There is No One to Lead Us  

It is difficult to describe the geopolitical situation that exists in the word today as anything less than chaotic.

This week alone, we saw an election in Venezuela where Nicolas Maduro, the incumbent president, who was polling 30 points behind the person trying to unseat him, claim victory after the polls closed. Of course, riots broke out immediately in opposition to an election which, from a strictly statistical viewpoint, was probably “stolen” by the incumbent, a conclusion supported by the leadership of most countries in the Americas. Will the Organization of American States that brings together all of the governments of the Americas do anything about this?

In Turkey, its President, Recep Erdogan, tells a gathering of political supporters on Sunday that Turkey may have to invade Israel as they did previously in Libya to stop what we are doing here to Hamas in Gaza.  Imagine, a member of NATO threatening to invade a sovereign country with whom it has had diplomatic relations since 1949 in order to stop us from trying to defang the enemy at our doorstep guilty for massacring over 1,200 of our citizens on October 7^th.  One could rightfully ask why Turkey is still a member of NATO after such a threat and, if they did invade Israel, what would NATO do about it?

In Israel on Saturday afternoon, a Hizballah fired rocket from Lebanon lands on a soccer field in the Israeli Druze community of Majdal Shams and kills 12 children (with another dozen hospitalized in critical condition) and Iran, who supplied the weaponry, warns Israel not to respond as it risks serious harm from Iran.  Seriously?  The world rises up and urges Israel to practice restraint?  Is there nobody willing to similarly rise up and demand that Hizballah stop its daily unprovoked attacks against Israel?  Or that Iran should stop shipping them weapons? Or if they are so concerned about ending our war with Hamas, to simply tell Hamas that if they lay down their weapons and return the hostages the cease fire they want will happen….we will have no other choice.

Yesterday here in Israel, IDF reservists stormed the Sde Teiman military base angry that some of their fellow reservists were being interrogated about alleged mistreatment of a Palestinian prisoner that sent him to the hospital for serious damage to his anus.  And among those who stormed the base was at least one member of the Knesset (our parliament), Zvi Sukkot of the right leaning Religious Zionist Party.  Does our Prime Minister have the guts to immediately expel Sukkot or any other Member of Knesset who was there? And if not, why not?

And this is all over the last 3 days to which we could add the ongoing insanity of Russia’s unprovoked long war against Ukraine and their seizure of land that is part of another sovereign state;  or the human tragedy playing out every day in Sudan; or the ethnic cleansing of the Uyghurs by the Chinese……the list has no end.

But the bottom line is that today, 79 years after the end of World War II after which the world agreed “never again” there is simply not a single world leader who has the stature required to say “stop” and be heard.  Nobody, not the Pope, not the Dalai Lama, not the President of the US (presumably the most power nation on earth), not the Secretary General of the UN, nobody…..absolutely nobody.

For me, an optimist, it is a real challenge to be optimistic given the fact that one small mistake in any of these situations could set off World War III.  Yet, because we are human beings, because we are intelligent and blessed with brains good enough to figure out how to avoid war, I yet have hope that the leaders we do have will, somehow or other, come to the realization that if they do not work to prevent World War III, then World War IV will be fought with bows and arrows as there will be nothing left of the world as we know it.

I did not know him, but I so very much miss the late Chief Rabbi of England, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, of blessed memory.  He did have the power to bring people together worldwide, and they would listen because he was so much more than a man of God.  He spoke about the kind of leaders we need today when he said:  “If we are to negotiate the coming years safely, we may need a new kind of leadership. To put it more precisely, we need the rediscovery of an ancient kind of leadership that has rarely been given the prominence it deserves. I mean the leader as teacher.”

I am not sure where we will find such people, people who by their teaching and their practice of what they teach, can also lead.   These are a difficult three weeks for Jews, as we mourn the pillage of Jerusalem and destruction of our two temples.  Perhaps this year, this period, will be different and we will see the emergence of teacher/leaders who will, through their example, be able to right the world back on its axis.   May it be so.