#21 with Dr. Yakir Englander about Men, Peace and Anti-Semitism

MINDSETSHIFT with Mickey Feher

As things escalate in the USA, I am releasing this episode with a heavy heart but with a lot of hope. Heavy heart because we talked before the Capitolium was besieged, but we already knew that nothing good will come from the two sides demonizing each other. With a lot of hope as we do talk about some great and promising tools and approaches that might help us in this situation. Our discussion also flows around the history of Jewish masculinity and the roots of anti-Semitism. We touch on the sexuality of men and how many men tend not to have any understanding and connection to their body. My guest is Dr. Yakir Englander, the National Director of Leadership programs at the Israeli-American Council. He also teaches at the AJR (a rabbinical school) in New-York. Originally from the Ultra-Orthodox community of Israel, Englander obtained his Ph.D. from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem in Jewish philosophy and gender studies. He is a Fulbright scholar and was a visiting professor of Religion at Northwestern University, the Shalom Hartman Institute and Harvard Divinity School.

Englander's books have changed the discourse on sexuality and gender inside the Jewish religious societies in Israel. After leaving Orthodoxy, Yakir was drafted to the Israeli military, spending most of his service in an elite unit tasked with the identification of human remains. As a result of his service, he joined as a director and later as the vice president at Kids4Peace, an interfaith youth movement in Jerusalem and other cities in North America. We talk about the lessons he has learned from the peace work, and how we should handle the bitter divide in the USA and around the world.