TAKING AN AXE TO JEWISH VALUES April 24, 2026
If we Jews are “the chosen people,” I doubt it was God’s purpose that an Israeli soldier in southern Lebanon smash a statue of Jesus with an axe.
That horrific act happened in the beginning of the week. A “stunned and saddened” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu immediately stated that action would be taken. A day later, the soldier who wielded the axe and the soldier who took his photo were sentenced to thirty days in jail. The IDF replaced the damaged statue with a new one.
The destruction of the statue represents one of many inflection points as Israel, this past Tuesday, celebrated Yom Haatzmaut—Independence Day.
Where now?
On Tuesday night, Yom Hazikaron—Memorial Day—concluded and Yom Haatzmaut began. I attended a talk at Congregation Sherith Israel about Israel’s future. Our senior rabbi, Jessica Graf, chatted with Zack Bodner, CEO of the Oshman Family Jewish Community Center in Palo Alto and founder of the Z3 Project.
Divisions exist among Israelis, among Diaspora Jews, and between Israel and the Diaspora. Zionism 3.0® promotes Israel and the Diaspora working together to build a better, shared future.
Bodner defines Zionism 1.0 as pre-1948 Israel and Zionism 2.0 beginning when the state was declared in May 1948. My version of Zionism 3.0 blends with the Z3 project: Israel must decide if it will define itself solely by ethnicity or strengthen its democracy and protect minorities while retaining its Jewish identity.
I stand for democracy in a secure Jewish state that respects the rights of its non-Jewish citizens. More of the same far-right destruction of West Bank Palestinian communities and a denial of Palestinian self-determination will only continue the “Ground Hog Day” effect: ongoing terrorism, war and separation from the world community.
Only by recognizing the rights of Palestinians to have their own state on the West Bank and, eventually, in Gaza. can Israel play its part in ending the turmoil from which it suffers.
A tall order? Welcome to the Middle East. But tall doesn’t mean impossible.
As to the fracture between Israel and the Diaspora, there’s an old saying, Am Yisrael echad. The people Israel are one. Division counters one of Judaism’s key beliefs.
The tenets of Judaism—not cherry-picked but understood in their complexity—must come into play. This week, we read a double Torah portion. Kedoshim (“You shall be holy’) offers Leviticus 19:18: “… love your neighbor as your own self; I am the Lord” (translation: the late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks).
Are Jews to love only Jews? No. Deuteronomy 23:8 states, “Do not despise an Edomite, for he is your kin. Do not despise an Egyptian, for you lived as a stranger in his land” (translation: Sacks).
But didn’t Egypt enslave Israel?
Rabbi Sacks: “If the Israelites continued to hate their erstwhile enemies, Moshe [Moses] would have succeeded in taking the Israelites out of Egypt, but he would have failed to take Egypt out of the Israelites. Mentally, they would still be there, slaves to the past, prisoners of their memories.”
Too many Palestinians fixate on the past in detriment to their future. Israelis should not replicate that intellectual and emotional blindness.
Perhaps assaulting the statue of Jesus will open some eyes and urge all parties to pursue peace—and stop taking an axe to human decency.
To understand the background of today’s far-right, authoritarian descent, read my new novel, RIDE THE TYGER. Order from Amazon, barnesandnoble.com, iuniverse.com, or your favorite bookstore.
From your computer to …
I do have a direct line, Ellen, but service is spotty.
I thought there was something naive about Zack Bodner’s presentation. I’m all for dialogue, coming together wit people with who you disagree and trying to understand their story. But what is there to “understand” about destroying a statue of Jesus, or uprooting Palestinian families’ ancient olive groves and destroying their homes in the name of a messianic vision of recreating King David’s kingdom? These are a perversion of everything I thought Judaism stands for, and it’s hard for me to hear whatever “narrative” explains them.
The answers were not there, David. This is Zack’s position. Conversation around the edges may or may not have an effect. But real awareness of the violation of Jewish ethics mixed with bad geopolitics must be pointed out.
Getting settlers out of the West Bank could create quite a sqabble.
And that, David, is an understatement. But absorbing the West Bank into Israel will bring untold problems. A conundrum.
Israel has three choices: allow the creation of a legitimate Palestinian state; annex the West Bank, but not allow the Palestinians to be citizens (apartheid); or annex the West Bank and expel the Palestinians (ethnic cleansing). There is a fourth option: Annex the West Bank and let the Palestinians become Israeli citizens, but that destroy Israel as a Jewish state.
Indeed, David. And only the first choice, made with appropriate safeguards, will enable a long-term peace.
I was neither particularly saddened nor surprised by the destruction of the crucifix. Why should we expect IDF soldiers to be exempt from normal religious passions? The destruction of enemy religious symbols and places of worship has an ancient history: the destruction of pagan shrines and images during the initial Jewish conquest of the Canaan, the Babylonian and Roman destructions of the Temple, the Taliban destruction of the two Buddhas of Bamiyan, and iconoclasm among Christians—to name just a few. I found it more interesting that that the soldiers were immediately tried and punished, in contrast to the IDF’s widespread failure to prevent or punish Settler violence and property destruction in Judah and Samaria. But the Crucifix incident was public and embarrassing and the Settler violence is hidden, less reported, and probably more in line with the long-range plans of many in the Israeli government.
I expect the IDF and Israel to act on a higher level, Ron–for religious, ethical and pragmatic reasons. I’d also like to see Hamas and Hezbollah abandon their desire to kill Jews and destroy Israel. I don’t hear many calls for that, though.