Showing posts with label Judean Rose. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Judean Rose. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 27, 2025

Letter of Infamy: When Rabbis Parrot the Settler Violence Lie (Judean Rose)


Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

Last week I addressed the accusation of “famine” in Gaza in a letter (HERE) signed by more than 80 Open Orthodox rabbis. This week, I want to look at the second charge in that same letter: so-called “settler violence.” 

To hear the rabbis tell it, extremist settlers are raining down bloody hell on “Palestinians.” But that is exactly false. Which suggests that the signatories have not at all done their due diligence before affixing their names to what stands as a very public condemnation of Israel at a time of extreme peril for the Jewish people.

If they had done the bare minimum research before signing their John Hancocks to that statement accusing Israel of not doing enough to combat “settler violence,” they would have discovered that only four months earlier, in April 2025, Israeli NGO Regavim had released a detailed report on this very subject, “False Flags and Real Agendas, The Making of a Modern Blood Libel: The ‘Settler Violence’ Narrative as a Weapon in the Battle to Delegitimize the Jewish Presence in Judea and Samaria and the State of Israel”

Regavim, which monitors land use and policy in Judea and Samaria, examined the UN database that is perpetually cited as proof of “settler violence.” What they found was that the numbers collapse under scrutiny, reduced to dust.

“The UN incident list we obtained distinguishes between 2,047 incidents of violence against Israelis and 6,285 incidents defined as violence against Palestinians… once one delves into the list of incidents, the clear conclusion is that the vast majority do not describe violence related to settlers, and certainly do not describe violence initiated by settlers against Palestinians. Among the 6,285 incidents… 1,361 were simply Jewish ascents to the Temple Mount, every one counted as ‘settler violence.’ Another 1,613 were general complaints, such as ‘entry onto land’ during tours or hikes, which do not involve assault or harm. Ninety-six involved legal infrastructure projects carried out by the State of Israel.”

This is the extent of the UN’s “evidence” of settler violence. Temple Mount visits. Land surveys. Legal infrastructure. In other words: ordinary life contorted into charges of violence. And when those distortions are stripped away, we are left with a big pile of nothing.

“After subtracting these cases, only 833 incidents remain, which the UN classified as settler violence against Palestinians in the Judea and Samaria, allegedly resulting in bodily harm and in some cases also property damage. This constitutes only ten percent of the original list, which sought to reflect alarming levels of severe violence by settlers against Palestinians in the Judea and Samaria. Not only did this review cut 90% of the events, undermining the foundation of the UN’s arguments and their consequences, but the remaining cases suffer not only from lack of credibility but also from a disgusting level of false accusation against the real victims.”

Ten percent. That’s all that survived the first cut. Yet these reports, too, are riddled with distortions. Almost half of the reported cases were clashes with both sides involved. Of the rest, some cases of "settler violence" were attributed to Israeli security forces, while others were Arab terror attacks against Jews—recast as ‘settler violence.' Blood libels dressed up as data.

As Regavim concludes:

“…examination of these cases revealed that in many of them, it is not settler violence of one kind or another, but rather the opposite: these are terror attacks by Arabs against settlers that ended with the injury or elimination of the attacker.”

Had the rabbis taken five minutes to investigate, they would have found this information—current, comprehensive, and devastating to their claim. Instead, they affixed their names to a letter built on entries in a database programmed to tell lies. Even the name of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik is invoked, as if to give the letter's distortions a veneer of authority. But the Rav, as he is known to those who revere him, would never have put his name on something so harmful to the Jewish people.

Which brings us to the names of the rabbis, themselves.

As my friend Julie P. on seeing the list of names helpfully pointed out, "Not one is Sephardi or Mizrachi."

Look down the list of 80 signatories. It’s tragic really. You’ll see Schudrich, Greenberg, Yanklowitz, Dolinger, Chernick, Feigelson, Schlesinger—names that could have come straight from an early, 20th century Lower East Side synagogue membership roster.

 



With one half-exception—a single hyphenated surname suggesting a mixed background—the entire coalition is Ashkenazi.

And this is telling. Sephardim, even those who are not religious in practice, are deeply respectful of rabbinic authority and tradition. Watching how they comport themselves in the presence of a sage is instructive. I have seen secular Sephardi women cover their arms and heads with a shawl when a rabbi entered the room. Nobody asked them to. They simply revere the rabbis who have guided their people according to the same traditions for generations. Perhaps it is that steadfastness that inoculates Sephardim against the hubris of lecturing Israel on “moral clarity” while parroting Hamas propaganda without looking deeper at the actual facts.

List of signatories

Rabbi Yosef Blau

Rabbi David Bigman

Chief Rabbi Michael Schudrich

Chief Rabbi Michael Melchior

Chief Rabbi Jair Melchior

Rabbi Joav Melchior

Chief Rabbi David Rosen (former CR)

Rabbi Dr. Shmuly Yanklowitz

Rabbi Dr. Yitz Greenberg

Rabbi Hyim Shafner

Rabbi Daniel Landes

Rabbi Herzl Hefter

Rabbi Shua Mermelstein

Rabbi Yoni Zolty

Rabbanit Mindy Schwartz Zolty

Rabbi Frederick L Klein

Rabbi Yosef Kanefsky

Rabbi Michael Whitman

Rabbi Dr. Jeremiah Unterman

Rabbi Barry Dolinger

Rabbi David Silber

Rabbi Yonatan Neril

Rabbi Ysoscher Katz

Rabbi Isaac Landes

Rabbi David Polsky

Rabbi Baruch Plotkin

Rabbi Mikey Stein

Rabbi Elliot Kaplowitz

Rabbi Ariel Goldberg

Rabbi Ben Birkeland

Rabbi Ralph Genende

Rabbi David Glicksman

Rabbi Dr. Donniel Hartman

Rabbi Dr. Martin Lockshin

Rabbi Dr. Pinchas Giller

Rabbi Avidan Freedman

Rabbi Daniel Raphael Silverstein

Rabbi Dr. Shalom Schlagman

Rabbi Dr. Daniel Ross Goodman

Rabbi Aaron Levy

Rabbi Chaim Seidler-Feller

Rabbi Dr. Mel Gottlieb

Rabbi Dr. Joshua Feigelson

Rabbi Jonah Winer

Rabbi Dr. Michael Chernick

Rabbi Dr. Eugene Korn

Rabbi Hanan Schlesinger

Rabbi Elhanan Miller

Rabbi Joel Hecker

Rabbi Michael Gordan

R. Sofia Freudenstein

Rabbi David Levin-Kruss

Rabbanit Myriam Ackermann-Sommer

Rabba Ramie Smith

R. Shayna Abramson

Rabbi Zachary Truboff

Rabbi David A. Schwartz

Rabbi David Jaffe

Rabbi Steve Greenberg

Rabbi Gabriel Kretzmer Seed

Rabbanit Rachel Keren

Rabbi Benyamin Vineburg

Rabba Dr. Lindsey Taylor-Guthartz

Rabbanit Leah Sarna

Rabbi Dr. Wendy Zierler

Rabbanit Sarah Segal-Katz

Rabbi Shimon Brand

Rabba Melissa Scholten-Gutierrez

R. Emily Goldberg Winer

R. Dr. Erin Leib Smokler

Rabba Adina Roth

R. Dr. Meesh Hammer-Kossoy

Rabbi Drew Kaplan

Rabbi Dina Najman

Rabbi Emile Ackermann

Rabbi Daniel Geretz

Rabbanit Sarah Segal-Katz

Rabbanit Tali Schaum Broder

Rabbi Max Davis

Rabbi Tyson Herberger

Rabba Aliza Libman Baronofsky

At first, I wondered whether one surname on the list—Neril—might break the pattern. I had never heard that one before and thought perhaps it was Sephardi. But no. Rabbi Yonatan Neril is Ashkenazi, and best known for founding the Interfaith Center for Sustainable Development, an organization that promotes environmental action across faith communities. His presence on the list highlights the broader orientation of many of the signatories toward progressive and ecumenical causes, rather than toward Israel’s defense in its hour of need.


 
The rabbis who signed this letter of betrayal may have meant no harm to their own, but intentions matter little here; the effect is the same. That letter was like piling logs onto a raging fire—then dousing it with gasoline. 

History will not remember the rabbis' statement kindly. At best, the signatories will be judged naïve or misguided. Sad, but with tragic consequences for the Jewish people and in particular for Israel’s hostages and soldiers. The rabbis' missive jeopardizes Israel’s ability to free the hostages by emboldening the enemy, who now see that even Jewish clergy can be turned into weapons against the Jewish state.

Buy EoZ's books  on Amazon!

"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024)

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

    
 

 



Wednesday, August 20, 2025

Harmful Rabbinic Statement: When Leadership Fails in the Name of Morality (Judean Rose)


Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

When more than 80 self-described Modern Orthodox rabbis signed a public letter accusing Israel of failing to prevent starvation in Gaza, the result was not “moral clarity,” as the document’s title claimed. Instead, it provided a dangerous boost to Hamas propaganda at a time of unprecedented hostility toward the Jewish state.

The statement, “A Call for Moral Clarity, Responsibility, and a Jewish Orthodox Response in the Face of the Gaza Humanitarian Crisis,” insists that while Hamas is guilty of heinous crimes, Israel bears responsibility for preventing hunger in Gaza. Cloaked in the language of compassion, the letter distorts reality, undermines Israel, and arms its enemies with new talking points.

Jewish law holds leaders to the highest standards of truth in speech. Yet this letter repeats claims that collapse under scrutiny. Though it does not have to, since May, Israel has facilitated the entry of nearly 183,000 tons of humanitarian aid into Gaza. The United Nations, by contrast, reports just 67,000 tons—a discrepancy of more than 115,000 tons. The explanation is simple: Hamas steals, hoards, and diverts supplies, while the UN amplifies those manipulated figures. In fact, since the start of the war, Israel has facilitated the entry into Gaza of almost 2 million tons of aid.



Instead of consulting Israel’s Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), which publishes daily data on aid deliveries, the signatories embraced Hamas-tainted statistics and then presented them as an Orthodox moral imperative. This feels more like moral confusion and cluelessness than moral clarity.



The harm goes far beyond numbers. Anti-Israel media outlets in Turkey and the Arab world immediately broadcast the rabbis’ statement as proof that even Orthodox leaders accuse Israel of starving Gaza. The familiar weapon of “even Jews say” has now been upgraded: even Orthodox rabbis say.



Such messaging hands Hamas and its allies exactly what they need—Jewish voices validating their narrative—while antisemitism continues to surge globally.

Those who hold the title of rabbi carry an obligation to weigh the impact of their words. Their statements reverberate far beyond their intended audience, particularly in times of war and rising antisemitism. To sign one’s name to a letter that repeats propaganda is not an act of conscience but a failure of responsibility.

Rabbis are expected to serve as witnesses for the Jewish people, not to echo the accusations of those who seek the destruction of the Jewish state. At a minimum, Jewish leaders must confirm the facts before attaching their authority to public pronouncements.



The rabbis who signed this letter may not intend to harm Israel. But intentions do not negate consequences. By repeating distorted figures and equating Israel with Hamas, they have lent credibility to falsehoods that endanger Jews everywhere.

This is not moral clarity, nor is it an Orthodox response. It is, at best, naïve—and at worst, a dangerous gift to Israel’s enemies.

Buy EoZ's books  on Amazon!

"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024)

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

    
 

 

Wednesday, August 13, 2025

Staging Sympathy, Delivering Nothing: The Red Cross and Israel’s Hostages (Judean Rose)




On August 12, four mothers—Galia David, Merav Gilboa Dalal, Viki Cohen, and Sylvia Cunio—traveled to Geneva to beg the Red Cross to do something, anything, for their children, held captive by Hamas since October 7, 2023. I saw the story in Ynet and hoped it might offer a reason for hope—something in short supply these days.

I should have known better. It’s Ynet. There was nothing worth seeing in this story, nothing new—only an anonymous Israeli source claiming the Red Cross hasn’t been cruel or insensitive to the hostages. “An Israeli source familiar with the Red Cross’s work told Ynet that Red Cross officials ‘weren't empathetic enough toward the hostage families mainly because they are Swiss and follow protocols, not because they are anti-Israel.’” In other words, they’re just Swiss—wedded to their protocol, not to saving Jewish lives.

The article suggested that things would be different this time. But instead of coming away feeling better, I felt sick at the thought of the false hope that been fed to these mothers who have been suffering so, so hard, for so long—that something would actually be done this time, that the Red Cross would do its job for once, and do something, anything for our hostages.

A mother’s tears are powerful, but perhaps not powerful enough to sway the “Swiss.”

Oh sure, the mothers came away with hope. They think something has changed. Why should it be different now? It was the awful images we all saw, now burned into our very souls, of Evyatar David and Rom Braslavski, looking like Muselmänner*, like the photos of Jews in Auschwitz, skeletal, skin and bones. Evyatar has lost 41% of his body weight.



In the propaganda video Hamas released, Evyatar is digging his own grave. Rom Braslavski, meanwhile, can no longer stand.

It is hard to believe the agonizing desperation their mothers feel can worsen. But those images of their sons moved them to speak from the rawest place a mother can speak, showing ICRC president Mirjana Spoljaric photos of their sons’ faces with hollows where flesh should be. They pleaded for medicine, for food, for a chance to keep them alive until they can be freed. They thought, “Surely these photos will move the Red Cross,” move Spoljaric, who, after all, is a mother herself.

Spoljaric did all the right things—the expected things. She took their hands, leaned forward, and promised to do “everything in her power.” Her expression seemed to hold the right mix of sympathy and resolve, or at least the mothers thought so. They believed they had touched her heart.

But they hadn’t. What they had touched was a performance—one Spoljaric has given before and is almost certain to give again. She said the Red Cross will try to help, but it should be obvious by now that they won’t.

It’s been more than a year and a half since I wrote about the International Committee of the Red Cross and its refusal to do anything at all for the Israeli hostages. Why? They despise Jews. During the Holocaust, the Red Cross knew about the gas chambers and did nothing. They hid behind a label of “neutrality” when they were anything but.

 

PM Netanyahu Meets with ICRC President Mirjana Spoljaric, 14.12.2023 © Photo by Amos Ben-Gershom, GPO

What has changed from December 2023—when I last wrote about this—to now, August 2025, when four mothers, evoking the four matriarchs of the Jewish people, went to beg for their children’s lives, for a bit of food and some medical attention for their sons? Mirjana Spoljaric has a son and a daughter. You might think that would make a difference—that she would empathize with the hostage mothers.

But that would be an illusion. The Red Cross holds no empathy for Jews. This is just a cruel new act the Red Cross has added to its repertoire: dangling hope in front of mothers in unimaginable pain, then walking away and doing nothing. Because we know that’s what will happen.

If you want to understand the Red Cross’s true capacity for evil and inaction, remember 84-year-old Alma Avraham. She was released in November 2023 in critical condition: a pulse of 40, a body temperature of 28°C (82.4°F), unconscious and with multiple injuries. Her family had begged the Red Cross—twice—to deliver her life-sustaining medications. Twice, they refused.

Alma spent five months in the hospital fighting for her life. An 84-year-old woman. And the Red Cross looked away and did nothing.

The Red Cross says it “can’t” visit hostages because Hamas will not allow it. But this is not true. It’s not that the Red Cross can’t help the hostages, but that they choose not to. The Red Cross operates in Gaza with Hamas’s blessing. It runs hospitals. It delivers supplies. Hamas gives them no trouble at all. Red Cross personnel have complete freedom of movement under Hamas—except when it comes to saving Jews.

No. The inaction of the Red Cross is not about Swiss neutrality and a need to follow protocol. In fact, the Red Cross is not at all neutral when it comes to Israel and Hamas. It is aligned with Hamas. It respects Hamas for October 7, for the slaughter, for the terror, for the rape of Jewish women and the beheading of Jewish children. It allies itself with Hamas because Hamas has done openly what the Red Cross has always endorsed without saying the quiet part out loud—hurt Jews, mutilate Jews, rape and humiliate them, starve Jews, strip them of all dignity and life.

It’s always been the same Red Cross—the same body that during the Holocaust refused to speak out about the camps, even as Jews were being gassed, starved, and burned by the millions. Back then, the Red Cross played by Nazi rules to keep its privileges because it didn’t care what was done to the Jews—didn’t like Jews. Today, the Red Cross plays by Hamas’ rules for the same reason—and with the same satisfaction.

Remember the Steinbrechers, begging for their daughter Doron’s daily pills, only to be scolded: “Think about the Palestinian side”? The Red Cross is not a powerless observer. It is a willing accomplice—and has been for generations.

This is the same organization that knew about Auschwitz in 1942 but said nothing, claiming it couldn’t jeopardize access to Allied POWs. Roger Du Pasquier, head of the ICRC’s Information Department, even lied about being “ill-informed.” And now, in 2025, the ICRC’s silence on Jewish suffering is once again dressed up as pragmatic restraint.

When lawsuits from hostage families and groups like Shurat HaDin accuse the Red Cross of abandoning Jews, they aren’t exaggerating—they are documenting a pattern. Seventy-six years later, the Red Cross still finds ways to look away from Jewish suffering while keeping its credentials spotless.

And now here we are, with two living skeletons starring in Hamas propaganda videos, their suffering public and undeniable. The Red Cross says they are “appalled” and “reiterate our call for access.” Appalled? Appalled is what you feel when a waiter forgets your coffee order. They’re not appalled. They’re complicit.

From 1930 to 2006, the Red Cross refused to recognize Israel’s Magen David Adom because of “territorialism”—a diplomatic fig leaf meaning no Jewish symbols allowed. The Muslim crescent? Accepted without hesitation. The Iranian red lion and sun? Not a problem. But a Jewish star? Not a chance.

Even now, abroad, Israel must hide its emblem inside the hollow “Red Crystal,” because the Star of David is still not recognized as a protected symbol. A small piece of metal and cloth tells the whole story: to the Red Cross, Jewish identity is something to be concealed, diluted, and finally, erased.

Don’t be fooled. The Red Cross did not meet with the mothers out of empathy or a desire to save lives. They granted a meeting only because the images of those skeletal Muselmänner had leaked out before the public eye. Some show of sympathy had to be made, or it wouldn’t have looked right.

So Spoljaric staged an audience, then sent the hostage mothers packing with the thinnest thread of hope—an illusion of momentum. Did the mothers really think that after seeing those hollowed-out faces someone would care, someone would cry, someone would save their sons?

If so, that’s not what they got.

And now, visit accomplished, the Red Cross can return to business as usual—the business of aiding and abetting the enemies of Israel.

It’s their favorite thing to do.


* Ironically meaning “Muslim men,” but that’s a column for another day.

Buy EoZ's books  on Amazon!

"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024)

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

    
 

 








Wednesday, August 06, 2025

The Lie on the Front Page: What the New York Times Chose to Show—and Hide (Judean Rose)



Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

It wasn’t a mistake when The New York Times ran a front-page photo of a skeletal 18-month-old Gazan boy and claimed he was suffering from starvation. It was a deliberate editorial choice — a lie that fit the preferred narrative: Israel is genocidal.

Even Fox News missed the point. Their headline—“NY Times' erroneous cover photo… joins series of media blunders”—called it an error, a media blunder. But this was no “oops.” It was propaganda. And the proof is in the cropping.


 

The boy’s healthy brother was edited out of the image. The Times didn’t disclose the child’s medical history until days later, after pressure from Israeli officials. Mohammed Zakaria al-Mutawaq has cerebral palsy, hypoxemia, and a severe genetic disorder. He requires specialized nutrition and therapy—not a ceasefire.


 

The Times eventually tacked on a note that the child had “pre-existing health problems,” but the damage was done. The image had gone viral, a global symbol of “Israeli starvation.” The Times knew what it was doing. That’s why it buried the correction in the digital story and posted it from a PR account with under 90,000 followers—not their main feed with over 55 million.

 

And when real starvation did appear—this time in the form of emaciated Israeli hostages like Evyatar David and Rom Braslavski—the Times’ front page was silent. No photos. No headlines. Just a weak, secondary article headlined, “Hundreds Protest in Tel Aviv After Hostage Videos Surface From Gaza.”



Nothing about Evyatar digging his own grave. No image of Rom weeping, his ribs protruding. Nothing of the horror that millions of Israelis felt—not just a “handful” of Tel Aviv protesters.

As Yaakov Ort, a former NYT staffer, put it: “If the Times had a Jerusalem bureau that reported the thoughts, communications and actions of the vast majority of Israelis… they would have told readers that the reaction… is not fear or protest. It is horror, rage, and resolve.”

The excuse? Mohammed’s condition had worsened due to war. But as Israeli pediatrician Dr. Michal Feldon said, “I’ve been a pediatrician for 20 years and we never see kids looking like this, even very chronically ill children. When we do, we suspect abuse.” Prof. Dan Turner added, “Even patients with background diseases should not be malnourished like that.” In Gaza, it’s not just illness—it’s lack of access, lack of formula, and yes, Hamas theft of humanitarian aid.

This wasn’t bad journalism. It was anti-Jewish narrative warfare—the blood libel of our time, illustrated by a carefully framed photo and a willfully ignored truth.

Because in today’s media: a carefully staged image used to falsely accuse Israel of starvation is front-page news — but the real starvation, suffering, and desperation of Israeli hostages doesn’t make it in at all.

Buy EoZ's books  on Amazon!

"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024)

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

    
 

 





Wednesday, July 30, 2025

No Mercy for Jewish Children. Because They’re Jewish. (Judean Rose)


Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

Imagine you’re a 14-year-old girl, still floating from the final night of Jewish sleepaway camp. You barely slept—you were too busy singing camp songs, exchanging weepy hugs, and saying heartfelt goodbyes. Still, you managed to pack your duffel bag, lug it through security, and board the flight home from Valencia to Paris with your fellow campers.

You’re tired, but your heart is full. Someone calls out “Lilmod!”—the beginning of a silly chant your bunk invented—and without even thinking, you shout back: “Mashiach!”

And that’s when everything changes.

Because two Hebrew words were spoken, airline staff suddenly see you and your friends not as teenagers but as Jews and as it turns out, they really, really hate Jews. Things get ugly. Flight attendants are yelling. Spanish police are called. And you and your friends are forced off the plane, grabbed by the arms, manhandled. Your phone is confiscated. All your camp videos—all your selfies—deleted.” Your camp director, a young woman trying to protect her campers, is beaten, handcuffed, and bloodied in front of your eyes.


All because two Hebrew words were spoken aloud on a plane.

“She still had bloody marks, red, bright red, on her wrists, because of the handcuffs. It was horrible… It’s the worst experience of my whole life.”
— one of the campers, in a viral video explaining the incident.


Jewish Childhood Interrupted

The 44 children from Camp Kineret, ages 10 to 15, had done nothing wrong. Vueling Airlines claimed they were “disruptive” and tampered with emergency equipment—but provided no proof. Meanwhile, a passenger on the flight who had no connection to the camp said the kids were “calm.” The real crime? Hebrew words. Kippahs. A visible Jewish identity.

In the aftermath, Israel’s Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli reported that airline staff shouted, “Israel is a terrorist state!” Spain’s Transport Minister referred to the children as “Israeli brats.”

They were not Israeli. They were French. And they were Children.

"Hide Who You Are"

Another video—less viral but just as haunting—shows a young male counselor on a bus speaking to Jewish campers before they reach the airport. He speaks with authority, but you can tell he’s scared too: “Take off your kippahs. Hide your tzitzit. Pack away your Stars of David and anything else Jewish.”

“Don’t give these antisemites a reason to kick us off the plane,” he pleads.

One small voice responds: “I have a kippah in my bag… What do I do?”

That shouldn’t sit right with anyone. But it did—and it will again. Because it always does.

What Does Antisemitism Do to a Child?

We know what antisemitism looks like: smashed windows, spray-painted swastikas, or the battered body of a handcuffed Jewish camp director left bleeding on the enclosed walkway leading from the plane to the terminal.

But what about the damage you can’t see?

According to a 2024 Stanford University study, nearly half of Jewish teens in the U.S. reported high stress or fear linked to antisemitism in the wake of October 7. Many said they’d stopped wearing Jewish symbols in public. Some avoided speaking Hebrew. A few even considered changing their last names—just to feel safe.

In the UK, a national survey found that 23% of Jewish schoolchildren had experienced antisemitism either at school or on their commute. These weren’t one-off slurs—they included physical threats, vandalism, and group harassment.

In Australia, researchers interviewed Jewish children who said they’d been called “dirty Jews,” been excluded from class projects, or watched teachers ignore antisemitic jokes. Nearly every single child interviewed had a story.

The research is clear: antisemitism doesn’t just affect Jewish children emotionally—it shapes how they see themselves, how safely they move through the world, and how much of their identity they’re willing to show.

Imagine being that young and afraid that your last name is “too Jewish.”

It’s Not Only France

The French campers aren’t alone.

In Staten Island, a seventh-grade Jewish boy walked into school just two weeks after the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust. A group of students surrounded him. They pushed him to the ground, kicked him in the leg and the face, and shouted, “F*** Israel.” No teachers intervened. No one asked what happened. He never went back to that school.

In London, a bus full of Jewish schoolchildren from the Jewish Free School was ambushed by a gang of ten teens. The attackers hurled large rocks at the vehicle while screaming “F*** Israel.” The younger kids screamed in terror. No one came to help. No arrests were made.

In Rome, an eight-year-old Jewish boy wearing a yarmulke went shopping with his mother. An Egyptian asylum seeker spotted his kippah and attacked him. When the shopkeeper tried to intervene, the man stabbed him in the face with a shard of broken glass. The boy survived. The storekeeper was left disfigured.

In Milan, a six-year-old French Jewish boy, his twelve-year-old brother, and their father were surrounded at a rest stop by twenty men. The mob targeted them for wearing kippahs. They stomped on the father, kicked him in the stomach and legs, and screamed “Free Palestine.” When police finally arrived, they didn’t arrest the attackers. Instead, they told the injured father to “tell Netanyahu to stop bombing Gaza.”

No child walks away from such moments unchanged.

A Soul Marked Forever

These are not isolated events. This is a wave. A sickness. A shadow falling on Jewish childhood.

One moment, you’re proud of who you are—your Hebrew, your songs, your symbols. The next, an adult tells you to hide that Jewish star necklace under your shirt, to tuck away your tzitzit, and pray no one sees you.

And the worst part?

They do notice.

You’re a child. But to them, the religion you were born into is reason enough to hate you.

Because They Were Jewish

This was no misunderstanding. It was not a noisy group of children on a plane. It wasn’t even a schoolyard squabble.

It was plain old antisemitism—ugly, familiar, and completely unbothered by the fact that it was aimed at children.

But the kids will remember. They’ll remember the bruises, the shouting, the violence—
and the silence of the bystanders who watched it happen.

And they’ll remember that the reason no one seemed to care…
was because they were Jewish.

The Children Remember

One of the French campers ended her now-famous video by saying it was “the worst experience of my whole life.”

But she’s wrong.

The worst part will come later—when she realizes that even after being humiliated, even after her director bled on the airport floor, even after she hid her identity and was still thrown off the plane…

The world looked away. Because once you see Jews as less than human—and more like vermin, as Hitler did—their age doesn’t matter. Even a baby cockroach, after all, is still a cockroach. And cockroaches grow up.

And if that’s how you see them—what difference does it make if they’re six, or sixteen, or sixty?

They can’t see Jewish children as children. Only as the next wave of Jews.
And once you see them that way, you don’t have to feel bad when they bleed.

So they’ll remember.
And they’ll grow up knowing what it means to be hated for simply being Jewish.
But they’ll also grow up knowing what it means to belong—to one another, to something older than hate, and stronger.
Not all of them will hold on to it. Many will walk away.
But some won’t.
And that will be enough to keep us going.

Buy EoZ's books  on Amazon!

"He's an Anti-Zionist Too!" cartoon book (December 2024)

PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism (February 2022)

    
 

 



Wednesday, July 23, 2025

Why I Don’t Care About the Suffering in Gaza (Judean Rose)


Disclaimer: the views expressed here are solely those of the author, weekly Judean Rose columnist Varda Meyers Epstein.

The war in Gaza rages on, and the images of destruction and suffering are inescapable. Yet, if truth be told, I feel a profound apathy toward the plight of Gaza’s civilians. My emotions are reserved for the suffering of my own people—Israelis, Jews, soldiers, survivors, hostages, and hostage families. The events of October 7, 2023, and their aftermath, consume all my energy, leaving me unable to muster sympathy for those who, in my view, have aligned themselves with terror.

My feelings are instead completely taken up with the hostages and the 895 IDF soldiers who have died trying to free them. Each soldier’s death ripples through our communities—friends, neighbors, or children of friends. We exchange pained messages on WhatsApp: “Another soldier.” These are not faceless numbers; they are our boys, some barely out of high school, others young fathers or newlyweds. Their sacrifice haunts me, as does the moral calculus: is it right that so many die to save so few?

The hostages, too, consume my thoughts. I can’t linger on the horrors they’ve endured—starvation, beatings, confinement in dank tunnels—without risking my own ability to function. I push away intrusive images of October 7, when Hamas and Gaza’s civilians breached our borders, murdered, raped, and kidnapped. Civilians bragged about their atrocities, spat on our dead, and hid hostages in their homes. They voted for Hamas, an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, in UN-overseen elections. They allowed tunnels and weapons under their children’s bedrooms. They are absolutely, 100 percent complicit.

You often hear people say things like, “the majority of Muslims are peaceful” and this always makes me roll my eyes. With what authority do people say this? If such a thing could be quantified, one would have to consider the ample evidence that shows the children of Gaza to be indoctrinated with Jew-hate from birth. They imbibe it with their mothers’ milk.

Do I believe every Gazan is evil? They’re complicit! How can they not be? Maybe some woman whose husband will beat her if she doesn’t vote for Hamas is innocent. I have no clue. But unfortunately, people get killed in war. And this war was started by Gaza. Not only by Hamas, but the people of Gaza, headed by Hamas. And it is definitely the people of Gaza who crowd the streets when there’s going to be a hostage release ceremony. They love to see Jews in captivity. They love to watch them be ridiculed. They love to jeer and spit and grab at them. They love to hate them.

So no. I do not believe that most Gazans are peaceful and neither do any of the polls I’ve seen on the topic. The people of Gaza continue to support Hamas and participate in the atrocities.

Now Gaza is rubble, its people hungry and desperate. Hamas shoots those who seek food or escape. Neither Egypt nor Jordan will take them in. No one will. But my focus must be with my own. My people, our soldiers, my son in the reserves, who leaves his wife and three young children to serve, again and again.

I asked my Facebook friends why they do or don’t care about Gaza’s suffering. Their responses were like an echo of my own thoughts, but perhaps offer greater nuance as well as important context I might have missed.

Avi Perez, 57, who made Aliyah from South Africa and lives in Ramat Beit Shemesh, pulls no punches:

“When a potential Middle Eastern Singapore chooses murder, terror, missiles, and more over prosperity and possibility ... mercy for monsters has left the store.”

Tehilla O., 60, living outside Israel, is uncompromising:

“They aren’t suffering. If they are, it’s self-inflicted. All the hostages are released at the same time, it ends. Simple. They know where they are. Even as ‘civilians,’ they are Hamas. And quite frankly, after 7 October and since and what has and is still being done, they can cry me a river.”

Elihu D. Stone, 67, a religiously observant Zionist in Judea, expresses sorrow but places blame squarely on Hamas:

“I care deeply about innocents suffering the ravages of war in Gaza. The agonies wrought upon families who must endure the predictable and anticipated consequences of Hamas’s savagery of October 7th is absolutely heartbreaking. I wish that the global community would back Israel’s war effort against Hamas whole-heartedly and bring immense pressure to bear… to return all those whom Hamas kidnapped.”

Yael Pedhatzur, 76, from Meitar, Israel, sees Gaza’s suffering as their own doing:

“I have very little empathy for the plight of Gaza and the Gazans as I believe their situation is of their own making. No other country has been made to aid their enemy during wartime. As one who wants complete surrender of Hamas, I know it can’t happen as long as we provide them with food and supplies.”

“Hamas obviously doesn’t care about them either as they shoot their people who take the aid.

“I have been saying this for the last several campaigns in Gaza over the past 15-20 years. No electricity, no water, no food. That’s how you end a war.”

Mark Isser Coopersmith, reflecting on past expulsions, is direct:

“We should be starving them until they let the hostages go.”

Toby Dachs from Jerusalem focuses on Israel’s losses:

“My concern and pain is for the hostages and all the families who lost their sons in this horrific war.”

Batsheva Gladstone, a longtime friend, differs from me in that she makes the effort—she actively struggles to find compassion:

“I have to fight to care in the slightest about any palestinians. I have to remind myself almost daily that G-d doesn’t want us to turn off our humanity. And, if there are indeed any innocents in all this horror inflicted upon the Jewish nation we should try to muster up the decency to differentiate between the terrorists, the terrorist sympathizers, and the victims of circumstance. It’s admittedly a tall order, and sometimes I fail, but I try, and sometimes I can…

“Do I think the war is justified? Yes, sadly, 100%, and necessary. ”

Iris Breidbord Langman questions the existence of innocent Gazans:

“My only concern is for our hostages. The perpetual ‘victims’ joined Hamas in brutalizing our people. Is there a difference between them and Hamas? Show me one ‘civilian’ who came forward to help a hostage and I will care about that person.”

Cheryl Mallenbaum-Ninyo would care about the innocent, but finds none to care about:

“I care about the suffering of innocent people in Gaza. But where are they? (That’s a genuine question.) I can’t help but remember that when Israel offered immunity, safety, and a CEO added financial incentive for anyone in Gaza who helps return a captive, not one single Gazan came forward. So I genuinely wonder: Where ARE these ‘good, innocent people’? (Possibly the exception being newborns who have not yet been indoctrinated to needlessly hate and seek destruction.)

“Those in Gaza (or elsewhere) who support Hamas or who raise their children with blind hatred or who think murder, rape, burning, beheading, kidnapping, mutilation, etc. is justified to “bring attention to a cause” or who hold innocent civilians (and dead bodies) for psychological torture? They don’t have my sympathy.

“If the only way to spread your ‘message’ is to harm others, the ‘message’ isn’t worth spreading.”

Alisa Chessler dismisses the notion of civilian innocence:

“I only care about ‘innocent civilians’ and since we are nearly 2 years with NOT ONE person coming forward to identify the location of our hostages, I don’t believe there are any ‘innocent civilians’ in that sh*thole. So therefore, they can turn the place into a parking lot for all I care.

“My only concern is the environmental impact of the garbage there. It needs to be removed to restore the land back to something livable for Israelis.”

Jan Poller contrasts the lack of Gazan compassion with Israel’s pain:

“We care about a lot more than they cared about the men, women, and children they raped and beheaded.”

Deborah K., a 70-year-old Jew from Scotland, feels torn by guilt but still unmoved about the Gazan people:

“I don’t care about the Gazans… but feel guilty because ‘I’m supposed to/I ought to.’ They’ve been offered various options several times over the years to live there peacefully, refused every time, voted in Hamas, and as long as Hamas are around, Israel is in danger. And Israel has to exist.”


Hinda Rochel Anolick-Rachel Ann prioritizes her people:

“I care about the people in Gaza. I care more about my people in Gaza. And I care more about my people period. They come first. However terrible it is there, it is worse for my people who are being held hostage, and to give in to terrorists will result in greater harm to my people. It isn't a matter of caring, it is who I care more about.”

These voices, varied in tone and perspective, reflect a shared sentiment: Gaza’s suffering feels self-inflicted—and distant—when weighed against Israel’s personal, uninvited tragedy. We didn’t choose this war. They did.

So when the sound of planes overhead draws my attention away from work, my thoughts are on the men in those planes—not the hunger in Gaza. I pause and say a few psalms.

The moral weight of this war rests not in Gaza’s ruins, but in the lives of our soldiers and hostages. My heart holds only so much—and its space is reserved for my own suffering people: those who are chained, those who are fighting, those who are grieving, and those still waiting for their loved ones to come home.

One name in this piece has been changed at the request of the contributor.

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