DO YOU EVEN KNOW ME?

  "A man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point where he does not discern any truth." Fyodor Dostoevsky The Brothers Karamazov

It is bad enough to deal with lies in one's personal world. How much more so is it difficult, impossible, to adjust to a life where lies are the dominant principle of life. Where people prefer lies to the truth; in fact, truth is anathema to that society, its moral structure badly perverted, its anchor of morality, decency, humanity, lost. Please keep the opening quote in mind as you read this.  

Do you know me? Would you know me if we should cross paths? Yes, you, I am talking to you, all of you. I need answers. Why must I die so you can feel complete. Why does the mere contemplation of it, let alone its reality, fill you with glee, with satisfaction of a job well done.  

 Here are the facts. I am a woman aged 75. I am a granddaughter, a daughter, a niece, a cousin, a grandmother, a great grandmother, a mother, a wife, a sister, a friend. For the most part I have spent my working years as an educator, a teacher, endeavoring to teach children of the joys of literature, of open minds, of awareness of positive and negative sides of life and the ability to discern the difference and the ability, the drive, to choose correctly. To know we all are the creations of G-d, and as such are far more alike than different.  

I have done my best, tried my best most of the time. There have been moments of triumph and moments of defeat. I am an American, native born. You may see me as a generic type of my class, but do you really, truly, deeply, personally, know me, understand me? In actuality do we have any point of connection, even way past the iconic six degrees of relationship? Thus, your answer to the question - do you know me - would have to be no, definitely not.    

Why then, do you want me dead? Why then do you feel you have the right to condemn me to death? Why must I die? Why is my death a treasured value for you? Why would that death be cheered as a victory? In what way would my violent death improve your life? Why does this death wish, this crazed enmity you continue to feed with outrageous lies, fed to you almost from birth, possess you, obsess you until you die. 

Is this the crux of the problem? I am a Jew. Proud, open, refusing to give in to those who would kill me and mine, have tried to do that, done just that, for millennia. Is it jealousy that we, the Jewish people, have invented and discovered so much of what benefits mankind? Who champion philanthropy and the creative arts? Who have been loyal to their homelands in so many ways?  

 Or is it that we remain the stubborn people of the Old Testament, who challenge G-d when necessary. Stubborn enough to keep the Judaic faith in continued existence despite all attempts to destroy it and its adherents. It remained functioning in all the lands of their Diaspora, but always and forever, remained true to their ancient G-d given land, promised to Abraham, where through 3500 years their presence remained.       

Is that why you want me dead, us dead? Angry, jealous because we honor our obligations, respect our heritage? That we have buried huge powerful empires, risen time and again, no matter how broken, and become whole again, standing straight and tall. That we have survived countless awful challenges to our very survival and buried them all.

Now, suddenly, yet not so suddenly, antisemitism has risen to a fevered degree. 2% of the population yet the recipient, the targets for the majority of hate crimes, increasing exponentially accompanied with ramped up violence to the point of murder.  Authorities have long been reluctant to call it like it is, antisemitism in the worst way. They conflate it with other biases, minimize it and forever compare   it to islamophobia, a much lesser problem, if actually a major problem, more exaggerated than not.  

Antisemitism is Jew hatred. That hatred has amped up to dangerous levels, and college students of Jewish faith are being threatened.  University administrations deny, deny, deny until it is impossible to ignore as headlines are made and donors cease donating. The administrations then put forth pathetically weak statements, too little, too late, meaningless as forced apologies are. Not even amounting to that proverbial hill of beans. Promises of programs to be installed, plans to segregate Jewish students for their 'safety' -what a crock of    s--t! A passel of garbage and please, no ghettoes in a false 'protection'. Do the job right, get rid of the poisonous professors, and educate properly and we can root out the problem. A true commitment is necessary as well as a deep dive to divine why American students have become so violent, so filled with hatred of Jews, and it is for Jewish educators and rabbis to understand why so many are disenchanted, disconnected young Jews who then work with those who hate them and would as soon as kill them without a thought or regret, earning a well-done commendation.

I cannot argue now re the blindness of people re Gaza, and the manifestly unfair demands the world makes of Israel. That is for another blog.  For this blog, we must pay attention, to prepare for a violence such as we have neither seen nor expected here, in America, nor in this worldwide battle against Jews, of legitimized wholesale mob variety Jew hatred. We must address all facets of it, for it is an overwhelming existential threat. It is to be taken seriously, very much so. 

 I ask again-

Why do you hate me?   Only lies and delusions can support this ugliness.  

You do not even know me.

All I and my fellow Jews wish, and dream is a chance to live in peace, to have an end to this baseless hatred and watch our children grow and become good people and help build a better world. 

Here are the words of a professor from Columbia University, a Jewish man, writing poignantly, speaking for all of us. (Please note that I have somewhat edited the order of his beautifully worded essay, ask pardon for doing so, but it aided my point without changing the meaning.   Thank you, professor for your words, and I, too cried.)  

"It is not just these chants that keep me up at night. It is the antisemitic violence that follows when ...leaders are willing to look the other way.... This fear that has engulfed me is not new, of course. Every Jewish person carries it within them...This fear is as old as the existence of the Jewish people, as old as our persecution. It is a fear that lurks in the dark basements of every Jewish mind. ...The darkest of griefs was joined by intense fear...for the future of my family, here, in New York City.

Abandoned by the silence of friends and neighbors ... Abandoned by colleagues who whitewash and excuse barbarities...This is happening not in Gaza. Not in Israel. Here in the United States of America...supposed to provide safe places for everyone in the community. Everyone, it seems, but Jews and Israelis."

...it seems that Jewish Americans around the country have been crying with me. It was a cry of despair - a howl, really - that took on the purest form of human pain. A cry that arose from the darkest, deepest and most primal of fears." 

Do you know me?

Do you, really?

Why then do you hate me? 

Why then do you chant for the death of my people?

Why do you acquiesce to the savagery of Oct.7? 

Do you know me?