AN OPEN LETTER TO EUROPE

From That Damn Jew

Dear Europe,

It’s me.

That damn Jew.

You know the one.

The Jew who apparently failed to understand the arrangement.

I was supposed to be historical.

A photograph.

A memorial.

A museum exhibit.

A brass plaque embedded in a European sidewalk explaining that a Jewish family once lived there before somebody thoughtfully relieved them of their home, business, possessions, citizenship, dignity, and eventually their lives.

That Jew, Europe apparently understands.

That Jew is wonderfully convenient.

Dead Jews are so much easier to love.

But unfortunately for you, I am very much alive.

Worse, I live in Judea and Samaria.

Yes.

Judea.

I realize the name presents certain branding difficulties.

You would presumably prefer somewhere called “Jew-Free-ia,” because then your foreign ministries could explain the situation without tripping over 3,000 years of Jewish history sitting inconveniently in the bloody name.

But there I am.

A Jew.

Living in Judea.

The scandal practically writes itself.

And apparently I have committed another unforgivable offense:

I build things.

A home.

A family.

A community.

A career.

A country.

I know.

Outrageous.

Europe spent centuries asking, “Why don’t the Jews go somewhere else?”

Then the Jews went home.

Europe immediately convened a committee to discuss why the Jews should go somewhere else.

You cannot make this stuff up.

Apparently Jews are allowed to live almost anywhere except the place where Jewish civilization actually began.

Rome? Certainly.

Berlin? Wonderful.

Paris? Magnifique.

London? Splendid.

Hebron?

CALL THE UNITED NATIONS.

A JEW HAS APPEARED.

Someone alert Brussels.

Perhaps schedule an emergency session between lunch and the next strongly worded statement.

Because I am that damn Jew.

The Jew who survived.

Not personally every massacre, obviously. Even Jewish mothers don’t expect that level of multitasking.

I mean the Jew who exists because generations before me survived expulsions, pogroms, ghettos, massacres, rape, confiscation, humiliation and the periodic European discovery that blaming Jews was considerably easier than fixing Europe’s own problems.

And somehow we kept coming back.

You burned our books.

We wrote more.

You destroyed our synagogues.

We built more.

You expelled us.

We rebuilt communities.

You murdered us.

We had children.

You tried turning Jewish civilization into archaeology.

So we turned archaeology back into civilization.

That must be absolutely infuriating.

Because now I am something Europe historically had considerable trouble processing:

A Jew who doesn’t need permission.

I don’t need your protection.

I don’t need your certificate of tolerance.

I don’t need a royal decree allowing me to remain until the next monarch changes his mind.

And I certainly don’t need some European bureaucrat who couldn’t locate Shiloh on a map explaining where Jews may live in the Land of Israel.

I am that damn Jew with citizenship.

That damn Jew with political power.

That damn Jew whose children speak Hebrew.

That damn Jew whose holidays follow the agricultural rhythms of the land his ancestors described thousands of years ago.

That damn Jew whose soldiers wear the Star of David openly rather than hiding it beneath their shirts.

And yes:

That damn Jew with an army.

That seems to be the part that really changed the relationship.

For centuries, everyone became remarkably courageous when the Jew couldn’t fight back.

Now Israel possesses one of the world’s capable militaries, and suddenly Jewish self-defense has become a terribly complicated philosophical subject.

Fascinating.

The lesson I inherited from Jewish history is not “destroy everybody before they destroy you.”

It is something far more inconvenient:

Never again will Jewish survival depend entirely upon the goodwill of other nations.

That is what Never Again means to me.

Not revenge.

Not conquest.

Not some suicidal fantasy about dragging civilization into oblivion.

Sovereignty.

Deterrence.

Strength.

Responsibility.

And the absolute refusal to stand defenseless while somebody debates whether murdering Jews technically qualifies as terrorism depending upon the perpetrator’s “context.”

We’ve tried defenselessness.

The reviews were poor.

So when Europe threatens sanctions because Jews build homes in Judea and Samaria, forgive me if I don’t collapse dramatically onto the floor.

Sanction me.

Boycott me.

Issue statements.

Hold conferences.

Print reports.

Create another committee.

Perhaps establish a Special European Subcommittee for Deeply Concerned Facial Expressions.

I will somehow endure.

Because here is the thing you still don’t understand:

I don’t desperately need you to like me.

That may be the greatest Jewish revolution of all.

For centuries Jews had to worry about whether the king liked us.

Whether the bishop tolerated us.

Whether the government protected us.

Whether the neighbors had suddenly decided that today’s economic problem was probably caused by Moshe.

Whether the mob was coming Tuesday or Thursday.

I refuse to live like that.

I am not applying for European approval.

My Zionism is not a popularity contest.

My Jewish identity is not awaiting ratification from Brussels.

And my connection to Judea does not become imaginary because somebody discovered the phrase “international community.”

I know hatred is a powerful word.

So let me be precise.

I despise the arrogance of governments that lecture Jews about where Jews may live while standing on a continent where Jewish neighborhoods were emptied with terrifying efficiency.

I despise politicians who photograph themselves solemnly at Holocaust memorials and then treat Jewish vulnerability as the preferred political arrangement.

I despise the ritual in which murdered Jews receive flowers while armed Jews receive condemnations.

I despise antisemitism wearing a necktie and carrying a diplomatic credential.

And I particularly despise the expectation that Jews must demonstrate our morality by volunteering to become weaker.

No.

Absolutely not.

I honor women.

I despise rapists.

I despise terrorists.

I despise political movements that glorify murderers.

I despise liars who rewrite Jewish history because acknowledging Jewish indigeneity makes their fashionable colonial narrative considerably harder to sell.

And I have absolutely no intention of apologizing because Jewish survival eventually became Jewish power.

You wanted the Jew wandering.

I came home.

You preferred the Jew defenseless.

I learned to defend myself.

You were comfortable with Jewish history.

I became Jewish history.

You wanted Jewish memory.

I chose Jewish sovereignty.

You wanted the Jew at the museum.

I moved to Judea.

That is the problem, isn’t it?

The Jew escaped the display case.

He learned Hebrew.

He planted vineyards.

He built universities.

He founded companies.

He developed technology.

He elected governments.

He raised an army.

He built a country.

And somewhere in a European foreign ministry, somebody is still trying to determine how this happened without first obtaining written authorization.

So allow me to save you the investigation.

Zionism happened.

The Jewish people stopped requesting permission to exist.

And I am its thoroughly inconvenient result.

I am that damn Jew.

Alive.

Successful.

Armed with sovereignty.

Living in the Judean hills.

Building.

Working.

Praying.

Voting.

Arguing.

Laughing.

Raising the next generation of equally inconvenient Jews.

And when you threaten me with a boycott because I refuse to disappear from my ancestral homeland, understand just how badly you’ve misunderstood the situation.

My grandparents’ generations had to wonder what Europe would do to the Jews.

My generation gets to decide what Jews will do for ourselves.

That difference is called Israel.

You may condemn it.

You may sanction it.

You may boycott it.

You may produce enough diplomatic paperwork to deforest Belgium.

But you cannot reverse it.

Because the Jew you were accustomed to dealing with is gone.

In his place stands a Jew with a country.

And this damn Jew isn’t going anywhere.

עם ישראל חי.

Am Yisrael Chai.