To begin, I’ll be following our lovely columnist Karen Swanson’s example, and refer to my friend as “the nameless one” from now on (at least while his job status is undecided). Among the important concepts still to address, is how fundamentally part of the American culture that separation and state is - but it must be noted, for understanding, that such a concept is non-existent in Israel. Not part of the Israeli mindset. At all. Nor, the nameless one says, does Israel have a constitution - yet even those who want to preserve Israel as a democratic state cannot separate it from religion. The Israel Democracy Institute says, “the absence of a constitution itself stems primarily from the dominance of religious and traditional circles that are opposed to such a separation.” In fact, Israel’s intention is to retain its unique identity as “the nation-state of the Jewish people,” an identity that blends both national and religious ideals. I thought this may be an enlightening topic because biblical verses were intertwined with the answers my friend gave readers last month, which isn’t common in mainstream America. The Israel Democracy Institute published an article a decade ago, arguing against separating church and state like America. An example the nameless one gives is that in Israel, a secular Jew cannot get married in a civil procedure, but only through rabbinic authority. The same holds true for Muslims and Christians, via their designated courts. Another example in Israel is that Shabbat is a respected calendar holiday, and the entire country operates according to it. Even secular schools are taught some measure of biblical curriculum, and Jewish law is taught. In the Israeli Knesset, Ben Gvir, Minister of National Security since 2022, is an example of a religious zionist. The nameless one asserts that the ultra-orthodox block is important for anyone who aspires to power, since a government without the ultra-orthodox is “near impossible.” Truly, Orthodox, traditional, and even some secular Jews perceive a Jewish state as reflective of Jewish religious identity, meaning that Israel embodies religious identity, without hampering it. So though Israel identifies with Western society, religion and state are thus inseparable. In large part this is in response to 2,300 years of dispersion among different lands and languages, with the common denominator amongst Jews being religious identity. The Jewish people have, in their history, been without a common language, a common territory, and a common history ascribed to that territory. But Jews have shared a common religion. Even today, a Jew cannot disregard religion and say that in every instance, liberal values are more important than religious values. Thus, religion is integral to Jewish identity, even in a modern-secular Jewish state. And though Shabbat stems from a religious commandment, it is part of the very essence of Jewish national identity. Shabbat still finds a role in a modern-secular Jewish state. As Asher Ginsberg, a secular Jewish thinker said, “More than the Jews kept the Sabbath, the Sabbath kept the Jews.” As such, it allowed Jews to retain a unique identity across millenia, despite being a minority in whichever land they found themselves. With this reasoning in mind, it may be easier to comprehend world events, such as the attack on Jews in the Netherlands as antisemetic. The King of the Netherlands has stated after the attack: “We failed the Jewish community.” From the Jewish perspective, it was not simply a failure, but a pogrom, reminiscent of Kristallnacht in 1938 in which the Nazis systematically attacked Jews (and it was no coincidence that the attack in the Netherlands fell on the 86th anniversary of Kristallnacht). In reality, the attack on Jews in the Netherlands falls within a tsunami of antisemitism that is in response to the worst attack on Jews in the history of Israel. Yet, it is also shared tragedy that binds Jews together as a people. Such anti Zionism denies Israel’s very right to exist. This also brings the name- less one to reiterate how, “the Biden administration was hostile to Israel, much like the Obama administration.” Not only were they hostile, but the nameless one believes that Biden is the reason the war in Gaza wasn’t over 9 months ago, and also why the hostages are still held there. The nameless one points out that the Biden Administration failed to pressure Qatar and Hamas, when it would have been within their power and foresight to do so. Rather, he sees how they’ve bullied Israel with their demands and stipulations about how to conduct the war, treating Israel like a country in need of restraint when its lands were massacred. Moreover, he’s waiting for the true, unconditional friendship of America that has been the byline of our two countries in years past. It might be helpful for American leadership to understand the lack of separation between church and state in Israel in order to be a true, unconditional ally.
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