He is deeply paradoxical: He has a truly flawed ethical past regarding his marriages, had a number of close Jewish supporters, a highly respected intellect, fantastic speaking skills, a remarkable grasp of complicated issues and a strong Likud orientation on Israel. He also is a ruthless politician with remarkable focus.

In short, it was hard to argue with Newt because he knew so much. Rather, it was best to listen then go home and think about it—a luxury of time that politics does not often allow.

On Israel he was a center-right and not hard right. In other words, he was willing to engage in the possible. He would not think of tolerating anti-Semitism. He spoke in front of several Jewish groups—including a Conservative synagogue (Etz Chaim—across the street from his district office) and to the Haredi Orthodox Torah Day School.

I once asked him, “You describe yourself as a man of faith. How would you describe your faith?”

His response: “Total.”

Me: “Can you explain that a little?

Him: “Total.”

In other words, that’s my answer and that’s all you’re going to get. Sharp indeed. 

A huge question is whether Newt could work with Democrats on anything. The architect of the 1994 Contract With America (jokingly referred to by Democrats as Contract On America) is not one known for compromise from stated positions.

Personally, I do not think Newt will overcome his personal past and become the nominee (but who knows?). I do know that when it comes to intellect, he is hands down the brightest GOPer in the race.

Only yesterday (Thursday) the important natural gas pipeline from Egypt to Israel was purposely exploded by anti-Israel radicals for the seventh time since February (when Egypt’s revolution was in its initial days. See more at: http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/2011-11-10/egypt-s-natural-gas-pipeline-to-israel-jordan-struck-by-double-explosion?category=%2F
).

This all raises fears that the Cold Peace between the neighbors will become a Cold War.

In truth, it’s been that way for a while. Yet holding the formal ties together – prompted by the U.S. “buying the peace” in 1979 with billions in military aid each year to both countries – have been long-time Egyptian leaders Hosni Mubarak and intelligence boss Omar Suleiman. The first is now arrested and on trial, the second out of favor (although I imagine he’s being protected from prosecution by Egypt’s new army bosses).

So what will happen? On Wednesday I met Lt. Col. (Res.) Ronnie Porat for coffee. He’s currently the Jewish National Fund Israel Emissary for Southern and Florida zones. Prior to that he served for a number of years in the Israel Defense Forces intelligence and operations branch. As his bio says, he was “conducting research on Egyptian-Israeli military history.” At various points, he worked in Israel’s embassy in Amman, Jordan and in Israel’s embassy in Cairo.

He stressed that he was not speaking on behalf of JNF, but as a private individual. And he sees a much brighter picture than many. I think it’s too early to tell, and told him that.

“The Arab Spring will be bringing, in the long run, positive things to Israel and Egypt,” he said without equivocation, noting Israeli Jewish society still suffers from the “Holocaust syndrome” of fear, which as a son of Holocaust survivors he understands but thinks has created far too much angst.

With Egypt, for example, he correctly noted that it’s not in the interest of that country’s next rulers—likely after the scheduled March 2012 presidential elections to form a coalition with former army/intelligence folks, Moslem Brotherhood representatives and secular democrats – to have tensions with Israel.

In addition to the 1979 peace treaty limiting Egyptian military forces in the Sinai Desert into three zones, he noted that tankers passing through the Suez Canal (whose closure prompted wars with Israel in 1956 and 1967) bring Egypt $5 billion a year.

With a once $12 billion a year and now tottering tourist industry (for obvious reasons), that Suez revenue is even more important.

“The main problem that should be addressed immediately by the Egyptian—current and future—regime is the internal economic one,” he said. “If the current peaceful situation will be changed into a sort of a tension between the two countries, it will badly affect the tourism, as well as the naval traffic through the Suez Canal. So it’s definitely in Egypt’s interest to maintain the peaceful—even if it described as cold peace—status quo.”

Then he added, “It looks like that even if the Moslem Brotherhood will be an influential component in the future Egyptian local politics, they will definitely need to consider the facts above.”

I noted that while I agreed with much of what he said, his is the rosiest scenario.

I’m concerned that Egypt’s rulers will let off popular steam by allowing a loser patrolling of the border with Gaza, allowing in even more weapons. He disagreed saying, “That’s already happening.”

Indeed, today there are reports that Israel will equip its El Al planes with anti-missile systems as rockets are said to be coming into Gaza from Libya (and guess where they have to cross first – yep, Egypt). (Read more at: http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/report-israel-to-equip-airliners-with-anti-missile-system-as-libyan-arms-reach-gaza-1.395057 .)

And, I added, it could get worse. Egypt’s rulers could use tensions in Gaza to keep Israel off balance, which would raise the popularity of those rulers with the infamous “Arab street,” which could distract from economic woes at home.

I certainly hope I’m wrong.

Only days after President Barack Obama and French President Nicolas Sarkozy were heard – when they thought the microphone was off—insulting Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Keinon gave a “so what” response. As the product of Denver’s Jewish community and Israeli since the early 1980s said, whose surprised? Sure, it’s news, he added, but it doesn’t really matter because leaders don’t have to like each other; they just need to work together and by all accounts the U.S.-Israeli relationship in the sphere that counts most – the military one – is thriving.

And, I add, if the U.S.-Israel relationship is only as strong as the person in the White House, it’s pretty fickle – which it’s not.

But Keinon’s further analysis of Obama and the Jews was spot on. He noted how the President first did outreach to the Moslem and Arab world by visiting Saudi Arabia and Egypt, the latter venue where he gave an important address to a gathering of Moslem leaders and intellectuals.

That actually was good, Keinon said, because if America is stronger Israel is strong. What was bad was that not only did Obama skip Israel on that trip (and every journey since becoming President), but he linked the creation of Israel to the Holocaust. “The Zionist movement was founded some 70 years before the State of Israel,” he said. “It wasn’t created by the Holocaust.”

He’s right. But Keinon – to the surprise of some – gave Obama a thumbs up for recent actions. Obama came into office, he said, with a very different worldview than Israelis and Netanyahu; the American believed negotiations can work while he did not understand that Israel presented a public battered and untrusting of dialogue with a people whose leaders for decades have said they want to wipe them out. (And he gave a fascinating aside as to how he – with a self-described liberal upbringing and now a resident of the West Bank suburb of Ma’alei Adumin – has strived to educate his four children to understand that not all Palestinians or Arabs are evil.)

Obama’s “good behavior” began with the September U.N. speech in which the president gave full and staunch backing to Israel’s right to exist (absurd that it even had to be mentioned), rejection of the U.N. declaring a Palestinian state (thus mocking negotiations) and strong language that the U.S. would never remove itself from Israel’s side.

“President Obama stood up and gave the most pro-Israel speech of the past three years,” Keinon said. “You can say it doesn’t matter and you don’t put much stock in it. You can say it was about the 2012 elections. You can say it came after what happened in the New York election [where a Democratic, Jewish district went Republican]. Or he didn’t mean it. Certainly some of that may be true, but I say, `So what?’

“It sends an important message to the Egyptians and the world that the President of the United States is not an autocrat, that he has limits on what he can do.”

And that is a product of American Jewish networking, lobbying, politicking and coalition building. That, in fact, is remarkable – particularly when looking at the course of modern Jewish history. Despite the ups and days and the headlines of the day, it shouldn’t be forgotten.

On the one hand – sadly – this is progress. After all, until 1965 the Roman Catholic Church (whose policy still sets the pace for a huge swathe of the Christian world) still technically blamed “the Jews” for the death of Jesus.

Of course, then and now the notion was indefensible by any logic. That is because Jesus and his disciples were all Jews and to them, the world was divided into Jews and non-Jews (albeit on the one side “good Jews” and “bad Jews”). They always saw themselves as Jews. Period—albeit ones who followed the teachings of Yeshu ben-Yosef – a.k.a. Jesus, son of Joseph, whom we call Jesus of Nazareth (Christ deriving from the Greek word for messiah, or anointed one).

Semantics aside, today this is a deep failure not only of American Christians, but of interfaith dialogue groups of which both many Jews and Christians have invested great energy.

If there is a silver lining to the gray cloud, it is this: “only” 15 percent of Americans hold “deeply anti-Semitic views.” And as disturbing as that is, it’s an improvement from past generations (albeit a marginal increase over the past few years, which – again sadly – is not a surprise in these miserable economic times).

Upon learning such information, I reflect on what Rabbi Tarfon said in the Talmud – and what I think is a metaphor for the long march of Jewish life “Yours is not to finish from the process of creation, neither is it to desist from it.” In this case, the task of normalizing Christian-Jewish relations is massive and will not be completed any time soon (if ever), but it cannot be forsaken. Chief among the reasons why is we know that working on it can literally saves lives – particularly our own.

“It was our mistake. It was an Arab mistake as a whole,” the Palestinian Authority president told Israel’s Channel 2 TV in an interview translated by the Associated Press (according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency). “But do they punish us for this mistake for 64 years?”

It’s quite easy to scoff at the remark, and there is much to “punish” in those 64 years – chief among them never making a realistic counter-offer to Israeli concessions whose stated end result was an independent Palestinian state. Still, these words could be the start of Palestinian self-reversal of a self-righteousness that refuses responsibility for their own woes. Perhaps it is more hollow rhetoric designed to impress the West. Or perhaps it is a trial balloon to gauge Israeli reaction.

For certain, the words are meaningless without meaningful follow up action. This is where American pro-Israel centrist and left-leaning groups come in. Groups such as Americans for Peace Now, J-Street, the Israel Policy Forum and the like speak openly with Abbas and his emissaries regularly.  Other American Jewish groups – Jewish Council for Public Affairs, the Jewish Federations of North America, the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation league and more – speak privately with Abbas and his representatives all the time.

Some steps they can to take, which will nudge a reluctant Israeli government into response:

• Now is the time for we American Jews who believe in a two-state solution to press Abbas to repeat in Arabic what he has said; it can be done as part of a joint statement with American Jewish and Muslim groups about the need for a two state-solution.

• It also speaks of the need to invite Abbas and his emissaries to address major American Jewish groups, forcing him to say what he is not naturally inclined to say.

• Likewise, American Jewish groups should push to address Palestinian legislators in the West Bank. (Simply forget about Gaza while Hamas embraces its viciously anti-Semitic characteristics.  Rather, raise the standard of hope and living in the West Bank, showing Gazans what civil society nurtures.)

• It’s also time for Abbas to address the many issues surrounding Palestinian incitement of Israel and Jews in textbooks (of which there is much information and disinformation).

All of that (or even some of it) would be something indeed.

So rather than scoff at this as just another PR moment for Abbas, we cannot allow this to be yet another lost opportunity. We must continue to press Abbas in the right ways, not the ones that embarrass him, back him into a corner and force him to be “holier than Hamas” when it comes to armed struggle.

Will it pay off? For certain we know the result of no effort.

Ben- Gurion: A Political Life, 2011, (Shocken Books). A link to it is here: http://www.amazon.com/Ben-Gurion-Political-Life-Shimon-Peres/dp/0805242821/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1319741451&sr=1-1

David Ben-Gurion has rightly entered the annals of modern Jewish history as a prophet in his time (and perhaps for all time), and Shimon Peres can rightly claim the title of Ben-Gurion’s anointed disciple. At the height of power, both were praised and reviled – although we cannot yet know if the still remarkably vigorous 88-year-old Peres will be remembered as a visionary (for engineering the Oslo Accords) or a fool (for engineering the Oslo Accords).

So it is only fitting that Peres (with journalist David Landau) has penned “Ben-Gurion: A Political Life,” a fascinating book that offers one historical leader chronicling and analyzing the life and times of his even more important mentor.

Throughout, we are treated to an insider’s view of Ben-Gurion’s biting scorn for his opposition, calls that seemingly went against his own views (such as withdrawing from the Sinai in 1956) and multiple resignations in disgust with his own party’s colleagues—only to return because every would-be successor knew he or she could not be as decisive, the qualities of a democratically-elected benevolent autocrat so desperately needed in the tumultuous early days of the State of Israel.

Not surprisingly, Peres’s healthy ego comes through, particularly in discussing why he believes Ben-Gurion embraced him over other young Mapai party stalwarts. One can live without “Peres on Peres,” but such is the nature of the beast. Besides, the relatively brief passage when compared to the book as a whole is overwhelmed by first-person accounts of Ben-Gurion’s facing phenomenal pressure, voracious intellectual appetite, single-minded purpose in creating a state (for which his family paid a hefty price – basically living without him)  and jockeying with the day’s top European and American leaders.

As Peres sums up, “It was Ben-Gurion’s genius to embrace the pragmatic acceptance of the possible, essential for nation building, without ever abandoning the prophetic yearning for moral perfection.”

It’s a characteristic one desperately wants to see in today’s leaders across the spectrum (both here and in Israel), individuals seemingly much more interested in pleasing their fringe followers than in (re)building a solid center.

All that said, the disciple remains enamored with the mentor, and we should be grateful.

Why in particular does it mean so much to so many of us who live outside of the State of Israel? Why is it so emotional? Why is it a day that we will remember where we were when we heard, just as has happened so many other times in our life?

It is because in Gilad Shalit we see the embodiment of the modern Jewish state – as well as our nephews and nieces, friends’ children and other Israeli soldiers we have met along the way in our own Jewish identity journeys. In Gilad, we see that a thread of hope can sometimes grow, that hope is not always (although so sadly often) overwhelmed by despair.

And, of course, the unspoken bond is one of fear, knowing that soon we may have to mourn and it is better to do so as one. That is because Israel is paying an incredibly high and controversial price to return one breathing soldier to the arms of his loved ones.

This can be read in opposing ways: On the one hand, it is a foolish, emotional response that enables terrorists to celebrate, which is exactly what they are doing. Hamas is a huge winner today. In fact, it is not the “more moderate” Fatah that is bringing home more than 1,000 prisoners – some who have served for more than three decades and emerge as old men, broken in body if not in spirit.

And some of these people will be engaged in terrorism again, particularly the younger ones. One cannot doubt that.

Against this, we weigh two Jewish values which are actually one: A few weeks ago we read in the Torah portion the instruction of “bacharta chaim,” you shall chose life. And in subsequent Jewish generations, we embraced the value of “pidyon hashvuyim,” or redemption of the captives.

The controversy comes from at what point does paying ransom for captives – so common in the Middle Ages – actually encourage more abductions? After all, Hamas has said repeatedly that it will seek more Israeli captives because the payoff is so big.

Does that mean that Israeli Jewish society is weak and cannot grasp realpolitik?

I think not. That is because it is a society of values. Even after listening to the victims of terror, and trying to imagine their incredible pain, I still hold these basic beliefs:

*Terrorists do not need encouragement. Let’s say Israel turned down the deal and declared Gilad Shalit dead, as some have encouraged. Does anyone think Hamas and its like-minded thugs would cease trying to inflict pain on the Israeli and Jewish people?

*I trust the security leaders of the State of Israel. The heads of Israel’s main security services – internal, external and military intelligence – backed this deal. They are obviously much wiser in such ways than I am.

*In this protracted war for the right of the Jewish people to reclaim its role in history – with its military, political and cultural fronts – this is a celebration for the People and State of Israel. We need these moments, we need these symbols, we need this sense of reinforcement of what Mordecai Kaplan in the early 20th century so correctly called “Jewish peoplehood.”

*Finally, to paraphrase what someone in Israel recently told me, “Terrorism is painful, but it is not an existential threat to the State of Israel. The unity of the nation and the army in particular is an existential threat to the State of Israel.”

And today, I also reflect on words of Yitzhak Rabin before he was gunned down by a lunatic with far too much support: “For Israel there is no path that is without pain…”

Footnote: Tonight, in our sukkah, I will speak to my children about the meaning of pidyon hashvuyim and peace. Then I will take a scissors and cut a rubber blue bracelet I have worn for about five years and two months. It has three names on it – Eldad, Udi and Gilad. The first two were Israeli soldiers taken on the Lebanese border by Hezbollah. Their bodies were returned in a previous prisoner exchange. Their bodies were given a proper burial. But now Gilad Shalit is home. Alive.

When it happens in the State of Israel – to Jews, Christians and Muslims within a few days – it represents incendiary agents tossed upon the region’s proverbial gunpowder of inter-religious, inter-ethnic conflicts.

So it was that last week – just before, during and after Yom Kippur – that Israeli society again found itself nursing a self-inflicted black eye. But this time, American Jews can do something by actively impressing on Israeli leaders how despite our many differences, instead of ripping each other apart we actually coalesce around loosely defined goals and at least strive to respect our differences – ones that in Israel can literally bring a government’s demise.

I speak of how last week an Israeli Arab mosque was torched, dozens of graves in Christian and Muslim cemeteries vandalized, and just after Yom Kippur, a Molotov cocktail was tossed into a synagogue.

Fortunately, and unlike elsewhere in the region, each act received unequivocal condemnation from the country’s top religious and political leaders.

Of particular note – and where we come in – is that after the mosque attack the New Israel Fund quickly garnered many signatures of Diaspora rabbis, cantors and others to condemn the act.

The document reads in part: “As religious leaders and representatives of Jewish houses of worship around the world, we wish to express our deep sadness and outrage at the desecration of a mosque in the Bedouin village of Tuba-Zangariya in the north of Israel. We condemn this act as an affront to G-d and to the values of our Torah… In this season of reflection and celebration, we pray that such acts like the attack on this mosque will not succeed in driving Israelis apart. Indeed, we pray that they will become the occasion of acts of fellowship and solidarity among Israelis from every walk of life.”

The good news is that 1,000 leaders signed. The bad news is that 10,000 did not. Local signatures included Rabbis Elizabeth Bolton, Susan Grossman and Jerry Seidler. We should urge their colleagues to follow suit. Immediately. (See http://www.nif.org/RabbisStatement .)

Why would any rabbi of any flavor not do so? There is no talk of “land for peace” or “religious coercion” or the like. Rather, it’s about enabling fellow humans to worship God as they see fit in the democratic State of Israel.

No doubt, some will be reluctant to sign a piece promoted by the New Israel Fund, which supports liberal organizations. Indeed, it is a failing that NIF – which I know had to act quickly – did not get a “right-wing” co-sponsor, such as Religious Zionists of America or the Zionist Organization of America.

It’s not too late.

When the politics are put aside, we want the same thing. Or at least we should—a healthy, independent, democratic Jewish state. Yes, there is inherent tension in the phrase “Jewish democracy,” but as one infers from the great modern Orthodox thinker Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, tension brings creativity, which enables one to live meaningfully with seeming paradoxes and alleged absolutes.

In fact, religious pluralism—or at least learning (struggling) to “live and let live”—is a hallmark of American Jewish life. Its principles enable us to set aside particular differences while embracing shared general ones. That is a gift we must help impress on the dangerously fractured Israeli society.

And if anyone has an argument with promoting it, I have an argument with them.

Then I get up and leave.

Like I do every single week.

And as I do so, no matter what I tell the person sitting next to me, I know it might be some time before I get back in and ask the closest person, “Did I miss anything we didn’t do last week?”

What is it about going to synagogue that drives me and other regulars (including periodically the rabbi) into the hall to talk about matters both profound and trivial?

It is simply that synagogues attract like-minded people, ones who enjoy ritual and prayer as well as chatting with fellow seekers of the unattainable “understanding the purpose of life” thing. In some way, we are all there to connect with one another on our mysterious, strange journey. Yes, there are moments in services when I yearn for that deep connection to “God-thought” and Jewish heritage, when I do get lost in the prayer and my mind wanders through the ages of Jewish history. Admittedly, such experiences are rare. But they also are precious, which keeps me coming back for more.

People who do not go to synagogue regularly miss this. Mind you, they often don’t’ go for several understandable reasons:

*They don’t believe “that stuff.” I get it. As the middle school kids asked a few years ago when I was helping lead Junior Congregation, “Aren’t all the prayers the same? God’s great, God’s great. Why so many versions?”

*They don’t like “the show,” which of course can be shifted with a change in venue.

*They do not feel comfortable saying prayers they don’t understand, which can be addressed by the same way as above.

*They have other time obligations – errands, kids’ sports, etc. But life is about setting priorities. It ain’t easy to make commitments, but when we make our choices we shouldn’t complain down the road about their results.

*They just don’t like the clergy at their congregation. Again, it’s that shift in venue thing.

So why do I go? In part it’s because I like the congregants, the rabbi and the informal structure of services where I have my “fixed place.” But it all began because I have an admitted need to be part of something larger than I am, to have a sense of roots and to do so in a place where I can seriously question, learn and enjoy. (And yes, as friends know, I’m a big Kiddush fan, too; I’ve even grown to love pickled herring, which in younger years seemed as likely as my becoming a singer for that great odd rock group the B-52s).

And unlike some, I am not necessarily in synagogue out of a sense of religious obligation. Rather, I am there because I am quite unsure of the purpose of life and need a place to explore it and I cannot find a more logical, comprehensive, compelling framework than Judaism and the Jewish experience.

So if you haven’t been to synagogue or temple or shul (or your preferred label) in a while, as we lead up to Rosh Hashanah – particularly as the introspective month of Elul that leads up to it just began) – stop by a Jewish house of worship that fits your needs, particularly one that you have yet to experience. In Baltimore, you have more choices than someone at the Texas State Fair who asks if there’s any fried food on the premises.

And somewhere out in the hallway, I hope you bump into yourself.

One might justly ask, “save American from whom?” No one cannot deny our country’s damaged economic, environmental and employment standing. Yet, they stem from joint Democratic AND Republican leadership, which is what it will take to improve the situation. And, by the way, the country is not “lost” or in need of “saving.” Rather, it is struggling. Mightily. And by playing the religion card, Perry can only divide the nation even more, purposely or otherwise. That is not because America is a land separated into major segments of heathens and believers. Rather, it is because the country is best when it keeps overt religion – not broad religious principals – out of the Oval office.

This religious talk makes some – not all – Jews nervous. That stems from a centuries long gene implanted in the DNA due to the violent abuse of political power by non-democratic rulers. So today some Jews brush off comments such as Perry’s as politics that plays to the American mainstream (certainly not much of northwest Baltimore City or central Baltimore County) or as a hangover from the once doctrinaire Jewish iron wall against combining religion and state. But our nation’s founders correctly warned about the toxic mix of faith and government. The solid reasoning for that has not changed.

One’s religious beliefs surely do help create one’s public policies. But decisions must be made in accordance with the law of the land – ones that enshrine protection of minority beliefs and populations. What Perry believes is his business. What he – and any candidate – needs to prove to ALL Americans is that he can represent every one of us while resenting or repressing not one of us with exclusionary practices.