Jewish Ideas Weekly www.jewishideasdaily.com July 22-29, 2011

Friday, July 22 and more interesting than Levy’s simplistic gave before the . The occasion was a anti-Zionist polemic. Knesset-sponsored celebration of 100 years The Loyalties of the Sephardim The roots of that reality go back to the of Yemenite immigration to , but Ka- By Aryeh Tepper Sephardi Jews who helped pioneer the Zi- pach began by making it clear that Yemenite onist idea, such as poet Emma Lazarus, aliyah was much more than a century old. In a recent Haaretz column, Gideon Levy, Rabbi Henry Mendes, and Sarajevo-born He even noted that the term “Zionism” was the radical leftist polemicist, sounded the Rabbi Yehuda Alkalai (1798–1878), a pro- unknown in Yemen, because “the Zionist warning that Israel’s religious Zionists— to-Zionist whose book, Minhat Yehuda movement was created as a remedy against “the knitted skullcaps”—have joined hands (The Offering of Judah) interpreted the the hostility [among European Jews] to ali- with the ultra-Orthodox and the Sephardim traditional vision of redemption in earthly yah, but without a sickness there’s no need to form “a united tribe of zealots.” Why have terms. Decidedly ahead of his for a remedy.” the ultra-Orthodox and the Sephardim time, Alkalai called for reviv- As Kapach’s autarchic spir- formed this coalition? In Levy’s telling, both ing Hebrew as a spoken lan- it makes clear, no left-wing groups are responding to the history of dis- guage and for the election of discrimination was or is nec- crimination they’ve suffered at the hands of a Jewish constituent assembly essary to fuel the Zionist de- the Zionist Left. in the land of Israel, where he sires of Yemenite Jews. Like every piece of demagoguery, Levy’s himself moved at the end of Kapach’s forceful reclama- is built on a kernel of truth: Sephardi and his life. tion of this deeply-rooted ultra-Orthodox Jews have, at various times While there’s no denying Zionist identity has recently and for various reasons, been discriminated that European and Russian been echoed in the attack against, both by the state and by what is con- Jews constituted the early en- launched by rebel ventionally called in Israel “the left-wing, gine of the modern Zionist MK Rabbi Haim Amsalem Ashkenazi, secular elite.” This generaliza- movement, equally undeniable against the ultra-Orthodox tion is itself a little silly, but it’s a sufficient is the tremendous appeal that leadership of the Shas party. basis for Levy’s attack. The moral of Levy’s Zionism held to masses of Jews Yemenite Jews. According to Amsalem, fanciful story is that as the Israeli Right is in North Africa and the Middle Shas, by aping Ashkenazi becoming “a united tribe of zealots” thanks East. ultra-Orthodox norms, is turning Israeli to the discrimination of the Israeli Left, then Consider the case of Yemenite Jewry. We Sephardim, natural nationalists, into anti- across the board, from right to left, Israel know from documents in the Cairo Genizah Zionists. So much for Levy’s “united tribe of has become—hold on to your hats—a racist, that Yemenite Jews had ties with the Jews in zealots.” bigoted society! the land of Israel during the medieval pe- Perhaps the most interesting polemic Alas, collectively smearing Israeli so- riod, while Rabbi Ovadia Bartinoro, a lead- against the Ashkenazi ultra-Orthodox ciety isn’t Levy’s only game. By reducing ing 15th-century jurist, also mentioned the establishment was launched by the late the nationalism of Israeli Sephardim to a aliyah of Yemenite Jewry. These waves of Chief Sephardi Rabbi of and kind of “false consciousness” attributable immigration to Israel continued up through Chief Rabbi of Morocco, Shalom Messas. to leftist discrimination, Levy (a German the 20th century. Between the two world In his commentary on the episode of the Jew) high-handedly dismisses the authen- wars, approximately 15,000 Yemenite Jews spies from the book of Numbers, Messas tic, historically-rooted Jewish nationalism arrived in Israel—a remarkable figure, as the compared the Sephardim to the Biblical of the Sephardim—thus embodying the Zionist movement was only beginning to set figure of Caleb, who possessed a natural paternalistic racism he claims to deplore. up shop in Yemen at that time. love of the land. In contrast, he likened the He also misses the tensions that, at pres- The independent character of Yemenite ultra-Orthodox Ashkenazim to the figure ent, characterize relations between the Zionism was vigorously articulated by the of Joshua, who over-intellectualized his Sephardi and ultra-Orthodox sectors of Is- Yemenite scholar, jurist, and translator, connection to the land as a consequence raeli society. Ultimately, reality is far richer Rabbi Joseph Kapach, in a 1982 speech he of the years he spent studying Torah with

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Jewish Ideas Weekly, published by Jewish Ideas Daily, is a project of Bee.Ideas. To contact us, please email [email protected]. Moses—and who, as a result, required di- nize that the sartorial choice of a knitted But Levy is familiar with the ignorance of vine assistance to be saved from the sin of skullcap can represent a variety of ideologi- his target audience outside of Israel, who sadly the spies. In light of the positions articulat- cal positions. Wearers of knitted skullcaps but predictably hailed his article as “phenom- ed by Rabbis Kapach, Amsalem, and Mes- range from the religious-nationalist bour- enally provocative.” Levy’s article was nothing sas, Gideon Levy’s clumsy lumping of the geois, who often loathe kippah-wearing of the sort, but it did aptly demonstrate that Sephardim and the ultra-Orthodox into radical nationalists, to students and follow- anti-Israel passion blinds otherwise intelligent the same category appears to be twice re- ers of the line dictated by the influential Har people, both in Israel and abroad, from seeing moved from the truth. HaMor yeshiva, who would sooner profane what is in right front of their noses—or under Of course, we must be wary of painting the Sabbath than raise a hand against a po- other people’s skullcaps. with Levy’s broad brushstrokes, and recog- lice officer.

Monday, July 25 of being a handmaiden of Zionism and priv- new biblical archeology. At Khirbet Qei- ileging the Jewish past, through invention yafa, on a ridge overlooking the Elah Val- The New Biblical Archeology of finds as well as destruction of Palestin- ley southwest of Jerusalem, Professor Yossi By Alex Joffe ian and Muslim remains. Israelis and Arabs Garfinkel of Hebrew University is revealing alike have been bitterly critical of research a unique, short-lived, and massively forti- Every summer, the Israel Antiquities Au- projects, particularly in Jerusalem, which fied town dating to around 1000 B.C.E. The thority holds a reception at the Rockefeller appear to upset the tinderbox city’s delicate location, and the site’s two gates, appear to Museum in Jerusalem for foreign archeo- Jewish-Arab relations. match the biblical description of the Judean logical teams excavating in Israel. This site of Sha’arayim. A short text found on a year’s reception in early July was attended potsherd in 2008, while not yet in fully de- by over 200 archeologists from over 50 dif- veloped Hebrew language or script, appears ferent Israeli and foreign projects, who are to contain the words “judge” and “king.” investigating sites ranging in age from the Guarding a primary route into Jerusalem, Paleolithic through Islamic periods. It was it is difficult to escape the conclusion that another indication that, despite its many in- Qeiyafa was fortified against the rival Philis- ternal and external critics, the new biblical tines to the west. Given the site’s date, a con- archeology is going strong. nection with King David (a biblical hero but But what’s “new” about the new biblical thus far a shadowy archeological figure) is archeology? tantalizing, although obviously still unprov- Part of the answer lies in the field’s scien- en. What is more obvious is that a high level tific and technological sophistication. The of planning and organization was necessary majority of archeological projects in Israel to build this site, precisely in the place and focus on sites outside the brief “Biblical pe- Digging at Khirbet Qeiyafa. time when we might expect from biblical riod” of the Israelite and Judean kingdoms, texts that the early Israelite state found itself ca. 900 to 586 B.C.E. But all projects incor- As a result, the impulse to use archeology threatened by the Philistines. porate scientific field and laboratory tech- as a means of reconciliation between Israeli Some six and a half miles west of Qeiyafa, niques as an end in themselves, using geo- and Palestinians (for example, by bringing Professor Aren Maeir of Bar Ilan University logical sciences as well as satellite imagery disadvantaged youths from both commu- is excavating Tel es-Safi, in all likelihood the to understand the changing physical land- nities together to work on excavations) has Philistine city of Gath. This enormous site scapes and climates of their sites. At many been strong. Some localized progress has contains a long sequence of settlement go- projects, teams with computers and spec- been made, but overall Palestinian attitudes ing back to at least 2500 B.C.E., and shows trographs sit on-site to analyze the chemical have hardened thanks to relentless official the advent of Philistines after 1200 B.C.E. composition of materials as they come out propaganda denying any Jewish past. With their Aegean lifestyles, the Philistines of the ground. At Tel Aviv University, one Still, the most notable feature of the new appear to have assumed control of existing especially promising laboratory project will biblical archeology is that it is largely un- Canaanite cities and then gradually assimi- examine the rate at which pottery sherds ab- apologetic. Some of the largest projects are lated. Dramatic finds continue to pour out of sorb moisture after being fired—a technique undertaken precisely on sites whose finds the site. The largest of all is a two and a half that promises the most accurate method of relate directly to questions of biblical history. kilometer long trench that unsuccessfully dating yet. The vitality of the archeological community protected the site on three sides. The trench After almost 150 years of work, biblical is met with eager public interest, with CNN was destroyed, probably by the king Hazael archeology has thus moved from a support- and Fox News carrying recent stories about of Aram-Damascus, around 830 B.C.E. (as ing role in theological dramas to a fully sci- sites that appear to figure prominently in noted in the second book of Kings). Anoth- entific branch of world archeology. But for biblical history. The successful run (whatever er is a Philistine temple toppled by an earth- over two decades it has also been drawn di- its leaps of faith and logic) of TV’s biblically- quake in the eighth century B.C.E., possibly rectly into the Arab-Israeli and, increasingly, focused The Naked Archeologist is another the one described by the prophet Amos. the Muslim-Jewish, conflict. At its extreme, sign of public interest. Excavations in 2011 also continue to expose biblical archeology has been falsely accused Three excavations may characterize the larger areas of Philistine residential areas.

Jewish Ideas Weekly July 22-29, 2011 2 Finally, on the brown, dry plains of the Judah, providing agricultural goods and biblical history and theology. But archeol- northern Negev, a few miles from the town perhaps labor to the kingdom based in ogy globally is discovering with chagrin that of Sderot, is the tiny site of Khirbet Sum- Jerusalem. public interest matters. Biblical interests and meily. There a team directed by Professors Many will stop here and observe with sat- desires among Christians and Jews remain Jeffrey Blakely of the University of Wis- isfaction that the Bible has been “proven” strong enough to bring hundreds of volun- consin and James Hardin of Mississippi by archeology. But this is far from the case. teers to digs in Israel each summer from State University have begun excavation of Whether the Bible is regarded as divine writ as far away as South Korea. In the process, a rural Judean village of the eighth centu- or dispassionate history, the relationship believers find their faith confirmed, while ry B.C.E. In its first season, among other of those texts and the archeological finds non-believers are provoked and occasion- techniques, the project is using advanced cannot be credulously assumed. To their ally enraged. But the majority of people in digital systems to record the precise three- credit, most biblical archeologists today un- between are stimulated to ponder the ques- dimensional location of finds along with derstand this, in greater or lesser degrees, tions of just what realities are embodied in images directly into a computer database. which is why serious and healthy disagree- the biblical texts, the relationship between Though the site is unlikely to have figured ment exists on virtually all issues. religion and science, and, most fundamen- prominently in biblical history, such villag- Still, though it is as scientifically oriented tal of all, the relationship between the past es on the border with Philistia would have as any other branch of archeology, biblical and the future. been the economic and social backbone of archeology remains typecast as a servant to

Tuesday, July 26 and liberty. Syrian landowners resented Cai- tion of the West Bank and Jordan. ro’s land reform policies, as Syrian military After all this, the quandary of political le- The State of the Arab State officers bristled at taking orders from Egyp- gitimacy remains unresolved. Some think- tians. The business class took umbrage at na- ers, including those at the Economist, are By Elliot Jager tionalization schemes, and the inherent inef- sanguine that the Arab Spring will ultimately From the Mashriq to the Maghreb, one end ficiencies of Nasser-style central economic deliver democratization. Yet in order for that of the Arab world to the other, people are planning soon came to light. to happen, today’s messy popular struggle contemplating where the six-month-long The Syrians broke away. Nasser prudently for liberty will somehow need to transform upheavals that began with the Arab Spring decided not to force the issue (“Arabs should itself into a concerted effort for genuine are fated to deliver them. Those with longer not shed the blood of Arabs”), and by Au- modernization. This means that regimes memories may recall the dramatic summer gust-September 1961 the union had been capable of supporting representative govern- fifty years ago when an earlier experiment at ment and providing institutional protections reshaping the political contours of Arab gov- for minority viewpoints must emerge. ernance came unraveled: the 1961 breakup But from our current vantage point, fifty of the United Arab Republic (UAR). years since the breakdown of the UAR and Declared in February 1958, the UAR was its promise of legitimacy through pan-Ara- the union of Syria and Egypt. It was created bism, prospects for democratization seem in response to Syrian lobbying of Egypt’s Ga- improbable. This is compounded by the mal Nasser for an alliance and was popularly failure of Arab nationalist movements, such backed in both countries. The ideal of pan- as the Ba’ath, and the current ascendency of Arab unity was all the rage and the hope was national-based Islamist parties. In light of all that other states, beginning with Iraq, would this, there seems to be a distinct possibility join. that the Arabs might abandon entirely the Pan-Arabism was seen as a workaround Western nation-state model, and opt instead for the lack of legitimacy of most Arab for the pan-Islamist alternative. leaders as well as the political systems they Postage stamps (Egypt, 1958). Certainly, the state of the Arab state oversaw. Nasser, by dint of his charismatic is hardly encouraging. Despite the Arab personality, had enjoyed an almost mystical junked. A magnanimous Nasser allowed the League’s brave front (inviting South Sudan sense of baraka, or God-given grace. But the Cairo-based Arab League to readmit Syria to join after it broke away from Khartoum, rulers of Saudi Arabia and Jordan perceived as an independent member. Still, the idea of for instance), Arab countries are founder- the pan-Arab model as a threat to their own pan-Arabism survived for decades. In 1958, ing. To cite only the most obvious examples: religious-based claims for legitimacy, and the monarchies of Jordan and Iraq attempted Lebanon is a failed state under Hizballah even a new Iraqi government, purportedly federation. Later Egypt and Syria tried again, domination; the current chaos has exposed favorable to pan-Arabism, found reasons once with Libya and another time with Iraq. the intrinsic political weakness of Libya and not to join. North Yemen twice sought to federate with Yemen (not to mention Bahrain); Jordan’s In short order, the experiment came un- Egypt (in 1958 and 1963). In 1961, Iraq monarch is facing unprecedented chal- done. In Nasser’s vision of unity, he would sought to “merge” with Kuwait, claiming the lenges; and the Syrian regime may be in its be the political and economic overlord of the sheikdom as a province of its own. There death throes. In Egypt and Tunisia, elections UAR. Promises to protect private property was talk of merging Libya and Egypt (1973); have had to be postponed due to (entirely fell by the wayside, as did pledges of bread Tunisia and Libya (1974); and a confedera- reasonable) concerns that not postponing

Jewish Ideas Weekly July 22-29, 2011 3 them would result in a “democratic” victory mense. Not only do Islamists reject the the Arab Spring does lead to democratic ref- for Islamist forces out to reshape the national state system embodied in the 1648 Treaty ormation, that the Arabs become convinced character. The Arab League has demanded of Westphalia (which resolved that reli- that the state is compatible with Islam, and the UN grant “Palestine” full membership gious differences ought no longer to justify that Islam joins other religions in what Hill even as the two contending Palestinian Arab international wars), they reject wholesale calls the “debate over how far religion should regimes remain incapable of even the pre- the boundaries, responsibilities, and in- go beyond private practice to display itself in tense of unity. deed the very premises on which interna- the public square.” In Trial of a Thousand Years, Charles Hill tional order is based. Failure on any one of these fronts would writes that if the nation-state paradigm in If the thesis is correct that the state model have consequences too devastating to con- the Arab world were to be supplanted by in the Arab world is today facing its most template—not only for the Arab world, but the pan-Islamist alternative, the challenge critical test, then Western policymakers can for Western civilization as well. to the international order would be im- have no higher interest than to ensure that

Wednesday, July 27 what turns out to be a sparsely-attended The Israeli Bedouins pose a more compli- enlistment party. Why throw a party? “To cated case. Also Sunni Muslims, the Bedou- Minorities in the IDF show everyone that you’re not ashamed,” ins distinguish themselves from mainstream says Ameer. After all, in the eyes of many Arab society by their more rural (and some- By Aryeh Tepper Arab Israelis—Palestinians, according to times desert-dwelling) ways. While not Recently, while driving by the Israeli settle- their own self-definition—Ameer and his obligated to serve in the IDF, it’s estimated ment of Nokdim (where Avigdor Lieber- fellow Muslim soldiers in the IDF are noth- that between 5 and 10 percent of draft-age man lives), I picked up a hitchhiking soldier. ing less than traitors. Bedouin youth volunteer for army service, We started chatting, and I asked the soldier Obviously, this attitude is not held among often as trackers. Amos Yarkoni, one of his name. “Mustafa,” he said. “You’re a Mus- all minority groups. The Druse, for one, of- the most celebrated trackers in the history lim?” I asked. “Yes,” he answered, “from fer a radical counter-example. An offshoot of the IDF, was actually a Bedouin named Haifa.” As our conversation progressed, I of Shi’ite Islam, Israeli Druse Abd el-Majid Hidr. In recent asked him his thoughts about Lieberman’s number approximately years, enlistment has fluctu- criticism of Arab-Israeli society, saying that 115,000, and aside from the ated wildly, likely because of I thought the foreign minister wouldn’t Golan Druse who maintain the increased influence of the have any problem with an Arab-Israeli who their loyalty to the Syrian Islamic movement among serves in the army. Mustafa demurred: “Li- regime, the overwhelming Bedouin communities. eberman only loves me so long as I’m in majority of men proudly Which brings us back to uniform.” serve in the IDF. This has the larger Israeli-Arab com- When most people think of the conflict been so since 1949, when munities. Each year, only a in the Middle East, they naturally enough the Druse leadership re- few dozen Arab Christians imagine Israeli Jews fighting Middle East- quested that military service volunteer to serve in the IDF. ern Arabs and Muslims. But non-Jews from be obligatory. The army, which believes that the Muslim, Druse, and Christian commu- Not only do they serve, Christian Arab soldiers decorate the number could be much nities in Israel serve in the Israel Defense but they serve with distinc- a Christmas tree (2005). higher, has been redoubling Forces (IDF) alongside their Jewish peers. tion. When the second Leb- its recruitment efforts in the After completing their basic training, these anon war broke out in 2006, an all-Druse community. One sign that the policy might soldiers swear fealty to the state of Israel on battalion was the first unit to enter Hizbal- be bearing fruit is the career of Cpl. Elinor Jo- a copy of the Quran or the New Testament lah country (on the first day of the war), and seph, the first Arab woman to become a com- instead of the standard Hebrew Bible. the last to leave. After a month of combat, bat soldier in the IDF. But among Arab Mus- But soldiers like Mustafa are still very the battalion took down 15 Hizballah ter- lims, while there are families like Ameer’s, rare. For various reasons (including security rorists, with no casualties of its own. some boasting three generations of IDF concerns), Israeli Arabs are not drafted— Like the Druse, the Sunni Muslim Circas- fighters, voluntary enlistment remains low. though some still do serve voluntarily. A sians (of whom around 4,500 live in Israel) What drives minorities to volunteer their recent documentary film, Ameer Got His also loyally serve in the IDF. The Circas- service? On the individual level, some are Gun, explores the decision of one eighteen- sians, who practice a moderate, consciously motivated by a sense of duty to defend their year-old Arab-Israeli Muslim to voluntarily non-nationalistic Islam, established good country, an idea that permeates the air of enlist in the IDF. The film is a bit saccharine, relations with the Jews in Israel at the end Israeli society. Druse and Circassian Israelis following the trajectory of Ameer’s untested of the 19th century, thanks in large part to often identify deeply with the state. Others idealism, but the (Jewish) producer and the language and culture they shared with make a pragmatic calculation that serving in director thankfully refuse easy moralizing, Jewish immigrants from Russia. Since 1958, the IDF will ease their social and economic and let the characters speak for themselves. again at the request of their leadership, all integration into Israeli society (as Mustafa’s The film’s most touching scene follows the Circassian men have been conscripted into complaint demonstrates, this expectation is intense preparations of Ameer’s family for the Israeli military. sometimes frustrated). On the communal

Jewish Ideas Weekly July 22-29, 2011 4 level, groups who send their sons to serve in in this group are increasingly sending their the day when both the ultra-Orthodox and, the IDF gain a greater hearing in their de- boys to units specially designed to meet as Efraim Karsh has speculated about, all of mand for government resources. their religious needs. In both cases, the army Israel’s Arabs are drafted into the IDF. But In many respects, the IDF’s efforts among is reaching out to communities located that day won’t be arriving in the foreseeable minority groups resemble the efforts under along the margins of Israeli society in order future, and so, for now, young soldiers like way with the ultra-Orthodox. While also to fill in the gaps created by a general short- Mustafa remain few and far between. exempt from military conscription, many age of manpower. It’s intriguing to imagine

Thursday, July 28 into the more thinly populated Galilee and eral of which now have ultra-Orthodox ma- the Negev. Sderot, Dimona, and Netivot in jorities. But Jerusalem is a case in itself. In No Room in Zion? the Negev were created in 1951, 1953, and the center of the city, older neighborhoods By Alex Joffe 1956. Their total population today is around like Mamilla have been completely remade 80,000. Kiryat Shmona (population 23,000) with luxury residences, most owned by non- Tent camps are appearing across Israel in was created in 1949, while the ancient site Israelis and occupied only on Jewish holi- protest over the high cost of housing. The of Beth Shean gained a Jewish majority only days. Belt highways to the north and south high cost of everything in Israel (recall the after 1948. have been built and an expensive light rail cottage cheese boycott earlier this year) has The Zionist imperative to settle the land system has been carved through the center led to widespread economic and social dis- has played out in different ways, but with of the city. But secular Jews continue to leave satisfaction, with otherwise serious com- Jerusalem, Arabs continue to apply for resi- mentators making overheated analogies to dence permits, and the labor participation Tahrir Square and the Arab Spring. Some- rate among remaining Jewish males is under thing must be done, but what? Prime Min- 45 percent—over 20 percent lower than in ister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised to Tel Aviv. address the crisis, this week announcing ini- Obviously, economics has played a big tiatives that may go some way toward molli- part in many of these changes. The eco- fying protesters in need of housing. But pro- nomic liberalization of the 1990’s and early testors themselves seem unable to point to 2000’s saw the decline of the last remnants long-term solutions, and political rivals on of socialism and the rise of entrepreneurial- all sides are sharpening their knives. ism and high tech industries. New wealth To say that the housing situation in Israel creation spurred new demands for housing, is distorted is to understate matters, as a new American-like patterns of consump- brief look at the history of the country’s set- tion, and American-style social inequality. tlement patterns illustrates. Very little of this predictable results. Housing pressures, The average price for a four-room apart- history is “natural.” Zionism, in its socialist commensurate with population growth, ment in Tel Aviv, up 30 percent in 2010, and neo-liberal manifestations, has shaped have increased. As the kibbutz movement increased another 12 percent in the first the landscape as much as wars. Though Tel collapsed during the 1980’s, privatization quarter of 2011 and now stands at over 2.25 Aviv is the center of protests, the city itself is schemes allowed many to sell their lands to million shekels (approximately $662,000). relatively new, having been founded only in pay off debts. This was especially profitable But overall Israeli wages have remained 1909. Bat Yam, on Tel Aviv’s southern bor- to those kibbutzim remaining in the Gush stagnant, along with investment in educa- der, was founded in 1926, while Herzliya to Dan region, while others have essentially tion and social services. Subsidies for ultra- the north was created in 1924. Nearby Petah been converted into garden suburbs. As for Orthodox have increased, while prices have Tivkah, Rishon L’Zion, and Ramat Gan (cit- the massive immigration from the former skyrocketed. ies within the Ayalon Highway belt, now Soviet Union, it also reversed a prior move- How is the government to respond in the each with populations over 150,000) were ment away from Tel Aviv to older cities such face of market fluctuations, while also deal- founded in 1878, 1882, and 1921 as agricul- as Ashdod and newer ones like Modi’in. ing with the multiple burdens of history, tural settlements. Overall, the Gush Dan re- Then there were strategic imperatives. demographics, and geo-politics? Netan- gion of Israel’s central coast and foothills, an Construction of Jewish communities in the yahu has proposed reforming planning and area of less than 600 square miles, is home to West Bank under Labor and Likud govern- building commissions and permitting rapid over 3.2 million Israelis, some 42 percent of ments entailed huge investments in infra- construction of another 10,000 housing the population. structure and defense. Another such stra- units, half of which would be rental units. Meanwhile, Israel’s development towns tegic imperative saw additional waves of Proposals have also emerged to limit prof- represent another path toward urban de- construction in and around Jerusalem to in- its on investments in second (or additional) velopment. In the early 1950’s, Jews flowed corporate the north, west, and east into the homes, as well as for rent controls. A pro- into Israel from Arab countries. The coast Jewish city. The original 1970’s belt neigh- posed “affordable housing plan” for Tel Aviv was already perceived as overcrowded, borhoods like Ramot, Gilo, and Pisgat Ze’ev would allocate new residence units to young and strategic and economic decisions were expanded and were joined by many others, families. Two exclusively ultra-Orthodox made to spread these (non-Ashkenazi) Jews such as Ramat Shlomo and Har Homa, sev- cities are also planned for the northern Ne-

Jewish Ideas Weekly July 22-29, 2011 5 gev and the outskirts of Haifa, each with a term. Even with an admirable fiscal situ- rises. But all this is the price of success, with population of over 50,000. (When, or if, Jew- ation and what appears to be a historically the attendant rewards and costs of the revo- ish residents of the West Bank are resettled low unemployment rate, any solution will lutionary transformation of Israel into a from across the Green Line, it will be neces- encounter obstacles and entail trade-offs. global high-tech superpower. Whether neo- sary to find housing for up to 300,000.) Additional housing can come either at the liberal or socialist solutions are adopted, the But, as with so many of Israel’s crises, expense of ever-shrinking green space and only things that are certain are that, for now, so long in the making, no solutions to the agriculture, or through the redevelopment social discontent will remain high, and traf- housing problem can emerge in the short of still higher-density housing, such as high- fic will increase.

THE WEEKLY PORTION In tacit recognition of the daughters’ legal on the issue, and one that is especially sensi- triumph, the Torah takes the unusual step of tive to family dynamics: prominently recording their names. On each Mas’ei: Tz’lafhad’s Daughters of the two previous occasions they have been The reader may think that the interpreter and Hamlet enumerated (Numbers 26:33 and 27:1), they is burdening the change in sequence with Numbers 33:1-36:13 a significance it really lacks. That is not the case. Perhaps we can endear the exegetical By Moshe Sokolow approach to the contemporary conscious- This week’s reading, Mas’ei, closes out the ness by citing a detail from the Shakespear- book of Numbers. It is named for the trav- ean play Hamlet. The king, who murdered els (masa’ot) of the Israelites during their his brother, and the queen summon the approximately four-decade sojourn in the two wicked courtiers, and induce them to wilderness. spy on Hamlet, their erstwhile boon com- The Torah enumerates 42 stations along panion, and reveal his secrets. They con- the way from Egypt to the Promised Land. clude this request as follows (Act II, scene Since they are now in “the Plains of Moab, 2, lines 33–34): opposite Jericho” (33:50) and about to cross are listed as Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milkah, into the land of Israel, the reading proceeds and Tirtsah. In our reading (36:11), however, KING: Thanks, Rosencrantz and in chapter 34 to delineate territorial boundar- the order varies: Mahlah, Tirtsah, Hoglah, gentle Guildenstern. ies and enumerate the tribal elders designated Milkah, Noah. Is the variation significant? to oversee the distribution of the land under Two medieval exegetes explain the discrep- QUEEN: Thanks, Guildenstern and the overall supervision of Joshua and the high ancy by reference to context. To Abraham ibn gentle Rosencrantz. priest Elazar. The Torah next provides for the Ezra (1089–1164), the first two lists (along allocation of 48 cities for the use of the Levites, with a similar naming of them in Joshua 17:3) This informs us that they are regarded equal- who received no regular patrimony (35:1–8), enumerate the women by order of their birth, ly by both the king and queen; neither one is and stipulates the preparation of six of these with the eldest first, while the sequence in given preference lest they become jealous of as sanctuaries (miklat; in modern Hebrew, our reading, which specifically relates to their one another, so that they may devote them- shelters) for unpremeditated murderers. marriages, lists them by the order in which selves wholeheartedly to the dastardly plot. In the light of the forthcoming distribution they were wed. Rashi, under the possible in- of the land, the reading then concludes by re- fluence of the talmudic prescription to marry There is, of course, nothing in the least capitulating an incident narrated previously off older daughters before younger ones, ar- dastardly about our own plot, which ends (Numbers 27:1 ff.). It seems the five daughters gues that the sequence in Mas’ei is by order with the daughters fulfilling all of God’s pre- of Tz’lafhad, of the tribe of M’nasheh, have of age, while the one appearing elsewhere is scriptions, marrying within the families of sought parity with their male relatives in in- dictated by the order of “their wisdom.” M’nasheh, and keeping their father’s portion heriting their deceased father’s territory. God The modern scholar Nehama Leibowitz within the tribe. Sometimes, though, a nod accedes to their request, with the additional (1905–1997) joins her predecessors in find- to the bard can help prevent us from assum- proviso here that they must marry within their ing meaning in the alteration of the sequence. ing that biblical exegesis is much ado about tribe in order to keep the allocation intact. But she offers a decidedly psychological take nothing.

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