No Civility in My Government’s Treatment of the United States
David Langerman
Kiryat Motzkin Israel
July 30, 2014

I am having a hard time thinking clearly these days.

But one thing I do know that we need to treat the Obama administration with respect and not behave as the neighborhood bully.

Or, as the German Jews, (known as Yekkes) used to tell us for years in their mixture of German-Hebrew, there is Keinen Tarbut תרבות – no civility in our public behavior. They prided themselves that even in tough and challenging times they maintained civility, including saying, “please” and “thank you.”

They would classify the way we treat Secretary Kerry, President Obama and their advisers as uncivil. The rhetoric that is publicly uttered is that they know nothing about the Middle East, that they are clueless about our situation, that they just don’t understand Israel. Or worse, that they are actually against us and should go home. These kinds of outlandish statements by our elected officials are the outcome of either stupidity or sheer nastiness. I tend to think that it is a bit of both.

Have they ignored the fact that America is our closest friend and ally? Are they pretending not to remember who gave us money to develop the Iron Dome that saved so many lives? Are they oblivious of who supports us in the United Nations?

And I think that I need now to follow the teaching of the prophet Amos: “The prudent person keeps silent at this time as this is a bad time” (Amos 5:13).

Translated from the Hebrew by Ayala Emmett