Mark Kastel, farmer and activist, was profiled last spring in The Chronicle as either the only or one of the very few Jews in the town of La Farge, about a one hour-drive from La Crosse.
So he had a distinctive reason to feel, as he put it, “like a naked Jew … exposed” by all the dramatic news events of 5762 — the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States, the continuing terror attacks in Israel, the rise in anti-Semitic sentiments and actions in Europe, the Israel solidarity rally in Washington in April.
Yet he is not alone in that all these dramatic events appear to have heightened the Jewish consciousness of many in the state’s Jewish community. And that consciousness has manifested itself often in dramatic ways, and in Jews of a wide range of ages.
Serena Pollack, 27 and a Milwaukee attorney, said the year made her realize that “I am an adult and that I have to start taking a role in the community so that the Milwaukee Jewish community stays strong.”
To be sure, “I was starting to become more involved before everything in Israel happened,” Pollack said, “but this has put everything together for me. It made me realize that you have to take a step up when events like these happen.”
As for Milwaukeean Eunice Safer, 90, the year “has absolutely made me feel stronger as a Jew, more so than before. I have special reasons because I have children and grandchildren [in Israel], so [the situation] has affected me that much stronger…. I am alert to every little thing happening there and wondering when the violence is going to end.”
For some, the increased awareness comes with a sense of worry, if not dread. “I would say [the year] has strengthened my identity as a Jew,” said Philip Katz, a first-year law student. “I have faith in the existence of Israel; but I sometimes worry about how long [Israel] will last.”
Commitment to work
For others, strengthened identity has intensified their commitment to doing communal work. Said Jody Kaufman Loewenstein, chair of the Milwaukee Jewish Federation’s community campaign 2002 and 2003: “I became more grounded in the lessons of Torah, family, community and tzedakah. These beliefs provided me with consolation, energy and a renewed sense of purpose in a year none of us will ever forget.”
The year has reminded Randi Komisar, program coordinator of the Metro Jewish Social Network, that “I want nothing more than to have a family of my own. That is why I choose to devote my free time to organizing and finding funding for young Jewish singles, so that I and other adults … may find Jewish friends and mates.”
Rabbi Dena Feingold, spiritual leader of Beth Hillel Temple in Kenosha, and immediate past president of the Wisconsin Council of Rabbis, said the events of Sept. 11 “proved to affect me as a Jew more in my communal life than in my personal life. Perhaps I was able to sublimate my personal fears because I had many opportunities to express my feelings and contemplate my concerns in public statements, interfaith services and speaking engagements on the subject.”
“By far the most significant effect that [Sept. 11] has on me as a Jew was an opportunity to enter into Jewish-Muslim dialogue,” Feingold continued. She said that four Beth Hillel couples have been meeting once a month with four southeastern Wisconsin Muslim couples, largely as a result of a post-Sept. 11 forum at the University of Wisconsin-Parkside.
“I have learned a great deal about the similarities in our two religions and our shared experience of being part of a minority religion in America,” Feingold said. “Naturally, we have our differences on the Middle East, but we can talk about them openly, and even this is an accomplishment.”
Kastel, who described himself as “an emotional man,” said one of the year’s events was “highly disturbing to me as a Jew.” This was the moment at the Washington rally when some of the 100,000 people attending booed Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz when he spoke of an eventual Palestinian state and the deaths of innocent Palestinians.
That incident made Kastel feel “so embarrassed at being a Jew…. The people booing there had forgotten some of the teaching” of Judaism, that “we’re not supposed to feel we’re elite or above other peoples” but that “we all are the children of God. How could you ever not have compassion for other people?”
Still, all these events also made him feel “blessed by being connected to the La Crosse Jewish community.” And for all that he disagrees with some Israeli policies and the sentiments of some of his Jewish friends, he still feels he and all American Jews “are stakeholders” in Israel, “even if we’re not Zionists.”
And Steven Morrison, executive director of the Madison Jewish Community Council, said that although the year’s events were “painful and challenging,” he feels that “ultimately I think it has been a triumphant year” for the Jewish world.
“I’m exceedingly proud of what the Jewish community here in Madison and world wide has done in the face of extraordinary crises,” he said. “When tragedy happens, it reminds Jews why we are continually seeking justice, the repair of the world and peace.”
As an example, he was in Israel with the Milwaukee Jewish Federation’s “Together-B’Yachad” mission last February, and saw that “when others were afraid to go to Israel and afraid of being publicly identified as Jews, these thoughts never crossed the minds of these Wisconsin Jews…. I felt such a sense of gratitude to be in the kind of Jewish community that we have in this state.”
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