Dear Jonathan,
Make no mistake – you are not being set free. You are merely being transferred from a small prison to a much bigger one. As long as America refuses to let you come home to Israel, you are still in bondage. I know you understand this, but let me explain to the Jews whom you will be meeting when you are transferred to your new prison-without-bars.
Yes, you will be able to walk the streets of America. You will be able to ride on a bus. You will be able to attend a ballgame at Yankee Stadium, and pray in synagogues filled with Jews. But you won’t be a free man. Because, as you know very well, a Jew can only be free in the Land of Israel. Everywhere else, he is in bondage.
One of the things that a Jew is supposed to remember each day is that Hashem took us out of bondage in Egypt. We are supposed to recall this each day because Hashem wants us always to remember that we don’t belong in foreign lands. For a Jew, being in a land other than Eretz Yisrael is being in bondage – mental, physical, psychological, spiritual, and cultural bondage – even if he can walk around freely on the streets with a kippah on his head, he is still in exile. The understanding that we don’t belong in foreign lands, and that we can only truly be ourselves, the Children of Israel, in the Land of Israel, is the cornerstone of our essence as a Jewish Nation and our personal identities as Jews.
In my most recent article for the Jewish Press, I posed a scenario where the Jews of America could be headed for detention camps if America insists on defending Iran’s nuclear facilities. But I was wrong. The Jews of America are already in a detention camp. A detention camp is a place where prisoners are detained. This is exactly the situation of our exile from the Land of Israel. For the last 2000 years, we have been detained in foreign detention camps, in Spain, and Russia, and Germany, and America, until Hashem, in the last century, opened the gates to freedom, allowing us to return home to the Land of Israel.
The reason that a Jew is called upon to remember our bondage in Egypt is that there is a yetzer (evil inclination) to forget. A Jew who is immersed in a foreign culture in a gentile land doesn’t like to be reminded of it. He’d rather forget the sordid truth of his situation. In a sense, he’s living in a dream world. He doesn’t want to have his bubble burst, so he pretends that everything is OK. He pretends that he’s an American, or a Frenchman, or a good German citizen. Forgetfulness can happen to creatures of flesh and blood, so Hashem is constantly reminding us in our daily prayers that we’re not supposed be living in gentile lands where we are not free to be ourselves, but rather strait-jacketed in foreign cultures, foreign languages, foreign identities, and foreign values, always trying to keep up with the gentiles.
The truth is that the exile in Egypt was a lot better than the exile today. At least in Egypt, we knew we were in bondage. We knew we were living in a foreign country. We knew we were imprisoned. We could see the bars.
Today, the Jews who live in the Diaspora don’t see the reality of their situation. They don’t think they’re in bondage. They don’t even feel that they are living in a foreign land.
In a sense, Mr. Pollard, for all of the horror of your last 30 years, you were better off than every other Jew in America. At least you knew that you were in prison. Everyone else lives with the myth that they’re free! The truth is that they are just as captive as you are today, only they don’t see the bars. Sure, they can visit Disney World and the Yellowstone National Park; they can work at whatever occupation they please, they can go to the most expensive colleges and become doctors and lawyers, but they are imprisoned in exile all the same.
“Why do you want to go to Israel?” they’ll ask you. “Buy yourself a condo in Boca, get yourself a Cadillac, start having some fun! You’ve got to be crazy to go to Israel these days!”
Don’t listen to them. Stay sane. They are ones who are crazy. Even if a million Jews in America tell you to forget about going to Israel, don’t listen to them. Wanting to go to Israel is sane. Always remember – you are normal. It’s all the exile lovers around you in your new asylum-without-bars who are deranged.
It’s a lot like the movie, “The Truman Show.” It turned out that the hero was living in a fake, illusionary world. He thought it was real, but it wasn’t. Only when a light fixture fell down from the fake sky did he begin to suspect that something was askew in his idyllic world. It turned out he was living a total illusion. He thought he was free, but he wasn’t. He thought things were real, but they weren’t. That’s exactly what life is like today for the Jews of America. They think its real Jewish life, but it isn’t.
So Jonathan. May Hashem be with you. When you are transferred from your small prison to the bigger Federal Penitentiary of America, always remember that as long as you are denied your right to come home to Israel, you are still in prison. Don’t let all of the synagogues and kosher bakeries fool you. Don’t be deceived by all the gala dinners you will be invited to as guest of honor – hosted by all those big Jewish organizations that didn’t say a word while you suffered for 30 years in your little prisons, while they lived the good life in the bigger prison-without-bars outside.
Soon, Jonathan, with G-d’s help, you will be a free man in your own free Land, not still a captive prisoner in America. Bezrat Hashem, Yonaton, we will see you here soon. Amen.