Kosher Bookworm: A graphic history lesson of the Jews of Hebron

The Kosher Bookworm

by Alan Jay Gerber

Issue of November 20, 2009/ 3 Cheshvan 5770

This past Shabbat we read the Torah portion of Chayei Sarah, the parsha deals with the passing of our first matriarch, Sarah.

We read of the ordeal that Abraham experienced in his effort to acquire a proper burial site for his wife. Through this narrative, we witness the first territorial link of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel, a link that has served as the prime physical basis for our claim to the land as our ancestral home.

However, a simple claim is far from what Hebron has come to represent. This essay will focus on a new study that gives this story a fair, yet objective, presentation of the history, the personalities, and the issues that have made both the town and the Jews of Hebron, the focus of so must negativity.

We are treated to one of the most comprehensive histories on this topic in “Hebron Jews: Memory and Conflict in the Land of Israel” [Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2009], by Jerold S. Auerbach, a professor of history at Wellesley College.

The author begins with a basic premise: the Jews of Hebron are among the most reviled Jews in the world, not only by many non-Jews, but also by their fellow Jews, both foreign and native Israelis. The reasoning behind this premise, while not fully answered in this book, is given full play. It is not for lack of effort that this attitude has defied both definition and rational explanation. It must be sadly admitted that it is the irrational that indeed does defy interpretation.

“Hebron Jews” spans from time immemorial, beginning with Abraham’s receiving his command from G-d to settle the Land of Israel and the purchase of the Cave of Machpelah. The book includes King David’s decision to make Hebron the capital of Judea for seven years prior to his move to Jerusalem, a legacy that has made Hebron the second most holy city in Judaism, a fact conveniently forgotten by many today.

However, the most poignant chapter in this book is chapter four, aptly titled  “catastrophe.” This chapter deals with the notorious Hebron Massacre of August 1929, a pogrom whose 80th anniversary was commemorated this past summer.

Because of this atrocity the Jews of Hebron became marginalized from their rightful domicile in their native town and thus became further marginalized by both gentiles and secular Jews who viewed their continued struggle as an impediment to peace in our own time.

No other Jewish community in Israel has ever been treated in such a manner. This book, whatever the original intent of its author, places these Jews at the center of the action; placing their rightful claims in their proper historical as well as political perspective.

The rest of this review will quote excerpts from the book about exactly what occurred on that famous “Shabbat Ekev” weekend, that will forever live in infamy in the annals of Jewish history.

“Virtually the entire Slonim family, including his wife Hannah and their son, his father-in-law, the chief rabbi of Zichron Yaakov, and his wife, was slaughtered. The sole survivor, one-year old Shlomo, was discovered, blood drenched and wounded, beneath the corpses of his relatives.”

Another scene describes how the “hysterical screams of Sh’ma Yisrael resounded throughout the house... The throats of Jews were cut, leaving pools of blood on the stone floor and, seeping from above, splashes of blood on the 12-foot-high ceiling...”

“Elsewhere in Hebron, Rabbi Hanoch Hasson, along with his entire family, was murdered. Ben-Zion Gershon, the Beit Hadassah pharmacist who served Jews and Arabs alike, had his eyes gouged out before he was stabbed to death...”

“Rabbis Meir Kastel and Tzvi Drabkin, with five of their students, were tortured, castrated, and murdered. Rabbi Yakov Orlanski HaCohen had his brain removed from his skull.”

These narratives are presented here to give you the reality of Islamo-Fascism as practiced, ten full years before the Holocaust, almost twenty years before the establishment of the State of Israel, decades before the Six Day War, the so-called occupation, and the establishment and resettlement of Judea and Samaria.

What were the motivations behind the slaughter of these innocent unarmed civilians by the hordes of crazed religious Muslim fanatics in 1929? All the contemporary excuses being given today to explain Muslim antipathy against the yishuv in Israel today rings hollow when judged by the actions in Hebron in 1929.

This is the lesson to be learned by the history Professor Auerbach presents to us in this book. It is a lesson that must inform our actions and beliefs as we go to the polls next year to elect two US senators and members of the US Congress. This is the lesson that we must impart to our children and grandchildren in our schools, the lesson of Hebron and of its now, unfortunately, miniscule community whose small size was made so by our own hand through political and moral neglect.

Yes, there is a history to be learned. We start with the readings from last week’s parsha, with the reading of the book under review this week, “Hebron Jews”, and when time permits, a reading of the Haftorah from Parshat Ekev, the very same Haftorah read by Jews the world over on the very day of the massacre. You will find its contents, from the words of the Prophet Isaiah, most timely.

I conclude with a quote from the author, at the conclusion of this book.

“Once Jews relinquish their right to live in Hebron, they implicitly undermine their claim to live anywhere in their biblical homeland. To abandon Hebron is to surrender the claims of memory that bind Jews to each other, to their ancient homeland, and to their shared past and future.”

Not learning from this admonition will have consequences.