A New Year's Resolution

Well, we are now a week into 2009. I haven't written much lately. Not because I didn't have anything to write about, but more because there is so much to write and think about.
We just got back from Israel and it was the trip of a lifetime. My husband didn't really want to go. One of my son's also didn't want to go. They were both nervous because they were certain things would go wrong and a war would start. I told them not to worry, that they would feel safe and if we were going to get bombed or in a war, we would all be together.
Of course what happened next was the biggest military action in Israel since 1967.
Before I get into the facts of why I am so distressed, let me tell you that we learned so much about history, about religion, agriculture, economics, mysticism, stoicism etc that I would go back in a minute. It is a magical place. All of my family loved it. We even felt pretty safe, despite the risks.
I will try and write a bit each day about what we learned but what is even more important now is to focus on the famous quote on the wall at Yad Vashem--the memorial to the over 6 million who died. I am paraphrasing this but what I remember is...."a society is only as good as what it tolerates". This is the time to step up and not slip silently by and let others do the talking and the fighting. This is the time to understand that it is an imperative to fight back when you are under constant attack for over 8 years. This is a time to understand that while Israel, at great cost to the country and to individuals who left homes, schools and lives behind, withdrew unilaterally from Gaza and areas in the West Bank and what did they get in return? Bombs. Fear. Lives under constant attack. Children who sleep in bomb shelters. Who can not attend school Would we do the same?
This is also a time to be aware of what is going on in our own country. We are not at a point in history where we should "blend in" or assume that we are so integrated into our American society that we are "safe". We can not assume that our future leaders believe in the same things that we do. This is what the Jews of Germany thought. They may not have identified with the Jews of Poland, or of Lithuania. They thought they were German. While I don't believe that a holocaust could ever happen in the US, in a free society, a lot of bizarre things are happening. I do believe that the constant news of Madoff, Drier, the way the media portrays Wall Street are all reflecting on the Jews---rightly or wrongly. You may have read about the violence and hate spewed at Jews in Europe and Yemen but what about here in our free country?
Did you know that:
A Molotov cocktail was thrown at one of the oldest Chicago synagogues last week?
That one of the pro Hamas protesters in Fort Lauderdale yelled that Jews should go back in the ovens?
A preschool in Camarillo CA has been vandalized by swastikas for the fourth time in recent weeks? Twice in the last week.
In Bethesda Maryland residents have been receiving anti Jewish hate mail in their mailboxes?
Jewish day schools in Chicago received bomb threats?
San Francisco's holocaust memorial was defaced with anti semitic graffiti?
Synagogues in Dalton TN and in Irvine CA have had signs or graffiti placed on them with anti semitic slurs or anti Israel remarks. See this site.

These things are not huge, but taken together they are an indicator of how things can unravel if we do not stand up to be counted. Read the Jerusalem Post on-line. Our sources of news are generally not very accurate in what is actually going on. Write to your representatives. Speak up in conversations. Don't be lulled into a false sense that you can remain silent. Act.