I don’t live in Oak Park, so I don’t have a vote in this referendum. But for 18 years Oak Park Temple has been my family’s second home, and Oak Park has shown me a model community that celebrates pluralism, inclusion and respect across differences.
Perhaps that gives me a useful perspective from just outside its borders. The Oak Park I have come to know over the last two decades is better than singling out one people or allowing an international conflict to divide neighbors here at home. I hope Oak Park voters will vote No.
I understand why some Oak Parkers may initially see this as a free-speech question. After all, the right to protest, criticize governments, and make individual choices about what we buy are important values. But I hope voters will also look carefully at the movement this referendum would support and how Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) has operated in practice.
For many American Jews like me, Israel is deeply connected to our history, families, culture and identity. Singling out Israelis and Israeli institutions therefore doesn’t feel like an abstract foreign-policy debate. So when Jewish voters are asked to take a side on a boycott movement that the vast majority of Jews find discriminatory and hurtful, that weight is personal, not political.
Please vote No on the referendum.
Susan Blumberg-Kason
Oak Park Temple member
