1. At T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights, Rabbinic Convening, I sat down for a conversation with the T’ruah’s ED Rabbi Jill Jacobs, moderated by Rabbi Mark Soloway for his podcast A Dash of Drash.

2. I also published a piece at the Forward called The Case For Nonviolent Resistance: It’s Right And It Works.

The question I have been pondering is this: does this week of White Nationalist racist violence give credence to the argument of the antifa that the only logical, rational and ethical response to these people is to beat them down? Cornell West, a student of nonviolence, said that the antifa and the anarchists at the demonstration in the Park in Charlottesville saved his life, and the lives of the other clergy who were under threat of violence from the racist thugs.

Ta-Nehisi Coates has argued that it is immoral to demand that oppressed people act nonviolently. He argues that in US history, starting with the famous Boston Tea Party, all American gains have been achieved through violence or the threat of violence. Even during the civil rights movement, Coates argues, it was the threat of Malcolm X that gave Martin Luther King’s opponents the motivation for dealing with him.

Peter Beinart argues, on the other hand, that the antifa’s tactics are troubling. (It’s important to stress that he draws a strong distinction between the Antifa violence and the nazi and white supremacist violence.) Beinart’s argument is that Antifa violence is used by conservatives to justify right wing violence, which allows the right to portray itself as victims, and by using violence, the left loses the moral high ground.

I agree with Coates’ arguments but with Beinart’s conclusions.

Read the whole piece here: http://forward.com/scribe/380583/the-case-for-nonviolent-resistance-its-right-and-it-works/

3. I also gave a lecture to the Board of Rabbis of Southern California called “A Radical Approach to T’shuvah”.