The Blogs: What Are They Thinking??

Internationally acclaimed actor Hugh Grant appeared on America’s Tonight Show with David Leno in July 1995 approximately 2 weeks after being arrested for “lewd behavior,” while sitting in a parked BMW with a prostitute. With millions of viewers wondering how Leno would “break the ice” in Grant’s first public appearance following the arrest, Leno turned to Grant and simply asked, “what were you thinking?”

I’ve been thinking a lot about that incident since October 7,2023. In fact, just within the last few days, Leno’s simple question has been playing repeatedly in my mind, like on a constant loop, as I have followed the news. Consider:

Last week another brave Israeli soldier, Will Shakin z”l, who as a lone soldier from the United States served with his Golani unit for over 2 years in Gaza, committed suicide. Apparently, Shakin was overwhelmed by the grief he felt following the death of his best friend in the unit, who was killed while serving a subsequent stint in Lebanon. To add insult to injury (and in this case it really was an insult), the IDF refused to bury Shakin together with other brave soldiers in a military cemetery. While standing among hundreds of beautiful young Israelis with machine guns slung on their shoulders and tears streaming down their faces at his funeral, I wondered what the person ultimately responsible for deciding where this brave soldier could be buried was thinking when he/she made the decision.
This week a school in Petach Tikvah informed parents that a student charged with participating in the premeditated killing of Yamanu Zelka z”l, a young army veteran who asked a group of rowdy youngsters to behave appropriately in a pizza shop, is being released from house arrest so that he can attend school with their sons and daughters. (Ironically, it seems this youngster may not have learned a lot in school prior to his arrest.) Of course, a person is “innocent until proven guilty” in a democracy, but one might think that in a “Jewish democracy,” someone might have come up with a better arrangement for everyone concerned, not just for the accused. (Otherwise, what’s the point of politicians constantly repeating the description?)
And then there was the picture of Israeli soldiers joining settlers praying in a tent which settlers illegally erected within meters of another family’s house. We have some idea what the settlers might have been thinking, but what were the soldiers of what is often called, “the most moral army in the world” thinking? Were they debating if the requirement for a minyan superseded the military-administered law in the territory? Doesn’t the halachic ruling דינה דמלכותא דינה (civil law supersedes religious law) apply, regardless if that law is being administered by military or by civilian authorities?
And while we are on the subject of settler violence, how is it that “Start Up” nation, which figured out how to detonate beepers, can’t stop “a few bad apples” from terrorizing innocent people?
And as if we have not yet had enough, other Israeli soldiers apparently wrote numbers on the skins of innocent residents in that same military-controlled territory this week. It’s possible that their school trip to concentration camps where Nazis branded millions of Jews with numbers of their arms was cancelled due to COVID-19, but didn’t these soldiers learn anything about the Holocaust in high school? What were they thinking?
But is it really “fair” to hold our society’s young people to a higher standard than we hold our nation’s business and political leaders (and their families)? While virtually millions of Israelis heeded the nation’s call – risking their lives, being killed and wounded, trying to raise their children while their spouses and partners served hundreds of days of reserve duty and volunteering to provide emotional and practical support to these soldiers and their families, the Prime Minister’s oldest son spent much of the last 3 years on self-imposed “exile” in Miami Beach, Florida with his dog. (Although I have never lived there, I understand the weather is nice in Miami most of the year.). There is no evidence that he used this opportunity to raise badly needed funds to help treat tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians physically and emotionally wounded, or to comfort the thousands of family members grieving over the loss of a son, daughter, brother or sister, or to provide for the thousands of newly-minted orphans or simply to help rebuild those areas destroyed on October 7^th and during the subsequent 3 years. Unlike during many existential wars fought around the world throughout history, there are no pictures of this prince treating the wounded, preparing meals or filling sandbags.
And how can we leave out this government’s Minister of Public “Security?” He seems to be “the gift that just keeps giving” when it comes to חילול ה״ (bringing shame on Gd’s name). This week he was concerned about how many siddurim were on the Temple Mount, where according to Jewish practice over thousands of years Jews are forbidden to go. (I guess he does not know that most people now rely on telephone apps instead of physical books.) By the way, his reported response upon learning about the premeditated murder of Yamanu Zelka z”l (see above) was basically “shit happens.”
And let’s not leave out the economy’s titans of capitalism, like the CEO of El Al, the nation’s flagship airline, who announced this week that the company’s profits doubled this past year, despite repeated airport closures due to the war and an historic decline in the number of tourists visiting the country, all while the company continues to refuse to compensate some individuals for flight cancellations due to the security situation. (The largest Israeli banks have also reported large profits as they benefitted from higher risk premia over the last 3 years. By the way, the profits of these patriotic companies fleecing Israelis helps explain much of the recent strong performance of the Israeli stock market.)
And speaking of patriotism, the CEO of Teva, a pharmaceutical company which was founded in Israel and which for decades benefited from subsidies and tax relief provided by the government, financed by taxes paid by citizens, respectfully (or actually, not respectfully) asked us to stop referring to his company as being Israeli. (Eli Horowitz, the company’s founder and the “dean” of Israel’s business community, must be rolling over in his grave.)

Upon receiving Gd’s commandments, it is recorded in the Torah that the Jewish refugees from Egypt proclaimed נעשה ונשמה (literally translated as, we will do and we will hear). In other words, the Jewish people were the first to teach the world that actions take priority over words. By contrast, these days it seems many Israelis in positions of responsibility believe that they do not need to think before acting, since the government can just allocate more money for הסברה (public relations) to clean up whatever mess they leave behind. It seems they think that non-Jews hate us regardless of what we do, so why even try doing the “right” thing. So much for being a אור לגויים (a light to the nations).

Of course these examples are not representative of all the actions of all Israelis. On the other hand, I don’t think our Rabbis or the founders of this nation, for that matter, considered being a light to the nations as a competition, in which everything is OK as long as the number of positive actions is greater than the number of negative ones.

When I began my career in public policy in Washington, DC, approximately 50 years ago, my mentor warned me not to say or do anything I was not prepared to see reported in the newspaper. This warning might also be a useful lesson for current and future leaders throughout Israeli society to follow.