I think it comes down to this:
It’s one am, and I’m trying to watch the Godfather. I get a message in my group chat. She’s an ex-Israeli living in Britain. Her “progressive” antizionist friend doesn’t understand why a Jewish man was stopped at last minute from giving a speech about antisemitism in his college.
Two days later, I’m sitting at the bank and scrolling through Facebook. I see three articles one after the other: “Man to be charge with hate crime for beating of New York Orthodox Jewish Man.” “Jewish teens assaulted, robbed in anti-Semitic attack in France.” “Jews’ headstones smashed in Greek city.”
Only a few months before, it’s seven am, and I’ve just woken up and I’m getting ready for work. I scroll through Facebook and see dozens of posts from my Jewish friends about Corbyn. Not a single one of their gentile friends comment.
A few weeks later, it’s five pm, and I’m scrolling through Tumblr on my way home from university. A post catches my eye. It’s a series of funny screenshots of idiots from Twitter. One of them is just an Israeli supporter.
Later that week, my friends post on Facebook and Twitter about a vandal who sprayed swastikas on a Jewish building where they grew up, where children are educated. I wish I could help, but all I can do is like their tweets.
Three months previously I realized that a group of friends I had was always extremely politically motivated to stand up for the underdog, the oppressed, the marginalized. But they had unfollowed me, see, because “I posted too many things that were irrelevant to their interests”. One of those girls had started our relationship by telling me that she was raised to believe Israel was evil, but didn’t seem to have any of the facts to back it up, because every time I brought up any point at all, she said nothing. And I got over that, and built a friendship with her.
And one day, I post about antizionism and how filled with antisemitism it is. And then she’s unfollowed me.
So it comes down to this:
The girl in the group chat said she thinks she might have to move back to Israel. The way the English see it, see, Britain might be where she’s lived for all these years, but she’s a Jew, and she doesn’t feel safe.
My Facebook friends are so tired of being angry, but they don’t know what else to do, because nobody’s listening.
I realize too late there was never any point to trying to force a relationship that would never work.
So it comes down to this:
Jews are in danger. They are in danger because they are Jewish. They are in danger because the world has never been and never will be a safe place for Jews.
And it comes down to this:
People don’t care about Jewish lives, and they aren’t listening, and they never will.
snowghoul
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annaxmalina
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vaporwave
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