Highlighting: “Brick by Brick: Building an Ahavas Yisrael Mindset One Story at a Time” by Joan Zlotnick and Grunny Zlotnick. Mosaica Press. 2023. English. Hardcover. 264 pages. ISBN-13: 978-1957579948.
“Brick by Brick: Building an Ahavas Yisrael Mindset One Story at a Time” is a book I co-edited with my daughter-in-law, Grunny Zlotnick. Published by Mosaica Press, it’s a collection of stories, most of them written by Jews who have had encounters with Jews unlike themselves, which have been eye-opening and in some instances life-changing. The underlying message of the book, as suggested by the title, is that through connection and acts of kindness to our fellow Jews, however small, each of us can participate in hastening the arrival of the Geula, which, among other things, will bring an end to the the persecutions we have experienced as Jews and usher in a period of peace.
Since we began writing it, many things have happened that make the message of the book more relevant than ever. When we started the project, during the COVID epidemic, we were especially concerned about the strife among Jews brought on by the differing approaches and outlooks. As time went on, we were distressed by the divisiveness of Israelis over judicial reform, especially the increasingly heated rhetoric and violent confrontations between protesters and the police.
Things changed radically following October 7. There was an enormous outpouring of achdut. Jews of every stripe rallied together in the wake of the horrific event. My daughter-in-law and I were eager to build on this momentum by getting word out about our book. Fast forward a few short months: We are beginning to see a deterioration of that unity as Israeli politicians and citizens are once again at loggerheads over the course of the war. Protesters are demanding the return of the hostages and an end to Haredi draft exemptions. Sephardi Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef recently said that, if drafted, the Haredim will leave the country There is, moreover, divisiveness in the war cabinet and calls for early elections.
As for American Jews, the erosion of strong support for Israel in the wake of October 7 has been disheartening and the spread of antisemitism alarming. Most astounding to some has been the realization of how deeply antisemitism is embedded in our universities.
As a retired professor of English at Brooklyn College, I have known this for over two decades. Early in my academic career, as organizer of the UJA Luncheons, I was able to recruit many secular Jews from my department to attend. As time went on, the numbers dwindled, until only one person signed up for the annual event. She was an Italian Catholic. Following the Sabarro suicide bombing in 2002, I was told by a Jewish colleague that the problem of terrorism could be quickly resolved if the Jews picked up and moved somewhere else. As unbelievable as it sounds, she was not alone among my colleagues in embracing this view. My last vote before I retired 12 years ago, was against the promotion to full professor of a Palestinian who was grossly unqualified, but whom my radical colleagues were eager to promote. It would be a feather in their cap to have the first Palestinian full professor in the college, thus confirming the department’s status as the most radical on campus. I was, as expected, the only faculty member in the department to cast a negative vote. Sadly, but predictably, it didn’t make a difference.
Moreover, with grandchildren on five college campuses—MIT, Sara Lawrence, University of Chicago, Yale and Columbia—some more antisemitic than others, but all antisemitic to one extent or another—I know from a different perspective how challenging it is for young Jewish students to deal with the threats they face on a daily basis. My grandson at Columbia, arguably the worst of these campuses, is debating whether to transfer out. The extent of hatred towards Israel and Jews and its perniciousness has been shocking to many who have had no affiliations with college campuses, but it has neither surprised nor shocked me.
What can we here in America do in view of the horrific events of the last few months in the Middle East and the unimaginable upsurge of antisemitism closer to home? We have upped our tzedaka, joined Tehillim groups, attended rallies, collected and shipped food, clothing and medication to those displaced from their homes or defending our homeland, and gone on missions to Israel to support our fellow Jews. Jewish philanthropists have stopped supporting many colleges; college presidents who have done nothing to protect Jewish students from intimidation on campus have been forced out of office: the number of applicants at many top universities has fallen precipitously.
I think there is something more we can do. It’s more abstract than any of the measures described above: It’s adopting a mindset of ahavas Yisrael. It is this, we are told again and again, that will bring on the Geula, which is something we desperately need now.
When the so-called civilized world questions our right to defend ourselves against our monstrous enemies, questions the claim of the Jewish people to their homeland, and pressures us to reward the vile and despicable acts of October 7; when we see before our very eyes antisemitism, described by Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, zt”l, as a sickness that never goes away, mutating, emerging in new forms, changing with the social, economic and political climate, it becomes clear that this is a plague we have not and cannot, despite every effort, bring to an end on our own. When we feel that never again is now, we have to consider bringing Hashem in as our partner: doing what He has promised us will be the reward when we take seriously the obligation to love our fellow Jew.
This doesn’t mean that we stop doing everything possible to fight the scourge of hatred and violence with all the resources we have, but this is something additional we can do. If it was sinas chinam that brought about the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash and sent the Jews into exile, it is its opposite, the embrace of our fellow Jews, that will bring about the Geulah, and, with it, the end our exile and suffering and the restoration of our people to its place of honor among nations.
Little did I know when my daughter-in-law approached me about doing a book on ahavas Yisrael how involved and passionate I would become on the subject. As the project got underway, I reached out to find contributors, edited and occasionally wrote stories told to me, and wrote two of my own. I was deeply moved by all the inspiring stories I heard from the contributors. I learned about unlikely encounters with Jews with different outlooks and lifestyles with whom they developed meaningful and sometimes deep connections. I learned not only about these encounters, but also about some amazing individuals and organizations dedicated to building bridges between Jews.
These stories moved me in a way that books or stories about the gedolim do not. These were not about exalted figures whom we cannot imagine emulating, but about ordinary people like us. The contributors are themselves an eclectic group, professional and first-time authors, rabbis and laymen, religious and secular, Modern Orthodox, Conservative, black hat, Chasidim, Americans and Israelis. Taken together, the pieces weave a tapestry of different kinds of Jews and organizations, showing that, despite our differences, we are one people.
Some of these stories were paired together and presented under the rubric of Acts and Impacts. One of these, by Shelly Mohl, is about the founding and mission of the Yeshiva of Manhattan Beach, in Brooklyn, and the impact that school had on one of its pupils, a starving and desperate child, who claims that her life was saved by the kind and loving acts of its administrators and faculty. One of the pieces I wrote, “The Power of Chabad,” was paired with a story by Rabbi Boruch Jacobson, who describes his upbringing and Chabad’s philosophy about reaching out to their fellow Jews. My story details the ways in which he brought enormous comfort and joy to my husband, z’l—to his fellow residents, and to me—when my husband, no longer able to stay at home, was living in a cognitive support facility.
Besides Shelly Mohl, many other members of the Fort Lee and Teaneck communities were contributors. Rabbi Zev Goldberg wrote about our need to accept converts into our hearts and homes; Nora Horn about two Ethiopian Jewish girls she hosted and the achdut that motivated Israel’s remarkable rescue of Ethiopian Jews in Operations Moses and Solomon; and Yitz Berger about his Jewish motorcycle club. One Fort Lee resident described her long history with a HASC camper who became an integral part of her family; and Sonja Nadritch wrote about the Jewish Culture Club she established in a Staten Island public school. There are accounts by Ani Herman, Joan Katz and Myra Genn, describing the unexpected kindness of fellow Jews unlike themselves, and by Dena Levie about the founding of Momentum, an organization established to enrich the spiritual life of Jewish mothers, which was paired with Michelle Mandelbaum’s piece about the life-altering experience that organization had on her. Iris and Elie Borger shared a heartwarming story about a Shabbos spent with many different kinds of Jews, and Aviva Breda wrote a moving piece about her kidney donation. Eitan and Rina Epstein’s story “We Are All Connected” sums up what our book is all about.
It was Grunny’s idea to include pieces about the efforts of particular individuals and organizations to build bridges between religious communities, and she put in endless hours pursuing this angle. One of these powerful stories detailed the backstory of the most recent Siyum HaShas at MetLife Stadium. In the years of planning that went into the event, which drew 90,000 Jews, accommodations were made to meet the needs of every person in attendance and make him or her feel like an important and valued member of the Jewish community.
At this dark time in our history, these stories uplift and inspire us. They teach us that there is something important we can do in addition to all our other efforts to bring a decisive victory to Israel and an end to the scourge of antisemitism. Through our own interactions with our fellow Jews we can hasten the arrival of the Geula. If not us, who? If not now, when?
Joan Zlotnick is a retired professor of English whose recent publications include a novel, “Griefwriting”; a column on caregiving and grief in Mishpacha Magazine; articles in Aish and Binah; and a memoir, “Holding it Together: Surviving Caregiving and Grief.” She and her daughter-in-law, Grunny Zlotnick, are co-editors of The Ahavas Yisrael File, which is currently in press.
