RECIPE BY CHAVI FELDMAN

STYLING AND PHOTOGRAPHY BY SHEERA SEGAL

FOOD PREP BY RACHEL BONDII

Fresh, fragrant, and succulent, this turbot literally melts in your mouth. I’ve been making this dish for several years now and was looking for an opportunity to feature it in Family Table. Yes, it’s that good!

SERVES 4

• 4 large fillets turbot
• salt, freshly ground black pepper, and garlic powder, for seasoning
• 2 medium zucchini, sliced into ¼-inch (½-cm) rounds
• 2 yellow squashes, sliced into ¼-inch (½-cm) rounds
• 4 lemons, sliced into ¼-inch (½-cm) rounds
• 2 Tbsp capers
• ¼ cup chopped fresh parsley

LEMON-BUTTER SAUCE

• 4 Tbsp butter
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 3 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
• ¼ tsp salt
• freshly ground black pepper

Season fish generously on both sides of the fillet with salt, freshly ground black pepper, and garlic powder. Place fillets spread apart on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Arrange the zucchini, yellow squash, and lemon rounds on the baking sheet, overlapping them in an alternating pattern, forming several rows on the baking sheet alongside the fish.

Preheat oven to 375°F (190°C). Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add the  minced garlic and sauté for several minutes, until lightly browned and fragrant. Add lemon juice, salt, and pepper and stir. Bring to a slight boil and remove from heat. Pour the lemon-butter sauce evenly over the fish and vegetables. Sprinkle with capers and cover the pan tightly with aluminum foil. Bake for 25–30 minutes, depending on the thickness of the fish. Uncover pan and place it back in the oven. Broil for 5–6 minutes. Remove from oven and baste the fish and vegetables with the juices from the pan. Remove the lemon slices from the pan and sprinkle with parsley. Serve immediately.

Tip: This dish can be prepped and frozen right before the baking step. When ready to serve, thaw completely and bake as directed.

The post Baked Turbot with Lemon-Butter Sauce Sheet-Pan Dinner first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

RECIPE BY CHAVI FELDMAN

STYLING AND PHOTOGRAPHY BY SHEERA SEGAL

FOOD PREP BY RACHEL BONDI

Here’s a quick and easy kid-friendly dinner that you’ll find yourself making time and time again. At least that’s what happened in my home. Feel free to swap out the snap peas for whichever veggie your family prefers. I’ve made this with frozen broccoli, pepper strips, and green beans with equally delicious results.

SERVES 6

• ½ cup sesame teriyaki sauce, divided (I use Mikee’s)
• 5 Tbsp oil, divided
• 1 lb (450 g) chicken cutlets, cut into fingers
• 3 3-oz (85-g) pkgs dried ramen noodles (flavor packets discarded)
• 4 cups boiling water
• ½ tsp salt, divided
• ¾ cup flour, for dredging
• 12 oz (340 g) raw sugar snap peas, trimmed and cleaned according to your rabbinic authority

Preheat oven to 400°F (200°C). Combine ¼ cup sesame teriyaki sauce with 2 Tbsp oil in a medium bowl. Add the chicken fingers and toss to coat. Marinate for about 20–30 minutes. While the chicken is marinating, place the ramen noodles in a large bowl. Pour boiling water over the noodles and cover with a sheet of aluminum foil. Soak noodles for 5minutes, then remove foil and drain. Add 1Tbsp oil and ¼ tsp salt and mix well. Grease a baking sheet with cooking spray and spread the noodles on the baking sheet. Dredge each chicken finger in flour, shaking off the excess, and place over the noodles, leaving some space between the chicken fingers. Toss the snap peas with the remaining¼ cup sesame teriyaki sauce, 2 Tbsp oil, and ¼ tsp salt. Pour over the chicken and spread the peas evenly over the baking sheet. Spray the entire dish generously with cooking spray. Cover and bake for 15 minutes. Uncover and bake for an additional 10 minutes. Serve immediately.

The post Easy Chicken ’n Ramen Sheet-Pan Winner first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

“Friends.” Often, the most superficial of words. A mere acquaintance is turned into a friend. Not only that, we all have so many friends, right? The superficial use of “friend” degrades a beautiful relationship.

I never thought I would put a positive spin on the superficial use of “friend,” but in a certain sense I do have many friends. I hardly know them. My interaction with them is usually for 15 to 60 seconds. Rarely, I meet one of these friends more than once, perhaps once every few weeks, not more, and even then, I meet them each time for not more than a minute — two minutes at most. Yet on some level, these are my friends.

Like this: In Denver, as I am sure is the case in countless American cities, people populate the corners of busy intersections. You know the signs they hold up, usually in crude lettering on old cardboard: “Anything helps.” “Disabled vet.” “Homeless with child.” The more cars that pass by, the better the chance of these people receiving a handout — law of averages. I know the Denver corners pretty well by now. I have noticed that as I drive along and a neighborhood becomes more upscale, the corners become empty. But the corners in downtown Denver can always be counted on, so to speak.

I notice these people. I try to notice them as more than objects at a street corner. I figure that if people have to stand outside (or sit on a crude carton) for hours each day, they deserve to be noticed. So I carry around small food packages in my car. Plastic bottles of flavored water (or, in the summer heat, cooled bottled water). Sometimes also small clothing items, like gloves or a knitted winter hat. It’s tricky: If I get to the corner when the light is red, I can easily hand off the items through the window. Sometimes, I might not be at the corner but the light has just turned green and I’m still at three miles per hour, so I can still safely hand food through the window.

I never give money; who knows what it might go for. But I figure, everyone can use food.

It’s more than food, which, to be frank, isn’t much. I don’t just hand the food. I ask the person’s name. I introduce myself as “Rabbi Goldberg.” Often, I shake hands. There isn’t always time for this, but most of the time there is. Here is where the friendship comes in. Very brief though they are, my interactions with the homeless are more than a handout.

When I ask someone his name (it’s usually, but not always, a male), often there is this surprised look. Often there is a gorgeous smile. An anonymous “homeless person” becomes a beautiful human being. I see a person standing in front of me, not a “case,” not an “addict,” not a ne’er-do-well. But a person. As I say, the interaction is very brief, but it’s a human interaction.

Why do I do this?

First, here is why I don’t do it.

I don’t do it to make a good name for the Jewish People. I do introduce myself as “Rabbi Goldberg,” and if the recipient thinks the better of Jews — if I’ve made a “kiddush Hashem” — so much the better. But this is not my motivation. Also, I’ve lived long enough in the Western US to know that not everyone knows what a rabbi is, anyway.

I don’t carry around and distribute food because I think it’s going to satisfy someone’s hunger that day. I know I’m giving a little. But it’s something — especially the cool water in the hot summer. And as Jewish law states, the impoverished should seek many small donations rather than be supported by one big benefactor. It’s clear: Although most cars drive right past these homeless people — hundreds and hundreds drive right past them — some do stop. There are little donations that add up, though probably not enough.

I don’t think I’m solving the homeless problem, even in a little way. I have no illusions about making a dent in a complicated, recalcitrant, socially damning problem, or even in one person’s life; nor do I have reason to feel any less disturbed by the desolation of these people living on the streets. Yes, most appear to be desolate. In Denver, anyway, there are rarely crowds on any given corner. Usually, one or two people.

Why do I do this?

First of all, I learn something. I learn not to judge. Take Pete. He is one of the few people I see with some regularity. The last time I saw him and asked him how he was doing, he said that he was doing well. He had been trying to get in shape and had been up the Colorado mountains, working, doing some painting.

Okay, so here’s the first assumption many people make. These people with the cardboard signs don’t really need help. They’re sponging off undeserved sympathy. Why is Pete seeking help on a street corner if he can work?

But Pete keeps talking. He says, “It’s been 22 months since my back surgery, and finally all of the bones have come into place, except for one, and I can do some work.”

So much for unworthy judgments about unnecessary sponging.

Why do I do this? We live in a society in which human relationships are radically minimized. We have coworkers, and most of us have family and “friends,” but for most of us, the great bulk of our human interactions do not enable the development of real friendship.

“Transactional” is the word these days; we do what needs to get done. That’s how we usually relate to the person at the grocery counter, the salesman in the store, the person next to me on the bus or the subway, the doorman, often even the fellow worker — all these people I see, in many cases every day; at best, I give and receive at best a nod, a “hello,” a “how are you.” Not to mention the faceless operator — if there is even that — at the other end of my computer order. There is little humanity in all this; there is little humanity in many of our lives.

Why do I hand out little food packets to the homeless? I want to humanize myself and, in an admittedly brief way, I want to humanize them. I want to step out of the sterility much of our civilization has become.

Rav Yisrael Salanter (d. 1883) founded a mussar movement to instruct us to treat others well. The first step is not to pass them by. On the basis of people I am not passing by who hand me a brief “thank you” or “G-d bless you” or a wide smile, I am a little bit more human. I need that. They need that. Superficial, yes; but against whizzing by in my car, never stopping, never noticing, never asking for a name, not superficial at all. —

This column will appear once a month.

Rabbi Hillel Goldberg is the editor and publisher of the Intermountain Jewish News, for which he has written a weekly column, “View from Denver,” since 1972, and the author of numerous seforim about the mussar movement and other subjects.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1043)

The post My Homeless Friends first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

ON the fifth night of Chanukah, photographer Avraham Elbaz arrived at the Flatbush home of Rav Zevi Trenk, the menahel at Yeshiva Darchei Torah in Far Rockaway, New York. Elbaz was hoping to get a shot of Rabbi Trenk as he kindled the menorah lights, but as he alighted from his car, he was in for a surprise — the ebullient Rabbi Trenk was standing outside of his house with a broom and shovel in hand.

Upon seeing Elbaz’s confusion, he explained: ‘They call me the rabbi on the block,” he said, “and I simply have to keep the front of my home clean.”

In fact, Rabbi Trenk’s house isn’t just “the Rabbi’s home.” His home has become a celebrated bastion of hachnassas orchim, a place where the front door barely closes and guests are welcomed in for a warm meal and a listening ear. Rabbi Trenk understood that people recognized the house as his home, and felt it was important that the sidewalk’s appearance reflects its occupant. True to form, he went about cleaning it by himself.

“This photo is even more important than the hadlakah photo,” he boomed to Elbaz. “This can teach anyone who sees it what it means that a Jew should keep the front of his home clean to make a kiddush Hashem!”

Happening in... Dallas

Last Sunday, the Dallas community united in a remarkable display of kavod haTorah, welcoming Rav Malkiel Kotler, rosh yeshivah of Beth Medrash Govoha. The occasion was a celebration of the kollel’s remarkable growth over the past few years, marked by the addition of multiple new families, including four families who settled in neighboring Plano, Texas.

A large crowd greeted Rav Malkiel at the airport and escorted him to the kollel, where he delivered a shiur on hilchos Chanukah to a packed beis medrash. As he stood at the shtender, his eyes swept across the audience. But before launching into his prepared shiur, he paused for a moment, and then shared an anecdote about his grandfather, Rav Aharon Kotler ztz”l.

“Sixty-five years ago, a menahel of a school in Texas came to the Zeide,” he said. “He asked the Zeide, ‘What should be our focus? That the talmidim should be shomrei Shabbos? That they shouldn’t marry out of the faith?’ ”

But Rav Aharon shook his head, objecting to both of those goals.

“The Zeide said, ‘Your focus should be that the talmidim should become Rav Akiva Eigers!’ ”

Rav Malkiel’s eyes remained fixed on the audience for another moment, and he gave a slight nod.

The Zeide was right.

Texas would yet be home to a generation of bnei Torah who would aspire to become the next Rav Akiva Eigers.

Overheard

“Today there is a popular song with the lyrics Hashem loves us, and everything will be fine, and even better, and even better. So we’re all fine with the words — this is what you want from Hashem. But what does Hashem want from us?

“Let’s see that you should always love Hashem — and that the love should increase from you to Him v’od yoter tov, v’od yoter tov — even more and even more.”

—Rav Shaul Alter

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1043)

The post The Moment: Issue 1043 first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

The leaves are magenta and gold, and the last extra kugel or pan of stuffed cabbage I forgot to serve on Simchas Torah and stuffed into the freezer has been consumed. Now lying in wait for me is that overwhelming “To Do After Yom Tov” list, or what the non-Jewish world calls “winter activities.”

I think I’ll bypass the ever-present “lose ten pounds, join a local exercise class, walk 10,000 steps a day,” and other ubiquitous annual goals.

Of course, I won’t ignore the spiritual growth items: Listen to a Shabbos halachah shiur online, review the weekly parshah, and maybe consider davening Maariv?

Moving on to the less esoteric items, I must change the summer clothes in the closet for winter clothes, get quotes to repaint the living room, and price new mattresses with pillow tops.

And of course, I must declutter. What’s with this continuous need to discard unused, dented, scratched, and possibly toxic pots and pans, and small appliances and gadgets like my make-your-own-yogurt machine or my super multi blade food chopper so simple to use that salads make themselves?

I have boxes and boxes of papers, pictures, art projects, report cards, scrapbooks, decorated jewelry boxes, Yom Tov projects — the time capsules of years gone by — to deal with. I always planned to implement an idea I read in a magazine and designate a box for each child’s mementos. Still, somehow the wooden jewelry box from my daughter’s first class trip to our national capital never really moved off my dresser. It sits next to the olive wood jewelry box my mother had on her dresser, made by the prisoners in Michigan’s Jackson State Penitentiary and gifted to her by my father, who was the first Jewish chaplain there. Needless to say, those items aren’t going anywhere.

Like a geological formation, there are layers and layers of sentimental strata among my clutter.

The post Sentimental Decluttering: An Oxymoron?        first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

By Yisrael Yoskovitz, Budapest

Rabbi Shlomo Koves didn’t know what a Jew was, growing up in the Hungary of the 1980s. But once he was on the trajectory of yeshivah, semichah, and a mission to rebuild, there was no stopping the maverick rabbi who purchased corporations in order to fund communal projects that would ignite hearts. And being friends with the prime minister, who locked the borders against Islamic immigration, hasn’t hurt either

Say what you will about Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s prime minister, but one achievement will undoubtedly go down in history in his favor: sealing his country’s borders against the wave of migration that swept Europe during the first round of Syria’s civil war.

Europe has been going through a self-inflicted and painful death in recent years. Masses of fundamentalists are flooding its cities, changing its character and way of life. The political crisis currently gripping the EU countries is an inevitable byproduct of progressive self-righteousness that photographed well but is now exacting the price. In hindsight, it turned out the picture was far too costly.

But one country that’s an exception is Hungary. In an admittedly unphotogenic move, Prime Minister Orbán decided to stand firm and prevent the entry of refugees (Poland did as well). Hungary, for its part, offers Israelis three benefits in one ticket: It’s essentially free of anti-Semitism, it’s home to many Jews, and it’s devoid of Islamists.

And a few weeks ago, when the International Criminal Court in the Hague issued an arrest warrant for Israeli prime minister Netanyahu, the first leader to declare that he didn’t recognize the court’s jurisdiction was Viktor Orbán.

The friendship between Netanyahu and Orbán began back in the early 2000s, when both leaders had already been prime ministers and were waiting to make their comeback.  Orbán, like Netanyahu, is an intellectual, a man of letters, and a phenomenon in political maneuvering. And like Bibi, Hungary’s charismatic leader and his nationalist government enjoy sweeping admiration from the hardworking middle class and deep loathing from the elites and academia.

Orbán, endlessly shrewd, manages to govern his country with a firm hand. Hungary’s political system grants him a stable government, a friendly parliament, and freedom from significant coalition pressures. His detractors claim that since he resumed office in 2010, his policies have undermined democracy, weakened judicial independence, increased corruption, and curtailed press freedom in Hungary.

But he proclaims to be a defender of national and moral values in the face of the European Union; in that vein, he’s one of Israel’s biggest supporters as well, in the face of a postmodern political landscape that prefers to embrace terrorists over victims. At the outset of the war, Hungary’s government even imposed a sweeping ban on pro-Palestinian demonstrations, which Orbán referred to as “pro-terrorist protests.”

And it’s Rabbi Shlomo Koves, chief rabbi of the Association of Hungarian Jewish Communities, who is a key player in the strong alliance.

The post The Right Spice first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

“They said you’re good, so I’m giving you a shot, but I have no time for fluff, and I don’t want a therapist, I want someone who’ll help me find a good guy who’s actually marriage material. If you can do that, and fast, great. If not, let’s not waste our time.”

I took a deep breath before responding to the woman on the other end of the line. “Hi. I don’t think I caught your name? Why don’t you tell me about yourself, and then we can explore the possibility of working together.”

“Meirav Dweck from Los Angeles*, 36, been dating for twelve years. Personal injury lawyer, made partner two years ago. What else do you want to know?”

“How would you describe yourself and what you’re looking for?”

“We’re supposed to be modest, but you need the facts: I’m bright, talented, ambitious, and hardworking — in my field, if you don’t put in sixty-hour weeks, you won’t get anywhere. I stay in shape, and people say I’m pretty.

“I just want a guy who’s the same way: a great profession, strong work ethic, charismatic, and obviously, I’d like tall and handsome.”

Meirav had gone on plenty of dates, and many started out promising. People set her up with high-powered executives, and the first few dates would be great as the two exchanged witty anecdotes. But then it would fall apart.

“I’m starting to wonder if all men are narcissists,” Meirav told me. “They’re fun to date in the beginning, but then they get hung up on stupidities, or start arguments over nothing, and somehow, by date number six, we’re yelling at each other. Or they’re so obnoxious, I never want to see them again.”

“Maybe you need to change the profile of the men you date,” I suggested gently. “More intensity may not work; you have enough ambition and moxie for two. Maybe consider someone who isn’t a go-getter, but is kind and gentle.”

“You mean I should marry a loser?”

The post Save the Date: Chapter 2     first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

Photos: Yossi Goldberger

When the Copper Box Arena in London was built for the 2012 Olympic Games, planners probably never imagined that it would play host to 10,000 lomdei Torah for a single event. Said planners might also have failed to appreciate the historic resonance of a massive pre-Chanukah celebration of Torah learning in a venue that featured a symbol of ancient Greece. But to the participants in Dirshu’s grand siyum on Maseches Shabbos in their Amud Yomi program two weeks ago, that resonance would have been obvious from the second chapter of the masechta, which deals with Chanukah.

History aside, the event was noteworthy for drawing together Dirshu attendees from all over Europe, and from all streams. Mainland Europe is very different from Britain, but contingents from Antwerp and Zurich indicated that in terms of Torah life, there’s a Europe-wide Torah world that shares a common language.

One participant was Avi Steinhart from a chassidic family, who learned in Brisk, and has since gravitated back to his roots due to the giant Torah organization.

“I’m a chassid of Dirshu,” he says with a smile. “My father, who was a Pshevorsker, would be very happy with this.”

Avi learned Dirshu Chaburas HaShas, a special track for kollel yungeleit, and then integrated into the Amud Yomi program when it began a bit more than a year ago.

“Daf Yomi effected a revolution in Am Yisrael, but I personally never connected to it,” he says. “The urgency and the rigid pace is something I struggle with. I felt like they were learning just to finish. There are some who love it, but I want to learn in order to understand, and only then to be mesayeim.

“There’s a phrase that Dirshu nasi Rav Dovid Hofstedter repeats all the time — yedias haTorah, knowing the Torah. The limud is important, but each person needs to ask himself honestly if he knows the Torah.

The orchestra begins to thunder in the hall, and Avi’s 15-year-old son, who is also part of a Dirshu track, urges him to come inside.

There, Rav Shimon Galai — who has traveled to London for just a few hours and will be flying right back to Bnei Brak for the shloshim of his son-in-law, Rav Dovid Wertheimer — takes a moment to speak with Mishpacha.

“Dirshu is the neshamah of Am Yisrael,” he says in the rabbanim’s room. “There are organizations for everything. You need a pillow for a bris? You have one. You need kimcha d’Pischa? You have it. But there is one organization in the world that does everything to enable you to get to Shamayim after 120 years with baskets full of spiritual wealth, and that is Dirshu. Therefore, I make a great effort to go where they call me.”

Maariv begins and thousands stand up to daven. Then the massive orchestra cues up a majestic march, and the rabbanim ascend the stage. This type of mass Torah spectacle has practically been trademarked by the organization, but its origins are not well known.

The concept behind these high-end events was born from a meeting 15 years ago between Rabbi Dovid Hofstedter and Rav Aharon Leib Steinman ztz”l. It was shortly before the Siyum HaShas, and Rabbi Hofstedter was consulting with Rav Steinman about how much to spend on the event.

“Invest as much as you can,” Rav Steinman told him. “When a wealthy man makes a wedding, he books the best band in the finest hall. And when we want to honor the Torah, we do it in an underground hall, without honor and without grandeur? The Torah is our biggest wedding, and that is where we need to invest the most.”

Rabbi Hofstedter carried out this instruction faithfully, and thus was born the classic Dirshu feel which the London siyum adhered to, featuring such well-known performers as Motty Steinmetz, Baruch Levine, Hershy Weinberger, and Zanvil Weinberger, alongside legendary conductor Mona Rosenblum, along with the Malchus Choir and a 30-piece orchestra.

The production team also went local, with a beautiful medley of Yigal Calek classics, a tribute to the recently-niftar composer who uplifted so many worldwide. As a continent-wide celebration of simchas haTorah deep in the European winter, the event left a glow in hearts from Gateshead to Manchester, Stamford Hill, and Antwerp to sustain them through the next leg of the long journey through Shas.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1043)

The post Light in London first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

It’s the dark fringe covering most of her eyes I see first, her face a frozen mask. I break the silence. “This is the play therapy room. Maybe there’s something in here that you’d like to look at?” She shrugs and plonks herself down at the sand tray, shoulders tense.

The referral says that Avigail is a nightmare to teach and upsets almost anyone who crosses her path. Here she is, in my office, a prickly 11-year-old, moments away from her next eye roll. I sit myself down on the floor a small distance from her, and wait.

The first five sessions are almost identical: Avigail dumps herself down and arranges things neatly in the sand tray, her back deliberately to me. At first, she’s bewildered by my attention, sneaking a glance at me when she thinks I’m not looking, then flashing me an odd, dismissive expression. Occasionally she speaks to me to correct my reflections, or to tut and roll her eyes, but mainly, we sit in silence. There’s no narrative to her play, no sifting of the sand, dialogue between characters. Just rows of miniatures placed in serried ranks, which she carefully cleans up before she leaves, despite my reminders that cleaning up is my job. My back starts to lock during those 50 minutes of oppressive stillness. What’s hurting you? I wonder.

The post Hide and Seek first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

M

ost of our readers view Canada as a friendly nation with a well-established Jewish community, Panama as an exotic destination with a vibrant Jewish presence, and Greenland as an unapproachable island visible only from a distance on the Tel Aviv–New York flight route. I’ll never forget one flight when an El Al pilot opened the public address system to suggest looking out the window because “Greenland looks especially beautiful today.”

For President-elect Trump, these three countries signify something different. Greenland is a big, beautiful island he wants to pry from Denmark. Panama is home to the Panama Canal, which America built from 1903 to 1914 for $300 million and relinquished to Panama by treaty in 1977. Trump says he wants it back. Canada, which sells 75% of its exports to the US, is a primary target for the hefty tariffs Trump plans to impose on America’s largest trading partners.

With all the major foreign policy dilemmas facing the incoming administration, including America’s porous southern border, the chaotic and treacherous Middle East, the interminable war between Russia and Ukraine, and China’s saber-rattling with Taiwan, why is Trump trifling with small fry?

Or is it part of his grand strategy to make America great again?

James Lindsay, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) who is following the Trump transition, contends that Trump is operating true to the form we saw in his first term. “[He] seems more interested in picking fights with friends than enlisting them in a common cause. And that will make it harder for the United States to succeed in a world of great power competition.”

Other analysts suggest that Trump is reinstating the Monroe doctrine as a foundation of US foreign policy. First promulgated in 1823 by America’s fifth president, James Monroe, the doctrine declared that America’s sphere of influence extended throughout the Western Hemisphere and that the US would no longer tolerate European efforts to colonize Latin and South America.

In 2013, President Obama’s secretary of state, John Kerry, disavowed the two-century-old doctrine, telling a meeting of the Organization of American States, which mainly consists of Latin American nations, that the “era of the Monroe doctrine was over.”

Trump overruled Kerry during his first term. In 2018, when addressing the UN General Assembly, Trump indirectly invoked the Monroe doctrine, stating, “Here in the Western Hemisphere, we are committed to maintaining our independence from the encroachment of expansionist foreign powers.”

Canada, Panama, and Greenland are all part of the Western Hemisphere. Trump, on the cusp of his second term, has now fired warning shots at America’s 21st-century rivals, including China and Russia, to watch their step in America’s backyard.

Competition over Latin America

The dynamic with Canada is slightly different from the other two. When Trump advocated that Canada become America’s 51st state, it was his way of mocking Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, whose political ideology is polar opposite to Trump’s. Trudeau is extremely unpopular and at press time is under intense pressure to quit. He and his party will likely be trounced in this year’s elections, whenever they’re held, by the Conservatives and their new leader, Pierre Poilievre, a conservative far more in tune with Trump.

On the surface, the Panama Canal’s importance seems overinflated. The US is the canal’s largest customer, and Trump rails against the high fees that US ships pay to pass through the 51-mile artificial waterway connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. However, everyone pays the same rate. Panama earns $5 billion annually in transit fees, which accounts for about 6% of its economy. For America, $5 billion is less than a drop in the bucket in a $30 trillion economy.

However, William Freeman, another CFR senior fellow, recently declared that the Panama Canal has much more to offer than its shipping revenues. “In the event of any military conflict with China, it would be needed to move US ships and other assets,” Freeman said.

China, the canal’s second-largest customer, has the same ideas. As South America’s largest trade partner, China is using its economic clout to build political alliances with countries, some of which are hostile to American interests.

Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) introduced legislation almost three years ago to increase security cooperation in Latin America and the Caribbean to stop transnational criminal organizations from smuggling illegal drugs into America, counter the destabilizing impact of authoritarian regimes, and rein in the malign activities of state actors like China and Russia.

He can be expected to follow up in his new role as secretary of state.

Race for Frigid Battlegrounds

Greenland, too, has strategic military value, then and now. Much of Europe’s stormy weather originates in Greenland and drifts to continental Europe a few days later. According to the Arctic Institute, Nazi Germany stationed four weather stations in Greenland during World War II to gather accurate meteorological data to predict weather patterns and determine the most favorable conditions for launching attacks.

Both Russia and China are eyeing Greenland. In last week’s edition of the US Naval Institute News, John Grady quoted the head of the Russian Navy, Admiral Aleksandr Moiseyev, as saying that the Arctic is “where the confrontation of the world’s leading states is unfolding.”

It’s hard to believe that Russia, stymied in Ukraine and having packed up and abandoned Syria, would be up for any more military adventurism, but don’t underestimate Vladimir Putin. Grady noted that Russia had concentrated its northern fleet of second-strike ballistic missile submarines and strategic bomber forces in the European Arctic. China also manages a fleet of satellites and plans to deploy a large-scale network of listening devices in the Arctic Ocean.

Scott Stephenson, a physical scientist at Rand Corporation, notes that Greenland may have the largest deposits of rare earth minerals outside China.According to the US Geological Survey, rare earth elements are necessary for defense purposes such as lasers and guidance, radar, and sonar systems. Greenland is strategically and centrally located between the North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, along several shipping routes that are becoming increasingly accessible as sea ice melts. It also has numerous transcontinental flight paths that rely on Greenlandic airspace, as El Al pilots know.

Many countries consider Greenland especially beautiful. Stephenson agrees that US control of the island could also make strategic sense, given Russia’s Arctic military buildup and China’s recent attempts to purchase a naval base and build airports there.

But Greenland holds all the cards, and Denmark has some say.

Denmark, a NATO member, provides Greenland with an annual $670 million subsidy to control its security and foreign policy. With Greenlanders eager for full independence, Denmark recognized Greenland’s right to self-determination, should the matter arise. This means that its 56,000 residents would have to vote in a referendum on any potential territorial transfer.

So Trump isn’t coming out of left field. Neither tweets on X or his lengthy speeches are the place to debate sophisticated aspects of foreign policy. Still, these ideas and others will be discussed in the right circles in cabinet meetings once Trump takes over.

Merely suggesting that Trump is being whimsical in his foreign policy formulation, as the Washington Post indicated over the weekend, or that the MAGA doctrine is an updated version of the Monroe doctrine, is off the mark. Such takes contain some kernels of truth but are far too simplistic in a world that Trump claims is on the brink of World War III, and where, at the very least, American security and economic interests are at risk.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1043)

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