During the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, eleven Israeli athletes are taken hostage and murdered by a Palestinian terrorist group known as Black September. In retaliation, the Israeli government recruits a group of Mossad agents to track down and execute those responsible for the attack. The movie recounts their brutal acts, but much more important, their Jewish ambivalence toward these acts. Some general reflections are in order. First, Golda Meir, former Israeli Prime Minister, once said to Egyptian President Anwar Saddat just before Israeli-Egyptian peace talks: We can forgive you Arabs for killing our sons. But we will never forgive you for making us kill yours. That is the crux of the movie. Five Israelis volunteer to avenge the murder of their fellow Israelis, but some of them quickly begin to feel a sense of moral repugnance at having to take the life of another human being, even an enemy. Munich presents us with their differing views of retribution, allowing us to make up our own minds while we watch their human struggles at what they are called upon to do. You can see them develop as moral actors who are confronted with their consciences before each and every murder. In a movie review last December in the New York Times, Manohla Dargis opines: they are never more human than when faced with the killing of another person. Second, the Talmud talks a lot about an eye for an eye, and there are those who use this phrase as a justification for all acts of revenge. In fact, the modern State of Israel was created precisely so that we Jews would always have a homeland with an army, so that no one ever again could spill the blood of Jews with impunity. Before the Hoocaust (Shoah), Jewish blood was cheap and could be shed by Nazis and Arabs without their worrying about being hunted down and punished. Now, thank God, that is no longer true. The enemies of the Jewish State now know that they will be hunted down and held accountable for each and every murderous action or suicide bombing anywhere in the world. Now that we have the State of Israel, Jewish blood is no longer cheap. But please note, the Rabbis of the Talmud never interpreted this text as meaning precise retributive justice, rather they understood the punishment for blinding someone to be a monetary one instead. Many pages in the Talmud explicate how exactly we estimate the value of an eye or a leg or a limb that is destroyed by an enemy, and what needs to be done to rectify the damage. Interpreting this text in a much different way, Rev. Martin Luther King once said: a world which carries out literally the doctrine of an eye for an eye will lead to a world with no eyes, and no vision. And of course he is right. Finally, at our Passover seder, during the recitation of the Ten Plagues, we dip out ten drops of wine from our cups. We do this to echo this Rabbinic conversation between God and the Heavenly Angels who were singing and dancing after the Egyptians were killed at the Red Sea: God: why are you rejoicing? Angels: because the Egyptian enemies of the Israelites have been killed, that is why we are singinging dancing. God: But how can you rejoice? These Egyptians too are My creatures! And so, we spill out sweet wine, in memory of our enemies, for they too are Gods creations. We are the only people I know that marks the death of enemies with a special ritual. No other nation in the world is as sensitive as we Jews are to the pain that we are sometimes forced to inflict on those who would try to destroy us, and to the value of human life. I have a friend who is extremely close with the Head of the Israeli Air Force. The general said to my friend last week that many of his pilots categorically refuse to kill innocent civilians, rather they must have irrefutable evidence that their bombs will fall on adult combatants or they will stay home. Whatever your opinions on this may be, you cannot help but be impressed as I am by the moral vigor with which they approach their military service. I cannot help but wonderwhere are others with this same attitude and respect for human life? Where are the other mothers and fathers whose sons feel the same ambiguity as our Israelis do? How long will it take before Israel can talk with neighbors who will share their concerns about the fragility and the sacredness of human life? I believe that there must be a sense of fear and trembling when we talk about the killing of another human being, and it is this precise feeling which comes across loudly and clearly in Spielbergs movie. Go see it and decide for yourself. It is a hard movie to watch, and well worth it. |
