It turns out that independence is not as simple as we thought.  On the one hand, of course, we are celebrating the 63rd anniversary of the Jewish “emergence from powerlessness,” of the existence of a Jewish state with an army, able to set its own path in the world.  On the other hand, we have learned that that doesn’t mean we are free to do whatever we want.  Rather, the key word is perhaps not independence, but interdependence.  Our lives and futures, it seems, are intertwined with those of the Palestinians – with those of Diaspora Jews –  and indeed with those of the rest of the world.  We are not independent of the global economy (as factories relocate from Israel to China), from global warming, from the “Arab spring(?),” from western culture.  Perhaps our greatest challenge is not in preserving independence, but in learning to live with interdependence.

  

In our work here in the Galilee, we see our task as helping build an Israel characterized by a sustainable balance between independence and interdependence, between a distinctive and value-laden Jewish identity and open-minded and caring citizenship in a diverse and complex world.