...Don't they know it's the end of the world... '
Yesterday was that kind of a day. I cannot remember a time other than my very early years in school when I did not know and/or feel the chill and the burn of antisemitism. Sometimes I didn't recognize it at that moment, but did later on, sometimes in thinking back, reviewing what had taken place. Other times it was an aha! moment. No time was comfortable nor excusable.
As I grew up, I began to understand the poison and contagiousness of Anti Semitism and its ugly eternal life on this planet. It boggled my mind when words of hate and Holocaust denial were made by those who had never met a Jewish person, at least knowingly, yet claimed to know it all. With confidence they spewed forth their toxins. Most uncomfortable for me were the moments when a person not knowing I am Jewish and oh so needful to share his garbage, made critical remarks. Most of the time I simply changed my seat if that would help or made a small comment or sound to convey disagreement. Why? I simply do not want to make a scene. Not worth it, for when one is so confident in sharing hate, they do not hear any other than that. Not worth the breath it would take and for what? Nothing.
The poison of hatred, virulent and powerful gloms on to anything and everything. Words. Cartoons and other illustrations. Writing from letters to essays and books and all in between. These days social media, both dark and open, wallow in cesspools of hate. Their eddies spread ever wider, and satiation is found in YouTubes, podcasts and radio and tv stations, from tiny outlets to large, from hate sheets to supposedly respectable disseminators such as the New York Times to the BBC. From streamed newscasts to panels and talk shows.
Very few seemingly have the willpower and/or the wisdom and decency to turn aside and away from hate. Evidently the ability and freedom, these days in particular, to speak what one wishes, wants, thinks, is both permissible and pleasurable. The bindings and boundaries of civil society are tossed aside gleefully. The ugly stream of voices raised loud, shouting, ranting words of hate, incitement to violence grows exponentially, ever replenishing and deepening the wells of hatred. Freedom of speech cited as permission and justification is not so, for when the claimed right of one impinges in harmful manner on the rights of others, it is no longer a right. It ceases. Dead in it tracks. Unfortunately, this truth, this tether to civility is shredded, no longer valid, no longer operational.
So why the title, the borrowed lyrics of a decades old song? 527 days of agony, Days when the world stood by, silent, or even condoning a brutal captivity of hostages snatched from their homes, from their loved ones. and then subjected to beatings, starvation, dehydration, isolation in the dark, raping and sexual abuse of all manners, and constant threats. They refused to publicly condemn it until forced to do so, at least some of them, when out of the darkness, snatched from death, emerged some few walking, living skeletons, clear for all to see the truth- No end to the cruelty and inhumanity of Hamas, of Islamic Jihad, of the oh so not innocent civilians of Gaza. Not even when Hamas played games of life and death, dribbling out a hostage or two in return for hundreds of animals in human clothing, murderers eager to slaughter more Jew again, ever again.
Despite the very visible truth of dead bodies strewn all over the South of Israel, of the burned and bloody cars, of the bomb shelters piled with bodies blown up by grenades, pierced by bullets, documented by pictures and videos. taken by the beasts themselves, so proud, so blood crazed, calling out to their god to praise them, to approve of their deeds. But no true God can do that.
Despite the proof displayed for the world to see, despite the naked bodies of women, shredded by gang rapes, despite the burned babies and bodies burned alive. the beheaded babies. the siblings wired together and slaughtered, the strangled babies and children, tattooed and molested, and worse, if one can even define worse. Despite what the Israeli army displayed for the world to see - despite all that and more, - The world refused to concede the truth. and in fact, turned the truth on its head. and blamed the violated the invaded rather than the violators, the invaders, the owners of this horror.
Time, and time again, Hamas cried wolf, and the world cried along with them. A constant famine to be-never. was. The only starving people in Gaza, the only people with sunken eyes and skeletal form were the captives. The hostages. No others. present None were seen. Only seen were the wellfed terrorists and repeated pictures of the same well fleshed children holding out the same pots at the constantly replayed food scenes. And the world bought it all. Hooks, lines, sinkers, lies and all.
Never Again we have been told. Never again the world said, the world promised. Never again. And yet never again took place again. Our children slaughtered. Elders abused and killed. Our women raped, torn apart, burned. Our men slaughtered where they stood or taken hostage. Our young adults killed and hunted as prey as they ran from those who would kill them, who chased them from a music festival. Never again - in full bloodied technicolor. No sorrow after our people were sought after, hunted down, to be slain by the thousands.
Ever eager to be more hurtful to the state of Israel, to Jews in general, the deaths within Gaza were laid at the feet of Israel. The invaders were deemed innocent, and the invaded deemed guilty. Actually, if truth were in play, it would be acknowledged that Israel did not wish to enter Gaza. She did not wish to see people dead. Israel did not use her own as pawns and human shields. She was not the one who used schools and hospitals and centers as terrorist headquarters or who dug tunnels which exited and entered into and from homes and yards. Israel neither began nor wished for the war. However, once forced upon her, she had to fight it and defeat Hamas. so as to prevent any future such brutality and horror. The instigator of such aberrational behavior forfeited any right to complain in its defeat. Think twice and then again before beginning a war with Israel.
Never again will be enforced by us, whether the world likes it or not, whether the world approves of it or not.
Back to the beginning. Why the song? Why the borrowed lyrics? Why the question as to why the bird sings? And is it indeed the end of the world? It is the end of the world as we know it. Lines have been crossed and cannot be recrossed. Truths have been bared and must be made clear. It must be internalized by all Jews all around the world, for Jews and Israel are synonymous. Our haters have insisted on making it so, deny it or not, as they wish to at the present time. The truth is there. It only remains for people to remove the curtains from their eyes, to expel the planks. and see and know the truth.
To know the truth, there are two excellent films available. One available online is entitled the Killer Roads. It presents October 7 as it truly is and was, through actual footage, actual sounds, actual horror. It is hard, but necessary. We and the world must know the truth. Your heart will ache and your tears will flow as a river, down your cheeks.
The other film is in the movie theaters at present, entitled October 8th. It addresses the amazing ugly mushrooming of hate, of vicious antisemitism around the world, a horrible unspeakable intolerable growth industry. It exposes the eternal nature of Anti Semitism. Ever at the ready, always ever waiting, lurking, eager to shed its chains and reinfect the world. To do its worst. And so it has. And so it seems to be continuing. And for those who prefer to be blind to this, understand that the Jewish people and Israel are synonymous. Antisemitism and Jew hatred cannot be hidden beneath the guise of anti Zionism. And as a matter of fact, why anti Zionism? Why is Israel denied, the only state to be denied, the right to exist?
Why is it indeed the end of the world and why the hell are birds still singing in this world of horror? Antisemitism, vicious JewHatred are unfortunately alive and well. My ancestors faced it, as did my great grandparents and grandparents. as did my parents as did people of my generation. Worse is the fact that it'll probably persist throughout the lives and times of my children, grandchildren and great grandchildren, and most probably into the future beyond that unless and until humanity undergoes a complete and thorough cleansing of its soul.
Also to understand, to know, is that hate has no boundaries, no ends and its hunger persists forever and will consume all before it.
It is for us to decide whether the end will near unto us. As for the birds, they know, they see, but they have hope. Thus, they sing. Maybe we should learn to sing as well,
So it was yesterday.
So it remains today.
On the morrow?
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