28-04-2025
Silence is not neutrality, it is complicity
The executive of the Jewish Democratic Initiative highlights the moral and ethical crossroads Jewish institutions face for their silence and inaction amid the policies of Israel's extremist government.
Recently the president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, Phil Rosenberg, wrote:
"The Board of Deputies is a democratic organisation. It is a broad tent, containing 300 representatives from all denominations of Judaism and spanning a wide range of political opinion. Deputies regularly speak out in public on a range of issues and often take positions which are at odds with the official policy of the Board itself."
A tolerant organisation. But not too tolerant. A few days later, Rosenberg initiated disciplinary proceedings against 36 deputies who had written a letter of dissent to the Financial Times, suspending two of the most senior members.
The Financial Times letter, written during Pesach "as we mark the festival of freedom" was couched in the mildest language: "We write out of love of Israel and deep concern for its future", it began and often repeated. The emphasis was on a mainstream Jewish issue: the collapse of the agreement to free the hostages. But the letter touched a raw nerve, best summed up by its last paragraph:
We stand against war. We acknowledge and mourn the loss of Palestinian life. We yearn for the day after this conflict when reconciliation can start.
Should we in South Africa care about this long-distant kerfuffle? We should, because the letter and the high-handed response raise an issue that affects us too: the refusal of our major Jewish institutions to utter a word of criticism against what the letter correctly described as "the most extremist of Israeli governments".
Jewish leadership in the diaspora remain largely supplicant, even though in Israel itself, hundreds of thousands, including prominent retired political and military figures, have demonstrated against that government for months.
Discreet silence
Our own Board of Deputies is among those who have chosen discreet silence. Which raises the question: Is there a red line somewhere that the government of Israel would have to cross before our board would speak up? Or is there no government action, neither word nor deed, too heinous to break the pact of silence?
The return to hostilities after the ceasefire, as the Financial Times letter points out, was a cynical ploy to end a viable and carefully brokered pact and to bring the warmongering Itamar Ben Gvir faction back into government to pass a budget and avoid defeat in new elections.
"Since then," says the letter, "no hostages have been returned. Hundreds and hundreds more Palestinians have been killed; food, fuel and medical supplies have once again been blocked from entering Gaza; and we are back in a brutal war where the killing of 15 paramedics and their burial in a mass grave is again possible and risks being normal … this most extremist of Israeli governments is openly encouraging violence against Palestinians in the West Bank, strangling the Palestinian economy and building more settlements than ever. This extremism also targets Israeli democracy, with the independence of the judicial system again under fierce attack, the police increasingly resembling a militia, and repressive laws are being advanced as provocative partisan populism is bitterly dividing Israeli society."
As the letter continues, silence is not neutrality. It has become complicity.
The inclination to avert our eyes is strong … Israel's soul is being ripped out … Silence is seen as support for policies that run contrary to our Jewish values … As we mark the festival of freedom with so many hostages still in captivity, it is our duty as Jews to speak out.
Our own Board of Deputies is well aware of its awkward silence during the apartheid era, and has apologised for failing to speak out on behalf of Jewish values. Today, the Board is at a similar crossroads, and history will judge it. Is the board on the side of Jewish values? Will it join hundreds of thousands of Israelis calling for the release of the hostages? Or will it continue to remain on the side of the "most extremist government in Israel's history"??
- The executive of the Jewish Democratic Initiative.
