Rabbi Arthur Weiner

How about some more good news? I want to share an important new study that is filled with some important news for the Jewish community. But before I do, I want to draw your attention to the famous parody song National Brotherhood Week by the satirist, musician, and world class mathematician, Tom Lehrer. Among its famous lyrics: Oh, the Protestants hate the Catholics And the Catholics hate the Protestants The Hindus hate the Muslims And everybody hates the Jews. We know that America has made great strides forward since the civil rights era during which this song was written. The song itself was a challenge for Americans to take the ideas and values of National Brotherhood Week (which was and remains a real thing), and try to live it throughout the year to improve life for all in our great nation. Yet the last several years have caused many Jews, over 80 percent of American Jews according to a recent survey, to wonder how our neighbors actually feel about us. Ac...

How about some good news for a change? The news from Israel this past week has been terrible. As we gathered for Passover, for what seemed like the first normal Seders since the pandemic began, it was painful to hear of missile and rocket attacks from Lebanon, causing damage but fortunately no casualties. There were rocket attacks from Gaza, as well as two terror attacks that claimed the lives of an Italian tourist as well as an Israel mother and her two daughters. Most of you saw the reports that made the national news earlier this week of Israeli police conducting what certainly looked like heavy-handed measures against worshippers at the Al-Aksa mosque in Jerusalem. Yet those same reports consistently failed to mention the reason for the Israeli police presence there in the first place, to prevent rioting by hundreds of worshipers who were stockpiling weapons and had barricaded themselves in one of the mosque’s chambers. Though this is not the point of my message today I once a...