Jewish Lives Matter, Too

“Well, of course,” you say. “But Jews are accepted and are part of the white establishment. Many of them are rich, and in the upper class.  If you use this slogan on their behalf, you’re just passing off the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement as illegitimate.” 

I do believe in taking one’s stand against the racism that de-humanizes the blacks and refuses to include them in the fabric of our society. Yet we must not forget the Jewish people who have experienced racism for their entire existence, beginning as a people in Egypt.

Yes, the Jews have experienced race-based hatred as well as blacks and other people of color.
Just yesterday, I heard this:  “The world has always had problems with Jews.” Why? Because they are unique and, when they are truly observant, they are separate.

On Monday of this week, I received a report from the “Daily Alert” which in turn quoted a write-up from the Jewish Anti-Defamation League saying that there have been at least 35 anti-Jewish rallies in American cities since July 1st. They report that these rallies featured speeches and placards with insults and the typical Jew-hatred accusations. Here are some typical slams:   
                        “The Jews are now showing that they learned from the Nazis.”
                        “The Jews rule the world by proxy; they get others to fight and die
                               for them.”
                        “Dirty Jews”
                        “The Holocaust was not as severe as they say.”  
                        “The Jewish lobby controls our government.”
                      
And more…. like the accusations that Jewish-American politicians don’t know which country they represent—America or Israel. Another: “The Jews are taking over the world’s power centers. They have their hands in the financial holdings world-wide. They’ll eventually control everything."

These tropes aren’t new, so one wonders really when the Jewish takeover is going to happen.
In these rallies, one could hear blatant tropes/clichés/harangues, by which I mean sayings like this: “Then there are the put-downs/tropes/clichés about the STATE of Israel:
            “Zionism is racism.” (Zionism is this: the movement of the Jewish people back to their country, most                            significantly, Jerusalem, which is called Zion.)

Get this: about half of these rallies blamed the Jews for police brutality in the United States!

The report further says that in the July 1st rally in Brooklyn, some in the mob chanted in Arabic, “Death to America, death to Israel.” 

​*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Then there are the tropes about the State of Israel:
            “Israel has an apartheid (absolute segregation on account of race) society."
                   “They are a colonial power.”                
                         “The Palestinians are the descendants of the ancient Canaanites.”                          
All wrong.

ANOTHER: “Palestine belongs to the Palestinians.” Wrong again. The land was never independent following the expulsion of the Jews in 70 A. D. until the present. It was governed by empires. The population has been replaced many times over the past two thousand years. During the time when Britain controlled Palestine (about 1920 – 1947) there were more than 100,000 Arabs who moved in from neighboring Arab countries. It was never an independent state.  

And….the name “Palestinian” for the Arabs who lived there was never used until the Palestine Liberation Organization and Yassir Arafat began their terrorist campaign for freedom from the Jews and their expulsion! Before that, Jews themselves called their associations “Palestinian” such as “The Palestine Symphony Orchestra in the 1930’s which was made up of Jews. The term “Palestinian” wasn’t used only of Arabs until the crew under Yassir Arafat came there from Tunisia in the 1960’s.

And now, the Arabs in Israel are citizens just like the Jews. And the Palestinians who do not have citizenship have much, much more than the Arabs of the neighboring countries and should have even more rights and higher living standards if the recent Trump plan goes into effect, with the West Bank under Israeli law and no more under military administration.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Well, the Europeans have had long periods of cruel anti-Semitism in their history. Following World War II and the Holocaust, it lessened significantly. But in this 21st century anti-Semitism has revived, and the influx of Muslim immigrants has exacerbated the problem. The nations from which they originate are soaked with anti-Semitism in their culture and their platforms. In their countries the people continually hear that Jews are a cancer, that they are descendants of apes and pigs, are sub-human, etc. and that those who kill a Jew will be honored by Allah.

And now most European politicians are slow to denounce this poison in their midst and are feeble in their actions to combat this racism against the Jews. Their timidity is disheartening to the Jews living there.

And in America, it is heavy on our university campuses and among the far left and  far right political activists. With the Muslim population increasing and so much favor shown to them and so much criticism against anyone who criticizes Islam, anti-Semitism is sure to increase.

So it has been in France. And Great Britain. 

It would be nice if the Islamists could change their tune about the Jews. But it’s firmly ensconced in Muhammed’s life, in the Koran and in their tradition. Their children are taught to hate them and to kill them.
The question is: Will be take our stand against this virulent form of anti-Semitism?

​*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

I must relate this incident. I know a young man who attended a large university in Pennsylvania and who had friends, both Muslim and Jewish. One day, as the young Muslim was visiting my friend in his apartment.  All at once the Muslim young man flew into a rage:  “How could you do this to me…I thought you and I were friends,” and on and on he went with his diatribe. What was it about? The problem was this: he happened to see on my friend’s desk a photo of two Jewish friends whose pictures made it evident that they were Jewish. The Muslim friend was actually a friendly personable fellow, but his rage erupted at the sight of Jewish people who were friends.  He accused my friend of being a traitor to him. Thus: “If you’re my friend, you cannot be a friend of Jews!”

So who can we count as our friends, and whose lives matter to us? Will we take the way the world is moving— heedless of God’s election of the Chosen People? Or will we respect the Chosen of God, regardless of their shortcomings, because they represent the Torah--that Mosaic Law, the prophets, the Blessed Messiah and the apostles of that Messiah, Yeshua, Jesus.            

It really does matter….a lot.  

                                                                                          TO ABRAM
                                                                  “I will bless those who bless you,
                                                           and him who dishonors you I will curse,
                                            and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
                                                                                -- Genesis 12 (ESV)

---