Dear Community,
It is our tree of life. We are fed by its deep roots and rising sap. I refer to Torah, the source and font of resilience of the Jewish People. Today is both the birthday and the Yahrzeit of Moses our teacher ‘who commanded us Torah.’
By Torah, I mean everything from challah on Friday night to deep study and devotion. I mean being Jewish, belonging in Jewish history, sharing in Jewish community because that’s who we are.
I stress this now, in these cruel days, when antisemitism is at its worst for forty years and we often feel bullied, maligned, threatened, intimidated and alone.
The Community Security Trust’s Annual Report indicates a massive rise in antisemitism, especially since October 7, an explosion of hatred which expresses ‘a celebration’ of Hamas and its unspeakably vile massacres.
Antisemitic attacks target schools, campuses, communities and individuals. I came out of the local tube station to hear a drunk man calling out ‘Kill the Jews.’ Ignore it; he’s just drunk, I thought. Then I realised: it shows how the phrase is acceptable, OK.
It’s beyond appalling that university chaplain Rabbi Zecharia Deutsch, his wife and young children have had to go into hiding because of repeated blood-curdling death threats. As Rabbi Ephraim Mervis has said in The Jewish Chronicle this week, these are attacks on our entire society. It is shocking that Mike Freer MP has decided not to stand for re-election because of threats against his life.
I feel for our students. I feel for the leaders and members of Jewish societies at schools and campuses. I wish I could reach out to them all!
I can’t count the number of people across the professions who tell me they’ve been surrounded by a wall of silence, or outright hostility, who’ve felt let down or betrayed by colleagues and former friends.
Israel is cruelly and horribly demonised. Again and again, groups condemn the country, debasing and weaponising the ‘g’ word, often without even referring to the indescribable evils perpetrated by Hamas. (We know what ‘g’ truly means, as Judge Aharon Barak courageously made clear at The Hague). It’s appalling.
I received an environmental journal referring to ‘x’ days of atrocities by Israel. I counted and found they included 7 October itself. I wish that was incredible, but it’s not. ‘We know who Hamas and Hezbollah are,’ an Iranian refugee told me. ‘They’re the people the regime employed to crush the uprisings against the Ayatollahs and kill and put down Iranian women.’ Many here in the UK evidently don’t know, or choose not to.
There’s all the difference in the world between upholding the dignity of Palestinian men, women and children and praying for their safety and an ultimate peaceful solution, which I and countless like-minded Jews do, and supporting Hamas’s fighters, who are the enemies of the entire free world and must be defeated.
‘British Jews are strong and resilient,’ commented Mark Gardner, chief executive of the CST.
That strength is being tested. “When will they leave us alone” is the constant cry I hear from the community,’ commented Lord Mann, the government’s advisor on antisemitism. But our resilience will not be found wanting.
I was deeply touched watching Stephen Fry’s Alternative Christmas Message, strong, clear, and calmly spoken. ‘I’m a Jew,’ he said: ‘I’ll be damned if I let antisemites define me… I’ll take ownership.’
All my life as a Jew, a rabbi, I’ve wanted us to take deeper ownership of that Judaism. I see before me Chagall’s marvellous painting, Solitude. In the background the village burns. In the foreground, a man cradles the Torah, his consolation, music, strength and hope.
But Torah isn’t just for our aloneness; it’s about our solidarity. Through Torah we create community, celebrate life and strive to ennoble our every day and interaction.
Torah is three thousand years of cultures. It draws us together round the Shabbat table. It guides us inward to the depth of the soul. It leads us outward to make the world better for all humanity, all people whatever their background, and for all life.
In this spirit I want to reach out everyone, of all faiths, and say in the words of tomorrow’s Torah reading: instead of hatred, let’s make the world a dwelling place for us all and for our God.
Shabbat Shalom
Senior Rabbi Jonathan Wittenberg
