Sickening what is happening in Israel and throughout the world. In Israel the IDF fights and we do all we can to bring the hostages home. Meanwhile throughout the United States we see people celebrating the murder, rape and mutilation of Jews.
At Columbia University, Yale and other schools we see scenes which we haven’t seen since the days of the Holocaust. Its not just the celebration of people, it’s the universities permitting it. Its professors encouraging it.
As Scott Galloway, an NYU Stern School of Business professor, told MSNBC “… if I went into the NYU square with a white hood on and said, ‘Lynch the blacks’ or ‘Burn the gays,’ my ID would be shut off by that night.” “I would never work in academia again,” he added. “There would be no need for the words ‘context’ or ‘nuance,’ I wouldn’t be protected by the First Amendment or free speech.”
This is reality and we as Jews need to deal with it. There has never been a time in history Jews have been safe in the Diaspora – and now in America too we can see reality. Those of us who know Jewish history know that there’s a reason we have a Jewish state. This is Jewish reality, this is Jewish history and American Jews need to deal with it, and consider Israel and obtaining an Israeli passport before its too late. Wonderful organizations like Nefesh BNefesh can facilitate aliya as clearly all along Zionists have been right – the only place a Jew can ever truly be safe is Israel.
Along these lines there are many things which need to be said.
American Jewry is broken – kvetching, whining, writing petitions, well behaved and cowardly. In Israel kids are fighting in Gaza, in America one doesn’t see Jewish college students fighting? (besides Anti-Zionists). American Jewish youth must step up. Noone is coming to save them. And if they don’t now step up, these are the future leaders of America, future employers. This blind devotion to liberal values has helped place us in this system. The vast overwhelming amount of American Jews are Ashkenazi Democrats who are constantly kvetching.
While they kvetch endlessly about replacing Israel’s elected leaders, why hasn’t every single American Jewish leader been replaced? Are they not responsible for this situation American Jews are now in? The ADL has spent who knows how many billions on fighting Anti-Semitism – how’s that working out?
Jews in America need to learn about the great Ze’ev Jabotinsky who spoke of the need for Jewish self-defense and for Jews to have guns – values which are completely against the value system of todays American Jewish leaders who for years have taught us that multicultural dialogue, gun control and liberalism were Jewish values. New leadership has to emerge quickly that can quickly adapt to the new world in which the Jewish community finds itself.
As Jabotinsky said in “The Idea of Betar,” the purpose of the Betar group which he founded was “to create that type of Jew which the nation needs in order to better and quicker build a Jewish state.” Max Nordau made a similar point, when he discussed the need for “muscular Judaism.” He believed that we needed a “new Jew” who had mental and physical strength in order to serve Zionism. Today we need to remind ourselves of the need for this kind of Jew.
This perspective came against the backdrop of pograms – including Kishnev where as Hebrew poet Hayyim Bialik wrote “In the City of Killing,”, there were horrors of attacks on innocent Jews in Kishnev, who hadn’t paid attention to what was happening and were passive and easy targets. Sound familiar?
Jabotinsky – a man I consider a hero who helped shape my life, my Judaism –has helped shape modern Israeli politics, as the founder of Revisionist Zionism which is now headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. As Jabotinsky wrote in Shir Betar (The Song of Betar), “ “Silence is Despicable!” Jabotinsky saw Jewish pain and suffering in Europe before the holocaust and called our people, so many of whom did not listen – Save yourselves, liquidate the diaspora before the diaspora liquidates you. In those days, Jabotinsky told his pupils, his children: A day will come when our people will call upon you to conduct their affairs, to take responsibility for their future.
Of course, Jabotinsky viewed his role as to create a “normal”, “healthy” Jew. In Gaza, and on campuses his words must be heeded, “Human society is based on reciprocity. If you remove reciprocity, justice becomes a lie. A person walking somewhere on a street has the right to live only because and only to the extent that he acknowledges my right to live. But, if he wishes to kill me, to my mind he forfeits his right to exist – and this also applies to nations. Otherwise, the world would become a racing area for vicious predators, where not only the weakest would be devoured, but the best. [Jabotinsky in Ethics of the Iron Wall.]
The philosopher Max Nordau has been quoted as telling the Jewish leader Ze’ev Jabotinsky that “the Jew learns not by way of reason, but from catastrophes. He won’t buy an umbrella merely because he sees clouds in the sky. He waits until he is drenched and catches pneumonia.” Its time.
The Jewish people are strong and we must teach our kids today to be strong, and show them pride and power. (and Jabotinsky once said “My instinct is that the only kind of children I have ever loved are the mischief makers.”) Jews today need some more mischief makers – make mischief.
And as the great Zionist leader and prophet Ze’ev Jabotinsky said many years ago that “The past lays a railroad track for the future.” Indeed while the years go by, anti-Semitism remains a constant throughout world history. We know Jewish history. Stand up. Fight. Am Israel Chai.
