Tune Up: Supporting Your Jewish Friends Who Care About Israel

My Civic had been nudging me for the last two weeks. Like most modern cars, it reminds me with increasing frequency and urgency when a maintenance interval approaches. Finally, the vehicle would brook no further deferrals or delays. A yellow warning light came on and stayed on insisting that an “A17 Service” was required now! I booked an appointment for the next day and drove the car to the Honda dealer. (Don’t judge, I trust the work they do at my dealer. I know I am paying too much).

I like to wait while the service is being performed. The waiting room is clean and nice. There is free coffee and doughnuts, solid wi-fi and little cubicles if you want to work. So, I declined the proffered ride back home or to the metro and settled in for an hour or two while my oil was changed, my tires rotated, and my brake lines flushed.

A few minutes later a young woman came in with her little girl. The woman was on the phone and I quickly realized that she was speaking Hebrew. Of all the languages I don’t speak, Hebrew is the only one that affects me emotionally the moment I hear it. Hebrew speakers know that almost no one outside of Israel will recognize the language never mind speak it. To acknowledge to a Hebrew speaker that you even recognize the language is to effectively declare to them that you are a fellow Jew.

I don’t always say something when I hear a person speaking Hebrew but sitting next to this mother in the waiting room, I felt a sense of kinship. After all, we were both Honda owners.

As she hung up her call, I turned to her and asked, “How is your family?”

It took a second for her to process my question. I could see the wheels turning as she said to herself: this apparent stranger heard me speaking Hebrew, knows I am Israeli, he is probably a Jew (he sure looks like one) and is asking about my family back home because he cares about what is going on. He cares about me.

And then she told me. For about 10 minutes she told me about her family, who she knew that had been murdered, who had been kidnapped, who was in the Army, what part of Israel she was from, and what was happening there. I said little except to present my credentials as a frequent visitor and member of the tribe. In other words, I am an American Jew who has personal connections to Israel and cares about what happens there. But that was established in a sentence or two. Mostly I just listened. Her Uber arrived. The conversation ended. She and her little girl left. No names or particulars about either of us were exchanged but I felt a connection, nonetheless. I hope that she at least took away a feeling that American Jews care about Israel. That we see her struggle and pain as ours too.

As I mentioned in my last post, I have been surprised by and grateful for non-Jewish friends who have reached out with words of comfort and support. Some know the deep connection to Israel that I feel while others don’t necessarily know but assume a bond just because I am a Jew.

For the most part these have been overwhelmingly kind and supportive. But one or two have been unintentionally (I think) thoughtless, even cruel. If you are not Jewish but want to express empathy for me or for your other Jewish friends who cherish Israel, here are a few things to consider if you want to avoid pushing some buttons. (If you actually are trying to provoke, consciously or unconsciously, perhaps examine your motivations carefully and consider not doing that right now.)

Here are some things to know about me and Israel. These may or may not be true about your other Jewish friends. Although many American Jews will find resonance with what I say, the American Jewish community is diverse to say the least. Perhaps you’ve heard the old saw, “Two Jews, three opinions.” Try to understand with whom you are speaking and listen rather than assume you know what they are thinking and feeling.

Here’s where I’m coming from.

1. I don’t care how many articles you’ve read on the internet or in the New York Times or listened to on NPR, I know more about Israel than you do. I know more about Jewish history than you, and I know more about the conflict than you do. I’ve been to Israel more than 17 times including having lived and worked there for three months. I’ve been to every part of the country including the part that is under Israeli occupation. I’ve led 14 Birthright trips, a ten-day trip around Israel with 40 college students and 8 Israelis of similar age. Each of these trips is a history lesson in itself. I’ve had right wing guides and lefty guides. I’ve met and talked with Jewish settlers in the West Bank and with Palestinians. I’ve studied Israeli and Jewish history both formally as part of my master’s degree program and informally. I spent a year as a Shalom Hartman Institute Fellow learning with Jewish and Palestinian scholars about the conflict and its history. I’ve also been to several Islamic and Arab countries, including Egypt, Turkey, and Morocco, and listened to people there and learned about the conflict from their perspective.

2. I have a deep personal and emotional connection to Israel. I have dozens of friends, co-workers, former students, and family members who live in Israel. Some of the people I care about most about in the world live there. Some of them are on active duty in the military. Virtually all of them have a child or close family member who is on active duty. Israelis do not pay a professional army to protect them. Almost every Israeli man and woman (really boys and girls) does several years of military service, and even when that service is complete, they continue as reservists until at least age 55. I am no more than one or two degrees of separation from people who are being held hostage or have been murdered.

3. I see every Jewish Israeli as a family member and a countryman. Israel is not only the name of a country. It is the name of my tribe and the name of a land in which my people have had a continuous presence for more than 3,000 years. The words Israel and Jew are synonymous to me. I see the Jewish state as existential for the Jewish people, our only chance to survive in a world whose other civilizations have for the better part of the last 2,000 years tried very hard to destroy us. Since 1948 it has seemed less likely that they would succeed.

4. Like most Jewish houses of worship in America today, my nearly broke synagogue pays a substantial amount of its annual budget for an armed guard to stand outside the doors anytime there is an event in the building, from a prayer service to religious school for the children of the community. I am part of a group of volunteers who serve as additional guards rather than participate in services so that the rest of the congregation can pray with peace of mind. I do this at least once a month. We must do these things, or we too could be murdered for just being Jews. And it is not just synagogues and temples. Most Jewish organizations from Jewish Community Centers to any other Jewish identified building has an armed guard, metal detectors, and bomb resistant glass film on the windows. Yeah, in America.

So, if friendship and comfort is your actual goal, be kind. I am in mourning for my comrades and my tribe. The attack on Israelis was to me an attack on Jews everywhere. Many American Jews are feeling even more vulnerable than ever in the history of this country. We may also be feeling a little defiant.

Also understand that not all American Jews have the level of connection that I do. Many have never been to Israel, others are deeply ambivalent about Israel’s role in the conflict. A few Jews even agree with Israel’s enemies that it has no right to exist. Still others have an even deeper connection to Israel than I do. I have friends whose parents and/or children and grandchildren are all in Israel and many of those are serving in the military. Compared to theirs, my relationship is like a puddle next to the ocean.

In short, don’t assume that you know how someone feels about Israel just because they are Jewish.

If empathy, kindness, compassion, and a willingness to listen are the dos, here are a few of the don’ts. Again, I am presuming that your intent is to console not to provoke.

• Avoid blind cc’d emails “To my Jewish Friends.” There is likely no exact sentiment that applies to everyone you know who happens to be Jewish. If you want to reach out, take the time to write to each person separately and ask how they are feeling, if they have family or friends in Israel. If they do, express a wish that they are safe and will remain safe. You’ll reach fewer people or it will take you longer but the interactions will be more genuine.

• Don’t tell us that Israel is to blame, even in part, for the cold blooded murder of its citizens. Even if you believe that, now is not the time to assert that belief, and certainly not over email or text. It’s like messaging someone whose mother just died of lung cancer to chide them that the deceased parent had been a lifelong smoker and brought it on herself. Likewise, do not send me articles accusing Israel of genocide, ethnic cleansing, or suggesting that Israel doesn’t have a right to exist or defend itself.

• Don’t refuse to engage face to face. If you are troubled by what is going on in the region (and who isn’t?) let’s talk about it in person. If you are sincere and open to enlarging your understanding, so am I. Why don’t we speak to each other with respect instead of launching missiles over email? Likewise, if I invite you to talk and you refuse, that tells me a lot. How many disagreements or conflicts -whether between two people or between civilizations - have been resolved where the parties aren’t willing to even talk to each other? Pretty sure that number is zero.

• Finally, please don’t lecture me that “all lives matter.” Is it not human to weigh the lives of our families, our loved ones, our neighbors, and our tribe more than those of strangers? In the grand scheme of the cosmos, we might agree that all lives, even non-human lives, are equally worthy (or equally worthless), but within our human constructed reality, everyone cares most about the people they are tied to through love, blood, or narrative. If you deny that, well, I don’t believe you. And no, that doesn’t mean I don’t care about the suffering of Palestinian civilians and innocents.

Friendships are in a sense are a bit like a car. They need care, attention, and the occasional adjustment of the pressures. When a warning light begins to flash, take the time to figure out what is helpful. If you just whip out your big wrench and start loosening bolts before you really understand what going on, you could easily do more damage than good.

The world’s a narrow bridge; fear nothing.

Israel and the Conversational Nature of Reality

The poet David Whyte often speaks and writes about the conversational nature of reality. It is an idea that what we believe we are, what we believe the world is, is constantly bumping up against the truth. The job of the poet, indeed of all of us, is to bring that truth into conversation with our deepest held beliefs thus changing ourselves and perhaps to some extent reality itself.

I’ve been thinking about Israel this week. Indeed, it’s hard to think about or write about much else. I am not one to process my deepest feelings publicly and, in any case, I don’t know that I could articulate them at this point. So, while I am still “processing” here are some of the actions and resources that are helping me come to terms with and make “sense” of what is happening.

• I reached out to many of my friends and colleagues in Israel with messages of love and support. I hesitated at first because I thought, the last thing my friends there need is to be responding to email but everyone seemed grateful that I had written. Throughout the week, I kept thinking of more people, I needed to be in touch with. Thankfully, everyone I have heard from so far is safe and their loved ones are safe. But everyone is no more than one step removed from someone who was hurt or is in danger.

• For the most part, I avoided doom scrolling the news. Instead of watching endless clips of violence and horror on CNN, I read the daily briefing sent out by the Jewish Federation of Greater Rochester. These 3-4 pages tell me most of the facts I need to know about what is going on. I am grateful I quit social media.

• I made a donation for humanitarian relief through the Jewish Federation of Greater Washington Israel Crisis Relief Fund. Please donate if you are so moved and are able. Money doesn’t solve all problems, but it can help with many of them.

• I’ve turned to the voices I trust. Chief among them the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem. The Institute’s two podcasts For Heaven’s Sake with Donniel Hartman and Yossi Klein-Halevi and Identity Crisis hosted by Yehuda Kurtzer often mirror and help me make sense of my own thoughts and feelings. I found the montage of American Jews living in Israel describing their experience on “Identity Crisis” in the early hours of the invasion to be particularly moving. You can find both on Apple Podcasts or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.

• I watched my favorite Israeli chef make this. Then I made it.

Umbrellas over Jerusalem. 2015

I was surprised by the number of non-Jewish friends who have reached out to me with words of support and comfort. Many of them know that I have many friends in Israel having been there more than a dozen times. Others aren’t sure about my connection but wanted to express support anyway and still others only know that I am Jewish and presume Jews care about Israel. It is understood that Israel and Jewry worldwide are inextricably connected.

Compounding the surrealness of the week was the email that I got from the German Embassy in Washington informing me that my application for citizenship had been approved and inviting my children and me to a ceremony to accept it. An odd juxtaposition, to be sure, since the same catastrophe that led me to be eligible to reclaim my grandparent’s German citizenship also was a major force in the founding of the Jewish State. Accepting German citizenship comes with a host of complicated feelings but more on that in another post at another time.

With my Shalom Hartman Fellow cohort at the Kotel (Western Wall). December 2018

I’ve been thinking a good bit about what Cole, the little boy protagonist in The Sixth Sense, said about the dead people he alone can see. “They see only what they want to see,” he tells his friend Malcom. How like these dead people are we! We tell ourselves that Israeli intelligence and its army are superhuman. That an invasion of Israel is impossible. That the terrorists are too disorganized and incompetent to mount a serious threat. We tell ourselves the stories we want to hear, reinforce those stories with the stories of others that confirm our biases and then shut out the rest. Not just about Israel or America but about so much of our lives. What it would look like if we were to occasionally engage in a conversation with reality?

The world’s a narrow bridge; fear nothing.

Many Milestones: Observations from the Rear Flank of the Baby Boom

This week I achieved another milestone birthday. Like many milestones these days, it is not a number that ends in a zero or a five. Most of my milestone birthdays now are determined not by the decades and half decades of the anniversaries of my birth but rather but the stange and seemingly arbitrary vagaries of U.S. law.

Last spring, my wife and I were in a funky museum in Arizona (I think) along the famed Route 66. I was pleased to see that in this establishment the “senior” admission price was for those 60 and ‘better.’ The cost would be $5 each instead of $8 saving us $6 between the two of us.

“There are some advantages to getting older,” I said to the lady selling the tickets who seemed like she might qualify for a much higher threshold.

“It’s the only one!” she said with a disgusted look on her face.

I could see her point. Yes, getting older does have some benefits including discounted entry fees to museums and a few other attractions but let’s face it, not one of them (with the possible exception of grandchildren should one be so blessed) is adequate compensation for the aches and pains, the cognitive decline, and yes, serious medical problems that go along with getting older. As a doctor friend of mine kindly reminded me recently, “Getting old is a chronic disease.”

Nevertheless, when perks of seniority are offered, no matter how modest, I like to believe I can accept them with grace.

Here are three that come along with my new advanced age of 62.

1. Most places that offer a senior discount, begin offering it at 62. Yes, there are some that are as low as 55 and some as high as 65 but 62 seems to be the most common number. These discounts are rarely significant. Usually just a few dollars, but they make me feel like I am getting a bargain when I get to see something or do something for $10 that my younger friends have to pay $12 for.

2. I can buy a U.S. National Park Pass for $80 that will be good for the rest of my life. Previously, I bought a pass every year for the same price. Many years I didn’t get my money’s worth but I bought one anyway to support the national parks. Now I feel I have done my share and this next purchase will probably be my last. My wife has her own though one pass covers everyone in the party. If you are not yet old enough to buy the lifetime pass consider buying an annual pass to support the park service.

3. I can collect Social Security benefits, though I probably won’t for 8 more years.

According to the Social Security Administration 23% of men who turn 62 start to take their benefits right away. The percentage is slightly lower for women. However, there is a good reason not to. For each year you wait, your monthly benefit increases about 6% per year until you reach full retirement age (67 for me) and then an additional 8% per year until you reach age 70. After that there is no longer a benefit to waiting. This means that all other things being equal, it may pay to wait if you can.

If you are married and you were the higher wage earner, there is an extra reason to wait because if you die before your spouse, they will get your higher benefit instead of their own for the rest of his/her life.

If you are the lower earning spouse, waiting may or may not make sense. There is a great online calculator called Open Social Security that can help you create a filing strategy as a couple looking at multiple life expectancies. Most calculators don’t take marital status into account. For example, the calculator suggests that I should wait until age 70 to file but that Barbara should file now. She hasn’t yet but maybe soon.

More milestones lie ahead (God willing). The next biggie is age 65 when I am eligible for our national socialized medicine program Medicare. Barbara is two years ahead of me so I have begun to try to make my way through the labyrinth and am sorting through the options and decisions that will need to be made in the next months.

Part A, Part B, prescription drug plans, Medicare Advantage (mostly disadvantageous), Medigap or supplemental plans, co-pays, and deductibles, oh my!

If you thought Social Security was complicated, Medicare is absolutely mind-boggling particularly as the onset of Medicare coincides with the aforementioned cognitive decline (see above).

No wonder our politicians never want to call it quits; they can’t make head or tail out of the retirement programs they created and make more complicated every year. It’s easier to get reelected than to enroll!

Well, I better run. I need to get over to my nearest Park Service entrance gate to pick up my lifetime pass before the government shuts down. Of course, all the parks will be closed for who knows how long but I can hold it in my hand and dream of the places I’ll go if not in person then with my Apple Vision Pro virtual reality headset (available early 2024).

Maybe Apple will even start offering a discount for seniors instead of just for college students. Tim Cook should be able to empathize; he is also 62 years old.

The world’s a narrow bridge; fear nothing.