Israel

Yom HaZikaron: Israel’s Fallen Heroes and Us

Rabbi Natan Trief
The day is a gut-wrenching one, and yet one profoundly important in the life of a country. It is a day when we let the pain in, when we listen to and internalize the myriad stories, when we understand that their fight is also our fight.

Contested Utopia: Jewish Dreams and Israeli Realities

Rabbi Robert Orkand
Growing up in the years following the founding of the State of Israel, I, like so many of my generation, was taught that the new Jewish state was the fulfillment of a utopian dream: a Jewish homeland after almost 2000 years of exile. It would be a refuge for persecuted diaspora Jews and its governance guided by Jewish values.