I believe we should always protest against injustice whenever and wherever it occurs, including in Iran. I never wrote anywhere that we should not speak out against the beating of protesters in Iran. I did however write that it would be wrong for our country to meddle in their politics, which is very different. (By the way, Israel does indeed use violence against protesters – read my earlier post on the weekly non-violent demonstration in Ni’ilin, for instance.)

Your Iran-Israel comparison is unhelpful and misleading. Israel is the beneficiary of billions of dollars of military aid from the US, which means I am financially implicated in its actions. Israel is also a Jewish state, and it purports to act in the name of Jews everywhere. I would say that gives American Jews the right, if not the responsibility, to urge our country to pressure Israel politically when it acts unjustly.

As for your Biblical justifications: I believe you are wrong. I challenge you to find a Biblical quote anywhere that says God gives the Israelites the “right” to the land of Israel. It says nothing of the kind. God tells Israel that they will have a future on the land if they are worthy of it: if they act justly, extend one law for all the inhabitants, if they do not oppress their neighbor. (If you are tempted here to cite the commandments to wipe the Canaanite inhabitants, I would only say that verses such as this represent the human voice of cruelty, not God.)

From the point of view of the Torah, no one has a “right” to any piece of land. The Torah repeatedly makes it clear that the land belongs to God. The question is not who has the right to the land, but how can we extend equal rights to all who dwell on the land.

also, as G-d tells Abraham, Isacc, Moses and many, many other prophets in the Torah, The Jewish people have a right to a jewish state in Israel just as the the Muslims have a right to have Muslim states in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, and many other countries.

I am no Mordecai Kaplan expert, but I believe that Kaplan was careful to use words and phrases for God that retained that idea that God has dominion over us, not the other way around.

!!!

Actually, the traditional view holds that the covenant is between the people of Israel and GOD. (Could the JPost be advocating a quasi-pagan re-reading of the covenant?)

Further, according to traditional covenantal theology, the Children of Israel will only have a future in the land if they uphold their covenant with God. In other words, we can only dwell in the land if we prove ourselves worthy of it.

Food for thought…