Parashat Bamidbar: The Imperative to Provide Refuge

My father’s family were refugees from Vienna, who fled just before World War II broke out, but not before my grandfather had been deported to Dachau. He remained incarcerated there from November 13, 1938, until January 19, 1939. He knew he had to leave Austria with his family. But leaving wasn’t easy. First, it meant...
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Not By Might: My Israel/Palestine

I am starting to write this from a cramped seat on an El Al flight to join the Center for Jewish NonViolence action from May 14-23 in the West Bank. I’ve been asked to drash Beha’alotecha in light of this trip, but, full disclosure, I have to write now because there won’t be enough time after...
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Be the Window

The window – where the dove returns with an olive branch –  is about hope and connection. The window is an escape from the crushing waves of the endless news cycle of fear and violence. The window is a possibility of change – of redemption.
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Stop Torture Now: A Complete Rabbinic Sourcebook

This is T’ruah’s primary resource booklet on government-sponsored torture, originally published in 2005. It includes the shorter versions of Rabbi Melissa Weintraub’s articles on torture and Jewish law, insertions for High Holidays services, materials for study and discussion, and the original public letter to the Bush Administration, signed by over 800 rabbis and cantors. The full-length versions...
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Signposts for a Troubling Future

Visiting Hebron, one of the first impressions that hits like a sucker-punch to the stomach is of a ghost town. Streets once bustling with thousands of Palestinians are now traversed almost exclusively by Israeli soldiers and settlers. Freedom of movement is squashed. Palestinian doors are welded shut and porches are caged in, ostensibly to protect...
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Migrants on God’s Land

That’s how I found myself chanting and marching, yelling to children that they were not forgotten, that they were loved – while holding the hand of my youngest son, whom I love so much it hurts. Having a child is like letting your heart walk around outside of your body.
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Photo of the author, Yael Marans

Naso: The Burdens We Cannot See

For me, acknowledging what I cannot see lies at the heart of community building. It helps me feel connected to the humanity of people in my circles and in the broader world, as ultimately the invisible heaviness of experience is one of the things that I know to be true of being human.
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Weak Eyes

As Jacob meets Rachel and Leah, the text shares a rare visual description of both women. We learn that Rachel is beautiful and Leah’s eyes are “weak.” The word describing Leah’s eyes, “rakot,” can also be translated as tender, soft, or gentle. It is difficult to determine if Leah’s eyes are an impairment or a...
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No More Sarahs

Last April, I traveled to Washington D.C. to visit my son at college. Georgetown University is a great place and, by all accounts, safe. We were in the bookstore when, suddenly, the entire student center was on lockdown. A policeman explained that the night before two students had been robbed at gunpoint outside the business...
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