Visiting Jewish communities in diaspora during the war - opinion

A few weeks ago, I wrote a column in The Jerusalem Post bemoaning the end of the Golden Age for British Jewry, suggesting that it was time for my fellow Brits to “come home.”

Well, this week, I have had an opportunity to see the picture from within, as I made a work-related trip back to my hometown, Manchester, England, where I spent the first 53 years of my life.

It was clear from the outset that the Jewish population here has been profoundly affected by the horrendous events of the Simchat Torah massacres. ( I refuse to describe it as “the events of October 7,” as this does not go any near doing literary justice to the horrific, subhuman attacks.)

The Jewish world unties after experiencing tragedy

Like the rest of the world’s Jews, the sense of shock that Israel is not sitting as comfortably and safely as they thought and is actually surrounded by malevolent, murderous, maniacal madmen bent on the destruction of Israel as its main course, and then, for dessert, all the other Jews it can get its foul hands on, has shaken Mancunian Jewry to its core.

What is fascinating about this real and tangible sense of concern, is that their worry is for us Israelis more than for themselves, whereas when I attended a Zoom event to connect ex-Mancunians living in Israel with their old friends and acquaintances, the Israelis were more upset about how their compatriots back in the old town were coping with the antisemitic backlash.

This was a very heartwarming realization – that we Jews have an inbuilt concern for one another.

The most common comment I have heard is along the lines of “I feel so helpless here – what can we do to help? Anything – just tell us how we can assist!”

In common with many places in the Diaspora, the myriad events of solidarity, fundraising, social media presence, and knitting of soldiers’ hats is a testament to the deep and beautiful Jewish soul that is very much alive and well.This latter phenomenon is a window into the psyche of the Jewish women here and around the world. 

My wife (a prodigious knitter) was asked by someone to knit warm woolly hats for the soldiers as winter approached.

Through the social media efforts of fellow Jerusalem Post columnist, Andrea Samuels, word got out that our wonderful soldiers needed their heads keeping warm.

The wheels of the women’s groups were mobilized and when we arrived in Manchester, we were greeted by bales and bales of black wool sufficient to warm the heads of an entire brigade.

My wife was asked to speak to the knitter’s group, and the local Jewish newspaper called her for an interview about the knitting of hats!

A rather pragmatic and, indeed, generous person (a man, of course) offered to buy a thousand hats that could be delivered directly for us to bring back to Israel – a most noble gesture, but one that, of course, missed the point.

The ladies want to do something to help – they want to be part of the Jewish army, and they are desperate to feel that they are contributing to Am Yisrael.

Kol hakavod to all of them because this is about more than woolly hats; this is the essence of what has kept our people together through 2,000 years of exile and what will ensure our survival as a sovereign nation for the next 2,000 years.

The Rabbis (Talmud Bavli Shavuot 39a) tell us, “Kol Yisrael Arevim zeh bezeh” – All of the People of Israel are responsible for one another. That feeling of mutual concern is very powerful and palpable here in Manchester, as well as in the rest of the Jewish world.

As for the outside (non-Jewish) world, it is clear that there is a stark dichotomy here.

PRO-PALESTINIAN marches and rallies full of hate speech against Israel and Jews, with the regular genocidal chants of “from the river to the sea,” have become commonplace around the country, with the police either unwilling or unable to take appropriate action against the inciters.

Last Sunday, in London, there was a rally against antisemitism, attended by an estimated 105,000 people, including many from here in Manchester.

The Daily Mail, the most widely read and popular mainstream daily newspaper with a readership of over two million, summed up the difference between the two marches with a banner headline that read, “No war cries, no angry chants, just solidarity with UK’s fearful Jews.”

The accompanying article described the orderly, rather somber, and somewhat sad sight of 100,000 people, with a sizeable proportion of non-Jews, displaying their solidarity with the Jews of the UK and the rest of the Western world, who are feeling sieged and threatened by the Muslim jihadists and their antisemitic hard-left “friends” (as Jeremy Corbyn described himself and his rotten ilk). The comparison between the behavior of the two sides was stark and represents the greater picture too.

In 1932, during the infamous “Bodyline Series” of cricket matches between Australia and England, the latter employed tactics that were dubious, to say the least, and well outside the spirit of the beautiful game.The Australian captain famously stated, “There are two teams out there; one is trying to play cricket and the other is not.” 

This is how the Daily Mail presented its position: one side is behaving in a moral and justified manner, whereas the other is simply not.

However, the dichotomy is revealed when one realizes that the majority of Brits obtain their news and, therefore, form their views from the rabidly biased, unabashedly anti-Israel, and thinly veiled antisemitic BBC. The other main news broadcaster, SKY News, is marginally better, but not much.

It appears that no nadir is too low for these journalists. Kay Burley of Sky News had the audacity to suggest in an interview with an Israeli spokesperson that the fact that Israel released three times as many prisoners as Hamas did demonstrates that Israel thinks its lives are more important than Palestinian lives – the old proportionality garbage re-hashed.

Well, Ms. Burley, let me tell you something clearly and unequivocally: in ethical terms, our behavior and moral stance are not three times greater than those of our enemies; they are infinitely so, and long may that be the case. Vive la difference!

Yes, this work-related trip to the old country has been an eye-opener, and while a walk in stunning Heaton Park, with its vibrant colors of green and copper brown carpet of leaves, was a delight and a reminder of the many happy years I spent here, it is a small oasis in a troubled world.

I am looking forward to boarding the El Al flight to the only place where I really feel at home.

The writer, a rabbi, lives in Ramat Poleg, Netanya, and is a co-founder of Techelet – Inspiring Judaism.