Melanie Phillips: The defender of faith
The King has shown much friendship and warmth towards British Jews. In 2013, at the inauguration of Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis, he became the first royal to attend such a ceremony — sporting a personalised kippah embroidered with the crest of the Prince of Wales. In a speech that year, he expressed concern at the rise of antisemitism in Britain.Liz Truss’s world view and its implications for UK-Israel relations
In 2019, at a Chanukah party at Buckingham Palace, he said that as he grew up he had been deeply touched that British Jews remembered his family in their weekly prayers. “And as you remember my family”, he said, “so we too remember and celebrate you”.
Five years ago, however, Jews were alarmed to read a letter he wrote in 1986 to his mentor, Laurens van der Post. He referred in this to Israel having been created by an influx of European Jews. He also lamented the influence of the “Jewish lobby” in America.
At the time, Clarence House disavowed these remarks. It said the letter “clearly stated” these weren’t his own views but represented the opinions of some of those he had met during his recent visit to the Gulf “which he was keen to interrogate”.
Whether or not he ever held such views, however, is all but irrelevant.
Now that he is the King, he has lost the freedom to express his opinions. In his private weekly audiences with the prime minister, he is most likely to follow the constitutional convention upheld by his mother.
This is to proffer wise advice to the prime minister, issue warnings and above all provide support — but never to seek to influence government policy.
In any event, his own deep belief in promoting harmony reinforces the fundamental duty of the British monarchy — to unify the nation.
In that duty, the British crown has patterned itself since antiquity on the monarchy of King David, who forged a united kingdom out of disparate tribes and whose own power was limited through alternative power bases of priests, prophets and judges.
Charles III is the latest British monarch in that Davidic tradition. God save the King. And God save British Jews.
While the world’s attention has been focused on Britain’s new king, the country also got a new prime minister just two days before the death of Queen Elizabeth II. Toby Greene investigates Liz Truss’s approach to both domestic politics and diplomacy—which he argues are not unlike those of Margaret Thatcher—and how these will shape policies toward the Jewish state:The contrasting tale of two monarchs
In Truss’s mental map of the world, in which decent, honest, sovereign, free-trading nations are pitted against aggressive authoritarians, Israel sits firmly in the former category. Israel’s inclusion in Truss’s list of “friends and allies” in her October 2021 conference speech was not an isolated example, with Israel referred to repeatedly as an example of a (non-EU) democratic partner that excels in innovation.
Truss’s attitude towards Israel cannot be separated from that of her party, in which a view of Israel as a democratic, economically successful, and strategically significant partner has become increasingly dominant.
Whilst Israel is a pariah for significant chunks of the [British] left—and bursts negatively into the public eye during periodic rounds of violence [in the Middle East]—for the right this is more grist for the mill in the culture wars. Conservative pro-Zionism helps expose Labor’s internal rifts over the legacy of [its former leader Jeremy] Corbyn, who got the party bogged down in his anti-Semitic anti-Zionism.
Like much of Truss’s politics, her philo-Semitism carries echoes of Thatcher, whose cabinet famously included more “old Estonians than Old Etonians.” . . . . But that does not guarantee plain sailing for UK-Israel relations under a Truss premiership. First there is the issue of Iran. While Truss talks tough on Iran, like many Western leaders, she is unlikely to stand in the way of the Biden administration’s determination to return to the [2015 nuclear deal], which Israeli leaders and U.S. Republicans will complain is disastrous.
The one was to live a tranquil 96 years – a full life. The other was to be cut down aged 23 in a bloody revolution. Faisal, his family, the prime minister Nuri al-Said and his ministers were brutally shot by military officers who seized power in 1958. Iraq became a republic. In a show of exceptional barbarism, the corpses of King Faisal II, his uncle Abdelilah, and Prime Minister Nuri al-Said were dragged, naked, through the streets of Baghdad.Check out the new Hebrew Jewish prayer for King Charles III - Read here
Iraqi Jews who were still living in the country – 98 percent had already left by 1951 – remember that ghoulish episode. For some it was the final signal to leave forever. They could not stomach the brutality with which Iraq treated its royal family.
Conditions had already deteriorated quite badly for the Jewish community by the time King Faisal II took the throne in 1953. When the photo was taken, only 6,000 Jews out of 150,000 still lived in Iraq, a fractious country.
The Queen was a comforting symbol of unity and stability to whom British and Commonwealth Jews have always pledged loyalty. Faisal I, Iraq’s first king, Faisal II’s grandfather, from the Hashemite dynasty, also commanded the respect of the Jewish community in Iraq. Still today he is thought of as a wise and tolerant king.
Iraq was a post-WW1 concoction of three Ottoman provinces under British mandate. The Jews experienced their golden age under Faisal I in the 1920s. He pledged to treat the Jews, Christians and Muslims in his kingdom equally.
The Hashemites were brought in from the Arabian peninsula by the British as a reward for fighting alongside them against the Ottoman Turks. The Allies had promised Faisal I the throne of Syria. But he was double-crossed by the British and the French and offered the throne of Iraq instead. Faisal never appeared to forgive the British and arrived in Baghdad with a coterie of disgruntled ex-Ottoman and Syrian nationalists. During his reign Iraq became a hub of Arab nationalism.
Since the death of Queen Elizabeth II, the traditional prayer that UK Jews have been reciting for hundreds of years has changed to include the name of King Charles III, as well as Prince and Princess of Wales William and Kate.
In addition, in the coming months, the United Synagogue will print a new version of its siddur (prayer book), with the updated version of the prayer for the royal family.
Jewish communities around the world have been accustomed to reciting a special prayer for the survival and peace of the heads of state in the countries they live in. In the UK, the prayer blessed Queen Elizabeth, and in the United States, it is a blessing to the president.
A source in the United Synagogue, the largest umbrella organization of synagogues in the UK, which is considered central to Modern Orthodoxy, has said they were planning on printing a new version of the siddur anyway – but now that the queen has died and there is a new king, they have decided to quickly edit the existing text to say: “He who gives salvation to kings and dominion to princes, Whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom – may He bless Our Sovereign lord, King Charles, our gracious Queen Consort Camilla, the Prince and Princess of Wales, and all the Royal Family.”
“Chief Rabbi … you have to get home for the Sabbath…”
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) September 18, 2022
Beautiful anecdote by @chiefrabbi Mirvis, about the lengths HM #KingCharles went to, in order to ensure the Chief Rabbi could attend the faith leaders reception & return home in time for Sabbath.pic.twitter.com/3ZTmoAAdDE
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