For Rabbi Hanan Schlesinger and Noar A’wad, the question of who their neighbors were was confusing and upsetting. Were their neighbors only the Israeli settler or Palestinian Arab communities they respectively lived amongst in the West Bank or were they also one another’s neighbors. While their physical proximity was very close, the political and religious divide between them was immense. These two proud men, from conflicting communities were the least likely of partners. Yet their work and the work of their organization Roots/Shorashim over the past decade has provided hope in a place in the world that so often lacks any.
Listening to their story this past Sunday night at Westminster Presbyterian, I couldn’t help but think of the first verse of this week’s Torah portion, Vayakhel, “and Moses gathered all of the children of Israel” (Exodus 35:1). We are all the children of Israel – Jews, Palestinians, Muslims, and Christians. And as hard as it is for to gather, gather we must. We must get past what Rabbi Hannan calls the “Hubris of Exclusivity,” a virus that causes us to think if we have one part of the story, we have the whole story. We must be able to, as one of the Palestinian members of the organization says, be able to “fit two truths into one heart.”
Being one another’s neighbor, means seeing one another for who we are, despite the radical differences we may have. Only by doing this, Rabbi Hanan and Noor tell us, can we find peace. May it be so!
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Alex