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Prof. Phyllis Chesler
The greatest poets and prophets always tell us exactly what’s happening and what’s likely to keep happening. Their words seem to be timeless. For example, there’s always William Butler Yeat’s “The Second Coming,” first published more than a century ago, in 1920.
“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold:/Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world/ The blood-dimmed tide is loosed….Surely some revelation is at hand;/Surely the Second Coming is at hand/…And what rough beast, its hour come round at/last/Slouches towards Bethlemam to be born?”
How can Yeats describe so well exactly what is happening in our world today? Mere anarchy is precisely what’s upon us. We now live without boundaries or borders–and I am not only talking about America’s southern border, although, that too, is a symptom of what I’m seeing.
A sense of personal boundaries in public has frayed. Social etiquette in public is gone. Post-pandemic, many people show up in fairly dressed-down, even in disheveled ways when summoned to court; appear at business meetings on zoom; arrive at airports, concerts, and restaurants. Worse: Although there are exceptions, people are so focused on their cellphones, that they do not see each other coming and thus, walk right into others, shove and push each other, take offense.
Too many people are in a permanent rage–none more so than the pro-Hamas demonstrators who’ve been “on the job” since 10/7.
Masked and keffiya-wearing pro-Hamas demonstrators have not only blocked traffic in my own fair city, they have also chained or glued themselves to bridges, defaced statues private residences, restaurants. By now, they are a completely normalized phenomenon.
No one has stopped them.
They are everywhere almost all the time: a yelling, chanting, Jew-hatring mob, disturbing the city peace, interrupting every holiday and public event, harassing innocent civilians, at work, at homes, and on the streets, but especially harassing Jews: Students of course, but also those who are dressed in visibly Jewish ways; Jewish museum directors, Jewish professors, both on campus and at their homes, and as they are dining in known Jewish restaurants.
This actually just happened a few days ago in Philadelphia at a restaurant, Goldie’s, owned by a Jewish businessman. Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, described the demonstration as pure “antisemitism.”
The pro-Palestine protestors trespass all boundaries of civility, just as similar Jew-hating groups have been doing for many years in classrooms. They shout down any speaker perceived as possibly a “Zionist,” or “pro-America,” and try to have him or her harassed right out of their university position.
The other day, two surgically masked young women interrupted CNN anchor Dana Bash’s book reading at the Politics and Prose bookstore in Washington, D.C.. One by one, one after the other, each got very close to Bash, and began screaming at the top of her voice rather hysterically. They were not interested in dialogue. They were there to shame, shock, potentially shut down the event. Here’s a little of what they said:
“You belong behind bars. We know who you are, we know what you’re saying. It’s not a war, it’s ethnic cleansing…You want millions/zillions from Zionists, you want millions from AIPAC. CNN’s Jake Tapper, (who like Bash, is also Jewish), described this “harassment as antisemitism.”
This Jew hatred is an infectious virus, a disease, a mania. Its’ spores have been spread via the media, the internet, and international organizations and and we are now facing a full-blown and very pernicious plague. Always, always, the Jew-hating masses are crazed about ill-gotten gain, “filthy lucre.” The Jews have money, it rightfully belongs to the masses, the Jews control the world because they have the money. Ipso facto: “Kill the Jews,” take their money–and the world will be alright again.
Even worse, they sau. Jews now have Israel and have the power to allegedly commit “genocide.” “ethnic cleansing,” impose mass starvation on the helpless, innocent Hamas terrorists and the Gazan population who serve as their human shields, whom they’ve terrorized and brainwashed into accusing the Jews of doing precisely what Hamas is doing.
The real problem with the “out of control,” boundaryless, individual demonstrators and with the surging, “flooding,” demonstrations; the large scale looting of stores; the violent, hallucinating mentally ill homeless men on my city streets and on public transporation; is this:
No one–absolutely no one–stops them.
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> Earlier this week, on Labor Day in Manhattan, thousands of fierce and raging pro-Hamas demonstrators occupied Union Square and then made their way uptown to Grand Central Station. A friend of mine was caught up in it. She was due at a meeting but had to jump out of the taxi and try to get there on foot. Suddenly, she saw a group of Orthodox Jewish men about to leave the diamond district and she rushed at them: “There are Nazis out there, you cannot go this way.” Some non-Jews, tourists, said: “You cannot risk going into this demonstration dressed the way you are. Please turn back.”
In other words, dressed like Jews.
The prophet Moses told us in parashat (chapter) Kedoshim, (19-16-18) : “Lo Taamod al dam reyecha.” You shall not stand idly by when the blood of your brethren is in danger. This may also apply to your neighbor and to all human life but it begins as a tribal commandment.
Iran, Qatar, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, the Palestinian Authority, the Houthis in Yemen, the United Nations, the United States leadership, are all spilling the blood of Jews, and of those who live in Israel, whether they are Muslim or Christian, whether they are Druse or are foreign workers. Americans, civilians, as well as soldiers, have been slaughtered by Jihadists. We are commanded not to stand idly by.
The Jihadi Jew haters are coming for Jews in America. Such violent language, such ceaseless harassment, has always, always led to savage beatings and then to bloodshed. It is only a matter of time before that happens in America and in a major way. Just yesterday, the FBI arrested a Canadian Muslim who was planning to come to Brooklyn, NYC, on 10/7, in order to shoot up a bunch of Jews.
Clearly, obviously, we Jews cannot wait to be protected or rescued. The IDF is not coming here anytime soon. They are already stretched thin on three war fronts in Israel. Therefore, we have to take our security into our own hands. What does this mean?
The biggest obstacle we face is that American Jews are not Israelis. We rely on our ideas, our ability to reason things out, to behave in a very civil manner, to pass laws, to bring lawsuits; we pride ourselves on never countering violence with violence. Most of us do not own guns. We oppose guns. We do not “do” street actions. We are classic, Diaspora or even shtetl Jews.
However, our neighborhood has changed rather radically. It has been changing for the last fifty years but post 10/7–that’s when all Hell broke loose, there is no limit, to the Open Season on Jews that is well upon us.
In addition, until now, most pro-Israel demonstrators are anywhere from fifty to eighty years old, with long historical memories. This is endearing, but it will not do.
Therefore, we need to train and encourage young Jews to turn out in really huge numbers prepared to stand their ground, prepared to block seven to ten thousand raging demonstrators, ready to push back when necessary–essentially, in order to protect more vulnerable and visible Jews who are under siege. When necessary, Jewish day schools, yeshivot, synagogues, large Jewish organizations, (as well as our Christian and Muslim allies), need to shut down and send all their students, members, congregants, staff, to augment a pro-Israel force on the streets and on campuses.
More: We need to identify the masked wearers, work hard to legally ban masking at such demonstrations, follow up with lawsuit after lawsuit. (As I said, we bring lawsuits and that’s a good thing but as the saying goes, there’s no point in bringing a knife to a gun fight). The lawsuit route is already underway at the Deborah Project, the Brandeis Center, the Lawfare Project. These masked cowards must be unmasked, held accountable for their racism/Jew hatred. We must tie them up, not with ropes, but in court, fine them for their exceedingly hateful and uncivil behavior.
There should be consequences for disturbing the peace, for commiting immoral, and unlawful behavior. For terrorizing a peaceful civilian population.
Students who return to their tentifada on campus lives, should, as my colleague Dr. Jon Mills has so eloquently suggested, be expelled, jailed, their tuition never returned.
Only then, can attempts at their re-education and rehabilitation begin.
