Letter to Rabbis for a Cease Fire

By: Phyllis Chesler

Rabbis: I reach out to you, not as your sworn enemy but as a foremother. However, your recent demonstration at the UN Security Council has broken my heart. If I were blowing a shofar, something that I’ve never done, I would sound out a long Shevarim, which is the sound of a broken heart and also a cry for help.

I, and the movement in which I served, have pioneered many of the ideas that you have continued to evolve. Like you, I recognize the wisdom of Yohanan ben Zakkai who, after the destruction of the Second Temple, taught us that we must take moral responsibility for each other, speak out against injustice, especially within our own tribe. You call this “tikun olam,” repairing the world, although the phrase may also have very different meanings.

Above all, we are meant to be kind to each other.

Sisters! Brothers! You know far more Torah and Talmud than I do. Some of you have or have had congregations and have held Jewish communities together. Some of you have taught Talmud, officiated at B’nai Mitzva, weddings, and funerals. Others have written articles, books, and certainly leyned from the Torah.

Therefore, why did you, Rabbis for A Cease Fire, so inappropriately drape yourselves in tallesim as if a prayer shawl is a fashion statement, or a tried-and-true signal of a politically correct “performance?” Why blow a shofar at the UN? Is this another political prop to bolster your rabbinical identities?

Whose attention or approval do you seek?

Why did you launch a demonstration at the UN Security Council–the very place that has so dangerously, and for so long, condemned only Israel among the nations? And another demonstration at the UN General Assembly? Why not sing the prophet Isaiah’s words to Hamas and Iran, as well as to President Biden, which you did at the Security Council?

You remained masked. I cannot tell if I know any of you personally. Thus, whoever you are, why did you protest at the UN? ? As rabbis, why focus now on a “cease fire” and not focus–really focus–on the Israeli hostages or on the atrocities that Hamas committed on 10/7? Or on the Arab world’s absolute refusal to admit any Gazan civilians at risk into their countries? Why not at least mention the permanent danger of having a jihadist community on Israel’s borders?

I sighed as I watched the video of your event. I began to look for the names of rabbis who signed your October statement? I have read some of your work, you have honored and published mine, I have learned Torah from some of you as well.