Monday, November 4, 2024

OCHLOCRACY!

A long, long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, I had to read A TALE OF TWO CITIES for a high school English class. I was lukewarm on Dickens, but my British grandmother and her son (who happened to be my dad) were nuts on the topic. Of course, ATOTC is about a guy named Sidney Carton, and my dad, Sidney, was a box-maker... folding cartons to be specific. Clearly, this was karma at work. There was no escape. Dad decided we would read ATOTC together. It turned out to be a terrific thing to do. I was already becoming a political junkie, and ATOTC just fed that habit. I was definitely a revolutionary.

The copy we had in the house was not a first edition, but it was pretty old and used the 1859 original Hablot Browne (aka Phiz) illustrations done for the weekly magazine serial version of the book. Those illustrations really worked for me...especially the one titled The Sea Rises. Phillip Allingham, a contributing editor for The Victorian Web wrote:
 ..."The Sea Rises" is a public panorama of anarchic natural forces that will sweep away innocent and guilty alike."
I was riveted by this illustration....specifically the three women at the center:

Their rage was palpable; the way the necks of the two women on the left are craned out and taut expressed tension in a way I'd never experienced as part of a book. I kept turning back to that page again and again. Those women could be me. 

There might have been a tangential reason for this: high school, for me, coincided with the Vietnam War, something I morally and politically opposed and as important for us, the persecution of Jews in the Soviet Union. I'd been in demonstrations where the anger and rage ran rampant. Standing in Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza on many cold nights demanding Jews be permitted to leave. Granted, we never stormed the UN, although lots of us wanted to, but being in an angry crowd, I know how close we came to being a mob. More than once. 

You lose yourself in a crowd and when it becomes a mob, it's easy to go along with it. Did you know there's a word for that? Ochlocracy...from the Greek ὀχλοκρατία (okhlokratía), from ὄχλος (ókhlos, "mass", "mob", or "common people") and κράτος (krátos, "rule") and bonus! it's considered a pejorative. Hmmm. I saw it up close and personal at Columbia University. I wrote about that back in April. 

Jan 6, 2021/Lev Radin/Pacific Press
We, the People, saw it up close and personal on January 6th, 2021. Through the magic of television, we watched a mob storm our Capitol and attempt to stop the ratification of our 2020 presidential election. People were hurt, people died, rioters were reported to have defecated and urinated in the halls and offices. Windows were broken, art defaced, walls and furnishings damaged.
 Smithsonian Magazine covered the testimony of Farar Elliott, a curator in the House of Representatives' Office of History and Preservation:
All told, Elliott said, eight artworks—six sculptures and two paintings—were vandalized in the attack. Chemicals present in fire extinguishers, pepper spray, bear repellants, tear gas and other irritants used by rioters caused the majority of the damage. (Per Blanton’s testimony, staffers raced to the roof of the building to reverse airflows and try to limit the damage inflicted by these chemicals.) House curators have requested $25,000 in emergency funding to cover the costs of restoration and repair.

It's just art, right? Culture? Part of our national collective memory? Something frivolous to cut from the budget, right?

The January 6th insurrection may not have succeeded, but it was not completely unsuccessful. 

Do not underestimate the lessons learned that day, not by us, but by the minions, militias, and fringe groups who favor fascism, racism, and isolationism over what we have. They lie in wait, listening intently for the moment the dog whistle goes aloud. They are well rehearsed, armed, and incredibly dangerous. 

I am less worried about Tuesday than I am about Wednesday. If Harris and Walz win, the election will just be contested, the first wave of violence will commence. As the votes are counted across each state, you will see more and more violent responses to a possible Harris presidency. We have every reason to believe that a civil war is already mapped out and the plans ready to execute. 

The really scary part of all this is that half the country will vote for a guy who lies at his rallies without apology, doubles-down on those lies, has no idea how the government actually works, and despite all that, they would give him the nuclear codes. Never mind he's a serial adulterer, hawks the bible like his NFT trading cards, and says disgusting things about all sorts of people. Would you want your son or daughter to marry this man? But you'll vote for him, right?

That terrifies me because if half the country backs that kind of behavior, there is no hope for this country whatsoever. 

If Feckless Loser manages to win, he insists on day one he will begin mass deportations. This means there will be sweeping arrest nets that will scoop up legal and illegal immigrants alike to be held in camps. Billions will be spent on this effort without concern about what that will cost the economy. It might be worth it to mention migrant workers and those who come into the US to harvest our crops. Will they be able to cross the border? With relatively cheap labor gone, the food chain will be massively and immediately impacted. 

Liz Cheney and others (including little 'ol inconsequential me) who defied Feckless Loser risk arrest and trial for sedition and treason...because that's what he says he's gonna do. Parts of the Constitution, if not all of it, will be suspended by presidential decree, especially if he controls both houses of Congress. There are already more guns than people in the US, so with the repeal of any sane gun laws, that number will grow exponentially. There will be more mass shootings just because of the sheer number of automatic weapons. 

Jews will be in the crosshairs because he has said so repeatedly...to Jewish groups. He will figure out the Arab world is way richer than the Jewish one, and we will be thrown, lock, stock, and country, under the bus. He wants to rule like Putin, Kim Jung Un, and Xi Jinping. You think he's gonna protect us? Fat chance. He will sell Israel out to whichever Ayatollah books the most hotel rooms. 

As for protecting women? Right into the kitchen with white caps, red robes, and no shoes. Children will be forced to bear children because a total ban on abortion will take over no matter what he says he's not gonna do. His medical concept? Women at home caring for kids and parents alike. Out of the workforce we go so men can work without having to compete with stupid, naive women. Welcome to Stepford.

Listen, folks, this guy has been telling us who he is for a long time. No matter who gets the vote tally, a peaceful transfer of power is not gonna happen. I imagine the military is prepared, one way of the other, for whatever happens. 

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week
This election is a lose-lose. America is the biggest loser of all.

Still... make sure you get out there and

if you haven't already. 

Monday, October 28, 2024

HONOR

Well, I'm still sitting in my own kitchen, only marginally less pissed off than I was last week. This week, the Vikings played on Thursday night, and once again, the real Vikings showed up to play. They dropped their second game in a row after a spectacular start of 5 wins. The bright spot was that I didn't have to run out to the cemetery to see if Ziggy clawed his way out. Had they one either of the last two, that would've been necessary. Minnesota teams are choke teams.....they can only get so close.....except for the Lynx. We should be extraordinarily proud of the Lynx, and we are, quietly, because no one wants to put a makkes (a plague) on their season. Added to that, I couldn't watch the Chiefs' game because it wasn't "broadcast" in my area. After years of being a KC fan, for reasons I can't really explain except to say they have nothing to do with Travis Kelce, but getting Andy Reid for the coach was far more important. Big Red is good at team, something the Vikings haven't been good at since the days of the Purple People Eaters ...one of whom recently retired as a Minnesota Supreme Court Justice. But that's neither here nor there. The important thing with the Vikings is that being a prima donna does not make for good team work, which, in turn, loses games. Hiring washed up QBs and violent criminals does not help the image or the team. So while I sat quietly by while Ziggy had apoplexy during the games, I silently followed the Chiefs....long before Big Red, before Travis, and before anyone even knew what a Swiftie was. 

The Duke of Flatbush
Very few people know...or probably care, that I follow any sports at all. Toddler me was a total Brooklyn Dodger fan. Grandpa and Dad took me to my first baseball game at Ebbets Field so I could see them before they left town. Pee Wee Reese and Duke Snider were my faves and I knew how to spit if someone said "Walter O'Malley." When the Mets were born, I became a devoted fan and stayed that way until the late 80s. I abandoned my adoration for lots of reasons, Dwight Gooden and Darryl Strawberry being two of them. I was a marginal Yankees fan because, after all, they were the New York Yankees, but once I came to Minnesota, I fell hook, line and almost sinker for the Twins. Tom Kelly was a great manager, as was Ron Gardenhire. The caveat there being when the Yankees played the Twinkies, it was a win-win for me. It just was. 

Now, however, I'm having a conundrum: The World Series. Worse than a subway series, this one is tough. Met-Yankees woulda been a snap: Yankees all the way. But this one tugs at my little-girl heart. My bro is a Dodger guy and always has been. I've been more fickle. But truth be told, I do hold a soft spot for those boys from Brooklyn, the Trolley Dodgers. My American League loyalties are being sore tested at the moment. I suspect that it will be another win-win for me. 

The famous BCJ Baseball t-shirt
Rabbi Allen used to tell us baseball was a metaphor for the Jewish calendar. My dad used to tell me that baseball was a metaphor for life. There were good seasons and bad seasons, good games and bad games, but the most important aspect of the game was being a player with honor. That wasn't always the case with the Mets. Although he remained a loyal Mets fan while I railed against their follies and foibles, ...something I didn't always understand. He instilled in me the belief that no one could take my honor away unless I gave it to them; that being honorable was something only I could do for me. That players who behaved badly dishonored the whole team, and if I wanted to be part of a team, I had to make sure I was honorable. When I was a little kid, this ongoing conversation was over my head, but as I matured, it became increasingly meaningful. Probably the last in-depth conversation I had with him before the dementia set in was about the lack of honor in politics, right around the time Feckless Felon announced he was seeking the GOP nomination, back in June, 2015. Being my dad was a Republican most of his life, this was something to be discussed. His was a wait-and-see kinda attitude, not really believing he could get the nomination, but unwilling to dismiss him out of hand. He didn't live long enough to see. 

As terrible as it sounds, I am glad Dad isn't around now. This election would smash his heart to smithereens. 

Dad spent most of World War II in a tank in Patton's army. He was a telegrapher and in rotation with General Patton. He was at the Bulge, he was at Remagen, he was even at the liberation of at least one concentration camp, called in to process survivors because he spoke both Yiddish and French. He fought Nazis and Fascism. He had a lot to say about Fascists of all types. We spent a whole lotta hours sitting in beach chairs at the club while he talked about the war. For the first time, according to Mom; I took notes as he told stories I never heard before. I watched my dad weep as he talked about the bodies in the villages, about the skeletal survivors in one of the camps, about the nightmares he still had decades later that prevented him from sleeping through the night. We didn't know much about PTSD until his medical interview at the Minnesota VA when they moved here for assisted living. That's a whole other story. But the bottom line was....and still is....he believed Fascism could happen anywhere, even in the US, if we forgot about what Fascism looked like in Europe. 

Increasingly, the right wing of this country is moving into Fascism. This isn't being alarmist; this is the increasingly worried voices of people who know about this stuff.  In an interview given to the New York Times, former Marine Corps General John Kelly, Feckless Felon's longest serving Chief-of-Staff said: 
“Well, looking at the definition of fascism: It’s a far-right authoritarian, ultranationalist political ideology and movement characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy,” he said. 

Mr. Kelly said that definition accurately described Mr. Trump.

“So certainly, in my experience, those are the kinds of things that he thinks would work better in terms of running America,” Mr. Kelly said.

He added: “Certainly the former president is in the far-right area, he’s certainly an authoritarian, admires people who are dictators — he has said that. So he certainly falls into the general definition of fascist, for sure.”

Kelly said Trump chafed at limitations on his power.

“He certainly prefers the dictator approach to government,” Mr. Kelly said.

Mr. Trump “never accepted the fact that he wasn’t the most powerful man in the world — and by power, I mean an ability to do anything he wanted, anytime he wanted,” Mr. Kelly said. 

Once upon a time, I had high hopes that Kelly would be that adult in the room. Appointed in July, 2017, it was announced on December 8, 2018 that he would be replaced by Mick Mulvaney. When I wrote the episode, It's Not A Coup, It's A Junta on August 28, 2017, I was already wondering about generals running the West Wing. I hoped they would be able to rein in the president and maybe bring a sense of import to foreign policy that was sorely lacking. Nah. No such luck. Still, hindsight can be very interesting because in the period following his removal, Kelly began sounding warning bells about the president. After the attack on the Capitol on January 6th, 2021, Kelly said he supported the removal of the president according to the 25th Amendment to the Constitution. Was he just a disgruntled, unemployed general...or was his possible junta thwarted?

It doesn't matter anymore. What does matter is that enough people who know what Fascism is all about are pointing fingers, attempting to draw attention to the actions of a candidate who is increasingly unhinged. His rally at Madison Square Garden was shockingly racist. Yeah, it was a comedian who called Puerto Rico a floating garbage island, but it was the audience that clapped and hooted. Yeah, yeah, the GOP tried to distance themselves from it, but they hired him knowing what his comedy is about. His reiteration of lies about FEMA and hurricane recovery are just destructive to the people who are being helped. CNN stepped away to their coverage to give anchor Jessica Dean a chance to fact-check. After the fact, CNN's Daniel Dale posted an in-depth analysis of 16 lies. 

I'm going to stop now. You, gentle readers, all know this. It's not news. What happens on November 5th will impact all of us, one way or another, honorable behavior be damned. Which I think is unfortunate. 

I remain especially concerned about November 6th. January 6th, 2021 was a trial run. We're about to experience the real thing.

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week
Citing cowardice, complicity, and lack of honor
 on the part of Jeff Bezos,
 over 200,000 subscribers have cancelled their 
Washington Post subscriptions.
I am one of them.
If you have a subscription, you should be, too.

Monday, October 21, 2024

Deception

El Al Lounge at JFK
See, the plan was to finish writing this while I sat in the very kosher El Al Lounge at JFK, sending it out before I boarded my very posh flight to Tel Aviv. I was so looking forward to flying the new Dreamliner jet with its business class suites and all kosher meals. Maybe I'd be brave enough to daven shacharit in the air. I was seriously excited about the flights since Delta stopped flying into TLV and they had moved me to El Al in both directions. And I would still arrive during Sukkot. But.....

It wasn't the war that put a kibosh on the trip; it was a health issue for friends in Israel. Being a house guest right now would not be a great idea, and after many texts and phone calls, we decided I would postpone the trip. The ticket was fully refundable, so it wasn't like I was gonna have penalties up the wazoo. In fact, I cancelled the flights on the 17th and the ticket is already refunded. Which is a small miracle all by itself....as AmEx is sending me a cheque for the full refund because it may as well be earning interest in my bank account. But that is little comfort because I want to be sitting in a coffee house with my friends instead of sitting in my own kitchen. 

One of the bonuses of going now was the lovely idea of being out of the country during the last two weeks of the election. I was so happy at the thought of missing all those bull-hockey hate ads I was already seeing. AI is clearly the devil since so many of the ads were manipulations of all manner of media. It's beyond disgusting; it's revoltingly shameful on the nation. 

There was one ad in particular about Kamala Harris pushing for sex change operations: it is a complete misrepresentation of the fact. It's a complex issue and providing appropriate care for transgender inmates must be addressed as part of the prison system. FactCheck.org does a respectably good job of explaining the complexity and the issues attached to Harris's position. What the GOP does not mention in their nonsense attack ad is that the care in question is part of a federal mandate for prisoners. In other words, it's the law. Sure, there are unanswered questions, but she is not advocating sex-change operations for all. 

Here's the thing: there is absolutely no way to combat campaign lies. Feckless Felon's stump speeches are chains of not exaggerations, but outright lies. And there is no way to stop him when he spews hate and deceit. Not to mention descriptions of a dead golfer's genitalia. What is wrong with this guy?

More importantly, what is wrong with America that half the population seems to want to trust a man who augared into the ground every business he ever owned, who made money off his own Secret Service by overcharging hotel rooms, who sent Vladimir Putin COVID testing supplies when they were unavailable to medical establishments here, with nuclear codes and the safety of our country? The media repeats everything regardless of veracity since salaciousness sells. 

Oddly, Thomas Jefferson confronted the same problem 217 year ago as he wrote to his friend John Norvell on June 11th, 1807
To your request of my opinion of the manner in which a newspaper should be conducted, so as to be most useful, I should answer, “by restraining it to true facts & sound principles only.” Yet I fear such a paper would find few subscribers. It is a melancholy truth, that a suppression of the press could not more compleatly deprive the nation of it's [sic] benefits, than is done by its abandoned prostitution to falsehood. Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in situations to confront facts within their knowledge with the lies of the day. I really look with commiseration over the great body of my fellow citizens, who, reading newspapers, live & die in the belief, that they have known something of what has been passing in the world in their time; whereas the accounts they have read in newspapers are just as true a history of any other period of the world as of the present, except that the real names of the day are affixed to their fables. General facts may indeed be collected from them, such as that Europe is now at war, that Bonaparte has been a successful warrior, that he has subjected a great portion of Europe to his will, &c., &c.; but no details can be relied on. I will add, that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods & errors. He who reads nothing will still learn the great facts, and the details are all false.                            
Of course, he didn't have the 10-second newscycle and social media to contend with, which means he did not have access to instant, internet fact-checking, something now so critical for disseminating misinformation. 

Power to the Soviets
Free speech is a tough thing to cherish. On one hand, you want someone to stand up screaming THE EMPEROR IS NAKED; on the other hand, that can land you on a raft of trouble...from death threats to well....more death threats. Gone are the corner soap boxes, replaced with loudspeakers like TikTok, Instagram, FaceBook, and even (heaven forfend!) Truth Social...giant, bubble-creating feedback loops which stymie any attempt to discern truth from fiction. But it doesn't matter. A willing and eager audience stands by waiting for these gems to be dispersed like sneezes..germs carried on the air we breathe, sucked into our lungs only to travel into our brains where....if we don't completely fall prey to the nonsense, we begin to doubt the veracity of anything and everything we hear. In short, we are inundated with propaganda. 
As a 1960s kid, we used to learn about Communist propaganda. It was overt, depressing looking art, posters and slogans meant to intimidate the viewer to comply with the message. 

But these days, the images are meant to evoke something else. Maybe they want you to believe these are serious guys who are going to save America from her enemies. The firm jaw is a masculine sign for strength and determination. Vance's beard is a virility meme all by itself. This poster is designed to project not only physical strength, but strength of pose as well. 
Feckless Felon wants you to believe he is extraordinarily soooo bad, he had trading cards made up. Oh wait, those are NFT cards...non-fungible....which means "... trading cards are virtual counterparts to traditional trading cards, existing solely in digital format and managed via online platforms or applications." The images are meant to portray super-hero powers in a variety of endeavors. Are you supposed to believe Feckless Felon can do all this stuff? He's like a kid at Halloween, believing that if he dresses the part, people will believe he is that character.

Over the past weekend, Feckless Felon cemented his place as a no-class, vile, liar. Forget his 12-minute discussion of Arnold Palmer's genitalia, forget the incoherency of his remarks, but do remember he called the sitting Vice President of the United States "a shit vice president." Something about that set off all sorts of bells and whistles for me. It was incredibly disrespectful to use salty language at a rally. That was offensive....and frankly, I swear like a sailor. Secondly, it was disrespectful to the office of the Vice President. Name calling is sinking to the level of a first grader. He is running for President of the United States, a grave and serious position and he demeaned it with his foul language and graphic descriptions of another human being. Even if you don't respect the occupants of that office, his disrespect for the office itself makes me wonder how anyone can think he is fit to be there. 

Is this the image he wants his supporters to take forward into the presidency? That he is a crude, classless, incoherent felon? I'm not sure, but his minions seem not to care. Maybe they do want someone who will shit on the Great Seal carpet in the oval office. If he does, it would not be far-fetched. He did it figuratively in his first term

Maybe we really do deserve the government we elect...whether we voted for that party or not. But if he is elected...and heavens knows, I hope he isn't....there are no do-overs in America. No way to recall the presidential election. There is no no-confidence vote.  The amount of damage he can do is unfathomable. We will just have to live with his policies....hopefully for only 4 years. Or not.

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week
Eric Hoffer got it right when he said:
"Propaganda does not deceive people; 
it merely helps them to deceive themselves."

Monday, October 14, 2024

From Generation to Generation

At this year's break fast, an interesting conversation was had about things we take forward, dor l'dor,  from generation to generation: the things we pass on. 

The next morning, I got a text from the Junior Son, asking if I still have the meat slicer. I do. The thing is older than me, still in excellent condition, amazingly enough, and just needs to have the wheel sharpened. and the crank oiled just a tad. The last one to do slicer maintenance was Ziggy....so it's been a while.

Admittedly, the thing is a pain in the ass to set up, but worth it. You set it on newspaper to catch the drippings, then attach 2 c-clamps to the counter to hold it in place. Ziggy even notched the spots where the clamps would easily attach because otherwise you spent more time trying to figure the best location and angle than slicing. Even with the c-clamps, you still had to hang on. I remember being pressed into service to hold the slicer steady. That job came with lots of warnings about where fingers did and did not belong. 

I remember the slicer in use when we lived in Bayside. I'm not sure if Mom bought it, or if it came from Grandma Bessie. Since she was originally the wife of a butcher, her having one is not out of the question. It was just always there. In North Bellmore, it was kept in the cabinet under the oven which, for reasons I never understood, had a little built-in desk right there making it virtually impossible to get anything outta the cabinet underneath without crawling on the floor. 

When the slicer finally made its way to Minnesota Ziggy used it all the time for salami...dried, hard and regular...and whenever I made turkey breast. Something good always came off the slicer. I suspect that's why the kids want to appropriate it; there's dried salami involved. 

But it's not just about the slicer. At the Yom Kippur break fast, we were talking about the weeks to come, and what will follow this election. Would we be safe? Would there be a civil war here? Would the Jews be held responsible for Feckless Loser's loss as he insisted? I got to thinking about what I would take with me if we have to go elsewhere. My house is full of pieces of my history, pieces I would want to pass on to Little Miss and Young Sir. 

There's the rolling pin my Great-grandmother and doppelgänger Nechama brought with her from the shtetl near Minsk. We know it's milchig (dairy) because there's a notch on the end. My Aunt Yetta's shabbat candlesticks were passed to me by Aunt Rose (her sister) and Grandma Sarah (her sister-in-law) at her specific request, held by Grandma until I had a home of my own. And later, Grandma Sarah and Grandpa Moishe's 50th wedding anniversary Kiddush cup found its way to our table...along with other family cups.

Not to be neglected was Grandma Bessie's favorite deco vase, a silver teapot Ziggy's grandmother brought from Wales, and a Belleek cake plate from my very elegant Aunty Florrie's house. There's a bone china pickle dish from Mrs. Junior Son's Grandma Mildred's house, but we made it pesadik (kosher for Passover) so it's packed away with the Passover dishes, or it would be pictured here. 


Each of these things, along with the others that I do not show, has a story. I have a whole breakfront full of stories. Just as I learned the little histories from my mother, grandmothers, and assorted aunts, I hope my grandkiddos will take those stories forward. Already they love Grandma Bessie (aka Grandma Don't) stories. It's a beginning. 

I think about how my grandparents left Europe to escape pogroms and persecution. I hear the rhetoric coming from the far right and the far left, and I find myself hoping I will be proactive enough to remove my family from danger. Will there be time to pack and ship, or will it be like my grandparents with a single suitcase and not much else. What are the absolute musts that must go with us? The candlesticks and Kiddush cups? ✅ The teapot? ✅ The rolling pin? ✅ The vase and the plate?Breakable. May have to be left behind. Someplace safe, where we may be able to arrange for shipping when we land. As for the slicer...if I can make it happen it will come with us.

I know this may sound silly to some of you, gentle readers, but better to think some of this stuff through than to be caught off guard and without some kind of plan. And yes, it's all just stuff, but it's the stuff that tells our stories. Stuff we can hold in our hands just like our grandmothers and grandfathers did. Knowing generations before us have cherished these things enough so that they come down to us. At the same time, we fully understand we are not the first generation of Jews to face down hate, nor will we be the last. 

As for me in Tel Aviv next week? There are a whole bunch of moving parts that have to stop moving before I can go. If I don't go next week, I'll just rebook for something later, but go I will. I have to. Someone has to scout new neighborhoods. 

Look, we have survived as a singular, identifiable people for over 4,000 years. We are nothing if not tenacious. We have faced adversity and we remain Jews. We are stubborn, stiff-necked, and determined to stay that way. We don't seek converts or followers. We just want to be left alone to be Jews. We're not here to change how you believe or what you believe or how you believe. That's none of our business and we'd like the same respect from everyone else. Leave us the hell alone where you find us, especially when it comes to our homeland.

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week

Happy Indigenous Peoples' Day!
From we who are
THE INDIGENOUS PEOPLE OF THE LAND OF ISRAEL. 

Monday, October 7, 2024

A Year and a Day

Odessa Pogrom 1905
When I was little, I knew my Russian grandmother came to this country to escape Cossacks. I knew she and her brothers had hid from the Cossacks, and pogroms were not exactly an out-of-the-ordinary occasion. I also knew we had family left behind in Russia, and that very few of them were alive. And I knew ours was not the only family like this. 

auto-da-fé
By the time I was in 2nd grade, I knew about 
Masada, the flaying of Rabbi Akivaauto-da-fé at the Spanish Inquisition, Nazis, ghettos and gas chambers. I knew lots of other gory, gruesome stuff, too, but those were the biggies in my mind. I knew our neighbors had numbers tattooed on their arms when they arrived at Auschwitz.  My parents assured me that wasn't going to happen again, not to me or my family or my friends, that America, with its Constitution and Bill of Rights was a safe place for Jews. That the lessons of the holocaust had been learned by the world. 

As if. 

I saw bits and pieces of anti-semitism growing up. I was confronted by it head-on in graduate school. But I believed that these were all outliers, that basically we were safe. Accepted as part of the fabric of American Society. 

Until we weren't. 

In the last 365 days, we have learned that we are not part of the American social fabric. Okay, maybe we're on the edges, but we are not safe. We all watched as American students turned against the Jews of America with their encampments, their slogans, their chants, and their desire to bring the intifada here. Do they not know Intifada is a form of terrorism, violent and bloody, indiscriminate in its targets? Do they think intifada is some sort of peaceful protest movement? 

Apparently.

Do they not understand that Hamas, ISIS, Islamic State, Islamic Jihad, Taliban, and Houthis are all proxies? Do they think that 9/11 happened in a vacuum outside the support and encouragement from Iran? Or perhaps they're okay with the death of 2,977 people on that day? Or because my two cousins who died who in the the collapse of the North Tower were Jewish made it okay? Are the pro-Palestinian protesters now dancing at the site memorials for the 9/11 victims? 

Possibly so, since some of them believe the Mossad was responsible for the attack....to make Islam look bad. 

One year ago, according to the secular calendar, Hamas crossed the border to brutally murder at least 1,139 people. More than 240 men, women, children, babies, and elders were taken hostage. Of that number, it is believed about 100 hostages remain in the tunnels of Gaza. Of that number, it is unknown how many are alive and how many are corpses left to rot.

My world changed radically one year and one day ago. Gone is the belief that Jews are safe here, or just about anywhere else in the world...outside of Israel where they are, at the moment, decidedly unsafe, but at least they are in their own land speaking a language that has been spoken, read, and written for over 3000 years. 

Israel is so small, 21,649 square kilometers, about the same size as New Jersey, that it's barely a percentage of measurable land mass on a globe....0.0139%. The number of Jews in the world, thought to be about 14,000,000, is 2% of the world's population.  According to recent data, the Muslim population of the world is about 24%. According to the Pew Research Center, the landmass of all Islamic countries is about 20%. 

Keep in mind, the number 14,000,000 is WORLD Jewry. Only about 7,300,000 of those Jews live in Israel, so the percentage in the Middle East is even smaller, by about half.

Here's a comparison by percentage:


There are so few of us, in such a small land area, why do they hate us? We don't take up much room. Maybe it's because we have survived for 4000+ years as a single, fairly unified identity? Have we poisoned their wells? Have we forced conversion to Judaism on them? Have we barred them from education, occupations, or the ability to earn a living? Have we told them they can't own land or livestock? Have we forced them to wear clothing that identifies them as Christian or Muslim? 

Nope. 

All we have ever wanted was to be left alone in the country where some tombstones written in Hebrew are over 3000 years old, a written testament that this is our country. The Temple Mount is called The Temple Mount because our temple was situated there long before Islam was even invented. We don't stop anyone from having holy sites....Al-Aqsa Mosque, Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the Bahá’í World Center, the Druze holy site Nebi Shu'ayb. Everyone gets to pray however they want....even Jews which is still not permitted in some countries.Our dream was to have a Jewish state, but one that would welcome all people. 

We may be tiny, but we are fierce. For over 3000 years we have faced east to Jerusalem when we pray. Our most ancient prayers are directed at Jerusalem. We sat by the rivers of Babylon in exile and wept, crying If I forget thee, O, Jerusalem, let my right hand wither. Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth....written almost 600 years before the Common Era. 

But despite all the evidence, we have never been permitted to defend ourselves in our homeland. It took the birth of Israel to learn that skill. In over 70 years of statehood, we have NEVER started a war. 

For a while, we were an amusing anomaly as we beat back armies bigger, stronger, and more populous than our own. During the War of Independence, the tiny Israeli Air Force ran out of bombs so they used empty seltzer bottles thrown from planes because the noise was terrifying and the bottles exploded on impact. 

In this war, the IDF used exploding old fashioned pagers. Not exactly what one might think, but, like the seltzer bottles, it served its unique purpose...which is to defend the State of Israel from the monsters who come in the dark to rape and murder. 

But here's the bottom line: what happened on October 7th is exactly what Hamas promised it would do. Their charter calls for the destruction of Israel and the removal of the Jewish people from that land. It does not matter to them that Israel decamped from Gaza in 2005, at which time the IDF removed everyone and everything, leaving Gaza to the Gazans. By September 22, 2005, disengagement was complete right back to the Green Line.  There were no settlements, no IDF, no nuthin'.....including peace. By 2006, Hamas and Fatah were back to firing rockets at Israelis over the border. They have never stopped firing. 

Don't we get to fight back? Don't we have a right to defend ourselves? 

Yes. 

When Hamas used tractors on October 7th, 2023, to break through the border, another kind of line was crossed. Tractors? Low tech. Seemingly innocuous.

Or not.

Israel did not ask for the massacre. Jews around the globe did not ask for the massacre. 


This is Shiri Bibas with her sons as they were being taken. Kfir was 9 months old and Ariel was 4. They were kidnapped at their home at Nir Oz. No one knows if they are alive or dead. Her parents were also taken. They were confirmed murdered on October 21st. Her face, and the faces of her red-headed children are etched into our collective soul. We demand to know where she is, where the children are. She is us.

Hamas continues to hold citizens of the world hostage, both alive and dead. No one knows how many there are; no one knows how many are still alive. We are not apologizing for defending our citizens. Israelis in Israel come first, be they Jews or anything else. Of the approximately 100 hostages that remain in Gaza, not all are Jews, not all are even Israeli citizens. But that really doesn't matter. And the world thinks this is okay.

Apparently. Just ask the UN. And most student populations. 

Our people were slaughtered on October 7th, but within days, Israel was declared responsible for the slaughter. As Bari Weiss noted in today's FREE PRESS column, A Year of Revelations:
As news of the scope of the slaughter was still registering, and the tally of hostages still being made—the final count: 240 people from 40 countries carried off like barbaric spoils of war—progressive groups here at home and across the West began to celebrate.
 
More than 30 student clubs at Harvard put out a letter holding Israel “entirely responsible” for the massacre. Israel. Not Hamas. Israel. This was on October 8, as Hamas terrorists were still roaming Israel’s south, and Hezbollah began its assault on Israel’s north from Lebanon.
 
Surely it had to be some terrible mistake, a sick prank. But the statement was sincere. And it wasn’t an anomaly.
 

In October 2023—just in that first month—George Washington University students projected the words “Glory to Our Martyrs” and “Free Palestine from the River to the Sea” in giant letters on campus buildings. At Cooper Union in Manhattan, Jewish students had to hide in the library from a mob pounding on the door. At Columbia, Professor Joseph Massad called the slaughter “awesome.” At Cornell, Professor Russell Rickford said it was “energizing” and “exhilarating.” At Princeton, hundreds of students chanted “globalize the intifada,” which can only mean: open season on Jews worldwide. At NYU, students held posters that read “keep the world clean,” with drawings of Jewish stars in garbage cans.

I watched Hamas tapes of the incursion tonight. We know this attack was carefully orchestrated. The tractors, the gliders, the motorcycles, the scooters, and the trucks. The film crew. The sound crew.It was so coordinated. So on top of the attack. Like a movie set. And the editing! Masterful. That didn't happen on the spur of the moment. They had equipment ready. They had skilled operators on hand. The Leni Riefenstahl-esque quality of the shots...almost like a shooting script had been done in advance. And why not? They were planning this for months. Why not have a film crew ready to go? Ready to release footage of the carnage almost as streaming action? That's a whole lotta advanced planning.

And the crowd went wild. Or so it seems according to the media.

The global celebrations of Israeli deaths were the least expected outcome. My director-brain finds it very interesting that the protests and the encampments and the hate spread like wildfire almost immediately. All those identical looking tents. All those keffiyehs, All those slogans and chants shouted in unison across the country. I understand social media works fast. I understand grass-roots and groundswell. There was no lag, no time to foment. It was fast. Too fast. Too tidy.

Almost as if it were planned in advance

If they can pre-plan a live-action war movie, why not a second, civilian wave? I remember Tommy the Traveler. Do you? Agent provocateurs are as old as history. With all that careful planning of murder and rape, why not plant agent provocateurs to make sure Israel is demonized in case we fight back? 

They made sure no one heard about the tunnels under Gaza, the tunnels under schools, the tunnels under hospitals that had launchers on the roof. They hid their weapons amidst their civilians, knowing any action would sacrifice their own people...men, women, and children...and Israel would be excoriated. 

They made sure no one heard about the relief funds pocketed by Hamas instead of allowing the Palestinians to build an economy. Whatever they did to structure that takeover of common sense and decency worked. Israel became the villain. The truth about the only democracy in the Middle East is rendered irrelevant. That Israel is a nation with successes and failures like any other nation is rendered irrelevant. That Israeli society is not defined by conformity is rendered irrelevant. 

They who support Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis ultimately support Iran and somehow manage not to understand that unless they embrace Islam, they are next. Gays for Palestine?
Great. Go to see how welcoming they are to your community in Palestine. Like the Nazis, Hamas and Hezbollah will make sure you, too, are dispatched to the world to come sooner rather than later. 

Yossia Klein Halevi made an interesting observation in his blog at The Times of Israel: The end of the post-Holocaust era:

The post-Holocaust era of the last eight decades was defined by optimism about the Jewish future. However improbably, we had emerged, stronger than ever, from the event intended to destroy us. For all its fluctuations, the post-Holocaust trajectory pointed forward. 
 
Through two thousand years of exile, the Jewish people were sustained by two dreams. The first – considered so fantastic that it was relegated to messianic times – was that a dispersed and powerless people would somehow reclaim its ancient homeland. The second was that, in the long interim before the coming of the Messiah, Jews would find a welcoming haven in the diaspora.  
 
After the Holocaust, both dreams were fulfilled. Two great centers of Jewish life emerged – a sovereign Israel and a self-confident North American Jewry, the most successful diaspora in history. Together, Israel and North America contain close to 90 percent of the world’s Jews. These two centers presided over the post-Holocaust renewal of the Jewish people – which moved from its historic nadir to the peak of its military, economic and political power.  

The post-Holocaust era may be waning, but that does not mean we won't grow into something stronger. We are no longer asking permission to exist. We are no longer relying on the UN to intercede on our behalf. We are not waiting for anyone to ride to our rescue.

Neither Hamas nor Hezbollah have demonstrated they give a damn about their own people. Oddly enough, we do. We want the killing to stop. We want the people of Gaza to find their way to a stable nation and economy that will contribute to the region. Therein lies all the difference in the world. 

Or not. It's up to them.

Our anthem is HaTikvah....The Hope. I am supposed to leave for Israel in a couple of weeks. Just my usual trip to see friends. I don't know if I'm going yet. I can cancel, but that would mean giving up hope that I'm getting on that flight. I'm not ready to do that quite yet.


The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week
Never stop hoping

Monday, September 30, 2024

With High Hopes For 5785

Ever hear of something called Rewards For Justice ? It's a federal program, part of the Department of State, and falls under the aegis of Bureau of Diplomatic Security. I kid you not. 

Our Mission is to lead worldwide security and law enforcement efforts to advance U.S. foreign policy and safeguard national security interests. Our Vision is to be an agile and proactive intelligence-led security and law enforcement organization to further diplomacy around the world. 
 
Rewards For Justice is exactly what it sounds like: a bounty system. 

Rewards for Justice (RFJ), the U.S. Department of State’s national security rewards program, was established by the 1984 Act to Combat International Terrorism, Public Law 98-533 (codified at 22 U.S.C. § 2708). Administered by the State Department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security, RFJ’s mission is to offer rewards to obtain information that protects American lives and U.S. interests and furthers U.S. national security.  

It even has a button at the top of the page for Submit A Tip . The drop-down menus will link to a variety of information in each of the global areas the office covers. Go read through the list under Terrorism. Quite the education there.

But that's neither here nor there. I'm just pointing out that these things do exist and there are "public enemy" lists for terrorists as well as for cyber criminals. I didn't believe this was true when Bill Maher suggested the State Department pay the IDF the reported $7M bounty on Hassan Nasrallah and just say thank you. So I went looking and tripped across this bureau. On the other hand, I don't think I was surprised that it exists. 

screenshot from Al-Manar TV
What did manage to surprise me was how Hassan Nasrallah was portrayed as some kind of jolly father-figure with a Santa Claus beard in news organs all over the place. Many of the pictures show him in social situations, smiling, glad-handing... happy politician poses, but don't go into detail about the number of people he has killed. They neglect to mention that his sole desire was to remove Israel and her people from the map...even though he claimed to have no problem with Jews. 
The BBC described him as having

...steered Hezbollah's evolution from a militia founded to fight Israeli troops occupying Lebanon, into a military force stronger than the Lebanese army, a powerbroker in Lebanese politics, a major provider of health, education and social services, and a key part of its backer Iran's drive for regional supremacy. 

He also steered Hezbollah into murderous and destructive conflicts that impact all of the Lebanese population. He altered their government and attempted to replace it with an Iranian puppet rule. If you're of a mind to learn more, read Foreign Affairs article, What The Lebanese People Really Think of Hezbollah from July of this year. It's eye-opening.

Israel has just begun a "limited" ground incursion into Lebanon. Like everyone else on the planet, no one knows what that means. For this writer, it may mean my departure for Israel is delayed. And no, I am not happy about that at all. 

At this writing, there is no additional word on the hostages as we approach the one-year mark. The UN has, once more, proven itself to be worthlessly toothless, and an elegantly written op-ed piece on that subject in the Jerusalem Post is worth reading.  The BBC is finally being called out publicly for its blatant anti-Israel bias, something long overdue. I've completely given up on NPR; their subtle anti-Israel bias, like that of the New York Times, isn't as glaring as the BBC, but it's the lack of criticism of Hamas, the missing recognition of the hostages still in Gaza. It's as though they are the nice Germans who just close the curtains. Ignoring the reality on the ground doesn't make it go away; it just lets it fester. It's okay to complain about Israel's actions but not okay to hold Hamas or Hezbollah for embedding its command posts in civilian neighborhoods, in hospitals, and under children's bedrooms.

The exploding pocket pagers, a surgically precise operation that probably saved far more lives than it took, was still castigated from all sides. It doesn't matter what Israel does to defend itself...whether it's bombing known terrorist compounds, or just castrating a few thousand known terrorists....the results are the same: Israel is condemned. Which should tell you, to be perfectly frank, Israel is NOT entitled to defend itself no matter what the UN or anyone else says. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. There is no path to self-defense for Israel that would meet anyone's approval. And Israel is the only nation held to that standard...but you knew that already.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, we're getting ready for Rosh HaShana. There's a whole lotta cooking going on, and that is actually comforting. My Big Bro is coming for his annual Minnesota sojourn and I'm looking forward to sitting with him in shul. 

There is one Rosh Ha'Shana tradition, however, that I both love and hate: kever avot....visiting the graves of our parents. It's a tradition to place a stone on top of a headstone to show that someone has visited the grave. Years ago, my dad began the tradition of painting a rock green for his mother, my veddy British Grandma Sarah who happened to be born on Saint Patrick's Day....and died the day after her birthday back in 1979. I have carried the tradition forward, and now we paint rocks to put on headstones. 

My folks may be in New York, but Ziggy is here. As is FIL. This year was the first time Little Miss and Young Sir came. I had prepared white painted stones and brought markers to the cemetery, but when they got out of the car, they already had painted stones in their hands. I was verklempt. I love that they have adopted this silly little family minhag (custom) as their own. Dad would've loved that. So we put our painted rocks on Ziggy's headstone, talked about him for a while, then took a walk around the older parts of the cemetery and talked about the interesting headstones. They saw family names that are familiar to them because they are family names of their friends. There were questions to be answered and even jokes to be shared. They were comfortable there.

It wasn't scary. It was life. Ziggy woulda hated that we were visiting him, but he really woulda loved the painted rocks. 


The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week
Wishing all my dear readers, Jewish or not,
שנה טובה ומתוקה
a good and sweet New Year.
May 5785 bring an end to hostages and hostilities,
and the beginning of peace throughout the region.