I am Maltese, and I am not Jewish, i was catholic, until I saw what the Roman Catholic Church was and still is capable of doing. So I am not Jewish by birth, but I am a Jew in spirit and a Zionist by DNA. I feel like a hand extended in friendship from Israel, telling me to cross the sea....and go where I feel I belong. It is a very unusual feeling. I got to know all about Israel and Judea, ironically enough from a decrepit old picture bible which belonged to my mother...and instead of just looking at the pics, at the inside of the cover there was a map of Israel and I would stare and stare at this map....i was around 4 years old at the time as i was born in 1967...the mythical year for Israel!!!! And when I was 10 years old, at the time whether you believe it or not, my mum used to take my brother and myself to Good Friday function where all I remember is of sitting down and standing up like a yoyo....but there was a prayer which really irked me...it was a prayer for the Jews to convert to Christianity. And although only 10 years old I asked my mum, why do we have to pray for the Jews and do the Jews pray for us to convert to their religion....and why should people want others to convert to their religion....she told me that at my age I should be playing with dolls not ask such questions and she only succeeded to answer me, because I continued pissing her off, saying because the church says so....Nowadays when I grew up I did try to go back to the church, but it seems that I don't belong, because sheer antisemitism during the homily, giving inflated numbers of casualties in Gaza, not once speaking about the hostages, and around a month ago, the priest's idiotic homily got a group of pro-pal who were in church to start applauding....that was it. I never went back and never will do so. To be honest I always felt more at once with Jewish people then with Catholics...or let's say pseudo catholics. I am presently also studying Hebrew and I'm looking forward to going to Israel to meet my large number of real friends...something I don't have here in Malta. Anyway...like what the late Danish King Christian stated when the Nazis invaded Denmark - he told them that as from the next day each Dane is same as the other, so everyone will start wearing the armband with the Star of David, starting from himself, as he declared everyone was Jewish....and sure enough from the next day he used to go on horseback in public wearing the yellow arm band with the Magen David Adom, and not only with his declaration the smallest number of Jews rounded up were in Denmark, apart from Italy, but he have a new proud dimension to the Magen David Adom. And I end up by saying...that today all decent people are Jewish! And we are not frightened to show it. Am Israel Chai
Margaret, I identify with so much of what you say. I’m Irish, raised as a Catholic but not devout. The books by David I Kertzer finished me off with Catholicism and Christianity. You perfectly expressed how I feel when you wrote ‘I am not Jewish by birth, but I am a Jew in spirit and a Zionist by DNA’. This morning I was driving near the synagogue and spotted a father with 2 young boys clearly walking to a service. I just wanted to slam on the brakes, jump out of the car and give them a big hug. I have never felt such a sense of despair at the state of the world.
P.S I can’t go quite as far as you in saying that I am studying Hebrew but I do subscribe to ‘My Jewish Learning’ website and I receive my daily ‘Hebrew word of the day’. I hope that’s just the first step.
Thank you for your beautiful, if sad story. As a Jew who converted through the Reform movement almost 50 years ago, I am reminded of the sweet Chabad rabbi in Chicago who, when he met me 15-16 years ago, remarked that I must always have been a Jew in my heart. I suspect that a remarkable number of us were raised in some version of Christianity, then became disillusioned, then found our forever spiritual home. If you find yourself in Israel eventually and want to convert, I urge you to seek out one of the few liberal Jewish congregations so you will have choices about the path you are about to take.
I am with you and one of you. I am looking to the day that I will be able to travel to Israel. That is the day of my dreams. And the first thing I will buy upon my arrival is a large flag of Israel!
I feel one of you. Unfortunately I live in a very antisemitic country, and the Jewish Community is very small and very silent, but I do use my fb, I can't be bothered, everyone knows where I stand and what are my feelings and beliefs. So I am as marked as any other Jewish person. In fact the cover pic of my fb is the candle with the Magen David Adom and the names of the Bibas children. Hehe more marked then that one cannot be and part of my profile pic is the Magen David Adom. In fact I very rarely put any pics of myself, as I am not a selfie person, and at times I am told that it seems they are writing or chatting with a ghost...and my answer always is that my cover pic and profile pic speak for who I am. But since I work at the ministry of Home Affairs and National Security...i try to not post pics...but whoever goes on my fb...they won't remain in any doubt whatsoever, with whom I stand. An Israel Chai!
Absolutely perfect article! My parents are Holocaust Survivors/Fighters. Never surprised by virulent antisemitic demonstrations as our history is full of them. Thats just the way the Hakodesh Boruchu set it up so Am Yisrael wouldn't become like the rest of the world! Am Yisrael Chai!
Shout out to the Jewish day schools who are soldiering on, increasing their enrollment, and training Jews to love Torah, tradition and each other. Shout out to the generous donors, magical teachers, hard-working Board members, and brave security guards, to the marvelous staff and administrators who make them stronger every day . . . to the rare politicians who have their back. There is so much for which to be grateful!
Yes! I don't give to any charities other than Jewish ones. And even then you have to do a little research. Some federations give to Gaza. I'm not interested in that.
Now we are getting somewhere. I just wish more of my liberal Jewish friends would see the same light. Even after two years of continuous struggle, they still believe that they will be accepted by the old crowd if they just temper their enthusiasm for Judaism. Enough with the "freierei". It just disgusts me to see the mental groveling when so many are out to kill the Jews.
I can’t understand why Israel’s leaders and our so-called friends in the United States (Witkoff, Kushner) are pushing Israel into this deal. I read today on Palestinian Media Watch that Abbas is saying out loud that they are going to keep Hamas under the radar for a few years and then bring them back. I also read that Hamas is making more and more demands, and that Israel is actually thinking about releasing major terrorist criminals (like Barghouti) who murdered hundreds of Jews. This is all too horrible to fathom. The United States did not make deals with the Nazis – they obliterated them. The same with the Japanese. Why in the world would they force Israel into a compromise plan that everyone knows is not going to last? The hatred that is pounded into Palestinian children from the time they’re born has resulted in a population brainwashed to hate and want to kill Jews. You don’t overcome that with a deal. Hamas is in no position to be making any demands. The minute they started making them, Trump should’ve called off the negotiations. Why is he pushing this so hard? And why is Israel going along with it?
I agree. No exchanges. End it and attack hard. And is there any mention of the end of refugee status and the end of "right of return"? Why is Trump pushing it -- he wants a Novel Peace Prize.
What I do is every month I donate some money to 3 different charities providing services and actual help in Israel. or example, ATS ( supports Technion University in Haifa), AMIT provides education to children in Israel, Beith Ruth,a home for abused girls, JNF which is planing a major development in Northern Israel.
I am almost 90 years of age. It is to late for me to join the IDF but it is not to late for me to send money.
Today, October 8th is my Birthday. It's been really tough to celebrate these last few years . Josh's latest essay has actually made it feel ok. Thank you Josh for helping me get through the day with meaningful new perspective and I hope any other October 8ers out there who see this can do the same
@JoshuaHoffman: thank you Joshua, insightful as usual and aggressive as needed!
One paragraph stuck with me, and after more reflections, mostly looking into my own perceptions and reactions, I added a comment at the end.
Your paragraph: “We have stopped waiting for the world’s approval to define our worth. We have remembered that our survival never depended on the kindness of kings, popes, or pundits; it depended on our own unbreakable covenant. We are the Jews who now know that safety does not come from slogans, but from solidarity. That the only protection stronger than an army is identity. That the only sympathy we can truly rely on is our own.”
My reaction: “After living in Israel from March 20, 1960 (I was 10-2 months when we arrived), I was an “inbetween” Jew — born in Western Ukraine to Holocaust survivor father and USSR-born mother, I was NOT exactly Israeli, like my 7 years younger brother, but some Israeli habits and psyche got into my DNA and the inoculation persisted. Gone was the diasporic paranoia and obsession with “what other tribes think about mine”. What upset my Jewish friends from the U.S., South Africa, Australia, Canada, the UK and more, as antisemitic slurs, made me chuckle dismissively. I maintained tactful, “foreign” behavior, e.g., including “please” and “excuses me” in my automatic dictionary, I didn’t try to show all “goim” the “birdie”, but would also resist unreasonable, authoritarian attitudes of controllers on trains and planes, if they were arbitrary and below required par of services, from Sweden to Australia, Switzerland to Canada.
My point: the only revelation was not about myself waiting for the world’s approval but rather about the persistency of contemporary relevance of antisemitism by the masses — I actually started to consider since about 1990 antisemitism an anachronism, not very pertinent to my existence outside of Israel. As another byproduct of 10-7, I realigned my axioms around Einat Wilf’s thesis about the goals of Palestinianized Arabs. Not great news, but accuracy in understanding facts trumps an unsupported “happy ending.”
I needed to read this. It provided me with a roadmap to a greater fortitude that I think all of us need these days. This fight is far from over. And it's going to take a lot of cognitive realignment for us to get through it. I believe that we can.
October 7 made it clear that we are all Zionists now, both Jew and gentile. We didn’t know it before. We are defined as such by others, those who are enemies of God, whether they know it or not.
The struggle has been, is, and will be eternal. Final resolution will only come when the Abrahamic religions finally realize that they all worship the same deity and that a spark of that divinity is within each of us, so that homicide or even suicide is deicide.
Exactly. I don't want to hear from MAGA that we owe Trump our undying loyalty and that we're ungrateful if we criticize his horrible qatari brokered deal to save hamas. I also don't want to hear bullshit that Israel would not exist without America.
Having a mother in law who is a holocaust survivor and still alive, it is not just grandparents. There are still a small number of parents, uncles, aunts, sisters and brothers alive and witnessed first hand and survived the Holocaust.
Let’s honor them and not move on to the next generation in our thoughts and essays until every single witness of this unimaginable atrocity has passed and is one with God.
I am Maltese, and I am not Jewish, i was catholic, until I saw what the Roman Catholic Church was and still is capable of doing. So I am not Jewish by birth, but I am a Jew in spirit and a Zionist by DNA. I feel like a hand extended in friendship from Israel, telling me to cross the sea....and go where I feel I belong. It is a very unusual feeling. I got to know all about Israel and Judea, ironically enough from a decrepit old picture bible which belonged to my mother...and instead of just looking at the pics, at the inside of the cover there was a map of Israel and I would stare and stare at this map....i was around 4 years old at the time as i was born in 1967...the mythical year for Israel!!!! And when I was 10 years old, at the time whether you believe it or not, my mum used to take my brother and myself to Good Friday function where all I remember is of sitting down and standing up like a yoyo....but there was a prayer which really irked me...it was a prayer for the Jews to convert to Christianity. And although only 10 years old I asked my mum, why do we have to pray for the Jews and do the Jews pray for us to convert to their religion....and why should people want others to convert to their religion....she told me that at my age I should be playing with dolls not ask such questions and she only succeeded to answer me, because I continued pissing her off, saying because the church says so....Nowadays when I grew up I did try to go back to the church, but it seems that I don't belong, because sheer antisemitism during the homily, giving inflated numbers of casualties in Gaza, not once speaking about the hostages, and around a month ago, the priest's idiotic homily got a group of pro-pal who were in church to start applauding....that was it. I never went back and never will do so. To be honest I always felt more at once with Jewish people then with Catholics...or let's say pseudo catholics. I am presently also studying Hebrew and I'm looking forward to going to Israel to meet my large number of real friends...something I don't have here in Malta. Anyway...like what the late Danish King Christian stated when the Nazis invaded Denmark - he told them that as from the next day each Dane is same as the other, so everyone will start wearing the armband with the Star of David, starting from himself, as he declared everyone was Jewish....and sure enough from the next day he used to go on horseback in public wearing the yellow arm band with the Magen David Adom, and not only with his declaration the smallest number of Jews rounded up were in Denmark, apart from Italy, but he have a new proud dimension to the Magen David Adom. And I end up by saying...that today all decent people are Jewish! And we are not frightened to show it. Am Israel Chai
That was wonderful to read. Blessings and love to you. Next year in Jerusalem . . .
Margaret, I identify with so much of what you say. I’m Irish, raised as a Catholic but not devout. The books by David I Kertzer finished me off with Catholicism and Christianity. You perfectly expressed how I feel when you wrote ‘I am not Jewish by birth, but I am a Jew in spirit and a Zionist by DNA’. This morning I was driving near the synagogue and spotted a father with 2 young boys clearly walking to a service. I just wanted to slam on the brakes, jump out of the car and give them a big hug. I have never felt such a sense of despair at the state of the world.
P.S I can’t go quite as far as you in saying that I am studying Hebrew but I do subscribe to ‘My Jewish Learning’ website and I receive my daily ‘Hebrew word of the day’. I hope that’s just the first step.
Awesome and wonderful.
Amen!
Thank you for your beautiful, if sad story. As a Jew who converted through the Reform movement almost 50 years ago, I am reminded of the sweet Chabad rabbi in Chicago who, when he met me 15-16 years ago, remarked that I must always have been a Jew in my heart. I suspect that a remarkable number of us were raised in some version of Christianity, then became disillusioned, then found our forever spiritual home. If you find yourself in Israel eventually and want to convert, I urge you to seek out one of the few liberal Jewish congregations so you will have choices about the path you are about to take.
@Margaret, thank you for sharing your experience and how it has affected your soul and spirit. Very heart warming.
I am pretty much speechless. With tears in my eyes, thank you.
I am with you and one of you. I am looking to the day that I will be able to travel to Israel. That is the day of my dreams. And the first thing I will buy upon my arrival is a large flag of Israel!
So beautiful! Thank you.
I feel one of you. Unfortunately I live in a very antisemitic country, and the Jewish Community is very small and very silent, but I do use my fb, I can't be bothered, everyone knows where I stand and what are my feelings and beliefs. So I am as marked as any other Jewish person. In fact the cover pic of my fb is the candle with the Magen David Adom and the names of the Bibas children. Hehe more marked then that one cannot be and part of my profile pic is the Magen David Adom. In fact I very rarely put any pics of myself, as I am not a selfie person, and at times I am told that it seems they are writing or chatting with a ghost...and my answer always is that my cover pic and profile pic speak for who I am. But since I work at the ministry of Home Affairs and National Security...i try to not post pics...but whoever goes on my fb...they won't remain in any doubt whatsoever, with whom I stand. An Israel Chai!
Absolutely perfect article! My parents are Holocaust Survivors/Fighters. Never surprised by virulent antisemitic demonstrations as our history is full of them. Thats just the way the Hakodesh Boruchu set it up so Am Yisrael wouldn't become like the rest of the world! Am Yisrael Chai!
Thank you again. You have expressed so eloquently what all of us are thinking and feeling!
Our forefathers built lives after the holocaust.
We have to rebuild lives after the betrayal from the institutions we helped create.
It’s clear that Jews need Jewish day schools. Forget goyim charities - support families that cannot afford day schools.
We are the only ones who can bring light into the world.
Standup to those who submit to allah.
Shout out to the Jewish day schools who are soldiering on, increasing their enrollment, and training Jews to love Torah, tradition and each other. Shout out to the generous donors, magical teachers, hard-working Board members, and brave security guards, to the marvelous staff and administrators who make them stronger every day . . . to the rare politicians who have their back. There is so much for which to be grateful!
Yes! I don't give to any charities other than Jewish ones. And even then you have to do a little research. Some federations give to Gaza. I'm not interested in that.
We will take care of our brothers and live forever. Am Israel Chai.
Now we are getting somewhere. I just wish more of my liberal Jewish friends would see the same light. Even after two years of continuous struggle, they still believe that they will be accepted by the old crowd if they just temper their enthusiasm for Judaism. Enough with the "freierei". It just disgusts me to see the mental groveling when so many are out to kill the Jews.
Hard to imagine they still care about what these others think. Oy. Move on! Be for yourself.
"If I am not for myself, who will be for me?" Rabbi Hillel (followed by "And when I am for myself alone, what am I?").
I can’t understand why Israel’s leaders and our so-called friends in the United States (Witkoff, Kushner) are pushing Israel into this deal. I read today on Palestinian Media Watch that Abbas is saying out loud that they are going to keep Hamas under the radar for a few years and then bring them back. I also read that Hamas is making more and more demands, and that Israel is actually thinking about releasing major terrorist criminals (like Barghouti) who murdered hundreds of Jews. This is all too horrible to fathom. The United States did not make deals with the Nazis – they obliterated them. The same with the Japanese. Why in the world would they force Israel into a compromise plan that everyone knows is not going to last? The hatred that is pounded into Palestinian children from the time they’re born has resulted in a population brainwashed to hate and want to kill Jews. You don’t overcome that with a deal. Hamas is in no position to be making any demands. The minute they started making them, Trump should’ve called off the negotiations. Why is he pushing this so hard? And why is Israel going along with it?
I would not like to be the decision maker, but you are right. These motherF****** will only return to kill more Israelis and Jews.
Whilst the return of the hostages is essential, it is also essential to act to ensure the safety and security of Israelis and Jews in the years ahead.
Accept the deal, get the hostages first, then turn around and smash them to smithereens. Seriously. We have to stop being so "good".
I agree. No exchanges. End it and attack hard. And is there any mention of the end of refugee status and the end of "right of return"? Why is Trump pushing it -- he wants a Novel Peace Prize.
trump likes shiny things. Has the attention span of a gnat.
Good points
I absolutely agree with you. There is nothing about a real solution, like for example this proposal of a plan that could lead to real peace: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pO0BLqQnnI&t=5s
Thank you!
Rather than just talking---do something.
What I do is every month I donate some money to 3 different charities providing services and actual help in Israel. or example, ATS ( supports Technion University in Haifa), AMIT provides education to children in Israel, Beith Ruth,a home for abused girls, JNF which is planing a major development in Northern Israel.
I am almost 90 years of age. It is to late for me to join the IDF but it is not to late for me to send money.
Today, October 8th is my Birthday. It's been really tough to celebrate these last few years . Josh's latest essay has actually made it feel ok. Thank you Josh for helping me get through the day with meaningful new perspective and I hope any other October 8ers out there who see this can do the same
@JoshuaHoffman: thank you Joshua, insightful as usual and aggressive as needed!
One paragraph stuck with me, and after more reflections, mostly looking into my own perceptions and reactions, I added a comment at the end.
Your paragraph: “We have stopped waiting for the world’s approval to define our worth. We have remembered that our survival never depended on the kindness of kings, popes, or pundits; it depended on our own unbreakable covenant. We are the Jews who now know that safety does not come from slogans, but from solidarity. That the only protection stronger than an army is identity. That the only sympathy we can truly rely on is our own.”
My reaction: “After living in Israel from March 20, 1960 (I was 10-2 months when we arrived), I was an “inbetween” Jew — born in Western Ukraine to Holocaust survivor father and USSR-born mother, I was NOT exactly Israeli, like my 7 years younger brother, but some Israeli habits and psyche got into my DNA and the inoculation persisted. Gone was the diasporic paranoia and obsession with “what other tribes think about mine”. What upset my Jewish friends from the U.S., South Africa, Australia, Canada, the UK and more, as antisemitic slurs, made me chuckle dismissively. I maintained tactful, “foreign” behavior, e.g., including “please” and “excuses me” in my automatic dictionary, I didn’t try to show all “goim” the “birdie”, but would also resist unreasonable, authoritarian attitudes of controllers on trains and planes, if they were arbitrary and below required par of services, from Sweden to Australia, Switzerland to Canada.
My point: the only revelation was not about myself waiting for the world’s approval but rather about the persistency of contemporary relevance of antisemitism by the masses — I actually started to consider since about 1990 antisemitism an anachronism, not very pertinent to my existence outside of Israel. As another byproduct of 10-7, I realigned my axioms around Einat Wilf’s thesis about the goals of Palestinianized Arabs. Not great news, but accuracy in understanding facts trumps an unsupported “happy ending.”
Yes. I am not a jew, support for you is unconditional
I needed to read this. It provided me with a roadmap to a greater fortitude that I think all of us need these days. This fight is far from over. And it's going to take a lot of cognitive realignment for us to get through it. I believe that we can.
October 7 made it clear that we are all Zionists now, both Jew and gentile. We didn’t know it before. We are defined as such by others, those who are enemies of God, whether they know it or not.
The struggle has been, is, and will be eternal. Final resolution will only come when the Abrahamic religions finally realize that they all worship the same deity and that a spark of that divinity is within each of us, so that homicide or even suicide is deicide.
Exactly. I don't want to hear from MAGA that we owe Trump our undying loyalty and that we're ungrateful if we criticize his horrible qatari brokered deal to save hamas. I also don't want to hear bullshit that Israel would not exist without America.
......................................................................................................................................................................................................
"Not gratitude, but conviction. We are not here because the world allowed us to exist; we are here because we refuse to disappear".
Having a mother in law who is a holocaust survivor and still alive, it is not just grandparents. There are still a small number of parents, uncles, aunts, sisters and brothers alive and witnessed first hand and survived the Holocaust.
Let’s honor them and not move on to the next generation in our thoughts and essays until every single witness of this unimaginable atrocity has passed and is one with God.
Support