What does it mean to be a progressive Zionist? What does it mean to live between those on the far left, opposed to every Israeli action, and those on the far right, for whom Israel can do no wrong? What does it mean to love a place and a people and feel eternally connected, through time and space? What does it mean to resist easy talking points and see Israel in the bright, blaring colors of its truest form: a place of complexity, tension, political sparring, history, destiny, wrongdoing and beauty? What does it mean to feel the pain of searing Israeli missteps in your own heart while celebrating Israel’s very existence each day?
These are the questions so few will wrestle with in our society, when so many are drawn to the easiest answers and laziest explanations. I have said it once and again since October 7 of 2023: We must dare to hold multiple truths at the same time. Even while there are fewer and fewer who will save a place for nuance, I challenge you to view this war – this mess – from a place of ardent nuance.
The people of Gaza are hurting and pained and starved, yes. The people of Gaza have been coopted by terrorist leaders who preach only hate, yes. Hamas instigated the most murderous day in Israeli history, yes. Israel has a right to defend itself, yes. There can be no peace as long as the hostages remain in Gaza, yes. The leadership of Israel and Gaza have deliberately missed every opportunity to end this gruesome campaign, yes. Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East, yes. Israel has danced with decidedly undemocratic policy-making, yes. The Israeli past includes no shortage of problematic moments, yes. A Palestinian state cannot be as long as its leaders are committed to bloodshed, yes. We do not live in Israel and cannot know what it means to rush to bomb shelters in the middle of the night, yes. There are many tens of thousands in Israel who come from a place of equity, fairness and the highest of Jewish ideals, yes. Attacking Jews on the streets of America or France or England or Hungary or Holland will not lead to peace, yes.
In this week’s Torah portion, Vetchanan, we learn once again that Moses will not enter the Promised Land. God says adamantly: ‘Look at it well, for you shall not cross the Jordan. Give Joshua his instruction, and imbue him with strength and courage, for he shall go across at the head of this people, and he shall allot to them the land that you may only see’ (Deut 3:27-28). Later Moses notes: ‘I must die in this land; I shall not cross the Jordan. But you will cross and take possession of the good land’ (Deut 4:22).
We are fortunate to live in a time when Israel is real and we can visit, engage and wrestle with Israel. So many of our ancestors were unable to do any of these things.
Maybe we are all Moses, forever imagining what Israel might become or could become on its very best day. Maybe we are, like Moses, deeply invested and – with that investment – working in our way so that future generations can be in relationship with this complicated place. It is called the Promised Land as it holds such promise, this complex sliver of land so precious to me, to you and to so many peoples.