The following is a transcript of Episode 120 of the For Heaven’s Sake Podcast. Note: This is a lightly edited transcript of a conversation, please excuse any errors.

Donniel: Hi, this is Donniel Hartman and Yossi Klein Halevi from the Shalom Hartman Institute, and this is For Heaven’s Sake, Israel at War, Day 180. And our theme for today is the six-month war. It’s 180 days. 

I don’t know if, when we started this, any of us even imagined that after six months we’d still be where we are. And Yossi, you and I decided that we want to start doing what in our tradition is called a cheshbon nefesh, an evaluation, a moment of reflection. Where are we? What are we feeling? What have we learned? What have we learned about ourselves? What has changed in us? What have we learned about our country? What have we learned about the war? What have we learned about our people and the world?

It’s critical after six months that we stop and think. Because the nature of a six-month war is very different from a six-day war or a three-week war like the Yom Kippur or even a six-week war. Six month, half a year now. It’s time to assess. And as a result also to think about where we need to go in the future. But today will be about the last six months.

And let’s start with you as always, Yossi. Individually, what’s been a major takeaway, something that you’ve been thinking about, something that’s influenced you, that’s been important to you, that you’ve been feeling as you look back these last six months?

Yossi: So for me, one of the formative experiences of this time has been engaging with you and being challenged by you, challenged in a way that really surprised me. I’ve been saying for a long time that Jews need to learn to speak two languages simultaneously about Israel. One language against those who are trying to criminalize Israel, and that’s an unequivocal language of pushback, of affirmation in the rightness of our cause, and then an internal Jewish language, where we open ourselves up to painful moral conversation. 

And what I learned about myself is that when we are under such sustained assault from without, I’m frozen. I’m almost incapable of having that internal conversation. And being involved with you has really forced me to own that moral introspection. And I don’t want to. I don’t want to be there. I want to be one of those Jews saying, we’re right, we’re always right. Look at what the world is doing to us. I don’t want to be in this place. 

And you and this conversation has forced me to be a better Jew, to be a more responsible Israeli. And I’m grateful for that, Donniel.

Donniel: So first of all, thank you very much, but I apologize for aggravating you. The truth is, Yossi, I aggravate myself too. 

Yossi: I know you do.

Donniel: I don’t know if I wanna be in this position either. But when I look at these last six months, one of the things that surprised me personally is how much sadness I felt. I usually protect myself much better than that. But the level of sadness, it wasn’t anger. It was just seeing our people in such pain hit me very, very deeply, experiencing that pain. And for some people, it expressed itself in a lashing out at who caused it. For me, there was just, for a very, very long time, there was just a very, very deep sadness. 

And then the Torah of my father, of blessed memory, and my mother, each one, who raised me, started to take over. And maybe that’s some of what you’ve experienced. Both my father and mother always taught us to question. My mother, her core Torah was, if people do something, it’s wrong. You’re not sheep. You don’t follow people. You know, as a Rebbetzin of a shul, she had a sweatshirt which said, “Viva la différence.” And you don’t just follow people.

And precisely when everybody is gathering around, what you call the voice that you’re most comfortable with, as people are declaring the certainty and the self-righteousness, and of course everything is going great. There were so many blacks and whites in this war. And on October 7th, there was black and white. It was simple. There was evil, and there was victimhood. There was just war. 

But as time within, as you saw, as I started to aggravate you, the viva la différence of my mother, and also one of the central challenges that my father always put before us, was what’s your question? Challenge something. What are you thinking about? 

And these last six months have been a combination of sadness and then really looking and asking questions, because frankly, you know, when you have a six-day war, you don’t have any time to ask questions. A three-week war, also, no time. A six-month war? And so my primary experience, especially for the last four months, has been deep, deep doubt. Doubt. Not about the righteousness of the war itself, but about questions about how we’re conducting ourselves and how is the Jewish world talking and how is the world talking and how’s our government. 

So, if I was personally, it’s been a journey between sadness and feeling obligated to ask questions that I have to ask. And the truth is, is that this podcast was a framework for me to do that, for me to, even for me to work it out, for me to figure out how I could do it and what it is that I’m feeling. Because right now, I have more doubts about the war on so many levels, from its strategy, we’ll talk about in a second, to it morally, to the Jewish people. 

I remember the certainty of October 7th. I remember the sadness of October 7th. Six months later, I’m in a completely different place. So let’s ask each other another level of question. You know, it’s now 180 days. If I had to ask you, what’s the primary thing that you learned, not about yourself, but what’s your primary takeaway, question, thought, about the war? Right now, where does the war hit you and your analysis of what’s happening?

Yossi: Well, it’s interesting to hear you say that you were living in this tension between sadness and, I would say, really deeper, what I picked up from you is just a deeper level than sadness. It was grief. It was this sense of carrying this constant burden of the Jewish people’s brokenness. That’s really what I’ve heard from you over these months, on the one hand, and on the other hand, growing questions about the way the war is being conducted, about who we are as a people.

I would frame that for me in a different way, but maybe it’s saying a similar, it’s making a similar point. And that is where I am right now is that on the one hand, everything is clear and nothing is clear. What’s clear for me is that we are facing a genocidal enemy. What’s clear for me is that much of the world has reverted to form, and the Jew is once again the symbol of evil. And what’s clear to me is my father’s voice, and I’ve said this to you in the past, that sometimes I feel like it’s not you and it’s not the two of us speaking, but it’s your father and my father meeting. And what’s clear for me is the imperative that my father taught me, which is when you’re facing the lynch mob, stand up and don’t equivocate. And so that’s one side of, and I’m still there. 

The other side where nothing is clear is again, as we’ve put this over the months, are we fighting a just war justly? Why is it that the Biden administration initiated food aid? Why wasn’t it the IDF? How is it possible that we’re fighting Israel’s most morally complicated war with the most morally corrupt government in our history? These are the questions that torment me.

Donniel: If I had to ask you, what’s your primary takeaway, do you have one?

Yossi: That I can live as I think Israeli society as a whole is living, in that place of complete certainty and commitment and complete confusion and brokenness, simultaneously. Because that’s where I am, that’s where I think we are as a people.

Donniel: You know in some sense that’s crazy.

Yossi: Oh, it’s, half the time, Donniel, I feel crazy. That’s the truth.

Donniel: You know, because like the word complete it’s like partial this but it’s complete and it’s that’s,

Yossi: Yes, yes. It’s two opposing forms of completeness.

Donniel: I also have two primary takeaways, but they’re not complete. So I balance them. I don’t live in as crazed a universe as you do.

If I had to look now for six weeks, and my primary takeaways are ones of pride and disappointment.

Yossi: Not shame?

Donniel: No, disappointment.

Yossi: That’s an important distinction because those are not opposites. Pride and disappointment are not opposites.

Donniel: Again, I’m not living in opposites like you do. These are two. But let’s play it out because let’s see, part of me, when I look at this war, I have an unbelievable sense of pride in Israeli society, in our kids, in the families of children, in what people have had to go through with their children in harm’s way, what our kids have had to go through being in harm’s way, your children, your spouses, your parents. 

And the level of commitment has been inspiring. And I don’t have to elaborate more, it’s pretty self-evident. It’s easy to fight a six-day war, or a six-month, or a three-week war. Six months, I haven’t seen even the slightest break in this core sense of commitment to be, and our right to be. 

And at the same time, if I would have to pick one, and I apologize to our audience. I have such disappointment, not just in our government, also in our army, in the overall way that we’ve been conducting this war. I think Israel wasn’t prepared, and I don’t think Israel ever thought through what a six-month war means. What does it mean to conduct a six-month war? What does it mean to combine strategy, tactics, public relations, international relations, all internal policy, external policy. 

I think, when I look at it, I’m just so disappointed because right now, I think Israel on the one hand is gonna win because Israel will survive and the Jewish people will survive. But the war itself, it would be very difficult to call this the operational part of victory. Very, very difficult. 

You know, now we’re sitting after the tragic killing of seven food aid workers, and I still haven’t seen our Prime Minister get up and say, chatanu, we have sinned, and speak about the pain. Nothing. I think the army spokesman, we don’t understand that from the world’s perspective, we have lost all, we’re not a moral country anymore. 

We’ve been treading water around Rafah, and now we finally bring out our plan, which we’ve had months to prepare, and the administration just looks at us and says, this is just mediocre. And part of me, when I look at the way we’ve been conducting ourselves, there’s a mediocrity. I think there’s a moral mediocrity. There’s a strategic mediocrity. There’s a public relations mediocrity. And there’s a deep disappointment because that’s not my Israel. 

I love being proud of Israel. And I’m so proud of the people of Israel. And there’s so many individuals. Overall though, I feel Israel right now is underachieving. And I feel a need to say it, to say it, to call it, because underachieving is not our destiny. And if we don’t see how poorly we’re conducting this war, on every level, every level, then these are mistakes that we’re going to continue. 

And the reason why I feel so compelled is that right around the corner is sitting Hezbollah. And I hear in Israel, yeah, we’re going to do a devastating short operation to return security to the north. And I, right now, Yossi, have no confidence. So my takeaway from this war, when I look at it as both unbelievable pride, you know, somebody once, they did this calculation of Medal of Valor actions. And in the Yom Kippur War, there’s a certain standard of what qualifies for valor. In the Yom Kippur War, there were 22 cases which qualified and met the standard of this Medal of Valor. Right now, there’s over 120 individual acts worthy of that valor. I’m humbled by it. But so, it’s pride and disappointment and it’s sitting…Does that aggravate you?

Yossi: Well, I hear you saying several things and I want to try to not conflate them and just look at each of your points separately. First, the pride in this generation. These kids are so extraordinary, so much more than we gave them credit for. The Tik-Tok generation, the way in which we dismiss them, they are as noble a generation as any we’ve experienced in Israeli history. And maybe more so because they’re fighting the most thankless war that any generation ever fought. There’s no glory in this war. And yet the way, the dedication, the soldiers who are wounded and return to their units, the officers, we haven’t seen anything like this since the 1973 Yom Kippur War. And the way in which they are despised around the world, and they’re able to just continue, knowing that they’re carrying this burden of hatred. 

So first of all, yes, tremendous pride and kind of astonishment in what Israel has created. Once again, it’s, to my mind, one of the great achievements of Israeli society is this generation.

Donniel: You know, Yossi, when you say that, if I could just, one of my experiences, and I’m sure it’s yours as an Israeli, is that I have never been in a society where the density of quality is so great, of human quality. The amount of great people that you meet. It’s just, I think it’s a deep part of our love for Israel. It goes so much deeper than ideology. It’s just, it’s like, it’s an honor to be a part of and to live in the midst of this society. And with all of our kvetching, this has been very powerful. Yeah, I’m sorry, but I interrupted you.

Yossi: No, no, that’s exactly right. And in terms of what you expressed as disappointment, I don’t feel disappointment. First of all, I don’t feel disappointment in this government because I had no expectations to begin with. 

Donniel: Well, just for a sec, that doesn’t count, Yossi, but that’s okay. But this doesn’t count as an argument.

Yossi: No, but I would not characterize the government as mediocre. I would use language like a total moral collapse. Yes, I’m speaking a language of totality again. A total collapse of its strategic vision. There is no strategic vision. For all practical purposes, there is no government.

In terms of the war itself and how the army is conducting the war, I’ve had questions about the creativity of the army. Sometimes it feels as if the army is acting according to a script, and there’s a certain plotting quality. 

On the other hand, one of the great achievements of the army has been to keep military, its own casualties relatively low. The warnings that we were receiving, including from friends, on October 8th, was don’t go into Gaza. It’s going to be a bloodbath, not only for Hamas, for the IDF. And I think that the IDF has fought this war probably in the only way that it was possible to fight a war in which the Hamas infrastructure and the civilian infrastructure were so completely entwined, where Hamas has sought immunity behind civilians. And so on so many levels, I look at the complexity, the impossible complexity of this war. And I appreciate the army’s achievements. So disappointment, I’m not there.

Donniel: So where are you?

Yossi: I’m carrying deep questions about where we go next. And part of me feels that, there’s a great word in Hebrew, and I don’t know how to translate it into English, mitzinu. There’s a whole world in that word, mitzinu. We’ve exhausted our capacities. We have fulfilled our, it’s both a negative and a positive word. We’ve fulfilled our goals. We’ve exhausted our ability to fulfill our goals. You can interpret mitzinu in many ways. 

And I say that first of all, because of this government. And you’re right, this government and because of this government, the state of Israel has lost all moral standing in much of the world, maybe for most of the world. And I question whether we’re able to continue this war, certainly to continue to the northern front. And you and I have argued in the past about the need to go to war against Hezbollah. I believe that we have no choice and sooner or later we must push them off of our border. We can’t do it with this government. We can’t do it when we have no moral credibility.

On the other hand, and again, it’s a question, it’s not a statement. On the other hand, how do we stop? How do we stop this war in Gaza and allow Hamas to declare victory? That would leave October 7th as the last word of this war. And I’m not ready to do that. So I have questions.

Another question, should we be resuming the anti-government demonstrations? And you know, they’re back. They’re back in full force. But they’re back in a way that really exposes the limitations of the democratic movement. It’s the same people that were protesting over the last year. We haven’t succeeded yet in broadening the ranks. And we’re not going to win if it’s only going to be liberal, secular, Ashkenazi Israelis. 

So, on the other hand, and again, it’s a question, we’ve been restraining ourselves for the last six months, this tremendous rage that so many of us feel toward this government, the shame that we feel that this is our face to the world. How do you contain that six months later? So I’m full of questions, Donniel.

Donniel: I want to defend a little bit more my disappointment. So much of my Jewish life and my Zionism is built around Exodus 19 and Leviticus 19. 

Yossi: There you go, there you go, pulling your rabbinic rank on me.

Donniel: You know, I’m just showing off for a minute. You know, you gotta be able to show off from time to time.

Exodus 19 is when God says to Moses, “Speak and tell Israel, obey what I have commanded you, and you shall be unto me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”

From the beginning, normalcy was never what we were meant to be. You’re supposed to be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. You’re supposed to exemplify something astounding. And my favorite verse, Leviticus 19, “You shall be holy, for I, the Lord, your God, am holy.” And I probably said it on this podcast and anybody who’s ever been in a class of mine has heard me say it, because it’s so core to how I think about what Israel and Zionism and Judaism are supposed to be, that in a normal theological universe, if God is holy, we don’t have to be holy. One advantage of monotheism is that we don’t have to be like God. The whole purpose of monotheism is to remind us that we’re not God. And our tradition turns it around and says, on the one hand, you’re not God. And on the other hand, you’re obligated to emulate God. Just as God is righteous, so you shall be righteous. God is compassionate, you shall be compassionate. Yossi: And we’re created in the image.

Donniel: And it pushes it, and it pushes it. And it means we’re never going to succeed, but I want to aspire. I want to move for greatness. And my love for Israel is that this is the place where the Jewish people have returned to power and to sovereignty. And we’re supposed to, on the one hand, create a safe country, a normal country, and at the same time, we’re supposed to aspire for greatness. And now, you know, Entebbe was easy. Six-day War was easy. Even Yom Kippur was easy.

This six month war, it could be the government, I also think it’s in the military. As you said, we’ve exhausted, where are we supposed to go? And so I feel that we are underachieving. I never feel that it’s too late. 

If I could just digress for a moment, there was this phenomenal evening at the Hartman Institute a week ago, in which somebody from the super combat unit called Duvdevan, that’s like a Fauda-type unit for our people, he wrote a book, a novel about Duvdevan, which somehow cleared the military censorship. And he brought three of the commanders of Duvdevan to speak and to reflect on what they’ve learned. And the founder of Duvdevan, an old-time military guy and then a senior in the police force says, yes, what we have learned is that the only way that we’re going to achieve security is if we keep the sword on our enemy’s neck for now and forever, and without the sword being there, we’re never going to have security.

And I’m sitting and listening to him and saying, really? Like, what have we been doing? Like, we haven’t been doing this? And he’s just still, we got, he knows how to use the sword, and that’s the solution. And this younger commander, he said, we have no strategy. And here he says, where are we supposed to go? And if our strategy is that we have to keep the sword on their neck and that’s the only way we’re gonna move forward, I think that’s exactly the question. Like, we’ve exhausted it. And the only thing that remains redeeming, and I think the only victory that we’ll have, is the returning of the hostages?
You know, at the end, all the rest, we’ll sort of, we’ll do a little this or that in Rafah, but as the American administration says, I haven’t even seen a plan on what you’re supposed to do. It’s the hostages is our one redeeming hope right now. I think it’ll be the one healing and it’ll be the exit strategy. In many ways we have moved six months beyond October 7th. The only place we haven’t moved and where we’re still in October 7th is the hostages. That stain, that pain, it’s still here as we’re looking back for six months.

Yossi: I want to just go briefly back to your sermon of a moment ago. And you so beautifully put it, the challenge of the Torah to the Jewish people for the last 4,000 years. And I really heard your father speaking. It was just this very touching moment for me. 

And the irony that I’m struggling with is that when we act like every other people, when we act in a normal way, the world treats us abnormally, it’s almost as if the dynamic is the world won’t let us be a normal people. I don’t know what to do with that. I don’t know what to do with that politically, strategically, theologically. What does that mean? Is Jewish history a setup? Was the Zionist dream of normalization this fantasy? These are political questions, but more deeply they’re religious questions. And that’s what I so much appreciate about your voice, Donniel.

Donniel: Yossi, it’s a pleasure as always being with you. I think we need to talk about this some more, about what a six-month war means and where it goes. But thank you. Being your chavruta for these last, it started beforehand, but for these last six months, without doubt has enabled me to get through these six months. And my gratitude to you is, here I’ll speak in completes, is infinite. 

Yossi: Completely mutual.

Donniel: Anyway, my friends, this is For Heaven’s Sake, Israel at war. One hundred and eighty days.

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