Out of Egypt

Thursday night we went to a talk at the AACI by Rabbi Michael Melchior, who is a well known Israeli politician and scion of a distinguished family of Scandinavian Rabbis. His grandfather was Rabbi of Denmark during WWII and he himself is still Chief Rabbi of Norway as well as being a member of the Israeli Knesset. He is a leader of the Meimad faction of the Labor Party, which is the religious group of Labor members, so it is an unusual grouping in contrast to the usual right wing religious MKs. Melchior is also Chairman of the Knesset Education Committee, as well as being on other Committees, and he is a former Cabinet member.
He was here to honor our friend Aron Korzen, who is a lawyer and long-time activist on social affairs in Netanya and formerly twice President of Netanya AACI. Aron is also a member and supporter of Meimad. Although I disagree fundamentally with Aron's liberal-left views, I respect his integrity and commitment to his principles.
Melchior spoke extrtemely well, the coherent presentation of a professional speaker. Being a Rabbi of course his talk was laced with Biblical quotations and allusions. His theme was that coming to Israel physically is not enough for a true Zionist, being here must also be a moral commitment to the betterment of the county and to our fellow human beings, Jews and non-Jews alike. He likened this to "coming out of Egypt," namely physically coming out of Egypt is not enough, but one must count oneself as morally and ethically coming out of a place of moral degradation to a place of moral betterment. This is a constant struggle for the Jewish soul.
He particularly bemoaned the constant cutting of the education budget in Israel that has reduced Israeli education from one of the best 20 years ago to one of the worst in the developed world. He also castigated Israel for the treatment of the Arabs of East Jerusalem, who were incorporated into Israel after 1967, but who have been neglected and ignored by successive governments.
Of course, one can agree that education and social welfare needs more funding without necessarily agreeing with his whole political position in principle. For example, as I pointed out to him afterwards, you can give as much money to education as you like, but some people will not try to better themselves. Some peoples are naturally industrious, such as Jews and Asians, and will better themselves whatever the circumstances, while some others are content to accept their lot, such as the Blacks and Arabs. Certainly there are some outstanding Black American individuals (such as Ed Bradley, who unfortunately died yesterday), but generally speaking Blacks do not do well educationally, even with the best of opportunities (there are reputed to be more young Black men in prison than in University). Note that I do not blame this on the color of their skin, but on their cultural predilections, and I recognize that this in not a "politically correct" opinion.
Palestinians are still living in camps after 60 years, not only kept there by their own Arab brothers, but also by their own sense of victimhood. They would prefer to blame the Jews than to try to better themselves by their own efforts. If any people could blame their oppressors if would be the Jews after WWII, but what did we do, instead we founded a State and in 60 years made it prosperous on a par with European countries. Such is the difference between peoples, and such is the limitation of the social welfare mentality.