Rabbi Danny Met A Man ..

Today Thursday July 24 I was walking in St Anne’s to The local Aldi. As I approached the entrance I passed by a man who was also about to enter the shop.

He made eye contact with me and then introduced himself:

“Hello I am from the local area and I understand you are Jewish”.

 

Well yes I was wearing my kippah and my tzitzit were hanging at the sides!

 

He then continued “I just want to tell you that whilst I am critical of the Israeli government I am not antisemitic “

 

He ended

“ I am fully supportive of the Palestinian people”.

 

I asked him if what he meant by “fully supportive” included Hamas continuing to rule in Gaza. To his credit he said no.

 

I explained that Israel are doing their very best to destroy Hamas and this involves separating the Palestinian people from Hamas. This was of course weakening Hamas rule over the people – a key strategy in the regime’s survival – and therefore motivating Hamas to shoot at their own civilians.

 

He was ‘certain’ israel were to blame for shooting civilians at humanitarian aid collection points.

 

His unwavering belief in the legitimacy of humanitarian organisations and the UN (and international community) was naive at best and willfully ignorant at worst.

 

Then he moved onto talk about his heritage (code for identity):

“I am mixed heritage half British half Indian and I very proud of this. I don’t care if a person is a black white gay etc. it is all about whether people respect people”

 

I did not initially understand what this had to do with his central focus of speaking to me – to reassure me that he was not an antisemite. But I nodded in agreement with this sentiment. Mutual respect and tolerance are values I cherish and seem to be fast fading.

 

I was taken by surprise by this uninvited encounter and to be honest was not in the mood for a political debate with a stranger when all I wanted was my groceries !

 

I explained to David (he told me his name on asking) that it might serve him well in his pursuit of truth to balance his diet of media sources. I guessed correctly he was a regular consumer of the bbc , sky and the Guardian. I suggested he might have a perusal of alternative media outlets like the Jewish news syndicate and so forth. At the very least he would gain a more balanced approach on the issues.

 

He claimed he had done this but still held strongly that it’s a moral outrage that israel are shooting and killing Gazans coming for aid.

 

I reiterated my point that he really needs to find better sources of information as there is clear evidence emerging that sadly western media outlets are now just parroting Hamas talking points (ie propaganda).

He became irritable with my rebuttal and moved onto “settler violence”.

Again I told him that whilst there are some instances of violence they are vastly outnumbered by Arab violence on Jews living in Judea and Samaria, that israel does pursue those committing acts of violence, that in fact their is mounting evidence that in many cases Jews are acting in self defence and that Arabs attacking Jews are accompanied by members of NGOs provoking.

 

By this point I realised he was disinterested in hearing another view point and frankly I wanted my apples and bananas.

 

So why have I bothered to write this account when there are so many more extreme anti israel events taking place around the world.

 

I think the reason is because it shows in a rather subtle way the profound crossroads we have reached in our western society

 

Here is a man who is morally conflicted. He wants to believe he is not antisemitic and reassure himself (not so much me) of this. This is clearly a part of his moral value system. That is why he made efforts to tell me about his mixed heritage and his views on minorities.

 

Yet at the same time because he is fed with modern day ‘blood libels ‘ wrapped in the legitimacy of the so called authority of international bodies – he is left with an vitriolic hatred towards the so called perpetrators of war crimes.

 

Therefore to avoid violating his cardinal rule of not being antisemitic,

He separates the Israeli government from the people of Israel placing the blame entirely on the former.

 

This approach may make sense on some issues within a democratic country but the war against Hamas and all the jihadist elements is an existential one. Whilst there is differing opinions within israel about how to conduct the war, there is overall consensus that israel needs to defeat Hamas.

 

And so this David is left having to play mental gymnastics saying “i am totally against israel but not antisemitic”

 

The problem of course is that the israel government and the idf are the only entity on the world taking sole responsibility to defend its people from genocide.

( not to mention that Israelies of course include 2 million Muslims and numerous other minorities.)

 

Therefore what David is really saying without realising is “ I am completely against the Israeli government for defending Israel and Jews from genocide yet I am not against Jews or antisemitic on any way”!

 

 

Conversations with David-like characters might be rare but gives me an insight into the effect blood libels against israel has.

They literally infect peoples minds with irrationality.

 

As of writing a story just emerged of 50 plus Israeli children forcibly removed from a flight for the crime of singing a song in Hebrew

I will leave the reader to explore this story online (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8AZDFE34KVA&pp=0gcJCccJAYcqIYzv)

 

but what is clear is that post Oct 7 a tipping point has been reach in the west:

 

Antisemitism has been normalised and for those who still find it morally unacceptable they are In a tortuous mental state as they believe the lies spewed against israel yet claim not to be against Jews defending their life land and liberty.

 

The time has come for people to choose a side.

 

Thank God there is evidence people are starting to wake up-

See this story https://tinyurl.com/bdhe5r3z

where 750 Christians in Munich formed a human chain around a synagogue to protect it from Pro Hamas supporters.

 

I will just conclude from a spiritual perspective. Fighting antisemitism and calling out anti Jewish hatred and prejudice is obviously needed.

 

But as Jews we must remember our mission.

Our mission is not just to survive but to thrive. Every time we hear of a negative story we can use it as a springboard to act even more proudly as Jews.

 

Every time we hear of hatred of Israel we can be proud that we are the beacon of moral and spiritual light to a world whose moral compass has gone rather skewed.

 

 

 

Rabbi Danny Bergson

07917 548 386