Democracy 2024: # 41

It always seems difficult to find the rights words on Saturday to describe the current craziness of American politics or other pressing current events. This past week has been especially emotional and it is even harder to put into words any sort of summary or analysis of the past week. It seems like at charged and uncertain times, matters like these might be best left history. However, these first hand observations are indeed primary history.

Still though, sitting in the suburbs, living a mostly comfortable life, I find it hard to really understand what it must be like to be living in Israel or in Ukraine. While many migrants who have crossed the southern border have been moved into Chicago, not far at all from where I live, my life, at least thus far has not really been effected by this crisis. I have wanted to write about the migrant issue and how and it relates to the American political scene for a few weeks now, but other things keep popping up. The same can be said for the fentanyl epidemic that is taking so many American lives and how that also relates to the border security issue. It all seems very distant to me.

 

There has of course been one story this week that has been of most importance. Last Saturday, I was not feeling well and avoided paying too close of attention to the news. Now, the totality of the attack on Israel is far more clear and even worse than I imagined. The scope and brutality of the Hamas attack during Shabbat and the religious holiday of Simchat Torah are unlike anything Israel has ever seen since its birth 75 years ago. I have never been too devout or observant in my religious practices, but my Jewish heritage and identity have mattered a great deal to me for most of my life, perhaps anticipating that such a turn of events against the Jewish people, the most persecuted in the history of mankind, could present itself.

Through it all, Israel survives and will continue, just like the United States of America will, despite all of our angst these days. The sad fact is that last Saturday, more Jews were killed on a single day than any since the Holocaust.We saw "Never Again" for a reason and not it takes on a new dimension. I still vividly remember how it felt in the days after 9/11/01 and this brings back a lot of those memories. Considering the population of Israel, this is more like 10 of those attacks for that country.  Well over 20 Americans were also killed in these terrorist attacks. Other Americans remain unaccounted for and it is hard to envision a good ending for what they may currently be going through. As horrible as 9/11 was, people were not targeted and killed in such a particularly brutal way. Babies were not targeted. Women were not raped. People were not kidnapped. Hamas did all those things and more. They are the epitome of evil along with those who have helped fund and sustain them over many years.

While I am heartened that the vast majority of the American people and indeed all humanity loving individuals around the world understand what happened and who the victims are, I still find it hard to believe that there are so many anti-Israel demonstrations around the world and even in America. Entitled college students from elite institutions, along with their professors, have brought shame upon themselves in the past week. As an American though, I view the First Amendment as sacred and have no choice but to support their right to say those things and celebrate acts of terror, no matter how disgusting I find their messages. The same goes for ignorant people online, who do not understand history, both older and more recent, such as recognizing that Israel left Gaza entirely back in 2005. They are not "occupiers" by any sense of the word. However well-intentioned people might think they are being by talking about "both sides of this conflict" or "the need to de-escalate", they are unfortunately part of the problem.

In the days and weeks ahead, and perhaps far longer than that, many Israeli soldiers will lose their lives. So will many civilians, both Jewish and Muslim. Many innocent people in Palestine will be killed and that of course is a tragedy as well. 

It must be said though that every single one of the innocent people who have died or will die in the Middle East will have died due to the actions of Hamas. Every. single. one.

Israel does not want to kill innocent civilians, but the government that controls Gaza is using them as human shields. They are refusing to let them heed warnings to leave. Other Arab nations are refusing to allow them to seek refuge there. Yet somehow voices assert themselves to blame Israel for the horror of what is to come. They are completely wrong.

Yes, the "conflict" here has been going on for generations and it has always been the same story. If the Palestinians would stop killing people, there would be peace, and they would have their own country. If Israel stopped defending itself, there would be no more Israel. For many years, I have been mindful of a quote attributed to Golda Meir. Roughly put, it says there will be peace when the Arabs decide they love their own children more than they hate Jewish children. The one time Prime Minister is also said to have said that Israel might be able to forgive their enemies for killing their children but they can never be forgiven for forcing Israel to kill theirs. That is the bottom-line of all of this. One side values death, welcomes death, and fosters death. That side is not Israel or the Jews,. However death will come to those who want it and leave others no choice.

All of this occurs while America continues to endure unprecedented and frankly unbelievable events on Capitol Hill. The Republican majority on Capitol Hill is to use a cliche a "clown-show." So much can be written about that, but it seems inappropriate this week. There is still no Speaker. Congress still cannot take action to prevent an upcoming government shutdown or to do all that our allies in Ukraine and Israel deserve to have done for them. The House Republican Conference nominated Steve Scalise for Speaker and it looked like the circus was about to end, but ideological and personal grudges and battles endure and Scalise did not have the votes and took himself out of the running. Now, his opponent in that vote, Jim Jordan "won"the nomination, but it does not look like he will have anywhere near the votes to become Speaker either, and good for that. He would be a disaster. Nobody really knows how this ends and who will emerge as Speaker. There are probably a lot of "compromise" choices, but compromise is a dirty word on Capitol Hill. MAGA forces hate it and House Democrats are not exactly willing to do anything to help their Republican opponents out, no matter how bad the outcome could be for the country. All of this is a byproduct of the rot that has overtaken the once Grand Old Party since Donald Trump took it over and those who know how dangerous he is refuse to take it back.

The Presidential race goes on. Will Hurd, an anti-Trump candidate dropped his Republican bid and threw his support to Nikki Haley, instead of a similar anti-Trump candidate like Asa Hutchinson or Chris Christie. I definitely get that Haley might wind up being the best of the worst options for NeverTrump people like myself but I do not believe Haley even acknowledged that she received Hurd's endorsement. Her opponents would use it against her.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is not officially running as an Independent, instead of a Democrat, as generations of his family have before him. Will the Libertarians be crazy enough to try to nominate him? Cornel West left the Green Party contest for some unknown reason and is running as an Independent as well.Again, all of this seems pretty trivial this week.

The inevitable contest of Joe Biden vs. Donald Trump seems as likely as ever. One recently sat down to answer questions from a special counsel about classified documents and has a son under indictment. The other is already facing over 90 charges himself. Both men are over 75 and often say weird outrageous things (although one is far worse in that regard than the other.) Somehow this is business as usual. Americans like myself yearn for a better option.

To say the least, I have many, many problems with Joe Biden and his Administration and I find him a very flawed person. While I voted for him in 2020 (almost purely out of spite against Trump), I am practically certain I cannot do so again. However, I am glad that Joe Biden, the President of the United States, is standing with Israel. He said many things that needed to be said this past week and he deserves credit for that. I had noticed that even some of his harshest critics on the right gave him some level of praise for the unequivocal way he expressed American support for Israel. I hope he never waivers from that.

The same cannot be said for Donald Trump who in my view, with each passing week shows himself to be more and more of a psychopath. While he expressed support for Israel in a basic way, he has seemed almost gleeful about the attack. He thinks that when he was President, the Middle East problem was solved and Israel faced no threats. Who is he kidding? Trump was roundly slammed this week for calling Hezbollah "very smart" but that is really nothing new. He has always used those words to describe dictators and despots and tyrants. He admires them. He is jealous of them.

While criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been very in fashion in America before this attack (and much of it deserved), Trump chose this week to turn his rhetorical fire on the man he once called a friend and ally. It is clear to see that Trump simply has grievances against "Bibi" because he congratulated Joe Biden on winning the 2020 election and did not do anything to tell Jewish-Americans that the election was stolen (or "stollen") from Trump. As is always the case, everything and anything is always about Trump. He is so vengeful against Netanyahu for the sin of realizing he would need to work with the new American President, that Trump thinks that he and Israel practically deserve what happened. Trump has long used rhetoric that makes it clear that he views Jewisn-Americans as somehow being subjects of Israel and not full Americans. There is a word for that and that word is "anti-Semitic." 

So, as another week comes to a close, I am grateful to be living in the United States of America. There is still fear here, especially because of online postings and rumors in regards to this past Friday, of danger, but the danger facing Jewish-Americans is not anything new. These are perilous times we all live in, but it is far easier to proceed with daily life as normal here than it is in Israel.While I do not know of any relatives that live there my prayers are with the entire state of Israel. For as long as Israel lives, the Jewish people will survive.

AM YISRAEL CHAI