Toward a Jewish argument for the responsibility to protect

Abstract

Articulating a definitive Jewish perspective on any issue, no matter how Aseemingly straightforward, is a fraught enterprise. While there are certain fundamental realms of agreement for most Jews, diversity of opinion is in many ways the sine qua non of Jewish communal identity. As the old Jewish joke goes, for every two Jews, there are three opinions. Given that tendency to disagree, it should come as no surprise that an issue as complicated and rooted in contemporary geopolitics as the "responsibility to protect" does not produce a consensus position from the entire Jewish community. Nonetheless, we believe that there is a compelling argument to be made in support of the responsibility to protect, grounded in a rigorous reading of Jewish text and supported by the particular arc of Jewish historical experience.