RABBI ARTHUR SEGAL:ECO-JUDAISM: GREAT IS PEACE; CONGRESSIONAL RECORD: AMERICAN PEACE : RABBI ARTHUR SEGAL

Monday, January 13, 2014

GREAT IS PEACE; CONGRESSIONAL RECORD: AMERICAN PEACE : RABBI ARTHUR SEGAL

GREAT IS PEACE; CONGRESSIONAL RECORD: AMERICAN PEACE : RABBI ARTHUR SEGAL

GREAT IS PEACE

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CONGRESSIONAL RECORD— January 10, 2014

HON. JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY
OF ILLINOIS
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Friday, January 10, 2014

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I rise
today to highlight a Rabbinic Statement, ''Step
by Step toward Shalom with Iran.''

Signed by 120 Rabbis, including my own
Rabbi, Andrea London of Beth Emet Synagogue
in Evanston, IL, the statement opposes
any actions that would undermine ongoing negotiations,
emphasizes the importance of
peaceful conflict resolution, and welcomes the
possibility of negotiations with Iran.

As we continue to work to ensure that Iran
does not develop nuclear weapons, I believe
that the Rabbinic Statement offers an important
perspective.

RABBINIC STATEMENT: ''STEP BY STEP
TOWARD SHALOM WITH IRAN''

As Rabbis, Cantors, and other Clergy serving
the American Jewish community, we are
deeply committed, as Jewish tradition
teaches—to the shalom—peace, social justice, functioning
democratic process, and ecological
sanity—of the country where we live—all of
which would be damaged by still another unnecessary
war; to the shalom, peace and security, of the
State of Israel, to its democratic character,
and to its special relationship with the Jewish
people; to unequivocal action by all the Arab-majority
and Muslim-majority states to make
peace with Israel, and to Israel's unequivocal
action to make peace with all its neighbors,
including an emergent Palestine; to our respect and our prayers for salaam, peace and justice, among our cousins in the
Abrahamic tradition, Arab and Muslim civilizations;
to the peace and prosperity of all the ''70
nations'' of the world;and to the healing of our wounded planet.

For all these reasons, we welcome warmly
the greatly increased possibility of a peaceful
resolution of the conflicts among the
U.S., Iran, Israel, and other nations.

We especially welcome the new attitudes
toward the Jewish people and toward the nuclear
issue set forth by the new President of
Iran, and his assertion that Iran will never
hold nuclear weapons. We also recall the
fatwa and repeated assertions by Grand Ayatollah
Khamenei that for Iran to possess nuclear
weapons would violate Islam.

We urge the U.S. and Iran to move swiftly
to agree on a step-by-step process of reducing
and ultimately ending sanctions against
Iran in accord with steps by Iran to make its
nuclear research transparent and to allow
verification that its research is directed
wholly toward civilian uses of nuclear energy.

We believe that such a step-by-step
process is the best way to guarantee that
both parties are fulfilling their commitments.

We urge Iran to make clear its full acceptance
of Israel as a legitimate state in the
fabric of international relations, protected
like all other states from aggression and attack.

We urge the Government of Israel to welcome
steps by Iran to make clear and
verifiable its commitment to use nuclear energy
and research for peaceful purposes only,
not for pursuit of nuclear weaponry, and
while this process is under way, we urge
Israel to end hostile acts and statements toward
Iran.

We urge the peoples of the United States,
Iran, and Israel to reject and oppose all
statements and actions from whatever
source that undermine the swift and thorough
achievement of agreements to ensure
the civilian nature of Iran's nuclear program
and to end sanctions against Iran.

We urge the American people to recognize
and do teshuvah (''turning'' or ''repentance'')
for the ethical errors of our own government
toward Iran particularly—the U.S. Government's
intervention in 1953 to overthrow the
democratically elected reform government of
Iran; U.S. actions to support the tyrannical
regime of the Shah until the Iranian people
overthrew it in 1979; and U.S. support for
Iraq's wars of aggression against Iran in the
1980s, including U.S. support for Saddam
Hussein's use of chemical weapons to kill
100,000 Iranians.

We urge the Iranian people to do teshuvah
for their government's demonization of the
United States and Israel, for its holding U.S.
diplomats hostage for more than a year in
1979–1980, and for the support it seems to
have covertly given for attacks on Israeli
citizens.

We believe that this combination of governmental
acts and public rethinking and refeeling
can move American society, the entire
Middle East, and the world toward the
shalom that Judaism yearns for.

Signed:
Shalom,
Initiating Signers:
Rabbi Amy Eilberg, Rabbi Everett Gendler,
Rabbi Marc Gopin, Rabbi Dr. David Gordis,
Rabbi Nancy Fuchs Kreimer, Rabbi
Mordechai Liebling, Rabbi Ellen Lippmann,
Rabbi Gerry Serotta, Rabbi David Shneyer,
Rabbi Susan Talve, Rabbi Arthur Waskow,
Rabbi Sheila Weinberg, Rabbi Rebecca
Alpert, Rabbi Ethan Bair.
Kohenet Ellie Barbarash, Rabbi Rachel
Barenblat, Rabbi Benjamin Barnett, Rabbi
Eliot Baskin, Rabbi Renee Bauer, Rabbi Dennis
Beck-Berman, Rabbi Leonard Beerman,
Rabbi Marjorie Berman, Rabbi Phyllis Berman,
Rabbi Leila Gal Berner, Rabbi
Binyamin Biber, Kohenet Shoshana Bricklin,
Rabbi Jason Bright, Rabbi Jonathan
Brumberg-Kraus, Rabbi Joshua Chasan,
Rabbi Aryeh Cohen.
Rabbi Andrea Cohen Kiener, Rabbi Hillel
Cohn, Rabbi David J. Cooper, Rabbi Robert
Dobrusin, Rabbi Art Donsky, Rabbi Doris
Dyen, Rabbi Renee Edelman, Rabbi Diane Elliot,
Rabbi Sue Levi Elwell, Kohenet Ahava
Lilith EverShine, Rabbi Ted Falcon, Rabbi
Charles Feinberg, Rabbi Michael Feinberg,
Rabbi Fern Feldman, Rabbi Brian Field,
Rabbi Tirzah Firestone.
Rabbi Nancy Flam, Rabbi Jeff Foust,
Rabbi Ruth Gais, Rabbi Hillel Gamoran,
Maggid Andrew Gold, Rabbi Dan Goldblatt,
Rabbi Laurie Green, Rabbi Julie Greenberg,
Rabbi Moshe Halfon, Rabbi/Kohenet Jill
Hammer, Rabbi Edwin Harris, Rabbi Lauren
Grabelle Herrmann, Kohenet Judith Hollander,
Rabbi Linda Holtzman, Rabbi Shaya
Isenberg.
Rabbi Burt Jacobson, Rabbi Josh Jacobs-
Velde, Kohenet Sharon Jaffe, Rabbi Melissa
Klein, Rabbi Sharon Kleinbaum, Rabbi David
L Kline, Rabbi Debra Kolodny, Rabbi Douglas
Krantz, Rabbi Hannah Laner, Rabbi Daniel
Lehrman, Rabbi Jason van Leeuwen,
Rabbi Michael Lerner, Kohenet Carly
''Ketzirah'' Lesser, Rabbi Richard Levy,
Rabbi Annie Lewis, Rabbi Andrea London.
Cantor Abbe Lyons, Rabbi Jeffrey Marker,
Rabbi Nathan Martin, Rabbi J. Rolando
Matalon, Maggid Melvin Metelits, Rabbi
Yocheved Mintz, Kohenet Tiana Mirapai,
Rabbi David Mivasair, Rabbi Lee Moore,
Hazan Judith Naimark, Rabbi Laura Owens,
Cantor Steven Puzarne, Rabbi Victor
Reinstein, Cantor Stephen Richards, Rabbi/
Kohenet Margie Klein Ronkin, Rabbi Moti
Rieber, Rabbi Brant Rosen, Cantor Aviva
Rosenbloom, Cantor Richard Rosenfield,
Rabbi Jeff Roth, Kohenet Mei Mei Sanford,
Hazan Pamela Sawyer, Rabbi Julie Saxe-
Taller, Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi,
Rabbi Chaim Schneider, Rabbi Randy
Schoch, Kohenet Alumah Schuster, Rabbi
Dr. Arthur Segal, Rabbi Jonathan Slater,
Rabbi Eric Solomon.
Cantor Robin Sparr, Rabbi David Spitz,
Rabbi Toba Spitzer, Rabbi Margot Stein,
Rabbi Naomi Steinberg, Rabbi Gershon
Steinberg-Caudill, Rabbi Danielle Stillman,
Rabbi Alana Suskin, Rabbi Louis Sutker,
Rabbi Daniel Swartz, Rabbi Renae Toben,
Rabbi Brian Walt, Rabbi Simkha Y.
Weintraub, Hazan Gregory Yaroslow, Rabbi
Barbara Zacky, Rabbi Laurie Zimmerman.

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2014-01-10/pdf/CREC-2014-01-10-pt1-PgE43-2.pdf#page=1