Last week, a minor political scandal unfolded around the note that Barack Obama put between the stones of the Kotel when he visited the Wall during his tour of Israel. Dug out from between the stones by a yeshiva student, and printed in the Israeli newspaper Ma’ariv. Obama at the wall: maybe he should have pushed that note a bit further backRabbi Shmuel Rabinovitz, the rabbi in charge of the Kotel, condemned the newspaper and their violation of Obama’s privacy, saying “The notes placed between the stones of the Western Wall are between a person and his maker. It is forbidden to read them or make any use of them.". The yeshiva student apologized for his actions, saying it was “kind of a prank.” Ma'ariv spread some rumors that Obama had leaked the contents of the note before he even went to the wall, but that seems to have been proved false. Ma'ariv’s third helpful contribution was the following sentence, printed the following: "In any case, since Obama is not a Jew, publishing the note does not constitute an infringement on his right to privacy."

There are a few issues here. First of all, publicizing someone’s private letter, whether it’s to God, Santa Claus, or their Uncle Ralph, is inappropriate. Rabbeinu Gershom, a rabbi living 1000 years ago in Mayence, issued a prohibition against reading anyone else’s personal mail, and that prohibition still stands today. I would have to look at the text of the prohibition to see if it seems to extend to everyone’s mail, or just the mail of other Jews. Regardless, stealing the letter and publishing it are in very bad taste. On the other hand, Obama should have and probably did know that this would happen, and had he released his note ahead of time, he may have been able to avoid all of the brouhaha that has surrounded this story. Or he may have wanted the brouhaha. Remember, when the Pope visited the Wall in 2000 he made his note public, and wrote it in English. He also, like Obama, prayed at the Wall.

Written prayer is not to be taken lightly, and I’m appalled at the craziness surrounding this letter, but it doesn’t really shed any light on Obama’s character or qualities. His note was perfectly PC, and earnest in a not-too-creepy way. If he has any secrets, confessions or great sins, he may have brought them up in his spoken or mental prayer at the Wall, but it’s hard to believe he’d be stupid enough to commit them to paper.

If we learn anything from this it should be about privacy—our own, and what we expect from others. We want emails to be private, some phone calls, letters from our employers, and medical information. But who among us hasn’t forwarded a few personal emails to friends wondering about the subtext, or spoken about a private matter while walking down the street surrounded by strangers who could hear every word? Google says that complete privacy doesn’t exist, and maybe they’re right, but if there’s anything in the world that remains private, shouldn’t it be personal prayers?

Of all the stories that have surfaced about Barack Obama in light of his election campaign, I bet he wasn’t expecting this particular bit of information to appear in the morning paper. Secrets, Secrets are No Fun: maybe he should have reached for a higher space

Barack Obama just got back from a tour abroad (you might have heard something about it?), including a stop over in Israel. There, in the city of Jerusalem, the presidential hopeful donned his Obamulke and put in his two cents to The Big Guy in the form of a personal note he wedged into a crack in the kotel.

Obviously, he thought the note was going to stay private. But, no – thanks to an anonymous (though now easily identified by the egg on his face) yeshiva student, the note was snatched out of the Western Wall cracks and handed over to the Israeli newspaper Maariv.

So while American media outlets were still LOLing over their own satirical versions of Obama’s prayer note, they were getting totally scooped by the Israeli press. Oh, snap.

The note, handwritten on King David Hotel room stationery went like this:

Lord -

Protect my family and me. Forgive me my sins, and help me guard against pride and despair. Give me the wisdom to do what is right and just. And make me an instrument of your will.

Hey, you didn’t read it here first.

After the whole note publishing affair was condemned by head Western Wall rabbi, Shmuel Rabinovitz, the same note-snatching yeshiva student appeared on Israeli Channel 2 news to publicly apologize. Or, at least as public as you can get when your face is totally obscured and your name is listed only as “Alef,” the first letter of your name.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “It was kind of a prank. I hope he wasn’t hurt.” Only time will tell whether the note will help or harm Obama, we’re guessing it will probably only add a hint of mystery and charm to Obama’s mystique. But for now, thanks in part to the Western Wall Heritage Foundation, the note has been safely returned to the kotel cracks.

The Southern WallIn Europe you see 500 year-old shit. In Israel you see 2,000 year-old shit. Today we’re at such a spot: The Western Wall in Jerusalem. Our tour guide Offer calls it the place “closest to God on Earth” and “the holy of holies.” We visit the Southern Wall first, probably because it’s less crowded and allows us to have time to hold hands and sing, which Offer has us do while ascending the steps to the Southern Wall. I don’t sing because I don’t know these prayers, melodies, or any Hebrew. And I don’t even pretend or try to participate because I don’t see the point. So when prayers and singing happen, which are all in Hebrew, I zone out.

After we touch the Southern Wall, we write notes to put in the Western Wall. Offer tells us it should be our greatest wish in life. Now I don’t believe this is going to affect my life but I figure it can’t hurt so I jot something down. It goes something like:

Dear Wall:
My greatest wish is to be as happy as possible. I hope you’re feeling well with all these people feeling you up all day.
Best,
Amy

Yes, it’s business-like, but that’s what comes out without me thinking about it. I don’t believe in God and don’t know the wall personally so a colon seems most appropriate.

I do, finally, have one surreal moment standing at the Southern Wall. (The way people talk about Israel you expect to have surreal moments all day long, but this hasn’t been the case for me.) My surreal moment occurs while hearing the Muslim prayer call, which originates from somewhere right above our heads and echoes over the whole city. I’ve never heard anything like it, and it seems so mystically appropriate to my surroundings. Finally I feel like I’m in a very foreign land, standing on a 2,000 year old fortress (or at least, the reconstructed version of it).

The Western Wall: men on the left, women on the rightOffer explains the story behind the wall so nicely that I don’t even mind that I have to listen to it while standing in the rain all day. I hardly even mind that it’s biblical rather than historical, and am even thinking the pointless exercise of sticking my stupid note in the wall will be kind of fun.

My note is neatly folded in my hand as I approach the Holy of Holies, and suddenly I realize I’m up against a partition. Men are on the other side. Division of the sexes always pisses me off, but noticing how much larger the men’s side is infuriates me. I immediately exit to get a better view of this appalling relic of sexism. With my view of both sides, I easily see that the men enjoy about four times as much wall as the women. They can spread out comfortably. Little boys chase pigeons in big circles and kick shit around on the ground. Meanwhile, the women huddle seven deep against their wall section. They have no room to run. No gleeful children are visible.

All the other women in my group are fine with this. “That’s how it is,” they all agree. Right, that’s how it is. But it’s like that because y’all don’t give a shit, which is really sad and you should feel sorry for yourselves, I think. Religion is no excuse for sexism. This is 2008. Get with it.

When everyone finishes praying, or whatever it is you do at the wall, I ask Offer about the partition. He explains that men have more space because they daven three times a week—way more than women. I ask why. He says that women are supposed to be home doing other things. They don’t need to daven because they are considered to be innately pure. Men need to make themselves pure, so they need to pray more. OK. But why shouldn’t there be equal space? Aren’t most visitors to the wall tourists, anyway? If the men really needed the extra space, wouldn’t the women’s side be comparable in crowdedness rather than looking like a refugee camp?

No, these answers are not satisfying. They are bullshit.

I am more of a feminist than a Jew and refuse to approach the wall.

Previously: Day 2, or Is This Really My Homeland?

Next up: Day 4, Falling in Love with Israel at Masada

Beth's post on Miriam Shear has generated a lot of reader feedback, including one post from the blogger she cited. Here is Manila Ryce, the voice behind The Largest Minority:

Thank you for posting my article. I see it's raised a few eyebrows and pitchforks. If anyone doubts the human rights abuses of the Israeli government, they merely need to visit the sites of Israeli groups like B'Tselem, or international ones like Amnesty Int'l. I feel no need to defend that declaration as many before me have done so successfully. I stated that Israel was "the biggest" violator of human rights, in part because of Israel's actions in the occupied territories over decades, and the abuses the IDF has caused outside of Israel's borders.

I quote Shamai Leibowitz, an Israeli human rights attorney. "For years, American taxpayers money has funded the occupation ­ the torture chambers, the military apparatus, the bulldozers used in house demolitions, the building of settlements and now the construction of the West Bank wall, declared illegal by the International Court of Justice (ICJ)."

Simply put, Leibowitz says Israel is not held "accountable to their obligations under universal human rights norms and international human rights instruments." As ashprintzen said above, Iran and Saudi Arabia are two large violators as well, but do we really want to use those countries as the measuring stick for progress? The reason I consider Israel to be a bigger threat to human rights is because of its American-backed policies. It has the luxury of imposing its will on other nations, and is only second to America in doing so.

Not sure I "agree" with the use of "biggest" in this context, but Manila's point does beg the larger question of using American taxpayer money to finance illegal settlements, the Western Wall and bulldozers used to raze Palestinian houses (not all of which contain terrorist-transporting tunnel entrances). An American Jew certainly has the right to call out Israeli citizens on sexist, medieval behavior, and to do so with more authority than that of an offended tourist.

This was the one of the powerful ironies lost on the Mearsheimer/Walt brigade, namely that by the grace of AIPAC and the supposed influence of the "Israel Lobby," Americans do have more of a say in how the Jewish state should conduct itself. There's no guaranty that say must amount to tacit (or not-so-tacit) approval of every policy crafted in Jerusalem any more than of how some peremptory frummy comports himself in public.

Miriam Shear, an American-Israeli woman, was attacked by a group of Orthodox men back in November for not sitting in the back of the bus (Mehadrin) while on her way to the Western Wall. When a group of Ultra Orthodox men repeatedly asked her to move to the back of the bus, the interaction escalated with Shear calling one, a "son-of-a-bitch," or ben zona. From there. a spitting match ensued before things got downright physical.

Throughout the encounter, the other passengers called her a “stupid American” for not giving in to the man’s orders. “People blamed me for not knowing my place and not going to the back of the bus where I belong.” Yehoshua Meyer, an eyewitness on the bus, verified Shear’s account as entirely accurate. “She was badly beaten and her whole body sustained hits and kicks. She tried to fight back and no one would help her. I tried to help, but someone was stopping me from getting up. My phone’s battery was dead, so I couldn’t call the police."

Of the attack, Manila Ryce, the blogger at The Largest Minority who posted on it, said:

There’s something very ironic in the bus passengers denouncing Shear for being an American while her American tax dollars go towards supporting Israel’s oppressive system. It’s always bothered me that most Americans view Israel as a shinning beacon of democracy and hope when it’s actually the biggest violator of human rights in the Middle East. Women in Israel are second-class citizens while Arabs are third-class citizens.