WE STILL WILL NOT BE SILENCED

Last Sunday, Lynn and I had occasion to visit the Wende Museum and Archive of the Cold War in Culver City. We attended the opening of a new exhibit, "Soviet Jewish Life: Bill Aron and Yevgeniy Fiks" and a panel discussion to introduce the exhibit. Those too young to remember the “Free Soviet Jewry” movement and the refusenik “Prisoners of Zion” in the USSR and other Communist bloc countries would have been astonished to hear of the treatment of Jews in the former Soviet Union, even those who had no desire to leave for Israel. Examples: internal passports with “Jew” as one’s nationality; summer camps where Jewish kids were told they were restricted to playing chess, because “Jews don’t play soccer”; books as different as Graetz’s “History of the Jews” (published 1853) or Leon Uris’ novel “Exodus” or basic Hebrew grammar were banned samizdat, possession of which could mean three years in prison, printing and distribution of which could mean six or more years in prison; the KGB monitored the few synagogues that were in operation, with rabbis appointed and controlled by the State; anyone who asked for permission to make aliyah to Israel would lose their jobs and their apartments, and were sometimes banished to Siberia or imprisoned. 

I cried as these memories came flooding back. And I began to worry. Could state-sponsored anti-semitism ever arise in the United States? We might think such a thing is impossible, yet the Jews of Weimar Germany thought the same of their country. Ha! And the USSR “officially” opposed anti-semitism. Double ha! 

There is a growing number of Christian nationalists in this country who fervently believe that Christianity should be the one and only official religion of the US (see e.g., Michael Flynn in the sanctuary of John Hagee's Cornerstone Church, advocating “one religion” in the US: https://www.timesofisrael.com/michael-flynn-calls-for-us-to-have-one-religion-sparks-outrage-from-jewish-groups/), and that Jews and others seek to replace white Christians with immigrant people of color (the “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory that drove the terrorist attacks against Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, Al Noor Mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand, Chabad in Poway, and Walmart in El Paso). The thugs in Charlottesville chanted, "The Jews will not replace us." But such ideas are not necessarily espoused only by unknown fringe kooks – Tucker Carlson, whose nightly show on Fox News has one of the largest audiences of any cable news show, is a frequent purveyor of these ideas, as have been other Fox “personalities” such as Laura Ingraham and Jeanine Pirro (see: https://www.businessinsider.com/racist-great-replacement-conspiracy-far-alt-right-gop-mainstream-2020-9) Former US Rep. Steve King (R–IA) and current US Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) and US Rep. Lauren Boebert (R–CO) have also made these claims. Few in their political party, and for that matter far too few in the US generally, have denounced this hatred. The profound silence of churches and “people of good will” is deafening – just as it was in 1930s Germany. 

The great bulk of the Jewish community in the US has long been active in fighting for the rights of immigrants and of people of color. That’s NOT going to change. Nor will Jewish resistance to converting to Christianity. As I wrote in response to the 2018 Tree of Life terrorist attack: 

“We will not be silenced. We will not go gentle into that good night. We Jews will always rage against the dying of the light – for THAT is what we were chosen for. THAT is what we have always done. And THAT is what we ask of God and every decent human being on Earth in Aleinu (one of the concluding prayers of the Jewish worship service - RAF) – to work together to repair and perfect a shattered world, and not let the light go out. 

“Silence is complicity. We Will Not Be Silenced.” 

Hanukkah is coming. We will not let the light go out. We will not be silent. 

What about you?