Archive for the 'Musings' Category

I and all the things I stand for are under attack


I am under attack. I and all the things I stand for are under attack. Im Tirtzu has launched a campaign against the New Israel Fund, blaming it for the Goldstone report. “Without NIF, there would be no Goldstone report” they are claiming. Which is to say, without the Jews who support the New Israel [...]


Solicitations


Mail solicitations I have received since I last took out my paper recycling, say, 3 weeks ago:

The Salvation Army
The Police Athletic League
Brit Tzedek v’Shalom: The Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace
The Jewish Foundation for the Righteous
City Harvest
The New Israel Fund
The Children’s Aid Society
The Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty
JDub Records x 2
American Jewish World Service x [...]


Pro-Peace Adrenaline


I write this on the subway home on the 2-3 train. My headphones are playing soothing music but my heartbeat is racing and my brain is slowly calming down. I’m on a pro-peace high, of sorts.
Why am I like this — after getting off the fourth conference call this week and a bigger, heavier to-do [...]


I am 26, I am a brown belt, I am an activist


Thanks to the three dozen-some people who left birthday wishes on my Facebook wall and the twenty-two people who gave to my birthday cause. The outpouring of friendship was lovely. And I didn’t end up doing any party or gathering, I felt so warm in the company of my friends that a party was just [...]


Isaiah, always a good source of quotes


Spent the past 15 minutes musing on Isaiah 1:27, “Zion will be redeemed with justice, and her returnees with charity.”
Wondering what that means for refugees, returnees to home lands, Jews and Palestinians…


Any love I have for the Jewish state is rooted in her prophets


Can you love a state? A set of policies and procedures manifested as a bureaucracy and office buildings, people in uniform, and budgets for garbage collection, school, roads? I argue you can love a set of principles. But you can’t love a state. And I’ve fallen in love with the principles of many Israelis I’ve [...]


I want you to know about my birthday cause


The 25th is my 26th birthday, and I want you to know about my birthday cause.
I am the local Chapter Co-Chair and a national board member for Brit Tzedek v’Shalom. It’s the biggest pro-Israel, pro-peace grassroots org in the American Jewish community — 40,000+ supporters in 40 cities and growing!
Unabashedly speaking, I am good [...]


Direction


I’m presently in DC, just having completed a two-day professional development retreat and am preparing for a board retreat tomorrow night. I’ve prayed at the Silver Spring Moishe House, I’m staying with my college best friend, and am very tired.
There’s all too much to blog about, what with Gaza aftermath, Hamas may release Shalit, Bibi [...]


Waltz with Bashir “has to do with everyone who has been in a war here, which is everyone here”


A beautifully moving peice by Bradley Burston on Haaretz about Waltz with Bashir, the animated documentary film about the director’s search for his memories of the Second Lebanon War. He says,
I went to see “Waltz with Bashir” this week, not suspecting for a moment that the story it told would have anything to do with [...]


Safeguarding Jewish universalism in times of terror


Last week, I was accused on two separate occasions and blogs of not issuing a “peep” and of a “deafening silence” about the Mumbai killings. One was even on a blog with nothing to do with international affairs. Meanwhile, the conservative blogs are in a bloody feeding frenzy.
But on the other hand, as the Hebron [...]