Ruth Wisse's lecture and Jordan acquiring part of the West Bank

Ruth Wisse

Last night I went to the Ruth Wisse lecture at Holy Blossom. It was excellent. It was a continuation of the thoughts in her book, Jews and Power but updated to the current time. She will undoubtedly make the speech into an article in due course.

Meanwhile these were her main points.

One of the good things about Judaism is that it suggests that a person is responsible for what happens to him and what happens in the world. This makes for great achievements but it also means that Jes think that they are responsible for political occurrences that don’t work out for the best. But Jews are not responsible for the political positions of others and their ability to change politics by their own deeds is extremely limited. Thus giving away more Israeli land is a useless exercise in that it changes nothing.

Know before whom you stand applies to God, not to politicians. Jews must realize the difference. Blacks have been successful in changing their political fortunes in America. They haven’t looked at themselves and said that they must effect the change. They said that America must change – and fortunately it changed for them although it has not politically changed for Jews. The changes were not due primary to Black activism but primarily to the general culture and circumstances of America

No one else is as self-critical as Jews. You don’t find any other group that holds meetings to criticize themselves as Jews do. This is not beneficial to Jews or Israel. It divides them and gives ammunition to the enemy

When Jews stopped following the Torah they replaced it by liberalism. Thus Jews are liberals even to their obvious detriment ie they have replaced the Jewish religion by some of its better social aspects but without understanding the consequences of what they are doing.

Ruth Wisse’s lecture and someone on Facebook suggesting that intelligent people came up with dumb answers had me thinking about the solution to the Arab-Israeli. My answer for a long time is that Jordan and Israel should split the West Bank. But they say that Jordan doesn’t want it. Why not? All countries want more land. The usual explanation is that they are afraid of destabilization. However I would suggest that the real reason is that they are being pressured by the other 22 Muslim countries not to take over part of the West Bank so that the conflict can continue and that eventually they hope Israel will be destroyed. Alternately, if Ruth Wisse is correct, Israel should stop feeling that the West Bank is their fault, build a fence around itself, call it their border and absolutely stop all Arabs from entering Israel. If the UN does not fund the West Bank Arab economy, then the people will either starve or join Jordan. In either case, it will be better for Israel and not their responsibility.