[HANASHIR:11292] Arab Peace songs

[Rosalie Boxt <cantorboxt...>]

Shirona writes:

"I'm amazed at how much energy some of us are willing to spend in trying to 
"make everything OK"...  The apparent lack of Arabic peace songs is just the 
tip of the iceberg.  Of course if you look hard enough you'll find a song here, 
a book there.  But that is not the point! "

What frightens me, not about anyone else, but about the natural human 
inclination, mine most specifically, is allowing my anger, frustration, and 
correct and acurate view of history as seen in Germany as Shiron points out, to 
repress all desire to find something to propel me forward in the search for 
peace, for shalom -- wholeness.  

I don't think one is attempting to make everything "ok" by responding to a 
search for Arab peace songs that yes, may not exist or at best be not what we 
would consider peaceful.  However, to me "that is the point!"  To continue to 
search for peace when others may not, to say - not that everything is ok, or 
that we are ignoring history or the reality, but that we will not rest; that is 
not enough.  We will hunt for one song that says "We want peace for us, 
Palestinians and Arabs, and our Jewish neighbors and friends."  Once we stop 
searching, yearning, dragging ourselves by our fingernails to find them, then 
there truly will be no Shalom.  

As far as I can tell, no one on this list has yet argued against the fact that 
most Arab retoric is anti-semitic.  Fine. Agreed.  Nu?  So we stop finding one 
chaver, one person who is not?  I can't continue as a Jew, or as a singer of 
Israel, sharing the message of peace and hope with my congregation if I don't 
know deep down, that I would open my arms to a Arabic song of peace, and try to 
see that maybe one of them, only one, was meant to share my vision of peace as 
well.  

(In addition, who from the outside in could not look at much of our liturgy, 
that asks God to vanquish our enemies, destroy them for our sake, for us to 
return to Zion, etc. Our liturgy is rife with sometimes violent struggle for 
the sake of a cause.  Is this different from the songs listed which spoke only 
of Palestinians returning to their homeland?  They may be different, but we too 
have songs of return, that don't always add a caviet "as long as we don't hurt 
the other people."  Why then are we surprise or more angered that Palestinian 
songs of struggle do not talk about living peacefully with us?)

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Rosalie Boxt, Cantor
Temple Emanuel, Kensington, MD
301-942-2000
cantorboxt (at) erols(dot)com