My conscience won't let me go

I refuse to be silent¹.

Maybe it’s because when, on our black fast day, my gut collapses into nausea as I read Lamentations. Or maybe because on Yom Kippur, I am plagued by a vivid image of Rabbi Akiva as he is being brutally tortured. Or maybe because I can envision Jews being burned at the stake as onlookers cheer. Or maybe it’s because I can see the maddening crowds screaming at a fever-pitch to “Kill the Jew Traitor Dreyfus”.

This is our history, our story. And I have to own it.

I refuse to be silent because my parents z”l were born in Poland and survived WWII, losing parents and loved ones to savages. Or maybe it’s because I grew up hating the haters, the Nazis. Or maybe it’s because as a first generation American, I was privileged. I didn’t see the murders of my family, my people. I escaped experiencing first-hand the ferociousness of animals wearing human skin.

This is not just my history. It’s our collective story.

I can not be silent. Not now, and not for the long road ahead in the IsraelHamas War.

I will not be silent because I’m Jewish.

And if you are Jewish, you shouldn’t be silent either.

So, I wonder, how can people stand idly by?

Don’t kid yourself, this is not a war against Israelis. It’s a war against you. Whether you practice Judaism or not. Whichever way you choose to practice. Whether you believe this way or that.

Unless maybe you haven’t been paying attention to the world-wide rallies and riots which call for our death.

Images I’ve seen of Hamas’ brutality are implanted in my brain. But not as historic markers from 70 years ago, of my people being hauled and mauled, starved and beaten…only to be shot or killed in gas chambers. But live videos, of such brutality and hatred for human life that bear witness to the atrocities on October 7th.

Yet, fellow Jews are not clear about what side they’re on.

The side of the Destroyers or the Defenders.

Still worse are those who have picked the wrong side, the side of the killers.

Because right now, to be Pro-Palestinian is not the point. You are eating the lies that are being fed to you. Hamas is using the Palestinians as pawns, but then, so are you.

When you don’t see clearly that caring about humanity is antithetical to the goals of Hamas, you’re ripping at your own human soul.

And that tear you’re making—it will leave a scar.

1. I’m not used to writing posts like this. The lane I prefer is a spiritual one. But I am pushed against the wall of the barbaric, the inhumane——way beyond my limits of what I thought my soul could bear. Quieting my mind seems selfish right now. So I will write.