Opinion

This week’s parshah begins with the story of Yaakov Avinu’s dream of the ladder ascending to heaven and the angels going up and down. At the end of the dream, G-d speaks to him. It is a promise to a man, but it foretells the history of a people. It is a lesson of profound importance in our own time.

The enemies of Israel are out in full force, pressuring Western countries into bullying the Jewish state to forget about the atrocities committed on October 7. It’s simple to recognize the ones who march on the streets and scream for Jewish blood, spray-paint genocidal slogans, don themselves in terrorist clothes, and shoot explosives at police officers.  Everyone can see that those are the bad guys.  What’s more insidious are those who sit on stages in suits, being interviewed by intellectuals, and say the exact same thing in a more politically correct way.

Election Day 2023 was another downer for Republicans nationally.  Losses in Ohio, Kentucky, and Virginia showed yet again how poorly the national GOP is doing messaging to and bringing out voters.  Once again, like in 2022, a bright spot for the Republican Party comes from the most unlikely of sources: deep-blue New York.

Last week’s parshah tells of the Akeidas Yitzchak. Its lesson for today is that the Jewish people are defined not by victimhood, but by resilience.

Rose Lubin excelled at anything she put her mind to. She left a comfortable life in the suburbs of Atlanta because she knew where she had to be. After literally saving hundreds of lives on Simchas Torah, she was killed last week at her post, while preventing a larger terrorist attack in the Old City of Jerusalem. She died doing what she loved, protecting the Land of Israel and the Jewish people. Few of us will be called on to make the sacrifice that Rose and her family made. But all of us have a responsibility to sacrifice something in this time of existential crisis.

Democratic Party Majority Leader Chuck Schumer railed against the House GOP in the Senate, claiming that the $14 billion for Israel military aid as they defend themselves against Hamas terrorism is a “joke” and “it’s dead almost before it’s born.” This would be bad enough if Schumer was a run-of-the-mill Majority Leader, even a Jewish one. What makes it despicable is that Chuck Schumer has spent nearly 50 years campaigning to the Jewish community that his name means he will be a “Shomer Yisrael,” a Guardian of Israel.