As of Thursday mornng, November 19, 89 Jewish clergy have joined in signing the Rabbinic Statement “Step by Step toward Shalom with Iran” – a path of shalom that protects the peace and security of Israel, the US, and Iran. Please see below the full list of signers  up to now. To join us, please click to <https://theshalomcenter.org/civicrm/petition/sign?sid=4&reset=1> 

We are  hoping to add to this number before making the statement public, and to that end we are inviting Rabbis, Cantors, Rabbinic Pastors, and KoHenot to sign if you have not already done so.

Why do we think it important for Rabbis to make public a statement along these lines?

First, for the sake of publicly reaffirming, honoring, and embodying the powerful prophetic and rabbinic voice, now millennia-long, that has called on us all to “seek peace and pursue it.” One of the sacred Names of God is “Shalom.” To advance it is one form of making holy the Name – a nonlethal form of Kiddush HaShem.

Second, because in this moment the rabbinic voice can actually matter. There is a real question whether the forward momentum of  diplomacy so far can be maintained in the face of hostility from ultranationalist elements in Iran and demands for more draconic sanctions against Iran coming from some elements in Israeli and American politics.

Though only the negotiators have seen the actual proposals that are close to agreement, it seems they look toward suspension of Iranian nuclear enrichment along with a partial easing of some sanctions. That would seem to be the first step – only the first step, but a necessary one – in seeking shalom and pursuing it for all the parties involved – Israel, Iran,  the whole region, and the US.

Security for each people to live under its own vine and fig-tree with none to make them afraid.

As the debate intensifies between worsening threats and calming steps, we think the Rabbinic voice can make a difference.

So with a sense of urgency in this moment, we invite you to join in the statement and to invite your rabbinic, cantorial , & pastoral colleagues to do so as well. Please click here –<https://theshalomcenter.org/civicrm/petition/sign?sid=4&reset=1> 
and enter your title-prefix (Rabbi, Cantor, Hazzan…), name, E-address, and affiliation, although we will reference only your prefix and name, not your affiliation in publication of the statement.

Shalom, Arthur

 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 US, 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 repeated assertions and fatwas by Grand Ayatollah Khameini that for Iran to possess nuclear weapons would violate Islam.
  
 We urge the US 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 tshuvah (“turning” or “repentance”) for the ethical errors of our own government toward Iran – particularly, the US Government’s intervention in 1953 to overthrow the democratically elected reform government of Iran; US actions to support the tyrannical regime of the Shah until the Iranian people overthrew it in 1979; and US support for Iraq’s wars of aggression against Iran in the 1980s, including US support for Saddam Hussein’s use of chemical weapons to kill 100,000 Iranians.
  
 We urge the Iranian people to do tshuvah for their government’s demonization of the United States and Israel, for its holding US 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 re-feeling can move American society, the entire Middle East, and the world toward the shalom that Judaism yearns for.

Signed: 

To add your name to ours, please click here –  <https://theshalomcenter.org/civicrm/petition/sign?sid=4&reset=1> 

Shalom,  

Rabbi Amy Eilberg

Rabbi Everett Gendler

Rabbi Marc Gopin

Rabbi Nancy Fuchs Kremer

Rabbi Mordechai Liebling

Rabbi Ellen Lippmann

Rabbi Gerry Serotta 

Rabbi David Shneyer

Rabbi Susan Talve 

Rabbi Arthur Waskow

Rabbi Sheila Weinberg

  Rabbi Rebecca Alpert

  Kohenet Ellie Barbarash

  Rabbi Eliot Baskin 

  Rabbi Leonard Beerman

  Rabbi Marjorie Berman

  Rabbi  Phyllis Berman

  Rabbi Leila Gal Berner  

  Kohenet Shoshana Bricklin

  Rabbi Jason Bright

  Rabbi Jonathan Brumberg-Kraus 

  Rabbi Joshua Chasan  

  Rabbi Andrea Cohen Kiener 

  Rabbi Hillel Cohn

  Rabbi David J. Cooper

  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 Tirzah Firestone 

  Rabbi Nancy Flam 

  Rabbi Jeff Foust 

  Rabbi Ruth Gais

  Rabbi Hillel Gamoran 

  Maggid Andrew Gold 

  Rabbi Laurie Green 

  Rabbi Moshe Halfon

  Rabbi/ Kohenet Jill Hammer

  Rabbi Linda Holtzman

  Rabbi Shaya Isenberg

  Rabbi Burt Jacobson 

  Rabbi Josh Jacobs-Velde

  Kohenet Sharon Jaffe

  Rabbi David L Kline 

  Rabbi Douglas Krantz 

  Rabbi Hannah Laner 

  Rabbi Jason van Leeuwen

  Rabbi Michael Lerner

  Kohenet Carly “Ketzirah” Lesser

  Rabbi Richard Levy 

  Cantor Abbe Lyons 

  Rabbi Jeffrey Marker 

  Rabbi Nathan Martin

  Rabbi J. Rolando Matalon 

  Rabbi Yocheved Mintz 

  Kohenet Tiana Mirapai

   Rabbi David Mivasair 

  Rabbi Lee Moore

  Hazan Judith Naimark 

  Rabbi Laura Owens

  Rabbi Victor Reinstein 

  Cantor Stephen Richards

  Rabbi Brant Rosen 

  Cantor Richard Rosenfield 

  Kohenet Mei Mei Sanford 

  Hazan Pamela Sawyer

  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 Toba Spitzer

  Rabbi Naomi Steinberg 

  Rabbi Gershon Steinberg-Caudill

  Rabbi Louis Sutker

 Rabbi Daniel Swartz

 Rabbi Renae Toben 

  Rabbi Brian Walt

  Hazan Gregory Yaroslow 

  Rabbi Barbara Zacky

  Rabbi Laurie Zimmerman