Page 35 - Why Israel?
P. 35
Rabbi Abraham Heschel, a close friend and supporter of Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. during the Civil Rights era, was an influential American Jewish leader who advocated for the unbroken rights of the Jewish people to their bib- lical homeland:
“The Jewish people has never ceased to assert its right, its title, to the land of Israel. This continuous, uninterrupted insistence, an intimate ingredient of Jewish consciousness, is at the core of Jewish history, a vital element of Jewish faith.”9
Jewish immigrants walk to Palestine in 1930.
Palestine began to prosper as Jewish returnees cultivated the land, eliminated disease-infested swamps, and brought a higher standard of living and more economic opportunity to the area.8 A beautiful thing was taking place—the Arab population grew and flourished alongside their Jewish neighbors, and for a time the two groups co-existed peacefully.
Rabbi Joshua Heschel presents the Judaism and World Peace award to Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1965.
8 David Brog, Reclaiming Israel’s History: Roots, Rights and the Struggle for Peace (Regnery Publishing: 2017), 61-81.
9 “Israel,” The Heschel School, https://www.heschel.org/the-heschel-experience/israel
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(Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons)
(Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons)
