ARE WE FIDDLING WHILE THE BURNING STARTS?

     Sometimes I wonder if five years from now we will pause in our struggle for survival and wonder why we were so dumb as to worry about Wi Fi when the world was beginning to burn around us. Why were we so concerned about reserve funding when it means nothing at all in the present that the future will bring?
     To be a Jew in the world of 2014 is to be in a scary situation. Do we begin to shout alarm! ALARM! as the ugly face of blatant and angry anti - Semitism comes out of the closet where polite society had consigned it? Do we wage war in the papers, in all the media, trying to raise a consciousness of this or do we try to hide and make ourselves small, unnoticed and thus maybe able to escape the new terrors and hatred unleashed upon us?
     I know this sounds pessimistic, but to read, see, and hear all of this 70 years after the Holocaust is to be frightened, and wisely so. Cries of "Burn them! Gas them! Kill them!" are heard throughout Europe, including in Germany, once so very careful about any signs of anti - Semitism arising once more in that country, the country that unleashed HELL with all its fire, sulfur and ash upon the world and especially the Jews, beginning in 1933.
     I remember a Jewish History teacher of mine, a professor from an Israeli university who was on sabbatical and one lesson he gave which stuck with me all through the years. He stated that all through history, Jews were oppressed and discriminated against, but always there was the ability to move  elsewhere or even convert, which some did, although many still kept up their Judaism in secret, for centuries, even while forgetting why! And yes, they were killed as well. In Tsarist Russia the rule was 1/3 by emigration, 1/3 by conversion and 1/3 by death; however, the philosophy under the Nazis was 100% dead. It is beginning to feel that way again.
     The statement and argument, if it can be called such, of proportionality is ridiculous. Does it mean that we need to kill at least one for every two Arabs dead, be they civilian or terrorist, be they innocent, just there, or being used as human shields, or allowing Hamas to set up there as does UNRWA!. What is the magic formula that would make it proportional? How many Jews have to die? How much more blood must be spilled before the world will be appeased? How much harm should we do to ourselves before the fever of anti Semitism begins to cool off?
    Or is there no hope anymore? Are we seeing the beginning of a new and awful period in our history, one of more bloodshed and agony, more hatred, more death? I asked G-d to make this stop when I wrote my Holocaust article for the Reporter; I asked people to stop, but I believe I was spitting into the wind, unfortunately. Personally, I am frightened, not so much for myself, but for my children and grandchildren. I pray to G-d that I am wrong.