Will the Nation Answer Zions Call or Choose National Suicide?
This week, I read a Jerusalem Post opinion piece entitled A wake-up call or time to give up on Germany? – opinion. Where Sacha Stawski, the President of Honestly Concerned, an initiative to fight biased media coverage of anti-Semitism in Germany and the conflict in the Middle East.
Stawski lays out her concerns with the growing anti-Semitism and particularly incidents by pro-BDS activists in German cities, which have caused many Jews to question their staying in Germany. Stawski’s answer to their concerns is to stay and fight.
I can’t disagree more with her advice to Germanys Jews. Stawski seems to be oblivious to the reality of Jewish life in Germany, which is a lack of Judaism and a growing loss of Jewish identity, with the unravelling of the traditional family, marriages at late ages, and a low birthrate compounded by a plague of intermarriage and Jewish assimilation into the host population. Stawski fails to understand that life in Germany and elsewhere in the Diaspora is in the process of disappearing.
The facts are Germanys Jews are now at a critical period, filled with dangers to their existence. They are in the process of spiritual and national disintegration.
Stawski fails to see that Germany, like all the other nations, is not the Jewish Homeland. Consequently, the Germans have a right to their opinions even when they are immersed in Jew-hatred and intolerance of the other amongst them. It’s their nation, not ours. It’s time to stop wagging the finger of moral judgement at them while wanting to live amongst them. Talk about schizophrenic behaviour.
Let’s state categorically what difference it makes to Jews if the Germans want to revisit 1933. It makes no difference! It is known that “Esav hates Yaakov”. Yet some advocate identifying with Germany and being loyal citizens of a nation that perpetrated the most ghastly murder of 6,000,000,000 Jewish men, women and children within living memory. The Jews of Germany appear to have forgotten the commandment: “Remember what Amalek did to you!”
What happens next cannot be blamed on others for our mistakes in identifying the Diaspora as the legitimate home of Jews while at the same time rejecting the Jewish Homeland. Are we willing to pay for our mistakes with the lives of our precious Jewish children?
The answer to that question lies in the act of Aliya to Israel and a rejection of the Exile once and for all.
It’s your choice, but your life may depend on what you choose.
I found the article challenging many of my preconceptions regarding the Galut, and at the same time reaffirming my belief that Israel is the only place for a Jew to be a proper Jew.
Esther, you are not alone in being challenged by people’s choices in exile. Your concerns are very much part of mainstream Jewish thought today.
To be honest, I’ve never understood why Jews would even want to live in a G-d-forsaken place like Germany, whose ground is permanently soaked in Jewish blood. Misguided Jews with $-signs in their eyes who want the “good life” (materialistically) and couldn’t care less about their Judaism or their Jewishness. Germany should have been totally destroyed after WW2, left in ruins never to be rebuilt.
Dina, your sentiments are well founded. Unfortunately for too many Jews, Aliya is not an option, while Germany is very acceptable. Pure madness. Like a moth attracted to the flame, many Jews court disaster as if it was some sort of nirvana. Still, it’s our duty to help our brothers and sisters who are currently lost in the Diaspora.