusalem organization that helps people navigate the bureaucracy of the Orthodox Rabbinate and other government institutions. He believes that the clout ultra-Orthodox political parties first obtained in the late 1980s by joining successive governments has gradually emboldened religious extremists.

“They feel greater confidence to impose their social norms on the general population. The women’s issue is just one facet,” Farber said.

Ragen, also modern-Orthodox, said she felt equally “infuriated” when, earlier this year, she heard that Frankel and Hoffman had been detained.

“On the one hand the Kotel [Wall] is a synagogue and does have its own rules. But because it’s the center and heart of the Jewish religion, everyone should have access to it,” she said. “Whatever the women are doing can’t be worse than someone throwing chairs. When this happens, who is really disrespecting the Kotel?”

It is time, Ragen said, “for people to take back this religion.”

However, not everyone believes that a woman’s right to wear prayer shawls at the Wall is part of the battle against religious fanaticism,

Einat Ramon, the first Israeli-born female rabbi, said that her Masorti (Conservative) stream of Judaism agreed to honor the High Court’s 2003 ruling which, in addition to banning prayer shawls, ordered the government to develop Robinson’s Arch, a secluded section of the Western Wall for use by non-Orthodox Jews.

“Sending our daughters to be wrapped in tallit at the section of the Wall that is run according to Orthodox interpretations of Jewish law is a violation…of our agreement with the State of Israel,” Ramon said. “It violates the moral-legal principle of minhag makom: respect for the customs of a certain place and for the rabbi and community that adheres to him.”

Hoffman counters that on the men’s side of the Wall custom undergoes constant innovation. “Someone brings in a drummer to perform at a bar-mitzvah and men find meaningful new ways to celebrate. It’s only the women who must stick to ‘minhag makom,'” she said.

“The Women of the Wall have been praying there for 20 years,” Hoffman added. “If that’s not a custom by now, I don’t know what is.”

Michele Chabin is the Israel correspondent for the New York Jewish Week, Religion News Service and the National Catholic Register. She has been reporting from Israel for more than 20 years.

It should be no shock to any of you, dear readers, that I am completely disgusted.  I think Einat Ramon’s comments, though not here in full are moving us backwards instead of ceasing an opportunity to propel women’s rights forward.  Naomi Ragen seems to be fighting for an important cause here (I do not agree with other things that she says/does) and she is doing so with the Israel Religious Action Center, a group that each of us need to help!

Rosh Chodesh is coming (on Sunday).  This means that the Women of the Wall will again gather with the threat of violence from the Haredi establishment looming.

After the past week Israel still needs our support.  Whether or not we like or agree with the actions of the military is irrelevant.  We must give our support to the organizations and the people who are doing the work on behalf of the liberal Jewish world so that we can have equal rights in Israel.

Rabbi Tarfon once said, “It is not up to you to finish the work, yet you are not free to avoid it,” (Avot 2.16).

———-

I also have a new background and theme.  Any thoughts or feedback?

I’m still taking all that has happened since Monday in.  The loss of life is tragic.  Israel has a right to protect her borders.  Her soldiers were acting according to maritime law, however they were walking into a publicity trap.  The more information emerges, the more complicated.

There were three interesting op-eds in the New York Times today.   Michael Oren, Rabbi Daniel Gordis, and Nick Kristof all have things to say.

The following is from ARZA.

ARZA Statement on the Gaza Flotilla Incident
June 1, 2010

On May 31, the day when Americans paused to remember those who have fallen in battle, we woke to the difficult news that early that morning Israeli commandos had stopped six ships carrying hundreds of pro-Palestinian activists on an aid mission to Gaza. Five of the ships calmly complied with the stoppage. The sixth ship did not. It was on this sixth vessel, the Turkish registered Mavi Marmara, where nine people were killed and dozens were wounded after IDF forces encountered unexpected resistance from civilians wielding knives, crow bars and small arms. Turkey’s NTV showed activists beating one Israeli soldier with sticks as he rappelled from a helicopter onto one of the boats. Another soldier was thrown from an upper deck of one of the ships and then stomped on by activists.

The Israeli military said troops only opened fire after the activists attacked them with knives and iron rods, and one activist wrested a serviceman’s weapon. Two of the dead activists had fired at soldiers with pistols, the army said. Organizers included people affiliated with the International Solidarity Movement, a pro-Palestinian group that often sends international activists into battle zones, and the IHH, a Turkish aid group that Israel accuses of having terrorist links.

Though the flotilla was in international waters at the time of the attack, Israel has operated under an international law that allows a state, during a time of conflict, to enforce an embargo in international waters. Within this framework, it is legal for civilian ships to be stopped if they are trying to break the embargo.

It would appear that this entire enterprise was a cynical set-up designed to present Israel with an unnecessary Hobson’s choice and to generate anti-Israel publicity.

As so often happens after incidents such as this one, foreign governments were quick to condemn Israel for excessive use of force without full facts. Editorials in Israel note a mixed reaction to the Government’s action while still all affirming the right of sovereign self-defense. The government of Israel has responded that Israel has the right to blockade Gaza ports to prevent weapons from entering that area and that Israeli Navy personnel were prepared to deal with protesters, not people armed with knives, crowbars and other weapons.

ARZA expresses its sorrow at the loss of life and expresses the hope that all those injured will soon recover from their wounds. ARZA further expresses the hope that governments and individuals will not rush to judgment but will wait for all the facts to emerge before coming to any conclusion. As is so often the case when dealing with incidents that occur in a very unsettled part of the world, it is often difficult to ascertain the facts but very easy to jump to conclusions.

Our sacred task is to build an ever stronger progressive religious presence in Israel. Even when Israel is experiencing difficult moments like these, we must remain focused on creating facts on the ground. To the extent that ARZA can support IMPJ and IRAC, their work will enlarge the societal conversation on Judaism and the creation of a just, democratic, and Jewish Israel.

While waiting for a full report on what happened today, there are some facts that are already clear:

· The flotilla was organized by an Islamist organization that has links to fundamentalist jihadi groups.

· Israel offered from the first announcement of the flotilla that it or the Red Cross would deliver any humanitarian aid to Gaza, as it does daily.

· The extremists brought small children on board by persons hoping to provoke what could be a violent confrontation,

· The activists were carrying 10,000 tons of what they said was aid. Israel transfers about 15,000 tons of supplies and humanitarian aid every week to the people of Gaza.

· “We fully intend to go to Gaza regardless of any intimidation or threats of violence against us, they are going to have to forcefully stop us,” said one of the flotilla’s organizers.

· Using the Arabic term ‘intifada,’ Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said “We call on all Arabs and Muslims to rise up in front of Zionist embassies across the whole world.

· Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said this week: “If the ships reach Gaza it is a victory; if they are intercepted, it will be a victory too.

· Israel left Gaza in hopes of peace in 2005 and in return received more than 8,000 rockets and terrorist attacks.

· No country would allow illegal entry of any vessel into their waters without a security check.

Here are additional resources for further background on this issue:

Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Danny Ayalon’s press conference on the flotilla incident:

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/137785

An excellent appraisal of the flotilla crisis from Rabbi Daniel Gordis:

http://danielgordis.org/2010/05/31/facebook-meets-the-flotilla/

Israel Goes on High Alert in the Wake of Flotilla Incident:

http://www.themedialine.org/news/news_detail.asp?NewsID=28979

MEMRI has posted clips of Gaza-Based Yemeni Professor Abd Al-Fatah Nu’man:

http://www.thememriblog.org/blog_personal/en/27418.htm

IDF Met with Pre-Planned Violence When Boarding Ship:

http://dover.idf.il/IDF/English/News/today/10/05/3101.htm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bU12KW-XyZE&playnext_from=TL&videos=KoyKrtEKHmY&feature=sub

Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon’s Statement: Activists Had Weapons:

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3896588,00.html

Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement about the humanitarian situation in Gaza:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wlWcNXzstI

MFA legal expert Sarah Weiss Maudi explains why the flotilla was not allowed to dock at Gaza:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2W457Ot6qw&feature=channel

Legal Backgrounder on maritime law and other related issues, from MFA:

http://www.jewishfederations.org/page.aspx?id=221580

A fascinating Al-Jazeera report on the flotilla before they left that offers insight into who was on board. One says: “We are now waiting for one of two good things — either to achieve martyrdom or to reach Gaza:”

http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/2489.htm

Video of a “peace activist” stabbing an Israeli soldier as he boards the boat:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buzOWKxN2co

Yesterday was the first day of Pri Adamah!  It was an incredible success if I do say so myself.  The produce available included: green garlic, green and purple onions, radishes, asparagus,  bok choy, spinach, salad greens, asian greens, peppermint, potatoes, apples, and rhubarb.

KO and I initially signed up to split a regular share and we quickly realized that we needed to upgrade to a large.  6.5 points per week were just not going to be enough!  Now we each have 9 points and feel more comfortable with the splitting option.

I didn’t get a chance to cook last night because I was working.  Tonight I’m so excited to make dinner. And I think an apple rhubarb crisp or something of that nature is in my future.

To the right is green garlic.  This is a vegetable I wasn’t previously familiar with before yesterday.  Thanks to the research of one of the Pri Adamah members, there are lots of recipes on the facebook group for this veggie.

As many of you know our minimum goal for memberships for Pri Adamah was 50.  We were aiming for this number by the middle of the season, but obviously wanted it as soon as possible.  Well we have 54 memberships and it has only been one week!

Hooray!

As I mentioned yesterday, DIVA and I are home to surprise my parents and we sure did!

Plans were in the works for over six weeks.  My mom asked me one time and I said I couldn’t get away and she believed me.  She was much more pestering of DIVA and still didn’t really believe she wasn’t going to be here up to the last possible moment.   The cutest story is that on Friday, my mom left work early to rest before Shabbat dinner and services.  My dad was outside doing yard work and apparently she walked around the house saying, “hello,” in a loud voice thinking DIVA at least was here.  My mom was also making my dad nuts asking him repeatedly if we were coming home (everyone knows better than to tell my dad a secret).  He became increasingly frustrated with her and finally told her to “get over it.”

Fast forward to the beautiful Shabbat dinner.  DIVA and I are hiding back stage.  They begin singing Shalom Aleichem, lighting candles and kiddush.  Then the rabbi asks, “where’s the challah?”  Jane thinks to herself, “if I had been allowed to do my job I definitely wouldn’t have forgotten a challah.”

DIVA and I open the door and I say, “we have a challah.”

This is followed by major tears and huge smiles.

As you saw yesterday I gave a sermon.  One of the rabbis introduced me and I didn’t have to say anything and my mom was already crying.  DIVA sang two trio pieces with the cantors and Lechi Lach as the sermon anthem.  My mom cried tears of joy the whole time.

Awesome surprise – check!

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I’ll be taking a few days off from blogging so I can enjoy my family time.

This is the d’var Torah I was asked to deliver on the occasion of my mom’s retirement.  There is a surprise involved and I’ll fill you all in on those details in another post.  Meanwhile, Shabbat Shalom.

Dear Mom,

Surprise!  It is an honor to be here tonight with Jessica in order to help this congregation honor you and your years of service as the Executive Director.  Even more than that though, it is an honor to have you as a mother; a woman who embodies the Jewish values she holds most dear.

Selfishly I have to say I’m pretty happy you’re retiring.  It’s about time you came to high holiday services when I lead them!   I have been generous sharing you and Dad with the congregation during those sacred days for seven years and I’m done with that.  No more reading my sermons, time to hear them live and in person.  Oh and if you wanted to cook a brisket or something for when we get home from services I would be okay with that, too.  I’m just saying.

Mom, it is said of Rab Yosef, that when he would hear the approaching step of his mother, he would say, “I must stand up, for the Shekhinah enters.”[1] Mom, as the Executive Director of this congregation, you too bring a kindness, a comforting presence, perhaps just like those attributes we attribute to God when we use the name Shekhinah.

You always inspired Jessica and I to be leaders and to use our own gifts to strengthen our communities.  I used to tease you that you were the last of the four of us to serve on Mount Zion’s Board of Trustees because dad as a member, and both Jessica and I were SPORTY president before heading off to college.  I once thought that I would be the first and only Jewish professional in our family and you proved me wrong when you took the position of Administrator here at temple when Jessica and I left home for university.

As I stand on this bima again, it seems kismet is at work. This Shabbat, 18 years ago we rushed to be in this very place for the Friday night service prior to celebrating my Bat Mitzvah.  That means that it is 18 years ago this congregation introduced the gender sensitive Gates of Prayer and the imahot into the Amidah.  Mom.  I get to stand here just like I did 18 years ago this very and teach something about Parshat Beha’alotecha which I read on my bat Mitzvah. I know we like to tell the story of my speech preparation that we learned “could be better.”  The section that I read was only about the Israelites complaining and wanting to return to Egypt where food choices varied.  I remember that I said the “manna was bitter, like coriander seed.”  And in all honestly, that is about all I remember.

Being a little older and wiser now, I couldn’t think of a better Torah portion to honor you and your role as Executive Director of this congregation.  Beha’alotecha reads like a job description, Mom!  If only we knew then what we know now.  Within this portion we read about specific details of the Sanctuary including how to light the lamps, leadership development and succession, the first temple picnics in the form of sacrifices, calendar planning, volunteer management, insurance, and complaining.

I know that members of Mount Zion hardly ever complain.  The sanctuary is always the right temperature, ample parking is available, the menu is to everyone’s liking, and everyone is always happy with printed materials they receive and the temperature of the coffee.  Similarly the Israelites miss the food in Egypt.  Varied produce, meat of all types is their cravings.  When Moses reaches his breaking point and can take no more complaining, he turns to God and says, “For-what have you dealt-ill with your servant, for-what-reason have I not found favor in your eyes, (that you) have placed the burden of this entire people on me? Did I myself conceive this entire people, or did I myself give-birth to it, that you should say to me, ‘Carry it in your bosom like a nursing-father carries a suckling-child, to the soil about which you swore to their fathers?’ Where should I (get) meat to give to this entire people, when they weep on me, saying: ‘Give us meat so that we may eat!’ I am not able, myself alone, to carry this entire people, for it is too heavy for me!  If thus you deal with me, pray kill me, yes, kill me, if I have found favor in your eyes, so that I do not have to see my ill-fortune!”[2]

Though it isn’t entirely obvious in the English, Moses does something fascinating here.  He refers to God in the feminine, not once, but twice.[3] Additionally he uses maternal language to describe the burden of caring for the people referring to himself as a nursing father.  Rashi sees this as Moses being worn down, lacking the ferocity of the leader we previously encounter.

I completely disagree.  Rather, I think Moses is displaying for us and for the people of Israel that there is a particular responsibility that falls upon women even in Israelite society.  Calling upon God in the feminine also reminds us of the compassionate, mothering presence between Moses and God and thereby the people and God, just like when we use the word Shechinah, to describe God.

Mom, Moses is God’s executive director.  God has the vision and Moses knows how to make things happen.  Without Moses, programs would fail, the building would fall apart, people might not make their membership contribution, and the leadership would wary and turn away from their tasks whether assigned of voluntary.  Moses communicates with the people on behalf of the Divine in language they can understand, language we can understand.

Most importantly, Moses never forgets that in the end, he is one of them, one of the Israelites.  Moses reminds of this when he says, “anochi b’kirbam,” “I am among them.”  Mommy, you always say that working for this congregation, working with this congregation is a labor of love.  For ten years you brought the ferocity of a mother feeding her child, tending to every need with diligence, dignity, and kindness.  You remembered to laugh and to have fun and to not take yourself too seriously.  You walk families through celebratory lifecycle events so that they are not throwing a party at temple, they’re celebrating Jewish milestones. You sit with mourners in their darkest hour and ensure that they fully supported by every member of the Mount Zion community.

And when it came time for the community to support you in your hour of need, not only as an employee but as a congregant, you learned the true impact of this place and the potential for holiness around every corner.  Coming into the office wasn’t just going to work and never has been, it is always coming home. Entering into the place where community transforms into sacred community.  A community who supports one another and lives Jewish values in a meaningful and compelling way for the 21^st century.

There is this great program that I used to do at camp, or that I still do at camp because I really like it.  It is called “who in the room.”  What happens is, the leader makes statements, and if the statement is something that is true for you, you stand up.  Let’s try it.  So when I make a statement that is true for you, stand up and remain standing.

-Jane is my mother.

Ok, good, that was a test.  Jessica passed.

-Jane is my colleague.

-Jane is my friend.

-Jane is one of the many people responsible for making Mount Zion a second home for my family and I.

-Jane Steinman’s smile brightened my day.

Please be seated.

Mommy, as you move into the next phase of your life may you know that you will hold your place “b’kirbam,” “among them,” and take your place among the people.  May you know good health, joy, happiness, spools of brilliant yarn, time with family and friends, and wholeness.  May the Shechinah shine upon you and accompany you on wherever the journey may lead.  Ken y’hi ratzon.

[1] Kiddushin 31b

[2] Num. 11:11-15.

[3] Num. 11:12 and 15.

Many people ask me what are some of the differences between Canada and the USA.  There are lots and lots of differences, of course.  One that has come to my attention of late is the ways we engage with our elected officials.

In Canada, MP Irwin Cotler sent around a petition to be signed by any resident of Canada.  This petition needed to be signed by each individual and mailing addresses were required.  The petition is about Iran and calling Iran accountable for the crimes against humanity perpetrated within her borders.  The petition is very important.  You can find it on the ARZA Canada website, print it out, sign it and have everyone you know sign it and get it to MP Cotler’s offices in Ottawa by May 31.

I do not know if members of parliament have twitter accounts or facebook accounts, for that matter.  (Yes I will look into this).  Because I am not a Canadian citizen I do not vote so this information isn’t as vital to me.

In the post September 11 world contacting the United States Congress has become something entirely different.  Because of the anthrax scares all mail goes to a facility in another state and is zapped to kill anything that could harm an individual.  This means that contacting representatives is most effective if done through fax, email or phone call because it alleviates the need for the process I described above.  Today I learned that it is also possible to tweet your representative.  Human Rights Campaign posted this which enables citizens to tweet their representative!  I hope that the RAC starts to do this, too.  It is simple.  Hopefully effective and enables people to engage in political issues that they are passionate about.

I am already a fan of twitter (you can follow me at @rabbisteinman) and this just solidified my opinion that it is leading the way in social media.

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The RAC does have a great Chai Impact Action Center where you can email your representatives pre-written letters or draft your own.  Check it out!

That’s right.  One week from today is the first pick-up for Pri Adamah.  As of last week, we’re at 37 members.  It is possible to join Pri Adamah once the season has started (clearly you will not pay for the weeks that you missed).  I hope that we will still find the 13 members to get us to our goal before June 1.  Have you been thinking of doing it and neglected to send in your forms?  There’s no time like the present.

In last weeks update, farmer Daniel told us about all of the planting that has been happening at the farm.  I am getting seriously excited for the heirloom tomatoes!

In other news.  Did you see Sunday’s post?  Have you called Congress yet?  Here is an update on what is possibly happening behind the scenes.