I would have liked to have written something funny today. I have a funny story to tell, about how I went to yoga with a face towel I'd clearly previously used to condition tack--it was clean, but it still smelled like Lexol--and how every time I wiped the sweat from my face my face got more and more shiny and conditioned until by the end of class it was as sleek and shiny as my saddle. But then after class I looked at my phone, and read about another hate crime, this time a Jewish man in Australia being attacked in a public park, and it didn't feel like time to be funny.
There's been a steep increase in the number of antisemitic events world-wide, especially since the terror attacks in Israel October 7th, but over the last several years as well.
I'm not Jewish, though I once read on the internet that I was. I can't offer a profound opinion on the current Israeli-Palestinian war or the decades of conflict that preceded it. I don't understand the history or politics well enough. I can say that terrorist attacks are wrong. I don't like bombing refugee camps, nor do I like the idea of refugees being used as human shields by their countrymen. I hate that children are dying.
I love my Jewish friends. I've spoken to a few of them and emailed a few more. My heart is especially with one of my college classmates, who lives in Israel and whose oldest child is currently doing mandatory service in the Israeli army. I pray for that young person every day.
But more than loving my Jewish friends--how hard is that, Jesus even talks about it, scathingly--“If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do that"--I support their civil rights. I support their right to exist peacefully in a global society--and honestly, I think everyone who considers themself a good person had better start doing that, because the last time we allowed antisemitism to rage unchecked we ended up in a horrible world war.
Next week I'm speaking at a Catholic middle school. Yesterday I sat down to tweak my slide presentation--I've got a new book coming out in April, and, for the first time, I'm talking about it. The Night War is the story of a young girl named Miri, who escapes the massive round-up of Jews in Paris and finds herself in the village of Chenonceaux, where Catherine de Medici's ancient castle is being used to smuggle people to the relative safety of Vichy France.
Miri is fictional, but the historic background is true. I made a slide about the Pletzl, the Jewish immigrant quarter in Paris. I put in one showing the only known photo of the Vel D'Hiv roundup, and added another of Chenonceau, the beautiful chateau.
Then I added a slide to illustrate the Nazi's antisemitism. Here's the image:
It was an exhibition the Nazis brought to Occupied Paris--"The Jew and France." You can see the stereotyped hooked nose and grasping fingers--all the old tropes repeated.
My search for my next slide sent me down a particularly loathsome rabbit hole. I'm not going to reprint the image I chose, though I will share it with the students I talk to. It features the same type of hooked-nose grasping cartoon figure, and then it accuses Jews of a surprising number of things, including feminism and hate crime laws--good job, Jews! Where do we thank you?--also climate change, communism, the lack of a wall on our Mexican border, and everyone's old favorite, usury. You know why Jews are accused of usury, which is the charging of too much interest? It dates back to the middle ages, when Catholics were forbidden by the Pope to charge any interest at all on loans. This meant that Catholics, which were the only type of Christian we had back then, couldn't be bankers, or at least not successful ones. At the same time, most countries had laws saying Jews couldn't own land or be in craft guilds. So--Jews became bankers. And then, if you're rich and powerful, and you've borrowed a bunch of money and don't want to pay it back---right, make it the bankers' fault. You can, because the bankers are all from a group of people who've already been stripped of many of their rights. See how this works? It's power and racism, same as now.
I'm looking forward to talking about antisemitism at this school next week, not because it will be fun, but because I'll be doing something I know is right. (Pro tip: if you're conflicted on which side is right, pick the side opposite the Nazis.) I know it's important, and I know it needs to be done.
Speak up. Yes, you. Speak UP. Otherwise the bad guys win.
