{"id":11994,"date":"2023-10-09T06:56:19","date_gmt":"2023-10-09T03:56:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jppi.org.il\/?p=11994"},"modified":"2024-01-14T11:45:12","modified_gmt":"2024-01-14T09:45:12","slug":"the-many-ways-american-jews-can-help","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jppi.org.il\/en\/the-many-ways-american-jews-can-help\/","title":{"rendered":"The Many Ways American Jews Can Help"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thanks to Hamas, American Jewry\u2019s long-Silenced Majority has found its voice \u2014 putting partisanship aside<\/strong><\/p>\n

In April, 1945, General Dwight Eisenhower visited the freshly-liberated Ohrdruf concentration camp. He vomited. Eisenhower called the atrocities \u201cbeyond the American mind to comprehend,\u201d then ordered all available troops to visit the camp \u201cto see why we were fighting.\u201d<\/p>\n

That last Saturday\u2019s atrocities were also incomprehensible to all civilized people reveals how evil the perpetrators \u2014 and their cheerleaders \u2014 are. Over these next difficult months, let\u2019s remember these war crimes of mass murder, kidnapping, abuse, of sheer inhumanity and Jew-hatred, as Israel does what it must do to defend itself. And anytime any of us, anywhere, hesitates, scroll back to those images of slaughtered families, of mutilated corpses, of defiled women, and of that little boy bullied by other little boys \u2014 riled by Palestinian adults \u2014 simply for being Jewish,\u00a0 to \u201csee why we are fighting.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thanks to Hamas, American Jewry\u2019s long-Silenced Majority has found its voice \u2014 putting partisanship aside. I have been deluged with messages from American Jews \u2014 vindicating those of us who keep reading the polls showing that over 80% of American Jews support Israel, even as others pay too much attention to the loud, shrill minority of anti-Zionist, un-patriotic, un-Jews.<\/p>\n

Everyone keeps uttering the four most powerful words in the American Jewish vocabulary: \u201cHow can I help?\u201d<\/p>\n

This may be this generation\u2019s May, 1967 moment. That awful month, the Arab calls to \u201cthrow Israel into the sea\u201d stirred Jews worldwide, making them realize how important it is to see Israel flourish. In October, 2023\u2019s non-partisan, heartfelt, Jewishly-patriotic offers of assistance, I hear a similar echo, a realization that Israel is fighting for its life against barbarians \u2014 and we all need Israel and the Jewish people to live, more than many realized.<\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0 The first answer is, \u201cgive with your hearts\u201d: Israelis are reeling, and it\u2019s only going to get worse. Every day, as the lists of dead lengthen, Israelis learn of more dead loved ones, and of more evils perpetrated against their fellow citizens. As the world\u2019s memory of these brutalities fades, as criticism mounts of Israel\u2019s \u201cdisproportionate response,\u201d that in this war it didn\u2019t seek a chockful of bad choices, the need for support, understanding, empathy, true love, genuine patriotism, will grow exponentially.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Also, \u201cgive with your spines.\u201d You saw the Jew-hatred. You saw how anti-Zionism and antisemitism created a spiral of poison and violence. Stand up for your people! Stand tall against the haters. Be willing to be unpopular \u2014 taking on your particular tribe\u2019s Israel-bashers and Jew-haters. Republicans should stop weaponizing support for Israel \u2014 it\u2019s not a partisan issue \u2014 and Democrats must clean house.<\/p>\n

This may not be politically correct, but with most American Jews leaning left, the challenge of Progressive Bash-Israel-First-ing is much greater. While most Americans, including most liberals, remain pro-Israel, let\u2019s be honest: Being anti-Israel has become not just an easy virtue-signal but the instinctive admission card to too many Progressive circles. Knee-jerk anti-Zionism infects much Progressive discourse, including anti-racism work, campus life, and, increasingly, the Democratic Party\u2019s disproportionately powerful radicals. It\u2019s time to confront \u201cDemocratic Socialists of America\u201d when they hold a pro-Palestine rally despite all that spilled Jewish blood. Start asking politicians you support to reject their endorsement \u2014 not sit there like some anxious high-schooler waiting for the cool kids\u2019 approval.<\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0 \u201cGive with your minds,\u201d learn the facts. Start explaining Israel\u2019s position, not because it\u2019s perfect, but because its enemies \u2014 as we saw \u2014 are perfectly evil. Learn how Israel got into this mess and why Israel is justified in taking some time if necessary to change the military rules of the game.<\/p>\n

Understand Israel\u2019s dilemmas: Its lose-lose choices in managing Gaza; its moral challenge in fighting an enemy hiding behind mosques, hospitals, and kindergartens; its disappointment that the Gaza Disengagement of 2005, which was supposed to bring peace and democracy, instead rained down death and evil.<\/p>\n

Learn about \u00a0the communal blind spots of \u201ctwo-staters\u201d who misread Palestinian political culture as seeking to live together rather than to destroy the Jewish state.\u00a0 Learn about the Palestinian death cult \u2014 mimicking the nihilism of ISIS and other barbarians, all fueled by Islamism. Take it seriously when Mahmoud Al-Zahar, a Hamas leader, shares his dream: \u201cThe entire planet will be under our law, there will be no more Jews or Christian traitors.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ask the tough questions about what\u2019s going on culturally, and existentially. Explore what has happened to the West culturally \u2014 why, when too many of us look in the mirror, we only see flaws, yet when we stare our enemies in the face, we somehow overlook their evil. See how obsessive anti-Zionism \u2014 blaming Israel for Western crimes it never committed, from colonialism to imperialism \u2014 is often the glue uniting these disparate and conflicting ideologies.<\/p>\n

And do a deep dive into Iran. See how it foments so much evil regionally, how it targets Big Satan \u2014 America \u2014 not just Little Satan \u2014 Israel, and yet, too many American policymakers go soft on the Mullahs.<\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0 Give with your fingertips: use whatever internet skills you have to make Israel\u2019s case, to expose the haters, and explain the red line distinguishing Zionism, a liberal-democratic nationalism that seeks to build its people up and help the world, from Palestinianism, a totalitarianism nationalism that seeks to knock others down and corrupts the world.<\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0 Give with your muscles, meaning your political muscle: Encourage Joe Biden to keep supporting Israel, to confront Iran more directly, and to try, with his Republican rivals, to keep support for Israel a rare bipartisan value, uniting America.<\/p>\n

\u2022\u00a0 And finally, yes, give money, to individual funds and to more formal philanthropies \u2014 for supplies, for equipment, for rebuilding and healing.\u00a0 One cousin wondered who helps pay for all those soldiers flying back from abroad. He was shocked that it comes out of their pockets. Open yours too.<\/p>\n

Sunday, October 8, the day after that blood-drenched Shabbat from hell, it felt that every Israeli woke up in a fog \u2026 Those, that is, who were lucky enough to wake up \u2014 and lucky enough to wake up in freedom, in our state, not in a state of capture in savage hands. Jerusalem was deathly quiet. There was a heaviness in the air \u2014 and in my chest. Everyone seemed to be sharing the same thoughts \u2014 how could it have happened \u2026 how much higher will the death toll spike \u2026 what about those poor captives \u2026 what kind of people behave so brutally and, most nerve-wracking of all, where will this all go and how will it end?<\/p>\n

Then suddenly by afternoon, civilians starting circulating shopping lists \u2014 buying supplies for our troops en masse. My son calls it a \u201cbalagan of trumot<\/em>\u201d \u2014 a chaotic cornucopia of donations. My wife went to buy toiletries for our son\u2019s platoon of 80, partially financed by American friends and relatives.\u00a0Mishpachat\u00a0<\/em>Fishman\u2014 strangers \u2014 saw her overflowing shopping cart \u2013 and added 200 shekels!<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why I love the Jewish people. We don\u2019t stand idly by. So build on the great American Jewish traditions of generosity, solidarity and love of Israel \u2014 and help with your hearts, spines, minds, fingertips, muscles \u2014 and wallets. Am Yisrael Chai.<\/p>\n

\n

Professor Gil Troy<\/strong>, a Senior Fellow at the Jewish People Policy Institute, \u00a0is an American presidential historian<\/em><\/p>\n

First published by the Jewish Journal<\/a><\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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