Shalom Rav

Shabbat services are definitely not the time to engage in political discourse but when Nachman, whom I like very much, voiced his approval of President Obama and expressed disdain for my feelings about the administration's policies toward Israel, I had to respond. Why do I feel Obama does not support Israel, he asked.

In the few moments before the service started I rattled off a handful of recent occurrences that could not be misinterpreted as anything but the administration's slighting and endangerment of Israeli security. It was obvious my friend (I really like this man) did not know much about recent US-Israel relations; he was speechless.

This 30 minute youtube video does a nice job of factually explaining Obama's policies toward Israel but it only goes up to 2012. The last two years have been much worse for US-Israeli relations.

I wanted to get back into the Shabbos mood and not think about politics for the next hour and a half.  It really helped when Nancy, Nachman's wife, got up from the choir to sing her beautiful version of Shalom Rav, "Abundant Peace".  Tears always gather in my eyes whenever I hear her sing this magnificent prayer for peace.  I really hope our current President, and the ones who follow him, feel the same way.

On the plus side, Nachman and I are still friends and I hope to go out with them soon for a politics-free dinner.

;-)