Wrestling in the Daylight by Rabbi Brant Rosen has received numerous accolades from leaders in the Jewish community, Israel-Palestine activists, and many others. A sampling of this praise follows:


"Brant Rosen's book is a journey of a rabbi who moves from believing in liberal Zionism, to questioning it to eventually abandoning it, in favor of humanist values of equality for all, irrespective of religion.  Originally disturbed by Israel's actions in Lebanon in 1982 and later Israel's bombing campaign in Gaza in December 2008, Rosen begins to question Israel's actions towards the Palestinians.  In his personal journey, Rosen gently tries to bring readers of his blog and members of his congregation to view Israel and Zionism from the standpoint of its victims, prodding and pushing his readers to abandon the oft-repeated excuses for Israel but to question whether Zionism benefits anyone."

—DIANA BUTTU
legal scholar and former advisor to the PLO negotiators



"Rosen wrestles openly, ‘in the daylight’ with his deepest moral dilemma: reconciling the classic Zionist narrative that has informed him his entire life with Israel's inexcusable treatment of the Palestinians (and the liberal Zionism often used to rationalize it).  We accompany him on his journey. The result is an eye-opening, much-needed contribution to the discourse surrounding Zionism in the American Jewish community. A critical work."

—LAILA EL-HADDAD
author, Gaza Mom: Palestine, Politics, Parenting, and Everything In Between

“Rabbi Brant claims that he only speaks for himself, but in fact he speaks for an increasing number of Jews of all shades of belief and practice, from orthodox to atheist, who view the Israeli dispossession and domination of the Palestinians to be the central challenge facing Israel and the Jewish people today. This collection of posts from his blog, together with comments of critics and supporters, provides a model for rational yet impassioned discourse about Israel and Palestine.”

—JEREMIAH HABER
blogger, “The Magnes Zionist”



“Brant Rosen is at once a courageous rabbi and the voice of a new generation of American Jews who are refusing to allow the right-wing voices of the Jewish world to define Judaism and loyalty to the Jewish people as requiring blind loyalty to the policies of the State of Israel. Wrestling in the Daylight provides us with a brilliant presentation of the evolution of his thinking from a liberal Zionist to an outspoken critic, along with the reactions of members of his Reconstructionist congregation in Evanston, Illinois, and other readers of his blog, many of whom challenge his views and push him in ways that end up deepening his universalist commitments. If you want to understand the inner struggle of American Jews about Israel, this is a must read.”

—Rabbi MICHAEL LERNER
editor of Tikkun Magazine www.tikkun.org,
chair of the Network of Spiritual Progressives www.spiritualprogressives.org,
author of 11 books including Jewish Renewal: A Path to Healing and Transformation and Embracing Israel/Palestine: A Strategy for Middle East Peace



“It was fascinating to read Brant's book and see in how many ways the process of breaking ranks and overcoming your tribal identity is so similar, whether you are an officer in ‘the most moral army in the world’ or a rabbi in Chicago. I would give this book as a gift to many Jewish Americans, rabbis and others who, despite their doubts, have chosen to carry on being 'good soldiers' in the service of the Israeli occupation.”

—YONATAN SHAPIRA
Israeli human rights activist

“Thanks be to God that Rabbi Rosen decided to join the hardest wrestle of our day, the one with our Jewish and our Palestinian ‘Others’. The one, once more, that really is with God. May the Rabbi’s wrestle, like the ancient one of God with Jacob, remind us that wrestling God can be a lot like making love—even, or especially, with those we thought our enemies.”
 
—Rabbi ARTHUR WASKOW
director, The Shalom Center,
co-author with R. Phyllis Berman of Freedom Journeys: The Tale of Exodus & Wilderness Across Millennia