editorials
A Breach at the Supreme Court
M uch has been said about last
week’s unprecedented leak
of a draft opinion by Supreme Court
Justice Samuel Alito in the Dobbs v.

Jackson Women’s Health Organization
case, proposing to overturn the
court’s historic Roe v. Wade decision.

According to the draft, four other
justices joined in Alito’s conclusion,
three disagreed and the position of
the chief justice is unclear.

But the leaked draft was just that
— a draft. And as experienced court
watchers have observed, positions,
arguments and votes of justices often
change as opinions are reviewed,
critiqued, refined and finalized. So,
while early indications are that Roe v.

Wade will be overturned (much as pre-
dicted following oral argument several
months ago), we will have to await
the final Dobbs opinion to see what is
actually decided, by whom and why.

But the draft nature of the opinion
leak hasn’t stopped advocates on
both sides of the divisive abortion
debate from reacting — including
protests by those opposed to the
predicted result and rallies in support
by those who embrace it, plans for
changes on the state level in reaction
to or because of the expected deci-
sion, and get out the vote and other
efforts by both parties in anticipa-
tion of the abortion issue driving the
upcoming midterm elections.

None of this is new. The abortion
ing its own abortion policies. Some
65 million women could lose access
to an abortion because 12 states
have “trigger laws” that will automat-
ically ban or highly restrict abortions
if Roe is overturned. A Democratic-
sponsored federal abortion-rights
law stands little chance of passing.

In fact, rights activists fear an
We worry about the partisan fury
that ignores tradition and makes
everything fair game.

debate has been among the most
contentious and divisive issues in
our country. Americans are torn —
with a majority consistently saying
they do not want Roe overturned
and a majority also favoring some
level of restriction on abortion. That
seems to indicate that Roe, with all
its flaws, was a good compromise.

If Roe is overturned, there will be
inconsistency with each state pursu-
eventual Republican-passed law to
prohibit abortion altogether, or even
the possible use of the Alito logic of
what the Constitution doesn’t say
in order to strike down a line of
civil rights decisions regarding con-
traception, same-sex marriage and
interracial marriage. But all of this
must await the final Dobbs decision.

For now, we worry that the unprec-
edented leak of the draft opinion
Russia’s Blood Libel
L ike the rest of the Western world,
Israel wants to support Ukraine
in its fight to defend its democracy
and right to self-determination
against an unprovoked invasion from
its more powerful neighbor Russia.

But because Russia has a sig-
nificant presence in Syria and has
allowed Israel to conduct occasional
airstrikes there to stymie threatening
activity by Iran and Syria, Israel’s
government has contorted itself in
order to balance its ideals with its
security needs.

As a result, Israel has sent signifi-
cant humanitarian aid to Ukraine but
has not joined in the imposition of
sanctions against Russia. And while
Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid
has made numerous statements
condemning the Russian invasion,
Prime Minister Naftali Bennett has
been far more circumspect and
14 MAY 12, 2022 | JEWISHEXPONENT.COM
refrained from doing so. Bennett
even attempted to serve as a medi-
ator between Russia and Ukraine
during the early days of the war.

Recently, however, Israel’s good-
cop, bad cop routine came to an
abrupt halt when Israel was attacked
in an ugly, antisemitic screed by a
Russian official and by the Russian
foreign ministry.

In an interview with Italian TV,
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei
Lavrov defended Russia’s claim
that it invaded Ukraine to “de-Na-
zify” the country. Lavrov then said
that it didn’t matter that Ukrainian
President Volodymyr Zelensky was
Jewish. And he went on: “When they
say that Nazification cannot exist
if there are Jews [in charge]: In my
opinion even Hitler had Jewish ori-
gins so it means absolutely noth-
ing.” And if that wasn’t bad enough,
Lavrov added: “Jewish wise people
said already a long time ago that
the biggest antisemites are Jewish
themselves.” Hitler was not Jewish, and there
is no evidence that Hitler came from
Jewish origins. Of course, Lavrov
is not the first person to make the
Hitler Jewish origins claim, nor is he
the first to blame antisemitism on
Jews themselves. But the fact that
others have made the same outra-
geous claims doesn’t excuse them.

Both Bennett and Lapid were quick
to condemn Lavrov’s antisemitic
rant. But rather than back away from
Lavrov’s outrage or apologize for it,
the Russian foreign ministry doubled
down a few days later and accused
Israel of supporting the neo-Nazis in
Ukraine. Someone must have explained
to Russian leadership how out-
is another indication that American
institutions are becoming casualties
of the corrosive and destructive cul-
ture wars that our country is fight-
ing. Until last week, it was largely
accepted that the internal workings
of the U.S. Supreme Court were
sacrosanct. Say what you will about
the motivations of the justices or
the politicians who promoted them,
everyone seemed to agree that
what went on in the often-messy
process of deciding cases needed
to remain confidential in order to
encourage the full airing of ideas
and approaches among the justices.

But that is no more. All it took was
one explosive, hot-button issue leak to
shatter that view and to drag the inner
workings of the court into the ongoing
debate over the court’s politicization.

We worry about the partisan fury
that ignores tradition and makes
everything fair game, as the betrayal
of the Supreme Court takes another
step in our nation’s unfortunate race
to the bottom. This madness must
stop. JE
rageous and offensive the dou-
ble-barreled accusations were,
since Bennett’s office reported that
Russian President Vladimir Putin
himself apologized to Bennett for
the comments. We note, however,
that a Kremlin readout of Putin’s call
with Bennett made no mention of
an apology.

Russian antisemitism has a long
history and continues to this day,
irrespective of whatever relationship
Putin has with Russian Chief Rabbi
Berel Lazar. (Lazar has also criticized
Lavrov’s comments.) We know that
Russia’s war propaganda campaign
is desperate. So it isn’t all that sur-
prising that the Russian war machine
won’t let a little blood libel get in the
way of its message. Perhaps this will
be enough for Israel to abandon the
hope of a meaningful relationship
with Putin’s Russia. It should. JE



opinion
Emotional Health an Issue
for Everyone
BY PAULA GOLDSTEIN
Nuthawut Somsuk / iStock / Getty Images Plus
W hen COVID hit in 2020, the collective trauma
over this mysterious illness led to a rise in
what was already a serious challenge for all of us
and our families, namely, our mental health.

Our minds needed to grapple with the ongoing
news reports of people getting sick and dying with
no treatment forthcoming for a signifi cant amount of
time. For those who had experienced signifi cant trau-
mas at other times in their lives, the pandemic only
served as a trigger for retraumatization, something
that mental health professionals are all too familiar
with. What happens to a person who has had continu-
ous mental health challenges, perhaps for months
or years and then has to absorb more contributors
to overall mental well-being such as disruption
in school schedules, remote working, the end of
after-school activities and social opportunities, not
to mention interruptions in attending college, not
being able to see elderly parents, and the closing
of one’s business since no one is going out of their
homes. What we see is exactly what is happening in
our community today — a fl ooded mental health
system with not enough clinicians in the pipeline
to supply the mental health care that is needed.

Looking back, prepandemic we were already
in a mental health crisis. The ability to fi nd an
aff ordable therapist, covered by insurance was
almost nonexistent. If a person had the resources
to pay for services “out of pocket” then they stood
a chance of being seen.

When you add children and teens to the mix,
the number of available and skilled therapists
drops dramatically. We know from more recent
statistics that one in six children ages 5-16 are
likely to have a mental health problem. We also
know that in a classroom of 30 kids, fi ve will be
struggling with mental health challenges.

For parents who were struggling to work
remotely during the pandemic while supervising
their children as they learned on Zoom, if they did
not already have existing struggles with anxiety,
depression or other disorders, they probably did
due to the stress that families were experiencing
for months and months.

We are seeing the aftermath of this chaos now
and children and adults alike are fi nding them-
selves on waiting lists to see a therapist. For
some, the wait is not comfortable, but they can
manage until the appointment comes through.

For others, this phenomenon is more concerning
and dangerous as the only other choice for a per-
son who is having a signifi cant mental health crisis
is a visit to the emergency room of a hospital to
supply stabilization until a therapist can be seen.

One positive thing that came out of the pandemic
was the ability for many young people to begin to
open and show their vulnerability in relation to their
own mental health through social media outlets.

Platforms such as TikTok, Instagram and Facebook
gave rise to many sharing their struggles openly
and encouraging others who were experiencing
similar challenges to seek help. This served as a
major contributor to cutting stigma, which is its own
obstacle for some in need of mental health care.

The primary issue is that there simply is not
enough mental health care in most communities.

For providers, the amount of reimbursement from
insurance companies pales in relation to the
amount of time spent with an individual in care
causing many practitioners to only accept private
pay, eliminating the option to be seen for so many.

Even if one can be seen by paying out of pocket,
the waiting lists are long. Can someone delay a
full-blown emotional crisis until they are able to
get an appointment — most likely not.

Communities need to fi nd ways to spread the
support to many so that a village model can exist
is caring for those who need mental health sup-
port. More training in mental health for primary
care physicians, nurses, teachers, camp counsel-
ors, day care centers and YMCAs is needed to
be able to sustain crises until more resources are
available. We have long surpassed the time when only
a psychiatrist, psychologist or social worker can
engage with someone who has mental health
challenges. Imagine if a synagogue community,
rabbi, educators and congregants had mental
health fi rst aid training and began to think diff er-
ently about off ering support to its members who
were struggling.

And what if, when a teen went to school, teach-
ers and students were more aware of signs of
mental health crisis and had the ability to address
them in a normative day-to-day way? Off ering
education to preschool children around emotional
well being and universalizing mental health chal-
lenges to everyone at one point or another could
change the dialogue in classrooms, enabling
educators and kids alike to supply support and
guidance in an integrated way.

Diff erent times call for diff erent measures and
we are defi nitely in those times now. Emotional
health is an everyone issue — imagine embracing
it as just that and creating a language by which
institutions and communities work to support
each other. JE
Paula Goldstein is the CEO of Jewish Family and
Children’s Service of Greater Philadelphia.

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