Let us not forget: The Palestinians in Gaza are our permanent neighbors, and we are theirs.
Is Israel going to continue to be 'Fortress Israel'? Or, as we all hope, become accepted into the neighborhood, which I believe is the only way we can move forward in harmony.
With my childhood, it's a wonder I'm not psychotic. I was the little Jewish boy in the non-Jewish neighborhood. It was a little like being the first Negro enrolled in the all-white school. I grew up in libraries and among books, without friends.
My parents were Zionists born in Poland. My father was a rabbi who didn't know much about science and ran a grocery store in the neighborhood with my mother's help.
My neighborhood didn't really encourage women, though it didn't prevent women from progressing, either.
There is no need for neighborhood informants and paper dossiers if the government can see citizens' every Web site visit, e-mail and text message.
Even as a kid, I was a businessman. I figured out that if you plucked all the berries off my neighbor's tree and smashed them up, they made a Nickelodeon Gak-type consistency. I sold them to all the neighborhood kids and made stacks of quarters. Of course, the berries were poisonous, and I got in all types of trouble.
My mom was always trying to figure out ways to make Hanukkah exciting and compete with our neighbors the Kremps, who always had these amazing blow-out Christmas parties.
The Bible calls us to love our neighbors, and to do justice and love kindness, not to indiscriminately kill one another.
If God is not sending earthquakes, destroying economies and inflicting pain upon human beings, what is God doing? God works through people, calling them to help their neighbors in need. God comforts His people, walking with them even 'through the valley of the shadow of death.'
