The Parable of the Wayward Child and the Foster Family: Why the National Reckoning Requires Governance, Not Victimhood | Josh Aronson

Josh Aronson calls for a national reckoning on Rosh Hashanah, warning that Israel must curb extreme violence and enforce the law, not out of fear of sanctions, but out of moral responsibility. He uses the parable of a foster family to explain how international sanctions, led by Britain, are the result of an Israeli governance vacuum, harming the majority of law-abiding settlers and the Jewish diaspora.

Josh Aronson, in an opinion piece for Rosh Hashanah, calls for a deep national reckoning. He argues that Israel must curb extreme violence and enforce the law, not out of fear of international sanctions, but out of moral responsibility and solidarity with the Jewish diaspora. Aronson uses the parable of a foster family: the father (the Israeli government) who does not educate the wayward child (extremist elements) leads to intervention by the foster family (sanctions by Britain and the West), which harms all the siblings (law-abiding settlers). He warns that sanctions are a direct result of a governance vacuum, and that the automatic response of victimhood obscures self-responsibility. The article cites the philosophy of Thomas Hobbes, that the justification for a state's existence is its monopoly on the use of force. Aronson concludes with a call for sobriety and moral nation-building, in memory of his grandfather who passed away on Rosh Hashanah.

The Parable of the Wayward Child and the Foster Family: Why the National Reckoning Requires Governance, Not Victimhood | Josh Aronson