The Blogs: United we stand. Let’s bridge our differences now

I’m scared.

I’m scared for the future of this country I have called home for the last 40 years.

It isn’t just the war, it isn’t just the threats from Israel’s enemies, it isn’t just the allies or friends Israel is losing or the blatant antisemitism spreading like a global plague.

I’m scared because of Israel’s internal divisions. Divisions Israeli politicians have played up, fed, and nurtured to win elections, to maintain control.

I’m scared that we will never find our way to a unified nation where everyone has their own values, yet, at the same time, lives according to the slogan “all for one and one for all,” as it did in the first months of the war.

Since then, as the population and the troops grow increasingly battle-weary, as the hostages remain underground maltreated and tortured by Hamas, as more and more soldiers are wounded, more and more soldiers are killed, more and more families struggle to deal with men of all ages who return from the front traumatized — glaring structural inequities are no longer a scratch but an open, bleeding wound.

It isn’t news that most Israeli Arabs and ultra-Orthodox do not serve in the army, and that one of these populations prefers to study instead of work; their prayers, they say, keep us safe. And it is that population that has, over the years, preferred to maintain that lifestyle, propped up by government stipends. It is a status quo that, despite repeated efforts, has been and continues to be very, very hard to change.

And it is a status-quo that puts the ultra-Orthodox exemption from the army front and center, ahead of other groups that do not serve.

Eugene Kandel, former head of the National Economic Council and economic adviser to the prime minister from 2009 to 2015, said in a Times of Israel podcast that if this doesn’t change, the Israeli economy may no longer be viable in 10 years. Before the war, before the economic toll of the fighting, that forecast was 25 years. According to Kandel, there is a way to avoid economic disaster, but only if each group that makes up Israel’s diverse tapestry maintains their values and pays their way.

The war has meant that what was once a looming economic crisis is now a serious and pressing one. Economists foresee a future with a relatively small proportion of the population paying the stipends for those who prefer not to work. This population, they say, is likely to get smaller and smaller.

Meanwhile, the cost of food, not including fruits and vegetables, has gone up 3 percent since the beginning of the war. Oil and margarine are up 7 percent, while sugar, jams and other sweets are up 6 percent, according to the Central Bureau of Statistics. Meat, chicken, and fish are 4.5 percent more expensive.

“Every time I go to the supermarket I seem to pay more,” a friend of mine moaned to me over the phone recently.

Other friends and acquaintances, those who have the option, are moving money overseas, buying property abroad.

Shira Greenberg, former chief economist of the Ministry of Finance, said in a recent interview with Calcalist that unless steps are taken for society’s different sectors to share in the national security and economic burden, “it will mean severe long-term economic damage.”

There was an expectation, she said, that “after such a large and shocking disaster, there would be some call from the government to those sectors to ask themselves what they can contribute to the country rather than what they can receive from it.”

I know quite a lot of ultra-Orthodox in Israel who work, many more than those who serve in the army. But neither has been the norm in that community, and neither has been adopted by the rabbinical or political leaders.

Under pressure following a June Supreme Court ruling, the government has begun to draft men from the ultra-Orthodox community. The first 1,000 orders have been sent out.

There are groups – secular, national Orthodox, and haredi – who have been working together to find creative solutions to the issue. There are organizations like the Kemach Foundation, that describes itself as the gateway for ultra-Orthodox to enter the world of employment and education. There is KamaTech, a tech accelerator for entrepreneurs from the ultra-Orthodox community in Israel. They all listen, learn, build bridges and are beginning to solve some of the major problems. But, given the costs of the war, such actions must be accelerated. And it is the government, the leaders, who must lead the change.

There are already ultra-Orthodox and Israeli Arabs who volunteer and work for emergency services, were serving on the ambulances that raced into the fray on Oct. 7 to try and save the wounded – some of them wounded or killed in the process. Israeli Bedouin and Druze have been killed in combat, their homes hit by Hamas or Hezbollah missiles.

The most recent horrific tragedy of this war was just a few days ago when Hezbollah fired a rocket into Israel, striking a soccer game in the Druze town of Majdal Shams, killing more than 10 children and teenagers and severely wounding others.

We must learn to respect one another and each other’s values, offer sympathy and help each other when we are able. We must all pull together to ensure this country survives. Pray if that is what we believe in, but also work, serve and pay taxes.

There are more than a few who tell me they worry we are on the cusp of a catastrophe, the cusp of the third destruction of Jewish sovereignty, a destruction brought about, in part, by total discord among the Jewish people.

Today the reality is more complicated. Today Israel is a tapestry of many peoples, and we must learn to treat one another as equal in all ways. We must learn to live together to prevent history from repeating itself.

Eighteen medical professionals, sorely needed in Israel, were recently poached by another country, and are leaving as a group, Kandel said in the podcast. The Weizmann Institute of Science and Tel Aviv University has reported a sharp fall in international doctoral and postdoctoral students and scientists fear Israel could turn into a monoculture like China or Iran, Haaretz reported.

There is a good possibility, Kandel said, that little by little “a sufficiently large number of people will lose confidence that their children will have a future here, and then what we call a run on the country will happen.”

A US congressman said to Channel 12 this week that California has Hebrew newspapers and a thriving Israeli community, and warned that if Israel didn’t take drastic steps, Start-Up Nation could easily move across the ocean, leaving Israel a large yeshiva with nuclear arms.

We are a creative people – all of us – and despite our varied values, we can find solutions. The Jewish diaspora, also under siege, can help. It can be done.

But major changes are necessary and pulling together is mandatory to avoid what Kandel, Greenberg and the US congressman warn could be the horizon, a future some of my friends are already preparing for by being ready to relocate at a moment’s notice.

The time is now – for all of us — from minister to judge to rabbi to every citizen, no matter our religion, no matter the group we belong to. The time is now to listen, learn and compromise.

Let us find those strengths. Let us move forward to a better, stronger, future of tolerance and acceptance.

I am not the only one who is scared.

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