General Disgust

Between the stabbings at the Pride Parade in Jerusalem, the firebombing of a Palestinian home with the residents asleep inside, and the garbage spewing out of the mouth of the Clown Candidate Cavalcade, I cannot just pick a topic and go with it. Quite the opposite. I have four opening lines, and I don't feel like writing about any of it.

It's a pretty well established fact that I'm disgusted with the viciousness and hatred coming from the religious right in Israel. And the PA foreign minister has traveled to the Hague to file a report with the ICC? Really? Oh, yeah. I forgot. Blowing up bus stops, restaurants and hotel lobbies don't count because the bodies are Jewish. 

Look, I do not for one New York minute think the right wing lunatic brigade should go unpunished. Just the opposite. Lock 'em all up. Terrorists are terrorists and there is no excuse and no reason on the planet to defend what they did. It's so against halacha that there aren't even laws to describe how to respond to such heinous actions. And if they don't start zero tolerance for acts of baseless hatred against ANY people as perpetrated by the black hat crazies, just kiss the State of Israel goodbye. We will do to ourselves what we did at the time of the Second Temple: we will be responsible for our own downfall. 

We. That's a BIG word.

כל ישראל ערבית זה בזה 

All Israel is responsible one for another. 

If we are silent, we are to blame the next time it happens. If the Israeli government continues to turn a blind eye to far-right's hatred of others, then we have not done our jobs as Jews. Either we state unequivocally that is not an acceptable position, or we are contributing to the downfall of the State of Israel. Here is the place where We, the Diaspora Jews, get to have an opinion. We get to say we cannot support a place where Jews commit terrorist acts against Arabs and other Jews, while the government does little to stop it. We cannot support a place that discriminates against other religions, including our own. And we get to say we will not support a place where Torah is violated intentionally, with malice and forethought. A terrorist is a terrorist is a terrorist. The color of the flag does not matter; the act of hatred does. 

For those of you who will condemn me out of hand for saying this, and countering, "Do not Jewish lives and children matter?" the answer is resoundingly YES. Jewish lives matter. Arab lives matter. All lives matter. But what matters most here is that Jews not sink to the base level of Hamas and Hezbollah. Two wrongs do not ever make a right, and countering the heinous crimes executed against the Israeli civilian population with homicide terrorism is not right at any time. Firebombing a house is not fighting in a war; it's the cowards' way. Just as we expect the world not to tolerate Palestinian terrorist actions committed in Israel We, Am Yisrael, cannot tolerate any of our own behaving the same way. 

If we do not stand up against Jewish terrorism coming from the lunatic fringe then we are culpable for anything and everything that happens. Netanyahu and his right-wing coalition cannot continue to believe this is okay and something to be swept under Haredi rug. It is not okay. 

As for the Clown Cavalcade on our own shores, Mike Huckabee's idea that negotiating with Iran was tantamount to delivering the Jews to the gas chamber, I would point out that there is no legitimate comparison to be made here. Huckabee is being a provocateur and needs to stop immediately. And in the too-stupid-to-live department, Marco Rubio sunk to a brand new level of utter inanity when he said:

The next president of the United States must nominate Supreme Court justices that believe in the original intent of the Constitution and apply that. We need more Scalias and less Sotomayors.

Great. Just what we need. More justices who want to stand guard in our bedrooms to supervise what we are doing with whom and when. Really? This guy claims he's for smaller government and less regulation...except when it comes to our sex lives? Bzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Wrong Answer! 

Truth is, gentle readers, this stuff is all depressing. And scary. And I have no idea where to go with any of it, but it is keeping me up at night. Really.

At this point, Ziggy would say, "And then they all stepped off the curb and got hit by a bus. Now go to bed."

And if that's not enough, I hear the neighbor kids are reading the blog now. Uh oh. 

Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week

Parental Guidance Is Advised.

If your kids are gonna read this, you should probably be prepared to discuss it.