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Never Again: A Call for Courageous Leadership Against Antisemitism
The bodies of people, some of them elderly, lie on a street after they were killed during a mass-infiltration by Hamas gunmen from the Gaza Strip, in Sderot, southern Israel, Oct. 7, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Ammar Awad
My great-grandmother’s grave was desecrated last week. Her name was Gitale Bernhold. She was a Holocaust survivor from Charleroi, Belgium, and her headstone was one of 85 in the Jewish section of a Marcinelle cemetery that had their Stars of David wrenched off and thrown in the trash.
I didn’t have the chance to know her, but I will share her story. She came to Belgium from Poland in the early 1920s to escape the pogroms — violent antisemitic riots to which the authorities turned a blind eye.
Once she arrived, she considered Belgium her home country. She was proud to learn French and integrate into her new nation’s culture. She was grateful to Belgium for providing refuge from the dangers she faced in Poland.
Her life could begin again; others were not so lucky. The Nazis arrested two of my great-grandfathers in Charleroi and sent them to Auschwitz-Birkenau. They never returned.
My grandmother survived the Holocaust thanks to a family that hid her, putting their own lives at risk to do the right thing. In 1995, they were honored as Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem.
My grandfather was saved by an entire village, along with his brother and their mother, whose grave was also desecrated last week. He often speaks about how — even though everyone in his village knew he was Jewish — he was not afraid when the Nazis came, because he knew no one would reveal him. And across three years of occupation, no one did.
These stories reinforce my belief that local leaders are key to fighting antisemitism, especially in terms of building resilience against hatred over the long term. These stories also show the importance of being on the right side of history; the people who saved my family chose to be Upstanders rather than Bystanders, and we remember their names.
Two months after the October 7 massacre, with antisemitism rising and Hamas still holding approximately 130 Israelis hostage, we all — individuals, organizations, and elected leaders — find ourselves asking questions: Where did we fail? What is our responsibility? What have we missed?
We have the duty to pause and review our strategy, adapt to this new reality, and ensure that “never again” really is now. That’s only possible if we put our differences aside and protect our democracies from hatred and bigotry — after all, persecution that starts by targeting Jews inevitably targets others.
Along with many other Jews, I hoped that antisemitic atrocities like those perpetrated by Hamas belonged to the past. If we can’t vow to prevent such brutality in the future, we have forgotten the lessons of the past, and failed as a society.
We cannot afford to fail, and that requires us to confront uncomfortable realities.
When Hitler shared his vision for the Jews, the world didn’t listen. When Hamas shared its vision, we didn’t listen. We hoped slogans like “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free” were just campaign rhetoric, not declarations of intent. Many thought the Hamas charter was so cartoonishly hateful that no one could really support it. We were wrong.
My children — Ari, 4, and Daniella, 2 — live between the river and the sea. What do you think Hamas has planned for them?
Ari and Daniella spent the past eight weeks running to our bomb shelter every day, several times a day. Each grabs their favorite toy and runs to the bomb shelter. That’s what it is to be a Jewish child these days.
From now on, we will listen — and act.
Jewish businesses, schools, synagogues, and institutions are under threat. My Holocaust survivor grandfather, who is my personal hero, had to witness the events of October 7 and accompanying antisemitic demonstrations in the streets of Europe and America.
By not preventing it, I feel that I failed him personally, and it tears me apart. Never again.
Our world has failed Jews on many occasions, yet the righteous have always won out in the end. We can build a world of respect and acceptance by fighting antisemitism and extremism. This demands leadership, not just nationally but locally, driven by leaders who have a daily connection to their constituents.
If you are a local leader, don’t underestimate your power. If you are a national leader, choose to use it for good. If you are a person who is willing to stand up for your Jewish neighbors, you belong in our movement.
History will remember. Please join us in this fight.
Sacha Roytman Dratwa is Chief Executive Director of the Combat Antisemitism Movement.
The post Never Again: A Call for Courageous Leadership Against Antisemitism first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Incoming US Senate Majority Leader Threatens ICC With Sanctions Over Arrest Warrant for Netanyahu
An exterior view of the International Criminal Court in the Hague, Netherlands, March 31, 2021. Photo: REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw
Incoming US Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) has threatened to push legislation imposing sanctions on the International Criminal Court (ICC) if it does not halt its efforts to pursue arrest warrants against Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Thune, who was picked last week to be the next Senate majority leader once the Republicans take control of the legislative chamber in January, wrote Sunday on X/Twitter that he will make it a “top priority” to punish the ICC if it refuses to walk back its arrest warrant application issued against Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. The US lawmaker also indicated he would take action if Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), the current Senate majority leader, does not do so against the intergovernmental organization.
“If the ICC and its prosecutor do not reverse their outrageous and unlawful actions to pursue arrest warrants against Israeli officials, the Senate should immediately pass sanctions legislation, as the House has already done on a bipartisan basis,” he wrote. “If Majority Leader Schumer does not act, the Senate Republican majority will stand with our key ally Israel and make this — and other supportive legislation ‚ a top priority in the next Congress.”
In May, the ICC chief prosecutor officially requested arrest warrants for the Israeli premier, Gallant, and three Hamas terrorist leaders — Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed Al-Masri, and Ismail Haniyeh — accusing all five men of “bearing criminal responsibility” for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Israel or the Gaza Strip. The three Hamas leaders have since been killed, and Gallant was recently fired as Israel’s defense minister.
US and Israeli officials subsequently issued blistering condemnations of the ICC move, decrying the court for drawing a moral equivalence between Israel’s democratically elected leaders and the heads of Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that launched the ongoing war in Gaza with its massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7.
ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan has come under fire for making his surprise demand for arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant on the same day in May that he suddenly canceled a long-planned visit to both Gaza and Israel to collect evidence of alleged war crimes. The last-second cancellation infuriated US and British leaders, according to Reuters, which reported that the trip would have offered Israeli leaders a first opportunity to present their position and outline any action they were taking to respond to the war crime allegations.
Thune’s Republican colleagues praised his threat to the ICC, suggesting that the Senate should target the international organization.
“Well done Senator Thune. The ICC’s actions against Israel have been outrageous, and an independent review into the prosecutor’s actions is more than called for,” wrote Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC). :The Senate should take up the ICC sanctions bill that passed the House in a bipartisan manner. Standing up for Israel today protects America tomorrow.”
“The Senate must immediately pass legislation to sanction the International Criminal Court,” stated Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY.), chair of the Senate Republican Conference. “Senate Republicans stands with Israel.”
“The Senate Foreign Relations Committee can and should act ASAP to pass ICC sanctions legislation. We waited for months for the majority to schedule the vote only to have them postpone it before the election. We will not fail to act when Republicans are in the majority,” wrote Sen. John Risch (R-ID), the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) wrote that the Senate “should immediately consider the bipartisan legislation passed by the House to sanction the ICC.”
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK) added that Thune is “right” and that “Chuck Schumer should do his job” by advancing legislation to sanction the ICC.
The US has said it does not recognize the ICC’s jurisdiction and rejects the implied equivalence drawn between Israel and Hamas.
The post Incoming US Senate Majority Leader Threatens ICC With Sanctions Over Arrest Warrant for Netanyahu first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Concordia closes its Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies, citing ‘budgetary constraints’
It was announced quietly, wit a small, two-paragraph notice replacing the web page for Concordia University’s Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies (MIGS), along with an unrelated stock […]
The post Concordia closes its Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies, citing ‘budgetary constraints’ appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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Jamaal Bowman Continues Diatribes Against Israel, AIPAC; Expresses Pride in Not Condemning Oct. 7 Massacre
US Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) speaks during the National Action Network National Convention in New York City, US, April 7, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz
In his final weeks as a US federal lawmaker, Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) has continued his persistent condemnation of Israel, accusing the Jewish state of perpetrating “apartheid” against Palestinians, expressing pride in not supporting a resolution condemning Hamas’s massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7, and arguing against the funding of Israel’s Iron Dome air defense system.
During a newly released interview with left-wing pundit Rania Khalek, Bowman reflected on his unsuccessful reelection bid earlier this year. The lawmaker blamed the “pro-Israel lobby” for his loss in the Democratic primary, claiming that his outspokenness about the ongoing Israel-Hamas war made him a target for “Zionists.”
Bowman, one of the staunchest critics of Israel in the US Congress, argued that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a prominent pro-Israel lobbying group, overwhelmed his campaign by spending roughly $15 million to aid his opponent, Westchester County Executive George Latimer. He added that his constituents were stunned that a “special interest” group such as AIPAC “can remove a congressman” by submerging a primary race in a torrent of money.
“Now the world has seen AIPAC for who they are,” Bowman stated.
The stated mission of AIPAC is to seek bipartisan support to strengthen the US-Israel relationship.
Bowman admitted that he did not know much about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict when he initially ran for office, opting to parrot talking points such as Israel “has a right to exist” and a “right to defend itself.”
Bowman said that his opinion on Israel was transformed after he visited the country on a trip sponsored by J Street, a progressive Zionist organization that recently called for the US to impose an arms embargo against the Jewish state. The left-wing firebrand said that the trip — which consisted of a series of discussions with peace activists, scholars, and former Israel Defense Force (IDF) officers — soured his view of the Jewish state, comparing the security checkpoints and barrier wall that separate Israel and the West Bank to protect against terrorism with the Jim Crow laws in the US south segregating black Americans.
Khalek asked Bomwan if his view on Iron Dome has shifted, citing that the missile interception system “shields Israel from the consequences for bombing all of its neighbors, for constantly stealing land.”
The congressman claimed that his view on Israel’s air defense system has changed, arguing that it represents “a weapon to use and continue apartheid, oppression, open-air prison, occupation, and now the genocide” of Palestinians. He said that he regrets voting in favor of Iron Dome funding, and that the missile defense system should only be replenished if the Palestinians are given a fully-funded army on Israel’s borders.
Bowman also criticized a congressional resolution condemning the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7, suggesting that AIPAC authored the document. He dismissed the notion that the mass murder, rape, and kidnapping of Israelis on Oct. 7 was “unprovoked,” claiming that Israel initiated the aggression by enacting “apartheid” on Palestinians. He then lambasted American governors, senators, and President Joe Biden for immediately showing empathy to Israelis, saying that legislators were being “dishonest” and not having a “full conversation” about the Jewish state.
In the year following the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, Bowman intensified his rhetoric against Israel and pro-Israel organizations. Over the summer, he condemned AIPAC as a “Zionist regime.” In a desperate attempt to salvage his ill-fated primary effort, he promise the Democratic Socialists of America — a prominent far-left organization that has made anti-Israel activism a top priority — that he would vote against future Iron Dome funding in exchange for financial backing of his campaign. Bowman infamously dismissed the widely reported and corroborated allegations of Hamas terrorists raping Israeli women during the Oct. 7 onslaught as “propaganda” before being forced to walk back his remarks.
In June, Latimer cruised to a commanding victory over Bowman, winning by a margin of 58 percent to 41 percent.
The post Jamaal Bowman Continues Diatribes Against Israel, AIPAC; Expresses Pride in Not Condemning Oct. 7 Massacre first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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