Coming Out As Pro Israel on Facebook

 This essay is about ten years old. All too pertinent today as it was then.

Today of course is the 80th anniversary of the Red Army moving in to Auschwitz,
and Holocaust Reembrace Day 

 

Hadas Fogel

Coming Out As Pro-Israel on Facebook

I recently spelled out my support for Israel on Facebook. This is new for me. I'm an American baby boomer, and I always took it for granted that my country supported Israel, and that forces infinitely more powerful than I had the job covered. There's another reason I previously hadn't said much about Israel. I'm Polish-Slovak-American, and I am Catholic. Polish Catholics are stereotyped as the world's worst antisemites. Poles suck antisemitism with their mother's milk, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir famously declared.

My book, "Bieganski, the Brute Polak Stereotype," is devoted to analysis of this negative image of Poles and other Eastern Europeans. In "Bieganski" I am very critical of prominent Jewish authors and scholars. I have received hate mail on a weekly basis for over a decade. This messy reality is part of why I hadn't previously spelled out my support for Israel.

On June 12, 2014 three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped. That triggered combat between Israelis and Hamas in Gaza. This conflict dominated the headlines and suddenly, for the first time in my life, I felt called publicly to articulate why I support Israel.

Kosciuszko Squadron mentioned (but misspelled)

 

"Berlin Diary" and Poles Fighting Heroically; Poles Assessed as Not Human; Poles Executed for "Race Pollution"

 A friend is reading Berlin Diary. He sends me screencaps of pages. 

A Pole executed for contact with a German. 

Poles fighting heroically against Nazis. 

Germans saying that Poles are not human. 

If only people other than my friend were aware of this history. 

Alan Dershowitz Lies and Mongers Hatred against Christians -- Again

 Alan Dershowitz is a confused old man, an attention whore, and a dishonest hate monger who kisses Trump's behind. But you knew all that. 

Someone I thought of as a "friend" sent me the article, below. It is full of lies and hatred. 

I reminded this "friend" that Christians are the most persecuted religious group in the world today, and that spreading hate and lies like this is used to justify that persecution. 

I have a lot going on in my personal life so I don't have time to go through this lousy piece of blood libel point by point, but maybe someone will want to address this in the comments section. Fact based, hate free comments only. Resisting the hatred of some not all Jews for Christians DOES NOT justify responding with antisemitism. 

And, no, I do not support any identification of Jesus with Muslim Arabs. Jesus was a JEW. No debate. It's the rest of the Dershowitz piece, full of hate mongering lies, that is vile. 

PS: I'm dealing with life/death health issues and I have been doing so since a medical emergency in early November. It's been two months of fear, sadness, what work can I get done before I die, including work on Bieganski, looking at the will, the card donating my body to medical research, and endless medical appointments and big medical bills. 

A social media friend, someone I liked and trusted, someone I'd known for ten previous years, in the midst of all this, a person who had previously said that she "loved" me, called me "vile" "pathetic" and a supporter of terrorism because I supported Kalama Harris in the 2024 presidential election, and was very opposed to Trump. 

And then the piece below comes in my mailbox the very day I had surgery.

These two communications epitomize  disregard for the humanity of the person to whom one is speaking. In both cases, my interlocutor was a Jewish person who saw me, in the moment, only as a -- what -- non-Jew? Enemy? Catholic? Polish Catholic? 

Not as a human being they'd been friends with for years, a supporter of Israel, someone focused on life/death issues. 

Just a person to bash. 

No, this is not how all Jews behave. No, this is not a comment on a religion or an ethnicity. It's a comment on my own personal experience in the past months, an experience that happened more than once, with others as well. 

People resorting to tribalism and forgetting humanity. People of all stripes do it. To the extent that Jews do it, I hope some will choose to examine this behavior and address it. 

and to Jewish friends who did not take this route, thank you. 

The Dershowitz piece is below. 

NPR and a Published Author Mispronounce Czeslawa Kwoka's Name.

NPR's Scott Simon and published author Lily Tuck discussed Tuck's new book about Czeslawa Kwoka. Their interview was broadcast Saturday, December 14, 2024. 

Tuck, again, has just published a book about Czeslawa Kwoka. 

Kwoka was a child Polish victim of Nazism. Nazis murdered Kwoka in Auschwitz. 

Both Scott Simon and Lily tuck repeatedly mispronounced Czeslawa Kwoka's name. 

As I listened to the interview, I was astounded. How does someone publish a book about a girl, how does NPR conduct an interview about this girl, and never take the twenty seconds of Google search to learn how to pronounce the murdered girl's name? 

ches WAFF a 

KWOK a

Not difficult. 

NPR interview is here. 

A Real Pain 2024 movie review

 

A Real Pain
Jesse Eisenberg explores American Jewish identity eighty years after the Holocaust

A Real Pain is a comedy-drama Holocaust-themed film. A Real Pain was written, directed, and co-produced by Jesse Eisenberg. The film depicts the journey of two cousins, David and Benji Kaplan, who travel with a tour group to Poland. The cousins' late grandmother, Dory, was a survivor. The cousins' journey is an effort to honor her and better understand their heritage.

Eisenberg, 41, plays David; Kieran Culkin, 42, plays Benji. A Real Pain also features Will Sharpe as James, the tour guide, and other tour members Jennifer Grey as Marcia; Kurt Egyiawan as Eloge; and Liza Sadovy and Daniel Oreskes as Diane and Mark.

David is a happily married husband and father. He lives in an attractive brownstone and makes a good living selling ads. He suffers from anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder, as does Eisenberg himself. David takes prescription medication to suppress his symptoms.

Benji is a "real pain" – as in, "a pain in the ass." He is disruptive and socially inappropriate. Benji lives in his mother's house and smokes a lot of marijuana. He has no committed relationships or steady work. He uses the F-word in every sentence.

David's pain and Benji's pain are set against the overwhelming pain of the Holocaust. The tour group members are flummoxed in their attempts to assimilate historical reality. They juxtapose their comfortable American lives with what Holocaust victims endured. They cannot craft a coherent narrative about the world or their own lives that encompasses that dichotomy.

Pogrom in Amsterdam

 There was a pogrom in Amsterdam last night. Attackers were "pro-Palestinian." Full story here.