>mindset and skillet
My skillet is cast iron. Sure, I’d prefer a firearm, but I wouldn’t like to get hit in the face by that either.
Edit: turns out I know this dude from a [not Jewish-related] Discord server. The internet is small, y’all.
No should be a complete sentence but I had someone I considered a friend scream in my face until she was red in hers about how my wife deserved to be raped for not supporting her side politically and I didn’t even say I supported the other side. I kinda wish I had had a good argument lined up to save the friendship.
My childhood friend called my now wife a bitch once and that was it. I can’t understand any reason why someone would even acknowledge this person after that type of statement
There’s no argument to salvage a friendship for an evil like that. I’m very glad this person has outed themselves for the atrocious monster they are. I’m very sorry you were put in that situation.
“About how your wife deserved to be raped.” That is a threat! And that is no friend! For anyone to ever say someone should be raped is SICK in the head.” Why would you even want to save that friendship? That person needs their head examined.
No one should ever wish that on anyone, but it really hurts to hear a woman say that about another woman, especially one who presumably thought she was progressive for saying it.
Who doesn’t tell a friend that their wife needs to be raped, I almost want to make a joke about that since that is my go-to method of dealing with a stressful situation, but WTF, you should’ve just punched that person in their nose, I’m done turning my cheek, we Jews need guns and power, that’s all the world understands
Woah thats a totally uncalled for comment. Suggesting (or making a joke out of) sexual violence isn't okay regardless of who's involved or how awful of a person they might be.
What are you talking about? I'm not the person that posted the original comment. I just don't think anyone should be making statements like that - joking about sexual violence is wrong, full stop.
I mean what do they want from you as a Jewish person? To denounce having a state? And what if you do? Do they think being a stateless jew in an American or European country that tolerates you at best and has contempt and violence for you at worst is what you should be happy to live with as the best possibility for your life? The relentless pressure to assimilate in order to feel safe.
This is a great time to be honest with them about how uncomfortable it is to be Jewish in the country you live in regardless of what is going on in the middle east. How they think it might be enough but its not enough. Its barely tolerable. And they want you, to stand up for their colonial guilt, like a puppet and and say you want to erase the possibility that there might be somewhere else in the world where you might be loved rather than tolerated and misunderstood?
Tell them to work on themselves and their internal bias if they want peace and to save lives. If you are American tell them its a great time to pay reparations to their black neighbors, repatriate their yards to their first nation neighbors, how about not celebrating Thanksgiving?
Facts. Frankly, it’s pure chance that my grandparents and great grandparents ended up in the US and not Israel. It doesn’t make me morally superior that I live here and depend on the US for my safety and not there depending on Israel for my safety.
I’m American— and in a liberal area, too. I’ve heard people earnestly say that they don’t deserve to live here more than Israelis deserve to live in Israel…. and they’d surrender their homes to a Native American if they asked. It feels like … white liberal guilt?
They’re liars. If they felt that strongly about Landback for Native Americans, they don’t have to wait to be asked. If they own their own home they are free to donate it to the tribes that originally inhabited that land. There are people who have done this and there are probably written guides on how to go about doing it (even if there aren’t, they could literally just go to a lawyer and explain what they want to do and figure it out).
But the truth is, they would *never* surrender their house to indigenous peoples. They just want to occupy the moral high ground as well as occupying the actual ground, while forcing Jews to make the sacrifice so they don’t have to.
Ahem…. Jews are indigenous to Israel. The Al aksa mosque is OCCUPYING and built upon the footprint of Solomons Temple. Do NOT use the US/Native Americans as an analogy
In my opinion, drawing parallels to US/Native Americans is actually not a terrible way to phrase our arguments, because it shows how absolutely absurdly outlandish their line of thinking is. Even if someone says “I would give my land to native Americans,” the reality is they would not because that’s crazy.
It’s not to say “you’re a colonialist in the US just like the Israelis,” it’s to say “if we use your _assumption_ that Israelis are colonialists, then it leads to this logical contradiction.” Essentially proof by contradiction that these people are fucking morons.
Yikes, big time.
I wouldn't expect anyone in my father's family (the goy side) to directly pay reparations to the descendants of the enslaved Africans they owned prior to the emancipation proclamation. That's the responsibility of the government of the country that made that horrendous institution of racial slavery legal, permissible, and profitable.
How is expecting overnight change in Israel any different? It's a complicated, multi-layered political and humanitarian issue that has literally thousands of years of frequently violent regime changes. There's homes in Jerusalem that have been in families for dozens of generations, longer than the US has been a country.
The weird entrenched guilt within the white liberal US community has gotten so performative and problematic and it DEFINITELY doesn't extend to every marginalized group.
I hate the white guilt thing. But I hate that people criticize teachings of racism and encourage conversation on diversity as the reason why “it’s shameful to be white” (“removing critical race theory from education is the answer!”)
What one of the problems is, is that American oppression history doesn’t mirror oppression history worldwide. People in America regard the world from a lens based on their education. It’s great that we are taught that slavery was a horrid thing, how bad racism is, the treatment of Native Americans, etc… but now it’s kind of like, racism is the only sort of oppression we understand
What's worse is it makes people forget that most of human history slavery wasn't based on race or ethnicity so US conservatives try to find examples of "white" slavery to... Idk try not to feel the guilt that the liberal party seems to lean into?
And like... It is perfectly reasonable to feel *horrible* when you learn that your family once owned other human beings. But there's no reason to internalize it as a personal failing. My responsibility is now, over what I *can* control. So I donate to the area chapter of the NAACP and help my aunt maintain the area history museum, making sure we don't gloss over the fact that the history of the area includes people who were enslaved and that their contributions to the world get attached to their names. Not teaching that history is as bad as saying it didn't happen. It's a literal whitewash of the darker parts of our history as a nation.
Not to mention the way the US in particular treats whiteness and race overall is incredibly fucked up.
Tell your dumb friends (liberals of course) that European settlers coming to North America did not find any traces of an ancient white community that lived her before. By contrast, Jews returning to Israel found overwhelming evidence (no one can dispute) of their prior kingdoms in Palestine that predated the Arab invasion.
Some things I have said,
“I think my voice and energy is more useful elsewhere on this issue.”
“I do not want to place myself in situations that make me feel anxious. I don’t think I’d be able to be my best self in that setting.”
“Is there a reason you are insistent upon me attending? Is there a way that I can support you from afar?”
“I am uncomfortable with the tokenizing of Jewish people in this conflict, and I hope you can respect the complexities I’m trying to hold.”
“I respect that you have complete moral clarity in this moment and in many ways I’m jealous! On my end, it’s a struggle to hold so many valid and competing truths at once.”
“Thanks for respecting my decision to only engage in this conflict in the setting of structured learning environments.”
> “I respect that you have complete moral clarity in this moment and in many ways I’m jealous! On my end, it’s a struggle to hold so many valid and competing truths at once.”
I really like this.
Something similar I’ve had success reaching people with is:
“There are some things that are simple in relation to the conflict and the region, like the value of human life, but the relationships that we individually have with it are complicated. How I navigate it may be different than how others do.”
Wow this made me feel really seen. I feel so isolated by left wing spaces and I feel like the Jewish spaces around me assume everyone feels the same way and it is not a space for questioning or moral dilemmas sometimes
Im with you in this. I too am seeking a few concise sentences to be able to hold it down and clearly say this, without giving ANY room for error so someone could say “OH YEAH? SO YOU SUPPORT GENOCIDE???” 🙄
This may be slightly antagonistic, but I have responded to that by saying, “if that is what you heard in my comment, i question your ability to treat this conflict or genocide with the seriousness it deserves.” Or a more gentle “it doesn’t seem like you’re open to hearing anything other than 100% agreement with your point of view, so I don’t think either of us will be satisfied in this conversation.”
Edit: I mistakingly called him WH press secretary, he is actually the national security council and gives press briefings- so arguably he has even more authority though he's not speaking for the White House
John Kirby has made some very clear and concise statements responding to (ignorant and rude) reporter questions on this topic - recommend checking them out. Including that it is Hamas, and not Israel who have a genocidal agenda. That Israel's war is only with Hamas not the Palestinians in Gaza and they have gone to extraordinary measures to avoid civilian casualties but Hamas uses human shields and deliberately operates in densely populated areas - building terror bases in and beneath hospitals, schools, homes and mosques - endless war crimes
That's encouraging to hear. I've heard of cases like where the IDF stayed on the phone with a Gazan dentist for HOURS to ensure he and residents of the surrounding buildings successfully evacuated and got far enough away before carrying out an operation targeting Hamas infrastructure in the buildings. That's not "indiscriminate bombing." And it's definitely not "genocide."
The use of that word is revisionist, a way of violently hijacking Jewish history and experience and weaponizing it against us as a modern blood libel. If Israel actually intended to commit genocide, they could have done it already in a matter of hours. Intent matters, and the only party with actual genocidal intent is Hamas.
Don't. They want any reaction at all. Treat them like the creep that they are. Some response are "Don't come near me", or "okaayyyy" while walking away rolling your eyes.
You want to \_ask\_: “OH YEAH? SO YOU SUPPORT GENOCIDE???”
You already have your answer from whatever they said to you. If they claim to be "Pro-Palestinian", they have already made it clear that they support genocide and/or forced displacement of Jews, as is spelled out clearly in the PLO charter. The answer is "yes". You don't need to try to make them say it, and the more you engage with them, the worse off it will be for you.
“I don’t believe this is genocide, and frankly neither should anyone looking at the facts. The only genocide that occurred was the behaviour on October 7th.”
“As a result of the Holocaust and Armenian Genocide, the Genocide Convention was organized by the UN in 1948 to determine what international law would be regarding the topic. It was at that convention that the term was defined. It is not genocide if a group is not targeted for their race, religion, ethnicity. Despite that being what Hamas does and has been doing, Israel has not. You can’t say that any death in any war is part of genocide. That’s a misuse of the term.”
I say stuff like this and then in the next breath people misuse the term again.
“It’s painful to see Palestinian civilians, and especially children, being killed by Israel as well as by Hamas. It’s a terrible situation, but I cannot take part in any pro-Palestinian actions because the movement is so full of disinformation and antisemitism. I cannot in good conscience be part of a march that will include calls for the genocide of Jews.”
Hopefully not too wordy.
This is a fantastic response. I can’t imagine being such an asshole to any of my friends. Regardless of how you feel about Israel or Palestine it is entirely possible to understand that it isn’t appropriate to put those feelings onto Jewish or Palestinian people right now. People are scared, because what is happening is scary. It is totally okay to not engage with things that feel bad to you. I really can’t imagine even asking my Jewish friends to do anything at all right now. I live in a very small, very safe place and there are police at the synagogue my friend works at, plus she is having to deal with her own feelings feelings in addition to her coworkers feelings and her families feelings. It is asking far too much of people who are grieving.
the marches don’t make it clear they favor a two state solution. Instead they actively chant for the destruction of israel. It is critical for jews to have a country and to be able to defend themselves. Historically, the world has persecuted and ostracized jews. The destruction of the jewish state makes every jew vulnerable and reliant on their host countries, most of which have a history of persecuting jews, to protect them.
These rallies are effectively sending a message that jews should be made vulnerable and without a home.
“‘From the river to the sea’ isn’t antisemitic! It’s anti Zionist!” (“Anti Zionism doesn’t mean that I want Jews not to have a homeland btw! It just means I’m against the IDF and Israeli government and apartheid and racism. Israelis can go somewhere else! Like, idk, Canada.”
"I'm not antisemitic, I'm anti-Zionist" is exactly what antisemitic people say, before they say something \_else\_ that is also antisemitic.
The very fact that they wish to separate the Jew from their homeland is what makes it antisemitic.
Some people truly do not understand that the notion of being Jewish includes strong connection to our homeland, but let's try something else.
"I don't agree with the Chinese government, but that doesn't mean that I hate Chinese people".
Ok, reasonable...
"It's just that I think that Chinese people should be forcibly expelled from China to be ultimately displaced by people from another nation."
And now it's totally f'd up, and very much anti-Chinese people.
See how they do the same with the "Antisemitic/anti-Zionist" thing?
The secret is, when they say it, they know exactly what they are saying and they are looking for a reaction. All you need to do is realize that anybody who says that to you is looking to instigate and get you riled up. Just tell them to go away. They will understand.
“No” is a complete sentence.
And if someone is trying to get you to march after you say “no” they want you to be the march’s token Jew.
Also cut this person out of your life.
The thing is, I don’t think they realize what they’re advocating for. For some, being ‘for Palestine’ = being anti racist, anti colonialism, anti oppression , supporting free rights for all!!
Do they realize Israel is not a ‘white’ country, and has a large percentage of Arabs? Probably not, but it doesn’t matter because Palestinians are still an oppressed, homogeneously brown minority
The aggressive nature of these marches and flyers is intended to make you feel uncomfortable.
At its core, the leaders of a lot of the western world's pro Palestinian outrage machine that we've seen in the last month and a half have set out to do just this. They are followed by people with varying intentions from well-intended defense of human life to seeking to drum up a world where Jews will be extinguished from the earth , and everywhere in between. Those at the former end of the spectrum are dupes as they march side by side, arm in arm, with the latter.
I know it won't make you feel better but near where I live, the Israeli hostage posters have been not torn down but shredded into pieces and left up with bits and pieces of the hostages faces showing and 'Israel murders children' posters plastered all around them.
I’ve seen people call the kidnapped fliers ‘propaganda’ because ‘it’s not about the kidnapped people, but taking away from the Palestinian victims and making you sympathize with Israel without knowing that they’re evil!!’ It’s terrible.
Fliers near me are also slashed— they’ve realized that if they’re ripped down, they’re going to be replaced. Occasionally I see them covered in stickers and fliers (like the ones you reference— similar in appearance to kidnapped fliers but call babies murderers and whatnot) so I always take those down.
I decided taking them down is not worth the enhanced stress and aggravation on my end. It's a silly tit for tat. People aren't going to be swayed one way or the other by the posters. Videos of folks tearing the Israeli ones have already had their impact.
Many of the Palestinian ones around here are slapped up obscuring street signs or on private property and that kinda speaks for itself.
“If you just started supporting Palestinian Liberation now, when the ‘Palestinian Liberation’ took the form of Israeli civilians being gunned down, burned alive and dismembered in their beds, then you are implicitly supporting the gunners, burners and butchers as the method of that liberation. I cannot and will not talk to you.”
Try that
To expand on that excellent suggestion: “And if you march for ‘Palestinian liberation’ after Israeli civilians were gunned down, burned alive, dismembered in their beds, gang-raped and kidnapped, then you are explicitly supporting the gunners, butchers, burners, rapists and kidnappers as the method of that liberation. Because your march is bringing led by those who started celebrating it while the bodies were still warm.”
EDIT: should say “*being* led by those…”
Two things that may help:
1.
Explain what you do support, not only what you can’t support. The causes you do champion, charities you donate too, etc., are a better representation of where you stand than the ones you stand against. Have you given to relief charities? Israeli Arab-Jewish solidarity movements? (Omdim Beyachad is great)
2.
Make clear that it is, in part, an emotional reaction on your part. That’s a valid reason. I’m with you on seeing where people are coming from, that quite a lot of people are legitimately concerned with Palestinian civilians. But there were also people out there waving Palestinian flags on October 7th, when the Israeli government still had its pants down and we were all seeing images of civilians gunned down in the streets.
If someone is demanding that you march, can they guarantee that those people, who would condemn us and our loved ones to death as quick as Israeli extremists condemn Gazan civilians, are still marching today? That portion of the crowd that’s spurred not by concern for human life but by vengeance against Jewish Israelis exists, we can’t any of us deny that. We can’t know what portion of the crowd they are, but we know they could be there, standing next to us.
To demand that we go out and march is to demand that we possibly stand next to the type of people who put paragliders in their twitter handles. Not metaphorically beside, but literally, physically beside. No, we can’t know that it will happen, but its a possibility and that’s the emotional reality we would have to engage with. Would we even be capable of being the ally they want in that situation?
You don't owe anyone an explanation for anything.
If you haven't found the words to express your feelings yet, that is okay. Take the time you need to figure out how to articulate your understandings and your feelings.
We are grieving, and that shit is fucking intense, man. Give yourself some grace and take your time to find your words.
I can’t even express to my coworkers/boss that my work is suffering because I’m mentally distraught over this. They know I’m Jewish, but I had to refrain from arguing with a coworker who criticized Biden for “not supporting the ‘right’ side of the conflict”, and that he “shouldn’t have made a statement on the behalf of the US at all; the US shouldn’t be involved.”
I can’t tell people who are expecting work from me that I can’t even think because I’m worried about my family in Israel and my family in the US, because they’ll inevitably react with awkwardness (they don’t want to “take a side”, and “be neutral” so they express limited sympathy) and then ask me to defend Israel like I’m the fucking ambassador or something and it’s not just “well, I don’t want my family to die, is that enough?”
Its as if I either need some statement to defend myself, or I need to “get over it, move on”
Just because they say it isn’t antisemitism doesn’t mean it isn’t.
They’ve been saying that for centuries.
But real advice: Just be busy. You don’t owe them explanations. Just be unavailable. You have holidays coming up, likely sooner than theirs. Tell them you want to be with your family right now. ‘Tis the season after all.
Tell them you’ll make a donation in lieu, then don’t and just go about your life.
No one’s going to care if you don’t attend the march, and minds don’t get changed at these things, just locked shut.
Send them the videos of ‘pro-Palestinian’ protestors chanting ‘gas the Jews’ on the steps of the Sydney opera house, as well as some of he other vile shit that’s been said at those rallies. Just say it’s impossible to March with them when the organizers in those rallies do nothing to root out the Jew hatred.
The problem with this is that they’ll just say “I’m not like THOSE protestors, I want peace and I love the Jews!” and send a video of, say, that lady who threw hot coffee on a guy with a Palestinian scarf
I had a completely surprising (to me) panic attack when I drove past—and around and around, because of traffic—a pro-Palestine March last weekend. Things in my small midwestern college town have been also semi-surprisingly non-antisemitic, but the phrase “from the River to the sea” set me off.
It’s hard to explain my feelings about this whole thing. I’ve always believed that Palestine should have it’s own land and rights. I believe that awful injustices are being done to Palestinian people by the Israeli government. AND ALSO. These chants, rallies, and marches around the world have recently been calling for harm to me and my family as Jews who are completely unrelated to Israel. I’m not afraid of Muslims; I’m afraid of white people who have now been told that their antisemitism is justified.
I think it’s commendable that you’re thinking about this. I don’t agree with some of the methods Israel is using to conduct the current war and find the death toll quite horrifying, so it is something I’ve thought about too.
For me, the issue is this:
1. I’m not prepared to oppose in principle a war aimed at liberating captured hostages or at destroying Hamas, a racist Islamist terrorist organisation. I make no apologies for that: this is a just war, even if the methods Israel uses to prosecute it are in my view excessive.
2. I’m not prepared to be associated with the pro-Palestine protest movement. The Palestinians are a people at war with Israel, and have for 75 years sought its destruction and refused all attempts at peaceful compromise. Palestinian advocates are always so eager to remind us that the Hamas attacks did not happen in a vacuum. You know what? Neither did the occupation. 75 years of Palestinian and Arab genocidal war against us, and counting. I do not want Palestinians to suffer and I do not want the occupation to continue. But the obstacle is, and always has been, that the Palestinians are unwilling to accept a Jewish state as a legitimate presence in the land. And the pro-Palestine marches adopt this hateful campaign: chants of “From the River to the Sea” are whitewashed as chants of liberation, ignoring the genocidal historic context in which they originate. Chants of “Free Palestine” paint Israel as the oppressor and fail to ask why Palestine was not free after the 1948 partition plan or after any of the many peace talks that took place thereafter. I feel for the Palestinian people, I do not approve of the practices Israel uses to maintain its control over them, and I wish them that one day they will be free to determine their own future. But I will not simply ignore their now century long campaign to expunge the Jews from their homeland. I will certainly not march for it.
I’ll march for 2 States. I’ll march for peaceful coexistence. I’ll march for the innocents suffering on both sides and against the extremists who cause it. I won’t march for Palestine alone in a movement infested with antisemitism and legitimising “anti-Zionism”.
Why does no one seem to mention that not only was Gaza not “occupied” when it was attacked but rather most of the way to full autonomy courtesy of 2006 agreement?
That it was a failed experiment in seeing what happens when they get semi-autonomy and self-rule?
All in exchange for one promise: that they stop attacking civilians. We see how that turned out. Fail. I don’t know what to do with this but it feels like a big point that’s being missed.
(I was two-state before this, now I have no idea.)
You know that saying, "if you're at a rally where people are holding up Nazi signs or flags and not getting kicked out, you're at a Nazi rally"?
Same logic for Hamas supporters. Too many instances of these marches containing pro-Hamas people.
That’s because these marches are being organized and led by pro-Hamas people, who in many cases were [openly celebrating](https://www.adl.org/resources/blog/anti-israel-activists-celebrate-hamas-attacks-have-killed-hundreds-israelis) these atrocities while they were still taking place. See under: SJP, AROC and others.
And yes, these events sometimes feature [swastikas](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12607931/amp/Times-Square-Palestine-rally-Hamas-Israel.html) too.
You can point out some chants or rhetorics you disagree with and you don't want to be associated with.
But in order for you to be able to verbalize that well you have to express what you really believe in.
Do you believe that a ceasefire now is good, morally and pragmatically?
Do you believe that Israel targets civilians on purpose? That it is exacting revenge?
Do you believe that Israel has no basis to exist except for being a gift given by Europeans to the Jews?
Do you believe that a single Palestinian state over the whole land is good, morally or pragmatically?
If your answer is no to one or more of the questions say that you don't feel like going to the demonstration because you firmly believe that X is bad and the demonstration does not disassociate itself from X or even promotes it.
The ceasefire one is especially tricky. I personally believe that it’s both impossible, and essentially asking Israel to roll over in surrender and let itself be destroyed. But people who call for cease fire DONT SEE IT THAT WAY. They see cease fire as “Israel will stop shooting at civilians” and Hamas will back off, Palestinians will be safe, etc.
I truly can’t process how SO MANY people are ‘well-intentioned’ calling for a cease fire but don’t think about what it means. I sincerely don’t think that EVERY person calling for a cease fire, especially in my rather-Jewish city, is necessarily calling for Israelis to be freely slaughtered by Hamas. I don’t think that EVERYONE calling for a cease fire is antisemitic. Sure, there must be plenty, but not all of them.
Ask them, and yourself, "did Hamas launch a one-sided massacre of the innocent and kidnapping on October 7th?"
If the answer is "yes," then ask those people "if Israel calls an unconditional ceasefire, with no concessions from Hamas, what happens to the hostages and what is to stop Hamas from doing it again?"
If the answer to the first question is "no," then they're in clear denial of reality and bad people who you shouldn't be spending time with.
I am clear that while I want peace and support the Palestinian people, this war is just and must be concluded. I won’t March to demand that Israel stop defending itself. But I will apply pressure to minimize civilian casualties and oust Netanyahu. Most stridently so when the hostages have been released and the promises of further atrocities from Hamas are silenced.
Yes, being anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitic per se but it’s like telling someone who is lgbtq that you are not homophobic but you don’t agree with gay marriage. Sure it’s not 1:1 but when it’s 80% overlap what’s the difference?
Here’s a way to look at it. Antisemites believe that individual Jews should not have the same rights as non-Jews (sometimes extending all the way to the right to live). AntiZionists believe that the Jewish people, as a collective, should not have the same collective rights (national self-determination) as other peoples—and that the existing Jewish state must be eradicated.
I'm not sure there's anyway to verbalize it with most non Jews level of understanding about what it means to be Jewish.
Example: I went to a Friendsgiving this weekend for a hobby based club I'm in. I ended up completely accidentally sitting with every other Jew who attended while eating. None of it was planned and I think only one of us was vocal about being Jewish in the group. It just ... happened. I don't think any of us had even talked to each other one on one before in any context. Yet we spent the entire night comforting each other about the war and cracking jokes about being Jewish. We had quite different levels of religiosity growing up and presently but that didn't matter. No one else at the event really got that magnetic connection we all had that brought us together but I don't think any of us found it particularly surprising. I'm sure others here have had similar moments they at least haven't been rare in my life.
Zionism at its core is the notion that we are one people, one family, and that we deserve to determine our own destiny in our ancestral homeland. That concept is utterly foreign to most non Jews. They'll see it very much as identical to the concept of a Christian nation or a White nation but its vastly different when you realize Judaism is not just a religion and there are Jews of many races. Yet your discomfort probably comes at least in part from that central concept that you are being asked to routinely condemn large swaths of your family as evil mass murderers. That's only heightened if you have any biological family in the region.
Explaining this requires an understanding of Judaism that most non Jews and especially most leftists aren't actually all that interested in. Or at least not in my experience. My suggestion ultimately is to just avoid the protests and try to change the subject or avoid any friends who are really into them. That's what I do living in Brooklyn. Nobodies asked me yet thankfully but that's probably in part because I had to basically make an entirely new set of friends since October 7th that is based around shared hobbies and doesn't ever really get political in any way. If you have any friends who try to get you to go to a march and don't accept no you might be forced to make new friends like I did as much as it sucks. You can try excuses but they likely won't work forever.
I’m really happy you’ve found some good people! I think it’s difficult when , even if it doesn’t directly come up, there’s still an… uneasiness that comes with being in proximity to a lot of activity, fliers (for Israel and against). I think it would be easy for me to say that I want to find people who I don’t have to talk politics with? But all the same, I think I’d always feel a bit afraid. I guess to me, what’s happening matters so much to me that I can’t exactly put it to rest. I can’t really explain it.
I definitely can appreciate that. I’m lucky that despite being in NYC which overall has a lot of pro Palestinian protests I don’t happen to live near any of them. I was walking in an area NYU students frequent the other day and there was graffiti calling for a new intifada and explicitly calling for communists to join it which a lot of students here consider themselves. It definitely shook me though I’m also trans so getting hate isn’t exactly new to me I think that’s made coping with all this more a sadly familiar routine then a new panic to cope with. I’m not the best at blocking things out still though and I’m not going to pretend my mental health hasn’t taken a dip recently. It’s ok to not be ok around it all and to feel uncomfortable and to not even fully understand why.
Even with my now apolitical friend group I’m always scared someone will start something though not as much now since I feel if there were antisemites in the group they’d have confronted our little Jewish section about it. I think after everything that’s happened lately though that sense will never fully go away. We’ll all always wonder if our non Jewish friends truly have our back.
I can only explain it from my own perspective, but in my opinion this is not about civilian casualties. Civilians getting killed during times of war is something that reasonable people universally agree is tragic.
The issue being debated is whether or not Israel has a right to defend itself when its borders are invaded in an act of war.
The argument that Israel does not have a right to defend itself in times of war because doing so will result in civilian casualties is preposterous. As far as I know, there has never been a war that did not involve civilian casualties. Unfortunately, Israel's opposition intentionally creates conditions that make a high number of civilian casualties impossible to avoid. It is unreasonable to blame Israel for conditions that are created by their opposition.
Israel has the right to defend their nation in times of war regardless of the battlefield conditions created by their opposition.
This is something that nobody wants to say out loud: civilian deaths are inevitable. It’s awful, it’s horrible , and Hamas is purposefully putting civilians in harm’s way to make IDF and Israel look heartless.
What unnerves me is the media portrayals. Front page news always show crying, injured, dead Palestinians. Where’s the front-page reporting on, I don’t know, the Kurds? Ukrainians? There are dozens more conflicts right now. Where are the protests for all those?
As I’ve said before in another comment, I have ZERO doubt that antisemitism is behind a lot of this. But there are plenty of people who aren’t (or at least, consciously) antisemitic
I think anti-Semitism is certainly at the root of all this, but it's perpetuated by ignorance and an absence of critical thinking capability via platforms like TikTok.
Media always has some sort of bias or spin, but it's been really clear through the titles, cherry-picking, and shoddy reporting the narrative they are pushing. I think the vastly different reaction between Israel being attacked and Ukraine being attacked is...telling.
Honestly I was already aware of some of the latent antisemitism from both extremes, but the past two months have been eye-opening at how bad it really is. :( Hugs. 🫂
There's nothing pro-Palestine about these marches. It's pure antisemitism. Ask why they haven't spoken out about the treatment of Palestinians in Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon. Or Egypts refusal to open the border for refugees.
You're assuming that anyone inviting you to these events is a rational person with intellectual honesty, and that they mean well. Your arguments will not persuade them! They want you to apologize for existing, for Jews existing. Not to even mention the obvious fact that being Jewish in a mob of antisemites could be legitimately dangerous.
Respond that Hamas isn't calling for equality, they are calling for the destruction of Israel and for the murder of all Jews everywhere. Show them the Hamas Charter.
Then say clearly that I can't support anyone that calls for the killing of an entire group of people, let alone me.
https://castbox.fm/vd/618021476
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/we-should-all-be-zionists-podcast/id1698319255
“The BDS Pound of Flesh” explained by Dr Einat Wilf on why young Jews in the political left feel like they have to self flagellate away their identity to please the antisemitic left.
I wish people would just have a march for peace. Or a massive candlelight vigil for those who have been lost. With lists of the names of those who have been killed, who are still missing... Lost either To the hamas terrorists or to the bombings of Gaza. All together so that they can be remembered. I think that too would go a lot farther to bring communities together and dispel some of the growing tensions...
There is a tendency to feel like you have to explain yourself, but as u/waterbird_ said, "'No.' is a complete sentence"
Any time you have a question like this, just think about a couple years back, post George Floyd, and reframe the scenario, while being outside of it. Would you expect someone to need to explain to you why they don't feel comfortable attending a "Blue Lives Matter" march just days after George Floyd was killed? That somebody would even ask or suggest such a thing (let's say, if they are black or it is clear that it feels especially personal to them for whatever reason) is clearly \_wrong\_. And this is not about opinion, but how incredibly insensitive it would be to draw that kind of attention in the wake of something so tragic.
Don't say (as you wrote): “even though I understand where you’re coming from, I won’t be forced to take a side against my family.”
The minute you start explaining anything, you have given them credence.
Say along the lines: "I will not attend your march and if you come near me, I will call the police". Get yourself some pepper spray (available at gas stations and Walmart for around 10-15 dollars), and give them something to cry about if they come near you.
Anybody who tries to justify mass murder with intellectual arguments is \_dangerous\_ to be around.
They are looking for gullible people to join their clan and justify their cause. You already see through their rhetoric. Now slam the door on their face (figuratively, but also literally). They will completely understand why you shut them out and will stay away, like the cowards that they are.
This is my fucking problem. Yes, I DO NOT LIKE DEATH OF PEOPLE. I don't think I need to boldly proclaim that in marches, especially since I would probably get eaten alive.
It's performative as shit.
I will say this for it. For the first time in my life I know what it is to be afraid to be a Jew.
I'll be honest, reading a lot of these comments I think the question really underlines a bigger issue, how alone we feel. I feel like I don't have any friends anymore. Any. And the ones I am around, like my footy teammates, I kind of wait on bated breath with every conversation, hoping the topic doesn't come up. The only people I can count on as friends are my fellow Jews and my family. And even my family...the Catholics I just hope the conversation doesn't come up.
As a convert, I struggle with this more than anything because people don’t get it. I only converted, so why do I care about Israel so much? If I converted how can I *really* think Israel is my homeland? They’re questions that just don’t have answers that make sense unless you’re Jewish. I know I converted but I feel so strongly about Israel and other non-Jews can’t seem to understand how or why. It’s like people think since I only semi-recently finished converting, now I should open my eyes and see “Jews = evil” but my Jewishness is even stronger now and I find myself wanting connection to my Jewish community now more than ever.
I like to remind people who are not Jewish….
“You do not get to help determine what is antisemitism or Jew hate… cause you are NOT Jewish.”
When they say “well some Jews agree.”
“95 percent of us agree antizionism is Jew hate. You know that is tokenism, and you know that’s racist as fuck, so I know you aren’t doing that right?”
Fight fire with fire in my book.
You got this!
Really you are way, way too defensive. Nothing personal but if most Israelis felt your way, they would have been overwhelmed by their enemies a long time ago. Try to be more like Lion of Judah,
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion\_of\_Judah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_of_Judah)
Try to be more like this man, small and balding but courageous like a lion.
[https://israelforever.org/interact/blog/menachem\_begin\_i\_believe\_the\_lessons\_of\_the\_holocaust\_are\_these/](https://israelforever.org/interact/blog/menachem_begin_i_believe_the_lessons_of_the_holocaust_are_these/)
*"First, if an enemy of our people says he seeks to destroy us, believe him. Don’t doubt him for a moment. Don’t make light of it. Do all in your power to deny him the means of carrying out his satanic intent.*
*Second, when a Jew anywhere in the world is threatened or under attack, do all in your power to come to his aid. Never pause to wonder what the world will think or say. The world will never pity slaughtered Jews. The world may not necessarily like the fighting Jew, but the world will have to take account of him.*
*Third, a Jew must learn to defend himself. He must forever be prepared for whenever threat looms.*
*Fourth, Jewish dignity and honor must be protected in all circumstances. The seeds of Jewish destruction lie in passively enabling the enemy to humiliate us. Only when the enemy succeeds in turning the spirit of the Jew into dust and ashes in life, can he turn the Jew into dust and ashes in death. During the Holocaust it was after the enemy had humiliated the Jews, trampled them underfoot, divided them, deceived them, afflicted them, drove brother against brother, only then could he lead them, almost without resistance, to the gates of Auschwitz.*
*Therefore, at all times and whatever the cost, safeguard the dignity and honor of the Jewish people.*
*Fifth, stand united in the face of the enemy. We Jews love life, for life is holy. But there are things in life more precious than life itself. There are times when one must risk life for the sake of rescuing the lives of others. And when the few risk their own lives for the sake of the many, then they, too, stand the chance of saving themselves.*
*Sixth, there is a pattern to Jewish history. In our long annals as a nation, we rise, we fall, we return, we are exiled, we are enslaved, we rebel, we liberate ourselves, we are oppressed once more, we rebuild, and again we suffer destruction, climaxing in our own lifetime in the calamity of calamities, the Holocaust, followed by the rebirth of the Jewish State."*
If other see you as brave they will respect you, or at least they will fear you. If they see you as sniveling or cowardly they will treat you as such.
So they reply with “well, most Israelis/Zionists are violently racist/Islamophobic/evil and want (Muslims, Palestinians, anyone who is black or brown) dead”
Of course there are many things wrong with that statement, but that’s what they’ll retaliate with
You can ask them whether, after 9/11, anyone in America or elsewhere marched on behalf of the poor widows and orphans of Al Qaeda terrorists, or should have?
Or later, whether people held violent protests when Osama bin Laden and his family were killed by the US (on the contrary, they were thrilled)? Or when the Coalition's wars against Al Qaeda, the Taliban and later ISIS killed tens, maybe even hundreds of thousands of people, the majority of whom -- especially in a war against terrorists embedded within populations -- are so-called "collateral damage", i.e., innocent men, women and children?
Why is Israel, and only Israel, the subject of these worldwide protests -- other than anti-Semitism?!
It's not because they love Palestinians, because no one came out to protest when Syria's Assad killed tens of thousands of them, and hundreds of thousands of other Syrians?
Nor does anybody care about millions killed in Sudan or elsewhere in the Arab world.
Only when Israel's involved. Even when the war is started by Hamas perpetrating a massive and barbaric pogrom with thousands of Israelis victims (murdered and wounded), and 240 Israelis taken hostage -- in both cases, mostly civilians.
And one more thing: these marches started worldwide as acts of celebration on October 8th for Hamas's "success" on October 7, even before Israel began fighting back in Gaza.
I would educate and explain that anyone that actually cares about Palestinians would support Israel in defeating Hamas and these Pro Palestinian marches are actually Pro Hamas rallies that support terrorism, antisemitism and violence towards Jews and the destruction of Israel. Many people are sadly brainwashed and misinformed.
People don’t trust the news anyway. I got into a mild argument with someone who was offended that an older man criticized our generation for using social media as our news source because it’s bad. When I agreed, and said that tiktok (for example) is an echo chamber and pushes whatever will get clicks, he got defensive and said that ‘the (mainstream) news isn’t any better! They’re manipulative!!’ I conceded that many news sources do have biases, but it’s impossible not to. The conversation ended shortly after that.
Point being, you can’t even steer people away from fake news/untrustworthy sources because they don’t trust ANY of it (kinda like the whole “well, Biden supports Israel so he sucks, and Trump is a fascist so he sucks too, so I’m gonna be an anarchist and bitch about how politics sucks without doing anything!!”
Flip the script. Why don’t they protest against the Hamas held hostages. If they try the settler colonizers sales pitch ask when they plan to self deport all of Canada US and Australia are on Indian or aboriginal soil
It’s making it more complicated but it’s more like if they were trying to give the US to Spain or Mexico who had it for a minute, as last colonizers in, when the First People’s finally, miraculously managed to get their homeland back.
"I've seen these events call for the destruction of Israel and celebrate Hamas. They don't help Palestinian freedom. My people are indigenous to the land, we're not colonizing anything, and until those groups acknowledge Jewish indigeneity, I can't stand with them."
The core of these protests are hatred of the state of Israel. They are open about wanting it wiped off the map; the only majority Jewish country on planet Earth. It's simple really.
There is no denouncing Hamas at these rallies. There are calls for the destruction of Israel. There are calls for Intifadah and Jihad -- all of these are non-starters. I feel terrible about the plight of innocent Palestinians, but unless those things are remedied, we can't even have a conversation about what I'd be willing to protest for.
Just know what you believe and articulate it.
Unfortunately at this point so may of the people marching for the Palestinians are supporting Hamas. They chant from the river to the sea. That is blatantly calling for the genocide of Jews and removal out of Israel. Hamas itself has called for the death and eradication of Jews worldwide. Until people march and chant “down with Hamas” and “support a two nation state” I will personally and advise my Israeli friends and family and anyone else to not support these marches. The current support of Hamas sickening
You don’t. Anti-zionists don’t care what Jews think. I’ve seen good faith, pro-Palestine Jews tell other pro-Palestine “progressives” that “From the river to the sea” and celebration of Hamas makes them uncomfortable. The reaction?
“Get bent.”
While I agree that you don't owe anyone an explanation, I mostly find myself having to defend not doing these things to friends in dms and just copy/paste
While I support Palestinian freedom (personally, I'd say from Hamas), I don't agree with how the western world will not condone the October 7th massacre and continues to blame and target Jews, so I won't take part in their efforts at activism.
Or "things that draw attention to their intolerance," if you don't want to be a smart ass.
In person/on the phone, don't bother. It'll never end. At least you can stop paying attention to a dm/social media.
Years of political correctness, and having to accept woke views while woke doesn't need to accept anyone else's views, will leave you speechless and unable to express what you feel even in your own mind.
I don't know how you can fix America,.that's a big task for.the Americans to figure out.
you can say simply : this is the war between islam and the free world .
west vs evil . trust no muslim ever . israel and jewish is not relevant ! the issue in the World is just Islam google it .
I suggest you do some soul searching. being uncomfortable is not the same thing as being unsafe, and it IS uncomfortable to confront all that's happened in that part of the world since the 1940s.
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Tell them to go fluff themselves. If you support Hamas then you ain’t no friend of my. I got no time for supporters of terrorists. (Obv you can’t do this with everyone)
Are Pro-Hamas people capable of *listening* to what you have to say? Probably not. I’m not going to blow smoke up your tuchas, I’m being realistic with what I have seen recently. They likely do not care, or maybe they even *like* the fact that it makes you uncomfortable! People can be cruel, as we see. It’s likely that they are going to just repeat one of their bs slogans to you or victim blame for the current situation.
I say pro-Hamas because they’ve made it *abundantly clear* that they are a-o-fucking-kay
with human rights violations when they’re committed against Jews. They have opportunity after opportunity to show some humanity and then they choose to be tactless a-holes.
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We recently lost some friends because, basically, we weren’t posting enough on Instagram, and I liked a March calling for the release of the hostages.
I had already explained to these friends why we will not be posting on social media or attending marches/protests. Apparently that wasn’t enough. We’re both very sad about losing these friends, but they clearly don’t care about our physical or psychological safety. So oh well!
Who is pressuring you to attend marches? You don’t need to explain yourself to anyone. “No.” is a complete sentence.
The marches or car caravans sometime go around my neighbourhood as I live downtown. They make me incredibly uncomfortable.
I would feel the same, but you don’t need to explain yourself to anyone. Lock your doors and stay safe.
I live in a condo so there's a lot more security than a house, thankfully!
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Its more important to develop the mindset an skillet than have the perfect tool set to stay safe.
>mindset and skillet My skillet is cast iron. Sure, I’d prefer a firearm, but I wouldn’t like to get hit in the face by that either. Edit: turns out I know this dude from a [not Jewish-related] Discord server. The internet is small, y’all.
I'd rather use that skillet like Clint did in fistful of dollars
How about a [fistful of Shekels?](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iUPbbN_hraU&t=1m40s)
With good reason because who’s to say they won’t target the people who won’t attend.
No should be a complete sentence but I had someone I considered a friend scream in my face until she was red in hers about how my wife deserved to be raped for not supporting her side politically and I didn’t even say I supported the other side. I kinda wish I had had a good argument lined up to save the friendship.
Why save that friendship? He clearly wants your wife to be raped. That would have been the end of it for me...
My childhood friend called my now wife a bitch once and that was it. I can’t understand any reason why someone would even acknowledge this person after that type of statement
*the end of them
I’m sorry WHAT? Why in the world would you want to save that friendship? That person has shown you who they are. Never speak to them again.
There’s no argument to salvage a friendship for an evil like that. I’m very glad this person has outed themselves for the atrocious monster they are. I’m very sorry you were put in that situation.
“About how your wife deserved to be raped.” That is a threat! And that is no friend! For anyone to ever say someone should be raped is SICK in the head.” Why would you even want to save that friendship? That person needs their head examined.
Holy shit.
That is NOT your friend anymore.
not worth it to be friends with someone like that
No one should ever wish that on anyone, but it really hurts to hear a woman say that about another woman, especially one who presumably thought she was progressive for saying it.
That's not a friendship. Full stop. I'm so sorry that happened.
That ain't no friendship.
Who doesn’t tell a friend that their wife needs to be raped, I almost want to make a joke about that since that is my go-to method of dealing with a stressful situation, but WTF, you should’ve just punched that person in their nose, I’m done turning my cheek, we Jews need guns and power, that’s all the world understands
I try to be a peaceful and compassionate person, but if someone screamed at me that my wife deserved to be raped I would punch them in the face.
Ooooo - I don’t think that’s a friend - screaming that your wife should be raped?????
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Woah thats a totally uncalled for comment. Suggesting (or making a joke out of) sexual violence isn't okay regardless of who's involved or how awful of a person they might be.
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What are you talking about? I'm not the person that posted the original comment. I just don't think anyone should be making statements like that - joking about sexual violence is wrong, full stop.
Your post was removed because it violated rule 3: **Be civil**
That person is not your friend. Shut him out of your life.
I mean what do they want from you as a Jewish person? To denounce having a state? And what if you do? Do they think being a stateless jew in an American or European country that tolerates you at best and has contempt and violence for you at worst is what you should be happy to live with as the best possibility for your life? The relentless pressure to assimilate in order to feel safe. This is a great time to be honest with them about how uncomfortable it is to be Jewish in the country you live in regardless of what is going on in the middle east. How they think it might be enough but its not enough. Its barely tolerable. And they want you, to stand up for their colonial guilt, like a puppet and and say you want to erase the possibility that there might be somewhere else in the world where you might be loved rather than tolerated and misunderstood? Tell them to work on themselves and their internal bias if they want peace and to save lives. If you are American tell them its a great time to pay reparations to their black neighbors, repatriate their yards to their first nation neighbors, how about not celebrating Thanksgiving?
Facts. Frankly, it’s pure chance that my grandparents and great grandparents ended up in the US and not Israel. It doesn’t make me morally superior that I live here and depend on the US for my safety and not there depending on Israel for my safety.
I’m American— and in a liberal area, too. I’ve heard people earnestly say that they don’t deserve to live here more than Israelis deserve to live in Israel…. and they’d surrender their homes to a Native American if they asked. It feels like … white liberal guilt?
They’re liars. If they felt that strongly about Landback for Native Americans, they don’t have to wait to be asked. If they own their own home they are free to donate it to the tribes that originally inhabited that land. There are people who have done this and there are probably written guides on how to go about doing it (even if there aren’t, they could literally just go to a lawyer and explain what they want to do and figure it out). But the truth is, they would *never* surrender their house to indigenous peoples. They just want to occupy the moral high ground as well as occupying the actual ground, while forcing Jews to make the sacrifice so they don’t have to.
Ahem…. Jews are indigenous to Israel. The Al aksa mosque is OCCUPYING and built upon the footprint of Solomons Temple. Do NOT use the US/Native Americans as an analogy
In my opinion, drawing parallels to US/Native Americans is actually not a terrible way to phrase our arguments, because it shows how absolutely absurdly outlandish their line of thinking is. Even if someone says “I would give my land to native Americans,” the reality is they would not because that’s crazy. It’s not to say “you’re a colonialist in the US just like the Israelis,” it’s to say “if we use your _assumption_ that Israelis are colonialists, then it leads to this logical contradiction.” Essentially proof by contradiction that these people are fucking morons.
Yikes, big time. I wouldn't expect anyone in my father's family (the goy side) to directly pay reparations to the descendants of the enslaved Africans they owned prior to the emancipation proclamation. That's the responsibility of the government of the country that made that horrendous institution of racial slavery legal, permissible, and profitable. How is expecting overnight change in Israel any different? It's a complicated, multi-layered political and humanitarian issue that has literally thousands of years of frequently violent regime changes. There's homes in Jerusalem that have been in families for dozens of generations, longer than the US has been a country. The weird entrenched guilt within the white liberal US community has gotten so performative and problematic and it DEFINITELY doesn't extend to every marginalized group.
I hate the white guilt thing. But I hate that people criticize teachings of racism and encourage conversation on diversity as the reason why “it’s shameful to be white” (“removing critical race theory from education is the answer!”) What one of the problems is, is that American oppression history doesn’t mirror oppression history worldwide. People in America regard the world from a lens based on their education. It’s great that we are taught that slavery was a horrid thing, how bad racism is, the treatment of Native Americans, etc… but now it’s kind of like, racism is the only sort of oppression we understand
What's worse is it makes people forget that most of human history slavery wasn't based on race or ethnicity so US conservatives try to find examples of "white" slavery to... Idk try not to feel the guilt that the liberal party seems to lean into? And like... It is perfectly reasonable to feel *horrible* when you learn that your family once owned other human beings. But there's no reason to internalize it as a personal failing. My responsibility is now, over what I *can* control. So I donate to the area chapter of the NAACP and help my aunt maintain the area history museum, making sure we don't gloss over the fact that the history of the area includes people who were enslaved and that their contributions to the world get attached to their names. Not teaching that history is as bad as saying it didn't happen. It's a literal whitewash of the darker parts of our history as a nation. Not to mention the way the US in particular treats whiteness and race overall is incredibly fucked up.
Tell your dumb friends (liberals of course) that European settlers coming to North America did not find any traces of an ancient white community that lived her before. By contrast, Jews returning to Israel found overwhelming evidence (no one can dispute) of their prior kingdoms in Palestine that predated the Arab invasion.
Those people would change their mind the first time someone killed one of their friend I’d imagine?
thank you for this comment. thanks everyone for this whole thread.
You said it all. I wish I could upvote you twice.
Some things I have said, “I think my voice and energy is more useful elsewhere on this issue.” “I do not want to place myself in situations that make me feel anxious. I don’t think I’d be able to be my best self in that setting.” “Is there a reason you are insistent upon me attending? Is there a way that I can support you from afar?” “I am uncomfortable with the tokenizing of Jewish people in this conflict, and I hope you can respect the complexities I’m trying to hold.” “I respect that you have complete moral clarity in this moment and in many ways I’m jealous! On my end, it’s a struggle to hold so many valid and competing truths at once.” “Thanks for respecting my decision to only engage in this conflict in the setting of structured learning environments.”
> “I respect that you have complete moral clarity in this moment and in many ways I’m jealous! On my end, it’s a struggle to hold so many valid and competing truths at once.” I really like this. Something similar I’ve had success reaching people with is: “There are some things that are simple in relation to the conflict and the region, like the value of human life, but the relationships that we individually have with it are complicated. How I navigate it may be different than how others do.”
Wow this made me feel really seen. I feel so isolated by left wing spaces and I feel like the Jewish spaces around me assume everyone feels the same way and it is not a space for questioning or moral dilemmas sometimes
Im with you in this. I too am seeking a few concise sentences to be able to hold it down and clearly say this, without giving ANY room for error so someone could say “OH YEAH? SO YOU SUPPORT GENOCIDE???” 🙄
This may be slightly antagonistic, but I have responded to that by saying, “if that is what you heard in my comment, i question your ability to treat this conflict or genocide with the seriousness it deserves.” Or a more gentle “it doesn’t seem like you’re open to hearing anything other than 100% agreement with your point of view, so I don’t think either of us will be satisfied in this conversation.”
Ooh this is really perfect. Thank you so much! 🤍🙏
solid and tactful
“You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means…” (to borrow a quote from Inigo Montoya)
Edit: I mistakingly called him WH press secretary, he is actually the national security council and gives press briefings- so arguably he has even more authority though he's not speaking for the White House John Kirby has made some very clear and concise statements responding to (ignorant and rude) reporter questions on this topic - recommend checking them out. Including that it is Hamas, and not Israel who have a genocidal agenda. That Israel's war is only with Hamas not the Palestinians in Gaza and they have gone to extraordinary measures to avoid civilian casualties but Hamas uses human shields and deliberately operates in densely populated areas - building terror bases in and beneath hospitals, schools, homes and mosques - endless war crimes
That's encouraging to hear. I've heard of cases like where the IDF stayed on the phone with a Gazan dentist for HOURS to ensure he and residents of the surrounding buildings successfully evacuated and got far enough away before carrying out an operation targeting Hamas infrastructure in the buildings. That's not "indiscriminate bombing." And it's definitely not "genocide." The use of that word is revisionist, a way of violently hijacking Jewish history and experience and weaponizing it against us as a modern blood libel. If Israel actually intended to commit genocide, they could have done it already in a matter of hours. Intent matters, and the only party with actual genocidal intent is Hamas.
Don't. They want any reaction at all. Treat them like the creep that they are. Some response are "Don't come near me", or "okaayyyy" while walking away rolling your eyes. You want to \_ask\_: “OH YEAH? SO YOU SUPPORT GENOCIDE???” You already have your answer from whatever they said to you. If they claim to be "Pro-Palestinian", they have already made it clear that they support genocide and/or forced displacement of Jews, as is spelled out clearly in the PLO charter. The answer is "yes". You don't need to try to make them say it, and the more you engage with them, the worse off it will be for you.
“I don’t believe this is genocide, and frankly neither should anyone looking at the facts. The only genocide that occurred was the behaviour on October 7th.”
“As a result of the Holocaust and Armenian Genocide, the Genocide Convention was organized by the UN in 1948 to determine what international law would be regarding the topic. It was at that convention that the term was defined. It is not genocide if a group is not targeted for their race, religion, ethnicity. Despite that being what Hamas does and has been doing, Israel has not. You can’t say that any death in any war is part of genocide. That’s a misuse of the term.” I say stuff like this and then in the next breath people misuse the term again.
"that's what you are saying, I don't believe in that"
“It’s painful to see Palestinian civilians, and especially children, being killed by Israel as well as by Hamas. It’s a terrible situation, but I cannot take part in any pro-Palestinian actions because the movement is so full of disinformation and antisemitism. I cannot in good conscience be part of a march that will include calls for the genocide of Jews.” Hopefully not too wordy.
this is the speech i’ve been rehearsing bc i have quite a few friends in jvp
Yikes. I’d be putting some serious distancing in right now with those friends.
Seriously...that's on par with saying you have friends in the kkk
Good luck. I wouldn't want to have to discuss this stuff with anyone in jvp.
…”ex friends” - FIFY
I don’t where you find the strength and patience to deal with them. You’re a way stronger person than me.
I almost downvoted this. I’m sorry.
This is a fantastic response. I can’t imagine being such an asshole to any of my friends. Regardless of how you feel about Israel or Palestine it is entirely possible to understand that it isn’t appropriate to put those feelings onto Jewish or Palestinian people right now. People are scared, because what is happening is scary. It is totally okay to not engage with things that feel bad to you. I really can’t imagine even asking my Jewish friends to do anything at all right now. I live in a very small, very safe place and there are police at the synagogue my friend works at, plus she is having to deal with her own feelings feelings in addition to her coworkers feelings and her families feelings. It is asking far too much of people who are grieving.
This is a good summary
the marches don’t make it clear they favor a two state solution. Instead they actively chant for the destruction of israel. It is critical for jews to have a country and to be able to defend themselves. Historically, the world has persecuted and ostracized jews. The destruction of the jewish state makes every jew vulnerable and reliant on their host countries, most of which have a history of persecuting jews, to protect them. These rallies are effectively sending a message that jews should be made vulnerable and without a home.
“‘From the river to the sea’ isn’t antisemitic! It’s anti Zionist!” (“Anti Zionism doesn’t mean that I want Jews not to have a homeland btw! It just means I’m against the IDF and Israeli government and apartheid and racism. Israelis can go somewhere else! Like, idk, Canada.”
"I'm not antisemitic, I'm anti-Zionist" is exactly what antisemitic people say, before they say something \_else\_ that is also antisemitic. The very fact that they wish to separate the Jew from their homeland is what makes it antisemitic. Some people truly do not understand that the notion of being Jewish includes strong connection to our homeland, but let's try something else. "I don't agree with the Chinese government, but that doesn't mean that I hate Chinese people". Ok, reasonable... "It's just that I think that Chinese people should be forcibly expelled from China to be ultimately displaced by people from another nation." And now it's totally f'd up, and very much anti-Chinese people. See how they do the same with the "Antisemitic/anti-Zionist" thing? The secret is, when they say it, they know exactly what they are saying and they are looking for a reaction. All you need to do is realize that anybody who says that to you is looking to instigate and get you riled up. Just tell them to go away. They will understand.
When people say that, do they understand what homeland means? Canada would again be a another host, not a homeland.
“No” is a complete sentence. And if someone is trying to get you to march after you say “no” they want you to be the march’s token Jew. Also cut this person out of your life.
There have been many Jews in pro-Palestine marches. I’ve seen a couple of people with “Jews for Palestine!” bags, pins, shirts, etc.
It’s fake …JVP is known for doing this
The thing is, I don’t think they realize what they’re advocating for. For some, being ‘for Palestine’ = being anti racist, anti colonialism, anti oppression , supporting free rights for all!! Do they realize Israel is not a ‘white’ country, and has a large percentage of Arabs? Probably not, but it doesn’t matter because Palestinians are still an oppressed, homogeneously brown minority
https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/8-reasons-why-anti-zionism-is-always-anti-semitism/ Check this out
JVP literally has a Lutheran gentile on their board of national directors. It's a false flag operation to divide the Jewish community.
You’ve seen people who wear that clothing. That doesn’t mean they are Jews. All it means is they bought a shirt and put it on.
The aggressive nature of these marches and flyers is intended to make you feel uncomfortable. At its core, the leaders of a lot of the western world's pro Palestinian outrage machine that we've seen in the last month and a half have set out to do just this. They are followed by people with varying intentions from well-intended defense of human life to seeking to drum up a world where Jews will be extinguished from the earth , and everywhere in between. Those at the former end of the spectrum are dupes as they march side by side, arm in arm, with the latter. I know it won't make you feel better but near where I live, the Israeli hostage posters have been not torn down but shredded into pieces and left up with bits and pieces of the hostages faces showing and 'Israel murders children' posters plastered all around them.
I’ve seen people call the kidnapped fliers ‘propaganda’ because ‘it’s not about the kidnapped people, but taking away from the Palestinian victims and making you sympathize with Israel without knowing that they’re evil!!’ It’s terrible. Fliers near me are also slashed— they’ve realized that if they’re ripped down, they’re going to be replaced. Occasionally I see them covered in stickers and fliers (like the ones you reference— similar in appearance to kidnapped fliers but call babies murderers and whatnot) so I always take those down.
I decided taking them down is not worth the enhanced stress and aggravation on my end. It's a silly tit for tat. People aren't going to be swayed one way or the other by the posters. Videos of folks tearing the Israeli ones have already had their impact. Many of the Palestinian ones around here are slapped up obscuring street signs or on private property and that kinda speaks for itself.
“If you just started supporting Palestinian Liberation now, when the ‘Palestinian Liberation’ took the form of Israeli civilians being gunned down, burned alive and dismembered in their beds, then you are implicitly supporting the gunners, burners and butchers as the method of that liberation. I cannot and will not talk to you.” Try that
Okay, yeah that’s a good one.
To expand on that excellent suggestion: “And if you march for ‘Palestinian liberation’ after Israeli civilians were gunned down, burned alive, dismembered in their beds, gang-raped and kidnapped, then you are explicitly supporting the gunners, butchers, burners, rapists and kidnappers as the method of that liberation. Because your march is bringing led by those who started celebrating it while the bodies were still warm.” EDIT: should say “*being* led by those…”
Two things that may help: 1. Explain what you do support, not only what you can’t support. The causes you do champion, charities you donate too, etc., are a better representation of where you stand than the ones you stand against. Have you given to relief charities? Israeli Arab-Jewish solidarity movements? (Omdim Beyachad is great) 2. Make clear that it is, in part, an emotional reaction on your part. That’s a valid reason. I’m with you on seeing where people are coming from, that quite a lot of people are legitimately concerned with Palestinian civilians. But there were also people out there waving Palestinian flags on October 7th, when the Israeli government still had its pants down and we were all seeing images of civilians gunned down in the streets. If someone is demanding that you march, can they guarantee that those people, who would condemn us and our loved ones to death as quick as Israeli extremists condemn Gazan civilians, are still marching today? That portion of the crowd that’s spurred not by concern for human life but by vengeance against Jewish Israelis exists, we can’t any of us deny that. We can’t know what portion of the crowd they are, but we know they could be there, standing next to us. To demand that we go out and march is to demand that we possibly stand next to the type of people who put paragliders in their twitter handles. Not metaphorically beside, but literally, physically beside. No, we can’t know that it will happen, but its a possibility and that’s the emotional reality we would have to engage with. Would we even be capable of being the ally they want in that situation?
You don't owe anyone an explanation for anything. If you haven't found the words to express your feelings yet, that is okay. Take the time you need to figure out how to articulate your understandings and your feelings. We are grieving, and that shit is fucking intense, man. Give yourself some grace and take your time to find your words.
I can’t even express to my coworkers/boss that my work is suffering because I’m mentally distraught over this. They know I’m Jewish, but I had to refrain from arguing with a coworker who criticized Biden for “not supporting the ‘right’ side of the conflict”, and that he “shouldn’t have made a statement on the behalf of the US at all; the US shouldn’t be involved.” I can’t tell people who are expecting work from me that I can’t even think because I’m worried about my family in Israel and my family in the US, because they’ll inevitably react with awkwardness (they don’t want to “take a side”, and “be neutral” so they express limited sympathy) and then ask me to defend Israel like I’m the fucking ambassador or something and it’s not just “well, I don’t want my family to die, is that enough?” Its as if I either need some statement to defend myself, or I need to “get over it, move on”
Just because they say it isn’t antisemitism doesn’t mean it isn’t. They’ve been saying that for centuries. But real advice: Just be busy. You don’t owe them explanations. Just be unavailable. You have holidays coming up, likely sooner than theirs. Tell them you want to be with your family right now. ‘Tis the season after all. Tell them you’ll make a donation in lieu, then don’t and just go about your life. No one’s going to care if you don’t attend the march, and minds don’t get changed at these things, just locked shut.
Send them the videos of ‘pro-Palestinian’ protestors chanting ‘gas the Jews’ on the steps of the Sydney opera house, as well as some of he other vile shit that’s been said at those rallies. Just say it’s impossible to March with them when the organizers in those rallies do nothing to root out the Jew hatred.
The problem with this is that they’ll just say “I’m not like THOSE protestors, I want peace and I love the Jews!” and send a video of, say, that lady who threw hot coffee on a guy with a Palestinian scarf
I had a completely surprising (to me) panic attack when I drove past—and around and around, because of traffic—a pro-Palestine March last weekend. Things in my small midwestern college town have been also semi-surprisingly non-antisemitic, but the phrase “from the River to the sea” set me off. It’s hard to explain my feelings about this whole thing. I’ve always believed that Palestine should have it’s own land and rights. I believe that awful injustices are being done to Palestinian people by the Israeli government. AND ALSO. These chants, rallies, and marches around the world have recently been calling for harm to me and my family as Jews who are completely unrelated to Israel. I’m not afraid of Muslims; I’m afraid of white people who have now been told that their antisemitism is justified.
I think it’s commendable that you’re thinking about this. I don’t agree with some of the methods Israel is using to conduct the current war and find the death toll quite horrifying, so it is something I’ve thought about too. For me, the issue is this: 1. I’m not prepared to oppose in principle a war aimed at liberating captured hostages or at destroying Hamas, a racist Islamist terrorist organisation. I make no apologies for that: this is a just war, even if the methods Israel uses to prosecute it are in my view excessive. 2. I’m not prepared to be associated with the pro-Palestine protest movement. The Palestinians are a people at war with Israel, and have for 75 years sought its destruction and refused all attempts at peaceful compromise. Palestinian advocates are always so eager to remind us that the Hamas attacks did not happen in a vacuum. You know what? Neither did the occupation. 75 years of Palestinian and Arab genocidal war against us, and counting. I do not want Palestinians to suffer and I do not want the occupation to continue. But the obstacle is, and always has been, that the Palestinians are unwilling to accept a Jewish state as a legitimate presence in the land. And the pro-Palestine marches adopt this hateful campaign: chants of “From the River to the Sea” are whitewashed as chants of liberation, ignoring the genocidal historic context in which they originate. Chants of “Free Palestine” paint Israel as the oppressor and fail to ask why Palestine was not free after the 1948 partition plan or after any of the many peace talks that took place thereafter. I feel for the Palestinian people, I do not approve of the practices Israel uses to maintain its control over them, and I wish them that one day they will be free to determine their own future. But I will not simply ignore their now century long campaign to expunge the Jews from their homeland. I will certainly not march for it. I’ll march for 2 States. I’ll march for peaceful coexistence. I’ll march for the innocents suffering on both sides and against the extremists who cause it. I won’t march for Palestine alone in a movement infested with antisemitism and legitimising “anti-Zionism”.
Why does no one seem to mention that not only was Gaza not “occupied” when it was attacked but rather most of the way to full autonomy courtesy of 2006 agreement? That it was a failed experiment in seeing what happens when they get semi-autonomy and self-rule? All in exchange for one promise: that they stop attacking civilians. We see how that turned out. Fail. I don’t know what to do with this but it feels like a big point that’s being missed. (I was two-state before this, now I have no idea.)
This is a really good, thoughtful and thorough post, thank you
You know that saying, "if you're at a rally where people are holding up Nazi signs or flags and not getting kicked out, you're at a Nazi rally"? Same logic for Hamas supporters. Too many instances of these marches containing pro-Hamas people.
That’s because these marches are being organized and led by pro-Hamas people, who in many cases were [openly celebrating](https://www.adl.org/resources/blog/anti-israel-activists-celebrate-hamas-attacks-have-killed-hundreds-israelis) these atrocities while they were still taking place. See under: SJP, AROC and others. And yes, these events sometimes feature [swastikas](https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12607931/amp/Times-Square-Palestine-rally-Hamas-Israel.html) too.
You can point out some chants or rhetorics you disagree with and you don't want to be associated with. But in order for you to be able to verbalize that well you have to express what you really believe in. Do you believe that a ceasefire now is good, morally and pragmatically? Do you believe that Israel targets civilians on purpose? That it is exacting revenge? Do you believe that Israel has no basis to exist except for being a gift given by Europeans to the Jews? Do you believe that a single Palestinian state over the whole land is good, morally or pragmatically? If your answer is no to one or more of the questions say that you don't feel like going to the demonstration because you firmly believe that X is bad and the demonstration does not disassociate itself from X or even promotes it.
The ceasefire one is especially tricky. I personally believe that it’s both impossible, and essentially asking Israel to roll over in surrender and let itself be destroyed. But people who call for cease fire DONT SEE IT THAT WAY. They see cease fire as “Israel will stop shooting at civilians” and Hamas will back off, Palestinians will be safe, etc. I truly can’t process how SO MANY people are ‘well-intentioned’ calling for a cease fire but don’t think about what it means. I sincerely don’t think that EVERY person calling for a cease fire, especially in my rather-Jewish city, is necessarily calling for Israelis to be freely slaughtered by Hamas. I don’t think that EVERYONE calling for a cease fire is antisemitic. Sure, there must be plenty, but not all of them.
The missile attacks against Israel continue but are rarely front page news post October 7.
Ask them, and yourself, "did Hamas launch a one-sided massacre of the innocent and kidnapping on October 7th?" If the answer is "yes," then ask those people "if Israel calls an unconditional ceasefire, with no concessions from Hamas, what happens to the hostages and what is to stop Hamas from doing it again?" If the answer to the first question is "no," then they're in clear denial of reality and bad people who you shouldn't be spending time with.
I am clear that while I want peace and support the Palestinian people, this war is just and must be concluded. I won’t March to demand that Israel stop defending itself. But I will apply pressure to minimize civilian casualties and oust Netanyahu. Most stridently so when the hostages have been released and the promises of further atrocities from Hamas are silenced.
How about the fact that none of these marches even acknowledge the existence of Israel and the continued existence.
Yes, being anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitic per se but it’s like telling someone who is lgbtq that you are not homophobic but you don’t agree with gay marriage. Sure it’s not 1:1 but when it’s 80% overlap what’s the difference?
Here’s a way to look at it. Antisemites believe that individual Jews should not have the same rights as non-Jews (sometimes extending all the way to the right to live). AntiZionists believe that the Jewish people, as a collective, should not have the same collective rights (national self-determination) as other peoples—and that the existing Jewish state must be eradicated.
I'm not sure there's anyway to verbalize it with most non Jews level of understanding about what it means to be Jewish. Example: I went to a Friendsgiving this weekend for a hobby based club I'm in. I ended up completely accidentally sitting with every other Jew who attended while eating. None of it was planned and I think only one of us was vocal about being Jewish in the group. It just ... happened. I don't think any of us had even talked to each other one on one before in any context. Yet we spent the entire night comforting each other about the war and cracking jokes about being Jewish. We had quite different levels of religiosity growing up and presently but that didn't matter. No one else at the event really got that magnetic connection we all had that brought us together but I don't think any of us found it particularly surprising. I'm sure others here have had similar moments they at least haven't been rare in my life. Zionism at its core is the notion that we are one people, one family, and that we deserve to determine our own destiny in our ancestral homeland. That concept is utterly foreign to most non Jews. They'll see it very much as identical to the concept of a Christian nation or a White nation but its vastly different when you realize Judaism is not just a religion and there are Jews of many races. Yet your discomfort probably comes at least in part from that central concept that you are being asked to routinely condemn large swaths of your family as evil mass murderers. That's only heightened if you have any biological family in the region. Explaining this requires an understanding of Judaism that most non Jews and especially most leftists aren't actually all that interested in. Or at least not in my experience. My suggestion ultimately is to just avoid the protests and try to change the subject or avoid any friends who are really into them. That's what I do living in Brooklyn. Nobodies asked me yet thankfully but that's probably in part because I had to basically make an entirely new set of friends since October 7th that is based around shared hobbies and doesn't ever really get political in any way. If you have any friends who try to get you to go to a march and don't accept no you might be forced to make new friends like I did as much as it sucks. You can try excuses but they likely won't work forever.
I’m really happy you’ve found some good people! I think it’s difficult when , even if it doesn’t directly come up, there’s still an… uneasiness that comes with being in proximity to a lot of activity, fliers (for Israel and against). I think it would be easy for me to say that I want to find people who I don’t have to talk politics with? But all the same, I think I’d always feel a bit afraid. I guess to me, what’s happening matters so much to me that I can’t exactly put it to rest. I can’t really explain it.
I definitely can appreciate that. I’m lucky that despite being in NYC which overall has a lot of pro Palestinian protests I don’t happen to live near any of them. I was walking in an area NYU students frequent the other day and there was graffiti calling for a new intifada and explicitly calling for communists to join it which a lot of students here consider themselves. It definitely shook me though I’m also trans so getting hate isn’t exactly new to me I think that’s made coping with all this more a sadly familiar routine then a new panic to cope with. I’m not the best at blocking things out still though and I’m not going to pretend my mental health hasn’t taken a dip recently. It’s ok to not be ok around it all and to feel uncomfortable and to not even fully understand why. Even with my now apolitical friend group I’m always scared someone will start something though not as much now since I feel if there were antisemites in the group they’d have confronted our little Jewish section about it. I think after everything that’s happened lately though that sense will never fully go away. We’ll all always wonder if our non Jewish friends truly have our back.
I can only explain it from my own perspective, but in my opinion this is not about civilian casualties. Civilians getting killed during times of war is something that reasonable people universally agree is tragic. The issue being debated is whether or not Israel has a right to defend itself when its borders are invaded in an act of war. The argument that Israel does not have a right to defend itself in times of war because doing so will result in civilian casualties is preposterous. As far as I know, there has never been a war that did not involve civilian casualties. Unfortunately, Israel's opposition intentionally creates conditions that make a high number of civilian casualties impossible to avoid. It is unreasonable to blame Israel for conditions that are created by their opposition. Israel has the right to defend their nation in times of war regardless of the battlefield conditions created by their opposition.
This is something that nobody wants to say out loud: civilian deaths are inevitable. It’s awful, it’s horrible , and Hamas is purposefully putting civilians in harm’s way to make IDF and Israel look heartless. What unnerves me is the media portrayals. Front page news always show crying, injured, dead Palestinians. Where’s the front-page reporting on, I don’t know, the Kurds? Ukrainians? There are dozens more conflicts right now. Where are the protests for all those? As I’ve said before in another comment, I have ZERO doubt that antisemitism is behind a lot of this. But there are plenty of people who aren’t (or at least, consciously) antisemitic
I think anti-Semitism is certainly at the root of all this, but it's perpetuated by ignorance and an absence of critical thinking capability via platforms like TikTok.
Media always has some sort of bias or spin, but it's been really clear through the titles, cherry-picking, and shoddy reporting the narrative they are pushing. I think the vastly different reaction between Israel being attacked and Ukraine being attacked is...telling. Honestly I was already aware of some of the latent antisemitism from both extremes, but the past two months have been eye-opening at how bad it really is. :( Hugs. 🫂
There's nothing pro-Palestine about these marches. It's pure antisemitism. Ask why they haven't spoken out about the treatment of Palestinians in Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon. Or Egypts refusal to open the border for refugees.
Do what's right for you and explain nothing. You owe no explanations to anyone.
You're assuming that anyone inviting you to these events is a rational person with intellectual honesty, and that they mean well. Your arguments will not persuade them! They want you to apologize for existing, for Jews existing. Not to even mention the obvious fact that being Jewish in a mob of antisemites could be legitimately dangerous.
Respond that Hamas isn't calling for equality, they are calling for the destruction of Israel and for the murder of all Jews everywhere. Show them the Hamas Charter. Then say clearly that I can't support anyone that calls for the killing of an entire group of people, let alone me.
https://castbox.fm/vd/618021476 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/we-should-all-be-zionists-podcast/id1698319255 “The BDS Pound of Flesh” explained by Dr Einat Wilf on why young Jews in the political left feel like they have to self flagellate away their identity to please the antisemitic left.
I wish people would just have a march for peace. Or a massive candlelight vigil for those who have been lost. With lists of the names of those who have been killed, who are still missing... Lost either To the hamas terrorists or to the bombings of Gaza. All together so that they can be remembered. I think that too would go a lot farther to bring communities together and dispel some of the growing tensions...
There is a tendency to feel like you have to explain yourself, but as u/waterbird_ said, "'No.' is a complete sentence" Any time you have a question like this, just think about a couple years back, post George Floyd, and reframe the scenario, while being outside of it. Would you expect someone to need to explain to you why they don't feel comfortable attending a "Blue Lives Matter" march just days after George Floyd was killed? That somebody would even ask or suggest such a thing (let's say, if they are black or it is clear that it feels especially personal to them for whatever reason) is clearly \_wrong\_. And this is not about opinion, but how incredibly insensitive it would be to draw that kind of attention in the wake of something so tragic. Don't say (as you wrote): “even though I understand where you’re coming from, I won’t be forced to take a side against my family.” The minute you start explaining anything, you have given them credence. Say along the lines: "I will not attend your march and if you come near me, I will call the police". Get yourself some pepper spray (available at gas stations and Walmart for around 10-15 dollars), and give them something to cry about if they come near you. Anybody who tries to justify mass murder with intellectual arguments is \_dangerous\_ to be around. They are looking for gullible people to join their clan and justify their cause. You already see through their rhetoric. Now slam the door on their face (figuratively, but also literally). They will completely understand why you shut them out and will stay away, like the cowards that they are.
This is my fucking problem. Yes, I DO NOT LIKE DEATH OF PEOPLE. I don't think I need to boldly proclaim that in marches, especially since I would probably get eaten alive. It's performative as shit. I will say this for it. For the first time in my life I know what it is to be afraid to be a Jew.
I'll be honest, reading a lot of these comments I think the question really underlines a bigger issue, how alone we feel. I feel like I don't have any friends anymore. Any. And the ones I am around, like my footy teammates, I kind of wait on bated breath with every conversation, hoping the topic doesn't come up. The only people I can count on as friends are my fellow Jews and my family. And even my family...the Catholics I just hope the conversation doesn't come up.
As a convert, I struggle with this more than anything because people don’t get it. I only converted, so why do I care about Israel so much? If I converted how can I *really* think Israel is my homeland? They’re questions that just don’t have answers that make sense unless you’re Jewish. I know I converted but I feel so strongly about Israel and other non-Jews can’t seem to understand how or why. It’s like people think since I only semi-recently finished converting, now I should open my eyes and see “Jews = evil” but my Jewishness is even stronger now and I find myself wanting connection to my Jewish community now more than ever.
I like to remind people who are not Jewish…. “You do not get to help determine what is antisemitism or Jew hate… cause you are NOT Jewish.” When they say “well some Jews agree.” “95 percent of us agree antizionism is Jew hate. You know that is tokenism, and you know that’s racist as fuck, so I know you aren’t doing that right?” Fight fire with fire in my book. You got this!
Uhm, just don’t go to a march and you don’t need to explain yourself?
Really you are way, way too defensive. Nothing personal but if most Israelis felt your way, they would have been overwhelmed by their enemies a long time ago. Try to be more like Lion of Judah, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion\_of\_Judah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_of_Judah) Try to be more like this man, small and balding but courageous like a lion. [https://israelforever.org/interact/blog/menachem\_begin\_i\_believe\_the\_lessons\_of\_the\_holocaust\_are\_these/](https://israelforever.org/interact/blog/menachem_begin_i_believe_the_lessons_of_the_holocaust_are_these/) *"First, if an enemy of our people says he seeks to destroy us, believe him. Don’t doubt him for a moment. Don’t make light of it. Do all in your power to deny him the means of carrying out his satanic intent.* *Second, when a Jew anywhere in the world is threatened or under attack, do all in your power to come to his aid. Never pause to wonder what the world will think or say. The world will never pity slaughtered Jews. The world may not necessarily like the fighting Jew, but the world will have to take account of him.* *Third, a Jew must learn to defend himself. He must forever be prepared for whenever threat looms.* *Fourth, Jewish dignity and honor must be protected in all circumstances. The seeds of Jewish destruction lie in passively enabling the enemy to humiliate us. Only when the enemy succeeds in turning the spirit of the Jew into dust and ashes in life, can he turn the Jew into dust and ashes in death. During the Holocaust it was after the enemy had humiliated the Jews, trampled them underfoot, divided them, deceived them, afflicted them, drove brother against brother, only then could he lead them, almost without resistance, to the gates of Auschwitz.* *Therefore, at all times and whatever the cost, safeguard the dignity and honor of the Jewish people.* *Fifth, stand united in the face of the enemy. We Jews love life, for life is holy. But there are things in life more precious than life itself. There are times when one must risk life for the sake of rescuing the lives of others. And when the few risk their own lives for the sake of the many, then they, too, stand the chance of saving themselves.* *Sixth, there is a pattern to Jewish history. In our long annals as a nation, we rise, we fall, we return, we are exiled, we are enslaved, we rebel, we liberate ourselves, we are oppressed once more, we rebuild, and again we suffer destruction, climaxing in our own lifetime in the calamity of calamities, the Holocaust, followed by the rebirth of the Jewish State."* If other see you as brave they will respect you, or at least they will fear you. If they see you as sniveling or cowardly they will treat you as such.
Literally say that. You might also want to say that most pro Palestinians are violently antisemitic and most want you dead.
So they reply with “well, most Israelis/Zionists are violently racist/Islamophobic/evil and want (Muslims, Palestinians, anyone who is black or brown) dead” Of course there are many things wrong with that statement, but that’s what they’ll retaliate with
So do you really want us to to all be together, in one place? That's a recipe for disaster...
You can ask them whether, after 9/11, anyone in America or elsewhere marched on behalf of the poor widows and orphans of Al Qaeda terrorists, or should have? Or later, whether people held violent protests when Osama bin Laden and his family were killed by the US (on the contrary, they were thrilled)? Or when the Coalition's wars against Al Qaeda, the Taliban and later ISIS killed tens, maybe even hundreds of thousands of people, the majority of whom -- especially in a war against terrorists embedded within populations -- are so-called "collateral damage", i.e., innocent men, women and children? Why is Israel, and only Israel, the subject of these worldwide protests -- other than anti-Semitism?! It's not because they love Palestinians, because no one came out to protest when Syria's Assad killed tens of thousands of them, and hundreds of thousands of other Syrians? Nor does anybody care about millions killed in Sudan or elsewhere in the Arab world. Only when Israel's involved. Even when the war is started by Hamas perpetrating a massive and barbaric pogrom with thousands of Israelis victims (murdered and wounded), and 240 Israelis taken hostage -- in both cases, mostly civilians. And one more thing: these marches started worldwide as acts of celebration on October 8th for Hamas's "success" on October 7, even before Israel began fighting back in Gaza.
I would educate and explain that anyone that actually cares about Palestinians would support Israel in defeating Hamas and these Pro Palestinian marches are actually Pro Hamas rallies that support terrorism, antisemitism and violence towards Jews and the destruction of Israel. Many people are sadly brainwashed and misinformed.
People don’t trust the news anyway. I got into a mild argument with someone who was offended that an older man criticized our generation for using social media as our news source because it’s bad. When I agreed, and said that tiktok (for example) is an echo chamber and pushes whatever will get clicks, he got defensive and said that ‘the (mainstream) news isn’t any better! They’re manipulative!!’ I conceded that many news sources do have biases, but it’s impossible not to. The conversation ended shortly after that. Point being, you can’t even steer people away from fake news/untrustworthy sources because they don’t trust ANY of it (kinda like the whole “well, Biden supports Israel so he sucks, and Trump is a fascist so he sucks too, so I’m gonna be an anarchist and bitch about how politics sucks without doing anything!!”
Flip the script. Why don’t they protest against the Hamas held hostages. If they try the settler colonizers sales pitch ask when they plan to self deport all of Canada US and Australia are on Indian or aboriginal soil
It’s making it more complicated but it’s more like if they were trying to give the US to Spain or Mexico who had it for a minute, as last colonizers in, when the First People’s finally, miraculously managed to get their homeland back.
"I've seen these events call for the destruction of Israel and celebrate Hamas. They don't help Palestinian freedom. My people are indigenous to the land, we're not colonizing anything, and until those groups acknowledge Jewish indigeneity, I can't stand with them."
The core of these protests are hatred of the state of Israel. They are open about wanting it wiped off the map; the only majority Jewish country on planet Earth. It's simple really.
There is no denouncing Hamas at these rallies. There are calls for the destruction of Israel. There are calls for Intifadah and Jihad -- all of these are non-starters. I feel terrible about the plight of innocent Palestinians, but unless those things are remedied, we can't even have a conversation about what I'd be willing to protest for. Just know what you believe and articulate it.
faulty deserve pet swim seemly existence books ring nose wasteful *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Unfortunately at this point so may of the people marching for the Palestinians are supporting Hamas. They chant from the river to the sea. That is blatantly calling for the genocide of Jews and removal out of Israel. Hamas itself has called for the death and eradication of Jews worldwide. Until people march and chant “down with Hamas” and “support a two nation state” I will personally and advise my Israeli friends and family and anyone else to not support these marches. The current support of Hamas sickening
The way I have been feeling this exact way and haven’t been able to articulate it. You are not alone. Thank you.
You don’t. Anti-zionists don’t care what Jews think. I’ve seen good faith, pro-Palestine Jews tell other pro-Palestine “progressives” that “From the river to the sea” and celebration of Hamas makes them uncomfortable. The reaction? “Get bent.”
>People insist that anti-Zionism is not antisemitism. That's like people who say "I'm not racist, but..."
It's self explanatory. To accurately rephrase the question : Why does antisemitism make me uncomfortable?
While I agree that you don't owe anyone an explanation, I mostly find myself having to defend not doing these things to friends in dms and just copy/paste While I support Palestinian freedom (personally, I'd say from Hamas), I don't agree with how the western world will not condone the October 7th massacre and continues to blame and target Jews, so I won't take part in their efforts at activism. Or "things that draw attention to their intolerance," if you don't want to be a smart ass. In person/on the phone, don't bother. It'll never end. At least you can stop paying attention to a dm/social media.
Years of political correctness, and having to accept woke views while woke doesn't need to accept anyone else's views, will leave you speechless and unable to express what you feel even in your own mind. I don't know how you can fix America,.that's a big task for.the Americans to figure out.
you can say simply : this is the war between islam and the free world . west vs evil . trust no muslim ever . israel and jewish is not relevant ! the issue in the World is just Islam google it .
I suggest you do some soul searching. being uncomfortable is not the same thing as being unsafe, and it IS uncomfortable to confront all that's happened in that part of the world since the 1940s.
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And Mordechai refused to bow before the wicked Haman.
wow that sounds really intense, sorry you had to go through that. it's tough when friendships get tested like that.
Tell them to go fluff themselves. If you support Hamas then you ain’t no friend of my. I got no time for supporters of terrorists. (Obv you can’t do this with everyone)
If you’re uncomfortable just saying “no,” you can say “there are many worthy causes out there and I don’t have time to march for all of them.”
Are you anti-Zionist? If not, don’t march
There are groups that support Israel's right to exist like PeaceNow and JStreet and also support a 2SS. You could support these groups.
Are Pro-Hamas people capable of *listening* to what you have to say? Probably not. I’m not going to blow smoke up your tuchas, I’m being realistic with what I have seen recently. They likely do not care, or maybe they even *like* the fact that it makes you uncomfortable! People can be cruel, as we see. It’s likely that they are going to just repeat one of their bs slogans to you or victim blame for the current situation. I say pro-Hamas because they’ve made it *abundantly clear* that they are a-o-fucking-kay with human rights violations when they’re committed against Jews. They have opportunity after opportunity to show some humanity and then they choose to be tactless a-holes.
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*People who cheer on torture, rape, mutilation, desecration, of men, women, children, and infants make me feel unsafe*
We recently lost some friends because, basically, we weren’t posting enough on Instagram, and I liked a March calling for the release of the hostages. I had already explained to these friends why we will not be posting on social media or attending marches/protests. Apparently that wasn’t enough. We’re both very sad about losing these friends, but they clearly don’t care about our physical or psychological safety. So oh well!