Advertisement To End The Slaughter In Israel, Lebanon And Gaza
READ the ad we ran in the New York Times on 7/31. With your help, we can reprint it in the Washington Post and
newspapers in Israel, Palestine, and Lebanon. It can only happen if you donate now.
Explanatory Note:
We at Tikkun and the Network of Spiritual Progressives ask you to join our effort to place ads in national and
international newspapers calling for an end to the slaughter in Lebanon, Israel and the Occupied Territories—and to use
this moment not only to create a temporary cease fire, but to resolve all outstanding issues between the various parties
in the Middle East. We are calling upon the international community to foster a new approach to resolving conflicts. We
approach these issues from our commitment to a “Progressive Middle Path,” recognizing that in the context of the past
120 years, both sides have legitimate grievances and both sides have acted with insensitivity and cruelty toward the
other. We do not accept that one side is the “righteous victim” and the other side the “evil aggressor.” But we do
recognize that at this moment Israel has far greater military power, and so we ask for Israel to take the first steps
toward ending the cycle of hatred and violence, even as we condemn Hezbollah for initiating the current escalation of
violence.
We hope to put this ad in newspapers in Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, and the United States (starting with
the New York Times and The Washington Post, both because the U.S. has a large role to play in bringing about a
resolution to the conflict and because we are hopeful that ads in these newspapers will help us raise money to buy ads
in other media).
If you agree with the ad, please sign on. We are hoping to be able to list everyone who signs, but space may constrain
us to only list those who can afford to donate at least $300 toward the publications of these ads, and even that we
can’t absolutely promise. However, if you endorse this ad but can’t afford to donate that much, whatever you can afford
will be very helpful. So please click on the link below so that we can collect signatures which we will present to the
U.S. Congress.
We’ve agonized about the enormous expense of this effort, but in the end we decided that we have no choice: this
perspective has been almost entirely blocked out by the Western media. Over the course of the past few weeks, every
attempt we’ve made to reach the media—either in press statements, speaking to journalists and TV reporters, or by
publishing op-eds—have been denied. We believe that it could be a huge contribution toward strengthening the peace and
reconciliation forces around the world to communicate that there are many of us in the U.S., Canada, Israel, and
Palestine as well as many Jews, Muslims and Christians and people of other faith communities who reject the dominant
assumptions of the contemporary discourse about the Middle East and how best to fight terrorism. So, we are now asking
you to join us in stretching your wallet and digging very deep to help us get this ad published. If you know people with
money, or are on foundation boards that might act quickly to support the ad, please approach them immediately. And
please send this request for support to everyone you know.
If, before we raise the money, a cease-fire is put in place, we will then use the money to print the second part of the
ad, focused on the demand that the international community should use this moment to go beyond a cease-fire and borders
with Lebanon to address the central issue of an Israeli/Palestinian final settlement agreement. Other than that, it’s
too late to make other changes in this ad—besides copy edits (which we will make)—because people are already signing on
to this ad just as it is.
Many blessings for a world of peace, kindness, generosity and love.
Rabbi Michael Lerner
Editor, Tikkun Magazine and Chair, The Network of Spiritual Progressives (www.spiritualprogressives.org). Author: The
Left Hand of God: Taking Back our Country from the Religious Right
* If you read the ad and think, how on earth will this fit onto one page, we have a preliminary PDF version on our
website www.tikkun.org
STOP THE SLAUGHTER IN LEBANON, ISRAEL AND THE OCCUPIED TERRITORIES!
Convene an International Middle East Peace
Conference to Impose a Final Settlement on All Parties
In the name of our sisters and brothers suffering and dying in Lebanon, Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories,
we, the undersigned religious leaders, scholars, academics, cultural leaders, poets, writers, philanthropists, social
change activists, and citizens of the world demand that the Israeli government, leaderships of Hezbollah and Hamas, the
U.S. Government, the international community and the United Nations immediately take the following steps to stop the war
in these countries:
1. We demand that the Israeli government immediately halt its attacks on Lebanon. We join with the Israeli peace
movement (and the thousands of Israelis who demonstrated against this war in Tel Aviv July 22, 2006) in their insistence
that these attacks are utterly disproportionate to the initial provocation by Hezbollah, have killed innumerable
innocent civilians, displaced half a million people, have destroyed billions of dollars of Lebanon's infrastructure, and
will not, in the long run, secure peace or security for Israel. We also call on the Israeli government to supply food,
electricity, water and funds to repair the humanitarian crisis caused by its invasion of Gaza. By endorsing Israel's
attacks, and explicitly giving it time to do more damage to the people of Lebanon, the U.S. government became party to
this violence, which, together with American military actions in Iraq, are sure to create enmity towards the U.S. and
Israel in the Muslim world for generations to come.
2. We demand that Hezbollah and Hamas immediately stop shelling or otherwise engaging in violence against Israel. These
actions, which have killed numerous Israeli civilians, terrorized the people of Israel and destroyed many cities, played
a central role in provoking the current crisis, and do nothing but harm the cause of Palestinian and Lebanese
independence and democracy. It is this kind of violence which has over the years pushed many decent Israelis into the
hands of its most militaristic and paranoid political leaders.
3. We demand that the U.S. government, and governments around the world, call on Israel, Hezbollah and Hamas to observe
an immediate cease-fire, place an immediate embargo on all shipments of weapons to all parties in the war (including
Syria and Iran), and join an international conference to provide security on the border between Israel and Lebanon.
These are the minimum steps necessary to stop the violence and the humanitarian disaster in southern Lebanon and the
Gaza Strip. But alone they will not ensure that the region doesn’t return to an untenable status quo which will again
eventually break into violence and new rounds of warfare.
We therefore also issue:
A call for Lasting Peace
We call upon the international community to hold an International Peace Conference to impose a fair and lasting solution
to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and to the conflict between Israel and other states in the region. Why do we say
“impose”? There are too many forces in each country in the region who are committed to continuing this struggle forever.
Their provocations will continue until the international community stops the violence once and for all and imposes
conditions of peace that will allow the peace and reconciliation forces in each country to flourish.
Such a solution would be based on the following conditions:
a. The creation of an economically and politically viable Palestinian state (roughly on the pre-1967 borders with minor
border modifications mutually agreed upon between Israel and Palestine); and simultaneously the full and unequivocal
recognition by Palestinians and the State of Palestine and all surrounding Arab states of the right of Israel to exist
as a Jewish state offering full and equal rights to all of its non-Jewish citizens.
b. An international consortium to provide reparations for Palestinians who have lost home or property from 1947 to the
present and reparations for Jewish refugees from Arab states from 1947-1967;
c. A long term international peacekeeping force to separate Hezbollah and Israel in southern Lebanon and to protect
Israel and Palestine from each other and from other forces in the region who might seek to control or destroy either
state;
d. The quick imposition of robust sanctions against any party that refuses to sign or violates these agreements.
A New Spirit of Open-Heartedness and Reconciliation
We know that no political solution can work without a change of consciousness that minimally includes an
open-heartedness and willingness to recognize the humanity of the Other, and to repent and atone for the long history of
insensitivity and cruelty to the other side.
Both sides must take immediate steps to stop the discourse of violence and demeaning of the other in their media, their
religious institutions, and their school text books and educational systems. They should implement this by creating a
joint authority with each other and with moral leaders in the international community who can supervise and if necessary
replace those in positions of power in both societies who continue to use public institutions in their respective
societies to spread hatred or nurture anger at the other.
Once the other parts of a lasting peace have been set in place, we call upon the parties to this struggle to launch a
Truth and Reconciliation Commission, following the model used in South Africa.
Use This Moment to Challenge the Paranoid and Cynical “Political Realism” That Generates Endless Wars
The paranoid and allegedly “realistic” version of global politics asserts that we live in a world in which our safety
can only be achieved through domination—or others will seek to dominate us first. Of course, when we act on this
assumption, it becomes self-fulfilling.
We propose, instead, a strategy of generosity—to act on the assumption that people have an enormous capacity for
goodness and generosity (without negating the truth that certain conditions promote fear, anger and hatred which
sometimes get expressed in horribly destructive ways). For the U.S. and other G8 countries, we call for a Global
Marshall Plan: For each of the next twenty years, the U.S. and other G8 countries should dedicate 5% of their Gross
Domestic Product to eliminating global (and domestic) hunger, homelessness, poverty, inadequate health care and
inadequate education for the peoples of the world. This would have to be carefully monitored and apportioned in ways
that ensure the care reaches the people for whom it was intended. But what is critical is the spirit in which it is
done.
Similarly, we urge Israel to not only return to its 1967 borders (with minor border modifications mutually agreed upon
including a sharing of Jerusalem and of its holy sites) but to do so in a spirit of generosity and caring for the other
before it is forced to return to those borders by the international community and before thousands more young Israelis
and Palestinians die in these senseless wars that will otherwise continue in the coming years.
The only protection that we in the advanced industrial countries of the world can ever really have for our lives is to
spread a spirit of love so powerful and genuine that it becomes capable of reducing the anger that has justifiably
developed against the powerful and the wealthy of the world.
The “cynical realists” claim that others are entrenched in their hatred, and that war and domination is the only way to
battle them. This kind of thinking has led to five thousand years of people fighting wars in order to “end all wars”—and
it has not worked. It’s time now to try a new strategy of generosity, both economic generosity and generosity of spirit.
As stated above, there will first have to be a transitional period in which real military protections are available to
people on all sides of the struggle. But by beginning now to simultaneously commit our economic resources and change the
way that we talk about those who we previously designated as “enemies,” we can begin the long process of thawing out
angers that have existed for many generations.
Nothing can redeem the death and suffering that all sides have faced in this struggle for the past 120 years. But this
very moment could be the time in which the human race realizes the futility of violence and comes together not only to
impose a lasting solution for the Middle East, but to begin a new era and recognize that our own well-being depends on
the well-being of everyone else on the planet. The International Middle East Peace Conference should be structured to
achieve this end—which means it should have an explicit psychological and spiritual dimension and a visionary agenda.
We affirm the Sacredness of All Human Beings. This is the moment to begin to make that real. The UN raised these
possibilities 61 years ago, but relied on political arrangements and fell into politicizing every issue. We need to
strengthen international institutions that move in a new direction, but we also need a commitment of the heart from
everyone on the planet. Our own countries must take the lead in a whole new approach to security and well-being. This
may be the last chance we in the advanced industrial societies have to avoid international catastrophe by modeling
something else besides brute power, military might, and indifference to the well-being of others. If not now, when?
Unrealistic? Nope. What has proved unrealistic time and again—whether we are talking about US policy in Vietnam and Iraq
or Israeli and Arab policies in the Middle East—is the fantasy that one more war will put an end to wars. The path to
peace must be a path of peace.
Religious and spiritual leaders are also making a global call for ten days of prayer and fasting toward the aim of
peace, reconciliation, and ending violence, beginning July 27th and continuing through August 6th.
Signed by
(Space permitting, your name and identification, plus the names of hundreds of others.)
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This Ad sponsored by TIKKUN: A Bimonthly Jewish Critique of Politics, Culture and Society
The Network of Spiritual Progressives (www.spiritualprogressives.org), and
The Shalom Center (www.shalomctr.org)
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