Gur Ba’aretz HaZot – Live In This Land: The Wye Plantation Accords and the Future

Rabbi Gary S. Creditor

November 20, 1998

Of the three patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, only the second, Isaac lived only within the Land of Israel all his life. He was born, lived in, and died in eretz Yisrael. In tomorrow's sedra of Toldot, a famine occurs and Isaac thinks to leave for Egypt, as did his father Abraham. God says to him: "God not down into Egypt; dwell in the land which I shall tell this of. Sojourn in this land, and I will be with thee…for unto thee, and unto thy seed, I will give all these lands, and I will establish the oath which I swore unto Abraham thy father." The patriarchal blessing promised numerous offspring and the land of Yisrael. God had previously said to Abraham: "Look, north, south, east and west. Everything that you can see I give to you." Though the borders of the political kingdoms differed from time to time, the vision was that from a river in Lebanon through the Negev, from the Mediterranean to the Dead Sea was the rightful inheritance of the Children of Israel, of the Jewish people. As difficult as it was for the kings of Judea to maintain their borders has it been for the third Commonwealth to establish them.

Because the complexities of the issue are so great, and because of other differences with the Likud government of Prime Minister Netanyahu, I have mostly refrained from speaking about such matters. In the past, when yielding to temptation to speak, I often felt like a Monday morning quarterback, usually wrong. Lastly, no one has a crystal ball, least of all me, though I often asked, "Nu, rabbi, what's going to be?" Yet the convergence of tomorrow's sedra and God's prohibition of Isaac's leaving Israel, with the Wye plantation agreements, encourages me to venture an opinion, one that is certainly as equally fraught with danger as it is with promise.

The first point I wish to make: eretz Yisrael, of medinat Yisraelis central as the cradle of the Jewish people, and as a unifying force for all Jews. Even if most of the past two thousand years were spent outside of the land and without political autonomy, we lived with the dream that we had or that it would soon come to pass. Without the reality, we had the vision.

My second point: from Abraham onwards, the Children of Israel always co-existed with other peoples who lived in the land of Israel. Abraham bought the Cave of Machpela from the children of Heth, a pattern that never ceased. Isaac went to Avimelech, Philistine king in Gerar during the famine. Joshua's return found many peoples living in the land, many if not most continuing to do so.

My third point: while modern history will be told from differing viewpoints, each to substantiate the myth, the living giving story of the teller-of-the-tale, it is undeniable, that even as Jews began returning to the land of Israel in the late 1880's, others were already living there, some for many generations, and others moved there even as our people did.Even if the Turkish census reports are correct, that Jewish settlement provided the framework for others to immigrate to Palestine, it cannot eradicate the fact that an Arab today can go the burial place of his great grandfather on that land, and I cannot.

My fourth point: the rabbis taught us to read the Torah in many ways besides its literal meaning. This Torah portion and that of Lech Lecha can be read very literally, as some do. Taken in a fundamentalistic way, one could deduce that everyone who isn't Jewish should be thrown out of the Biblical borders, or at least made clearly subject to Israelite dominance, reduced to second class citizens. The Rabbanic prism, through which we receive our Judaism, is much more universalistic and humanistic. While I wasn't there to here the discussion of the framers of Israel's Declaration of Independence, they most surely rejected a fundamentalist approach, proclaiming full citizenship for everyone.

The conclusion that I reach from these points is the following. There is a Jewish fantasy, which I felt and even partook in while living in Israel in 1968 – 1969. There is a map of this large country, in some dreams, stretching from the Suez Canal, truncated by the peace treaty with Egypt, but at least to the Lebanese border and from Sea to Sea, Mediterranean to Dead, and no one is there but us. But that is a fantasy. It is a lie. The leaders like Yigal Alon who wanted Israel to face reality over thirty years ago, when it was accessible, when it was easy, before all the additional bloodshed, were scorned. The fantasy must yield to reality.

The reality is that there are two peoples, relatives from ancient stock that live in the land, which their father was promised. These two peoples, like their ancestors, are very different. The two separated at birth, never were one, and never will be. And neither can deny the existence of the other. In tomorrow's Torah portion Rebecca is pregnant with twins that struggled within her. God tells her that two peoples will separate from her. One will be Esau and the other Jacob. Esau will follow in the line from Yishmael, Abraham's son through Hagar, and Jacob, who will become Israel, will follow the line from Isaac, Abraham's son through Sarah. Yishmael cannot deny Isaac, and Isaac cannot deny the existence of Yishmael. Jacob cannot dispute the existence of Esau, and Esau cannot deny the existence of Jacob. They siblings and cousins, all descendants of one father, Avraham Avinu, Abraham, our collective father.

Who knows what one really harbors in their heart? When Esau and Jacob will meet after many years of separation, Esau kisses his brother. There are dots over the word "and he kissed him." The Rabbis argue: he did not kiss him whole heartedly, or, despite earlier hatred, on the contrary, he was aroused to genuine feeling. What is the Arab voice? That of Hamas; that of the Arab in Israel's borders since 1948; those who build Israel's cities? What is the Israeli voice? Those who want to pretend that Arabs don't exist; that donates a heart for an Arab child? That creates co-operative ventures for mutual understanding? When Esau kissed Jacob, how did he feel? When Jacob was kissed, how did he feel? Could they set aside fantasies, which mutually excluded each other, or find a way to coexist?

I pray that both Israel and the Palestinians completely implement the Wye Plantation Accords, but even more so, create a vision which their forefathers only touched upon, that two, always being two, will yield to each other, in recognition, even if not in love, and live in peace. There must be enough room in this ancient land for two of the most ancient relatives, to cease their struggling. Both peoples need the prophet Malachi's promise, a covenant, brit hachayyim v'hashalom, a covenant of life and a covenant of peace. May both feel that the vision is worth the risk. May the promise of life and peace come soon, speedily in our day.

Amen.