More on
these possibilities in a moment. I want to turn to the brutal and unthinkable
murder of Muhammad Abu Khdeir. It is generally presumed that it was an act of
revenge for the killings of Eyal Yifrach,
Naftali Fraenkel, and Gilad Shaar. Revenge seems to be an inborn human
trait, part of our very make-up. William Makepeace Thackeray put it most
succinctly when he said, “Revenge
may be wicked, but it’s natural” (Vanity Fair). The impetus to
retaliate—arising
from anger, shame, and humiliation, which are all sadly inevitable elements of
life—is fierce
and difficult to suppress. Is there anyone who has not at some time fantasized
of revenge?
Parshat
Matot
is about raw and brutal revenge in the
guise of holiness. It is one thing to recognize our passion for revenge, but
quite another to claim it is God’s bidding. That is precisely what we find
in Parshat Matot:
The
Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Avenge the
Israelite people on the Midianites; then you shall be gathered to your kin.”
(Numbers 31:1-2)
The very
last public “service” of Moses, himself the model of
humility, devotion, and courage, will be to launch a bloody campaign against a
notorious enemy.
Moses
spoke to the people, saying, “Let men be
picked out from among you for a campaign, and let them fall upon Midian to
wreak the Lord’s vengeance on Midian. You shall dispatch on
the campaign a thousand from every one of the tribes of Israel. So a thousand
from each tribe were furnished from the divisions of Israel, twelve thousand
picked for the campaign. (Numbers 31:3-5)
To make
matters worse, Pinchas, the
fanatical vigilante we encountered in the past two parshiot, is to serve
as the priest of the military campaign, equipped with
the sacred utensils and the trumpets for sounding the blasts
(Numbers 31:6), signifying that Israel fights not only with God’s
imprimatur, but at God’s
behest.
Torah
records that the Israelites slew every male, including the kings of Midian and
the prophet Balaam. The women and children, along with animals and property,
were seized as booty. The Midianite towns were torched. And when all that was
done, the spoils of war were brought to Moses and all Israel awaiting them in
the encampment on the steppes of Moab. Moses becomes inflamed with anger
because the women have been spared. He reminds everyone that it was Midianite
women who seduced Israelite men into idolatry at Pe’or, and
orders them to kill every woman, as well as all the male children, and spare
only virginal girls.
It is a
shocking story. Were it actual history, it would be all the more horrifying.
How often
in history have individuals and nations sought revenge against their enemies
and claimed that they were fulfilling God’s will? Yet Leviticus 19:18 is very
clear: You shall not take revenge or bear a grudge against your
countrymen. Love your fellow as yourself: I am the Lord. We should
be careful not to dismiss this mitzvah as applying only in the realm of smaller
grievances, the type we have with our neighbors over the quotidian of life. The
Talmud offers the example of two neighbors: Reuven refuses to lend Shimon a
saw, so the next day Shimon refuses to lend Reuven an axe. Paltry stuff. We’ve all
been subjected to far worse. It is when we face the “big stuff” of life that this commandment reveals
its wisdom and moral value. In fact, the mitzvah to not seek revenge is a
vaulted a high moral standard to aspire to. The Rambam (Moses Maimonides)
wrote:
Whoever
takes revenge against his fellow violates a negative commandment, as is
written, “Do not take revenge or bear a grudge…”
Even though he does not receive lashings, it is a very evil trait; a person
should not take to heart anything in the world, for those who understand know
that all is vanity and worthless, and not worthy of revenge. (Mishneh Torah,
Hilkhot De’ot 7:7)
Many have
sought to defend the story of revenge in Parshat Matot by citing Deuteronomy
32:35, Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, and to
point out that God commands the Israelites to avenge themselves against the
Midianites. To those who wish to make this claim, I would assert that there is
no one qualified to affirm that God has again commanded vengeance, and there
are no longer any Midianites. Midrash B’midbar Rabbah 22:2
claims that Moses knew that he would die as soon as he had completed the task;
therefore acting immediately is to be viewed as meritorious. This amounts to a
glorification of Moses’ zeal for
the butchery.
And if all
this isn’t enough,
is it mere coincidence that the people Moses orders Israel to avenge themselves
against is none other than the family in which he married? His wife, Tzipporah,
is the daughter of Jethro, the priest of Midian. The closer we are to people,
the deeper we are wounded when they hurt us; consequently, the greater the
desire for revenge. Familiarity breeds contempt and proximity breeds resentment—on
steroids.
What
remains for us is to live up to the standard of Leviticus 19:18 as Rambam
taught—as
difficult as that is. Talmud teaches:
Those
who are insulted but do not insult back, hear themselves slandered but don’t respond, act with love and rejoice in
tribulations — of these Scripture states that, Those who
love [God] are like the sun rising with all its might (Leviticus 6:4). (B.
Yoma 23a)
All this
swirls through my mind as I painfully contemplate the torture and murder
of 16-year-old Muhammad Abu Khdeir and
the brutal beating of his 15-year-old cousin, Tariq Khdeir. I know of no one
who doubts that both were acts of revenge, the first for the murder of three
Israeli teens several weeks ago, and the second for Arab protests against the
murder of Muhammad.
All last
week, Israel was engaged in military action in Gaza. As I write this the United
Nations has reported that 177 Palestinians have been killed in Operation
Protective Edge in the past week, many of them children, and many more have
been injured. More than one voice has shouted to the hilltops that Operation
Protective Edge is an act of revenge. We should not be too quick to label it as
such because the evidence does not bear this out. To whit:
•
Israel has gone to historically unprecedented lengths to
avoid civilian casualties in Gaza. Hamas targets have been warned by cell phone calls and leaflets dropped
from the air to vacate houses targeted for destruction. Israel’s goal is
to cripple the Hamas infrastructure, not harm the people of Gaza.
•
Hamas operatives have embedded themselves deep within the
civilian population, increasing the likelihood of civilian casualties because
this plays well in the media and the arena of world opinion. They have long
employed the tactic of using civilians as “human shields.” They are also ensconced in a
labyrinth of tunnels below ground built to infiltrate Israel and attack Israeli
civilians.
•
Hamas rockets are aimed at Israeli civilian targets.
Israeli rockets are aimed at removing the means to launch rockets into Israel
in order to protect her civilian population, as she ought. Every country has
the right and responsibility to protect its citizens.
•
Israel worked out a cease-fire arrangement with the aid of
Egypt. Israel has unilaterally initiated a cease-fire. Hamas summarily rejected
it, firing 84 rockets toward Israel within a few hours.
•
Iron Dome, Israel’s air defense system that intercepts
and destroys short-range rockets and artillery shells whose trajectories would
bring them to populated areas, is working well. Thank goodness. And thank you
to the United States for contributing to its development. As Former Israeli
Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren has pointed out, Iron Dome has
saved countless lives—both
Israeli and Palestinian—and
staved off war on numerous occasions. How so? Israel’s ability
to protect its civilian population has bought time to pursue
diplomatically-arranged cease-fires, thereby decreasing incursions into Gaza,
which would surely have resulted in Palestinian casualties.
•
At this time, many in Israel believe that the only
long-term solution is to eject Hamas from Gaza, given Hamas’ terrorist activities and its stated
goals (articulated in the Hamas Charter) to obliterate Israel (preamble),
establish a fundamentalist Islamist state in Palestine (Articles 11 and 13)
through Jihad (Articles 15 and 33), reject a negotiated peace settlement
(Article 13), and kill every Jew everywhere. Concerning the last point, the
Hamas Charter reads: “The
Day of Judgment will not come about until Moslems fight Jews and kill them.
Then, the Jews will hide behind rocks and trees, and the rocks and trees will
cry out: 'O Moslem, there is a Jew hiding behind me, come and kill him.’” (Article 7) And if that isn’t enough
to make your blood run cold, the Charter also trumpets the notorious
anti-Semitic canard, “The
Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” forged
in Czarist Russia, that purports to describe a Jewish plan for worldwide
domination.
I mention
these facets of the current situation to make the point that Israel’s actions
in Gaza, however much we might wish they hadn’t happened and Israel had not
considered them necessary, are not acts of revenge, except in this sense: “The best
revenge,” wrote Marcus Aurelius, “is not to
be like your enemy” (Meditations).
The killing of Eyal, Gilad, and Naftali was an
intentional act of provocation. Israel’s sorties over Gaza are to protect
its population from the rain of Hamas rockets showering Israel, from the south
nearly to Haifa.
Only the
death of Muhammad and, most likely, the beating of his cousin Tariq Abu Khdeir,
were acts of revenge. They were both reprehensible and shameful. For the
record: Upon hearing of Muhammed’s death, and then Tariq’s
treatment at the hands of Israeli police, Israeli society went into convulsions
of moral revulsion—that
wasn’t covered
by the mainstream news media. Those responsible for Muhammad’s death
were rounded up within 24 hours; they will be charged, tried, and punished. The
Israeli police officer who beat Tariq has been suspended and could be indicted.
In contrast, the murderers of Eyal, Gilad, and Naftali, however, are still at
large; the Palestinian Authority has made no effort to identify them.
Palestinians on the West Bank gave their children candy to publicly celebrate
the murders.
שַׁאֲלוּ, שְׁלוֹם יְרוּשָׁלִָם Pray for
the peace of Jerusalem.
© Rabbi
Amy Scheinerman
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