Shema Yisrael
One year after October Seventh pogrom, Israel is strong and united; its enemies bitter, divided, demoralized.
For the past year the nation of Israel, and its allies, have successfully resisted attempts to destroy and delegitimize it. With a Nazi-style pogrom waged against it, by Gaza-based Hamas and its affiliates, on October seventh last year, followed by a barrage of rocket attacks by their friends in Lebanese Hezbollah just one day later—alongside military operations waged by the Jew-hating clerical regime in Tehran and its proxies in Yemen—Israel has dealt crippling and embarrassing military blows in return, including brilliant and clever targeted operations that, at once, demonstrated Israel’s genius while simultaneously humiliating her enemies.
Meanwhile, on university campuses and public squares all around the world, demonstrators who describe the jihadists as a resistance akin to the honorable partisans who resisted Nazism and fascism from 1917 to 1945 have conclusively exposed and demonstrated themselves to be nothing more than dishonest, ignorant bigots. Demonstrations in solidarity with the Islamists have thus waned and withered, like a house plant bereft of water or sun.
While thousands targeted New York City, particularly its areas of particularly high Jewish concentration (a la Skokie, Illinois), NYC was the only city that made any major headlines. All others were meager, hardly worth mentioning.
Down here in the Rio Grande Valley of deep south Texas, a small ball of students advertised their “week of rage”, in coordination with Islamist-sympathizing groups based in New York, for five days, at UT-RGV, with distribution of digital and print flyers. The event was hosted by the young Democratic Socialists of America and a so-called, “Intersectional Feminist Student Organization” on campus. Out of 32,000 enrolled students, the “activists” only managed to attract fifteen. As the event went on, around ten non-student, mostly middle-class environmental activists, and a couple of mediocre musicians from the local “music scene”, showed up to “augment” the poor fools.
University police had fenced off the area, outside the chapel, to demarcate the demonstration, resulting in the resemblance of a petting zoo, as people walking by stopped to observe the animals, while reclining on the steel fence along the grass. This actually reminded me of my days as a researcher for a primatology course at the university, part of my psychology degree, that involved observing primates (chimps) at the Gladys Porter Zoo in Brownsville.
Thus, it was somewhat sad seeing my old friend, and classmate, Katie Lavallee—past president of the Environmental Awareness Club (EAC) who hasn’t been a student for years—show up to the spectacle. (I was tempted to run a focal test on you, Katie, as I in fact did, I must admit, noting ‘petting behavior’ approximately every four minutes. Be smarter, more critical, Katie. This isn’t as simplistic, not to say simple, as those around you have convinced you. I know you’re better than that and can figure this out. Think about it.)
One student who stumbled upon the petting zoo recorded video on his cell phone, narrating over it, “What the hell is going on at my school…” It seemed as if Halloween came early this year. The masked chums, angry and ugly slogans, the shrill screaming, was a turn off for all who glanced.
A majority of the speakers, including the supposed feminists, concealed their identities with apparently religious Islamic garb, thus giving us: Hijabi Feminism (Fourth Wave Feminism?). It’s not exactly clear how actually religious these speakers were, versus how much (as they might say) “appropriation” was taking place, simply to hide their faces.
Spectators didn’t stop for more than a few minutes at a time, appalled by the fact that the demonstrators were openly in solidarity with the murderers and rapists who perpetuated the October seventh genocide.
I myself didn’t stick around for more than an hour, as the event was actually quite boring, the “socialists” using the language of, “as Americans and taxpayers,” thus becoming—in a real and objective sense—national socialists. As usual, they staged a short march, screaming genocidal slogans against Jewish people, succeeding only in appearing more foolish than they normally do.
Well-attended, eventful, interesting, inspiring were those events in solidarity with Israel and the pogrom victims all around the world. Here at home, I was honored to be invited to a private gathering at my local Chabad temple, led by our local Lubavitcher Rebbe. It was spiritual, life-changing, full of history and learned scripture from Torah, internationalist, and relevant. The next day, at the reform temple, dozens filled the shul to mourn, grieve, but above all to lift each other up, show what everyone had done to push back against jihadist fascism in the last year, to show the internationalist friendships made on volunteering trips to Israel, and most importantly and constructively, to discuss ways of strengthening solidarity and ties with the multi-religious and multi-national people of Israel.
In what country of the middle east could a Hindu and Buddhist live and practice their religion in peace? In what country of the middle east could a Christian or atheist live and express their philosophical views in peace? In what country of the middle east can Arabs enjoy full citizenship, run for office, and vote for the candidates of their choice? October seventh 2023 only made the answers to these somewhat-rhetorical questions much more obvious.
Every reasonable working-class person with any average sense of moral integrity has totally seen through the jihadists, and their apologists, and has come to fully realize that Israel is a democracy and a people worth defending. Victory is the wind blowing behind our backs. Now, we kick back (without letting our guard down) and enjoy watching what’s left of the jihadists run around like chickens.
Please, do not feed the zoo animals.
jonathansalinas@substack.com