I am a very private person. I didn’t even have a facebook page until a few months ago. I don’t share my thoughts and feelings, or my political convictions, readily. But I am ashamed that I have stayed silent in the face of the cold status quo antisemitism and Israel-bashing that has been part of my daily experience for as long as I can remember. Some of the silence has been because I don’t know where to begin; I have been speechless when Jewish colleagues have advocated in support of BDS, and even in support of Hamas. As an historian I have seethed at the public ignorance of Jewish history – even of Jewish history within the last century – encouraged and fostered in the educational system and especially in journalism, in which what happens in Israel is never contextualized or nuanced; the Jews are always the bad guys. I thought once, in the aftermath of 9/11 when Palestinians and their supporters were filmed around the world in their celebrations upon learning of the deaths of thousands of American civilians in the heart of New York, that maybe the world would finally see another side to the news. I was wrong. History repeats: my daughter suggested yesterday, as we tried not to watch the clips of Hamas terrorists mutilating, desecrating, and tossing the bodies of dead Jewish women around their cities in victory – and as these celebrations were echoed in chants praising the fact that 700 Jews were dead and the numbers were rising steadily in Pro-Palestinian rallies around the world – that maybe now the Jewish side of history, the nuances that are so commonly left out of the histories and the narratives that have been forgotten by almost everyone except for those who have lived them and passed them along to their children and grandchildren, would be remembered. Maybe now our stories would be told more fully. The straightforward equation that Palestinians = good guys and Israelis = bad guys would become a bit more nuanced, would begin to reflect the deep complexities that comprise the realities of this history. I sighed and told her that I thought the same thing in the aftermath of 9/11. She was surprised to learn that the same celebrations, chanting, swastika-waving, and handing out of sweets had already been enacted at the death of 3000 Americans 20-some years ago, and even more surprised that she had never heard that before.
There is no question there have been Israeli bad guys and Palestinian good guys, and that the history is fraught with wrongs on all sides. But right now, in this moment, when terrorists are invading homes, raping women and children, butchering and mutilating everyone in their path, and bringing trophies of dead and alive bodies back to Gaza to parade around and further humiliate and debase in celebration while being called “militants” and “freedom fighters” in news outlets across the world, it is simply too much for me to continue to hold back. Right now, there are no good guys and bad guys. There are terrorists and civilians, predators and prey, and there is a definite and clear divide between right and wrong. In this moment, there is no equivalency, no relativistic justification that can possibly be rationalized as truth. Israel, and Jews, have the absolute right to defend themselves against this. I don’t have a gun and I don’t know how to fight. But I know the history, and have read many of the narratives, and I know how to write.
The culture of normalized anti-Israelism, and the inevitable anti-Judaism that underlies and accompanies it, has been my reality for my entire life. I have never fully understood it, and still don’t. But I have also never really addressed it outside of the safe spaces of my family and inner circles. Now, as I sit here in my rented apartment on the Mediterranean Sea, in the beautiful, multi-cultural and normally vibrant city of Haifa that has been eerily silenced as everyone sits transfixed at their televisions by the horrors of the rape, slaughter, and destruction being experienced by those unlucky enough to live 200 km south of here, I feel the need to explain myself. Why I’m here, and why I’m not looking to leave anytime soon. Read it if you’re interested, if you want to better understand me and/or the situation here, and if you don't mind being challenged by a different narrative than you may have heard before.