Tsav, Palestine, and the Vietnam War / צו, פּאַלעסטינע, און דער וויעטנאַם מלחמה

This is a weekly series of parsha dvarim written by a frum, atheist, transsexual anarchist. It's crucial in these times that we resist the narrative that Zionism owns Judaism. Our texts are rich—sometimes opaque, but absolutely teeming with wisdom and fierce debate. It's the work of each generation to extricate meaning from our cultural and religious inheritance. I aim to offer comment which is true to the source material (i.e. doesn't invert or invent meaning to make us more comfortable) and uses Torah like a light to reflect on our modern times. The full dvar is paywalled for four weeks to help me sustain my work as a writer; if you can't afford to subscribe, email me and I'll send you the link for free.

An appeal: My friend Madleen needs help to support her children in Gaza. This fundraiser is run by a friend of a comrade, and I talk to Madleen regularly. Any amount helps, no matter how small.

Content note: Genocide in Palestine and the Vietnam War

The parsha Tsav details the process of slaughter for the five types of burnt offering made to Hashem on the alter of the Mishkon or Temple. We're also given the punishments for improperly eating from the sacrifice, and the consecrating of the Kohanim. There's some strong gender: only the male descendants of Ahron may eat the holy offerings. Then, we shift from instruction to narrative as Moishe Rebeynu and Ahron make a sin offering of a bull and a ram.

While there's some interesting paths we can explore about gender or the Jewish obsessive compulsions with food touching other food, I'm too dazzled by the descriptions of the sin offering that Moishe and Ahron make in killing the bull. It reminds me of the scene in Apocalypse Now where they film the actual ritualistic slaughter of a water buffalo. The blood. The beast's knees buckling as it falls down dead. We are not the only culture to kill animals in the name of G-d. I've been thinking a lot about the Vietnam War lately, so it's no big leap from the parsha to Colonel Kurtz for me right now. I've been looking backwards as I always do, searching for patterns in history that I might find applicable answers for this moment. Vietnam calls me from the archives. The Iraq War might be more similar in geography and technology, but it's Vietnam that looms in my mind as the endless, unwinnable American conflict ("campaign") against an anti-war population at home and a civilian (guerrilla) force abroad.

The urgency of the war—this war, the war in Palestine—hasn't left me, 552 days later. My mind still races and searches for more effective ways we can stop the genocide from here in the heart of empire. It's our tax dollars funding it and our weapons shipments that kill. What good is a march, a photo-op, a hundred protestors getting arrested on purpose? The gears of war grind on.

"During the Vietnam War, which lasted longer than any war we've ever been in—and which we lost—every respectable artist in this country was against the war. It was like a laser beam. We were all aimed in the same direction. The power of this weapon turns out to be that of a custard pie dropped from a stepladder six feet high."

—Kurt Vonnegut, 2003

I am too young to have seen the Vietnam War. Like the stories in Torah or memories of the Khurbn, I've only got second-hand references and media depictions. Full Metal Jacket. Jacob's Ladder. Fucking Forrest Gump. Or devastating songs about disabled veterans like "Ruby Don't Take Your Love to Town" by Leonard Nimoy or "Hero of the War" by Scott Walker:

He's a hero of the war
All the neighborhood is talkin' 'bout your son
Mrs. Reiley, get his medals, hand them 'round to everyone
Show his gun to all the children in the street
It's too bad he can't shake hands or move his feet

The affects of the Vietnam War are ongoing in Vietnam and in America. Aside from the millions dead, Agent Orange has disabled some one million Vietnamese. The anti-war movement in America defined modern protest tactics which we still use today, for better or for worse.

I want that we learn the lessons of the anti-war movements from the '60s and '70s and '00s, and the AIDS movement in the '80s and '90s. Spectacle isn't enough. One million people marching on the National Mall doesn't even register. We need real, material disruption.

The parallels between Palestine and Vietnam are striking, at least to me as I search for patterns: an offensive colonial power drafting its citizens into war; a guerrilla defensive that won/will win despite underwhelming fire power; civilian infrastructure targeted; a refugee crisis; children systemically maimed; crimes against humanity; a war that drags on despite public pressure for peace. But Palestine isn't Vietnam. IDF soldiers are drafted, but there isn't the same culture around draft-dodging in Israel that America had; refuseniks aren't yet celebrated. We have new lessons to learn about how to stop this war characterized not by jungle but desert and AI.

Like those who committed atrocities in Vietnam, I think the IDF soldiers who shoot civilians and aid workers will mostly remain anonymous and protected by their government. I don't believe we will see justice for the dead.

Why does the Torah demand sacrifices? What is divine about slaughtered animals, burning flesh and entrails? Why is that odor pleasing to Hashem?

We consecrate our priests in blood. Blood—bulls and buffalo, dashed across the alter, on the road in Mỹ Lai, mixed with dust and rubble in Gaza, vials in the clinic filled to test for HIV, and just a little bit on my thigh as I remove the needle after injecting testosterone. Will I stop bleeding that way under this government that wants to take away my hormones? Or will I bleed more, punched in the face by Lubavichers on the street because I won't back down when they call me a faggot? I'm sorry for getting so personal this week. I'm exhausted from the flu and I'm not sure how else to relate to Torah right now. The people around me have kashered everything (generously and largely for my benefit) but I'm not going into Peysakh feeling ready or clean. Maybe the burning of the khamets or my last haircut before the Omer will help. Maybe our silly little rituals are for something.

Why does Moishe make a sin offering, which are made for sins committed inadvertently or out of ignorance? What does material reconciliation look like for such sins? Is the sin offering just a spectacle—not real tshuva for wrongdoing but a sensory distraction? How can we ensure our protests aren't pointless distractions? Is there anything inadvertent about the war in Palestine after over a year of livestreamed murder?