Here is an article I wrote for the upcoming issue of Reform Judaism magazine. It is about a remarkable group of Germans who work hard, often anonomously, to reconstruct the culture and perpetuate the memory of the Jews who once lived among them. The editors stripped much of the energy and life from my prose. […]
Author: Dan Fleshler
The kids are alright at J Street
It was Palestinian suffering that got me engaged with Israel and concerned about its future. I had attended Habonim camp and had grown up in an ardently Labor Zionist household. But when I was in my twenties, I didn’t have much to do with Israel until the massacre of Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatilla […]
The pro-Israel peace camp cares about America, too
As it prepares for its first national conference this weekend, J Street, the political arm of pro-peace, pro-Israel American Jews, is being assailed by those who don’t want it to take positions independent of the Israeli government. Chuck Freilich, a former Israeli National Security advisor, castigates the J Streeters’ “presumptuousness†and claims they think they […]
The myth that “Israel has no partner” for peace
The claim that “Israel has no partner for peace” is often trotted out by Israeli and American Jews. Sometimes it is backed up by the argument that the Palestinians are in political disarray, and that relatively moderate Palestinians don’t have the power to stop violent extremists from wrecking any agreement. That argument deserves to be […]
How to prevent another conflagration in Jerusalem
At long last, I’ve found some sensible sentiments on the scary, sad situation in Jerusalem. They come from Americans For Peace Now’s Lara Friedman and Daniel Seidemann of Ir Amin, who have a piece in Haaretz. They note a few other times when battles over Jerusalem’s holy places threatened to turn a nationalist conflict into […]
Guest Column: A new “grand bargain” in the Middle East
What follows is a column by Thomas Mitchell, lightly edited. We often read and hear comparisons between Israel and South Africa under apartheid. Mitchell finds lessons to be learned from South Africa, but not the most familiar ones. Instead, he focuses on diplomatic efforts to end South Africa’s occupation of Namibia and its confrontation with […]
Who cares who represents the “American Jewish majority?”
Is it more important for American Jewish peace groups to prove that they speak for most American Jews, or to be right? I vote for the latter. Last week, sighs of relief could be heard in the organized American Jewish establishment. A new American Jewish Committee poll showed that a majority of American Jews favored […]
One state advocates, how do you know two states aren’t possible?
How do you know? What makes you so sure? You say, “It is too late for a two state solution” or “Israel is already one state. It is an apartheid state, and the only way forward is to transform it into a just state.” Where do you get this absolute certainty? With all due respect, […]
Is a breakthrough feasible? Alon Ben-Meir says yes
NYU Professor Alon Ben-Meir sees reasons for hope. It seems to me that ALL of the scenarios he envisions would need to occur in order for a breakthrough to occur. That is unlikely. But stranger, more unlikely things have occured on this planet, including the birth and development of a Jewish state. As I noted […]
George Mitchell rejects the “F-word”
Much of the media are dismissing today’s Obama-Netanyahu-Abbas summit as an abject failure. Check out the Guardian, which uses the word “failure” no less than three times in its chronicle of the UN meetings, along with “meager results,” “inauspicious start” and other formulations to characterize negotiations that supposedly yielded nothing. I haven’t come across the […]