OPINION: A month of depravity, despair and heartbreak
One month after 7 October, there's still barely time to catch your breath until the next horror unfolds in this immeasurably dark and ghastly episode, writes Rebecca Simon.
7 October.
Calamity. An earthquake. A seismic shift in the tectonic plates of our world order. A day of unspeakable horrors piercing our hearts, followed by a month where the aftershocks refused to subside or lose any of their potency.
They just keep on coming. Wave after wave after wave after wave.
Relentless and all consuming.
It started with news of the murders, shootings at close range. Shootings with automatic rifles. Indiscriminate.
More gruesome details emerged; Pregnant women mutilated. Stabbings. Burnings. Decapitations. Wanton destruction. The babies. Massacred. It went on, the rapes and blood-stained pants. The music festival – youthful, shiny haired, beautiful people – dancing and high, ecstasy at sun-rise, a new day dawning. But not for them. For them it was the end. Gunned down, in their hundreds.
Their hope and energy buried forever.
Hostages. Very young, very old, very innocent. Some of the party goers, kidnapped.
The numbers kept pouring in. Including babies.
More hostages than even in Israel’s most hideous nightmares.
The kibbutzim. Green and lush, modest and peace-loving. Whole families murdered. Now Empty. Burnt. Black. Pools of blood.
Thousands of rockets fired. War declared.
Unfathomable terror, horror, shock and grief. 1,400 brutally slaughtered. Never forget. How could we?
The world took a brief moment to gasp, before uncomfortably quickly taking a breath.
Tourists leave, kids on their gap years leave. Israelis across the world return to join the fight. The need to do something. So we fundraise and create Amazon lists and donate anything that can be donated. Bullet proof vests for the soldiers, nappies for the kids, clothes for the displaced. 200,000 Israelis displaced.
And a different battle ground emerges. The war of words. Language selected – militants, freedom fighters. But not terrorists. Killed not murdered. Incursions not massacres. Language contorted, moral equivocations drawn. False reporting. Write an angry letter. Rant and rage.
Never forget? How can you have already forgotten?
No news of the hostages. Are they alive?
Posters of the hostages are put up, and then torn down. And then put up again. And then torn down, again. And again.
A social media tsunami – misinformation, disinformation, propaganda. Scrolling. Posting. Sharing. Hashtags. Too much to keep up with. Can’t see everything, although so many images that can’t be unseen, that beggar belief, that soil our already fragile souls.
We rally and hold vigils. And pray and cry. But our gatherings are small, they pale into insignificance compared to tens of thousands chanting “From the river to the sea!”, displaying placards hoping for a cleaner world with Israel confined to the dustbin of former nations.
Demonstrations, week after week after week after week.
Gaza. Air strikes. The retributions. The Israeli politics. The geopolitics.
Clash of civilisations? Could be.
The scourge of antisemitism, that ancient old mass-market appeal racism which many can easily get on board with, rears it’s ugly, but oddly attractive, head.
Jewish school kids told to take their blazers off. Kippot off. Stars of David hidden.
Parent WhatsApp groups panickily debating whether to send their kids to school at all. But for the most part we do, because we don’t really believe something could happen in this country, do we?
Security heightened. Police, CST, parent volunteers all manning the gates, closely guarding our next generation – but we suspect we can’t really protect them from all this.
Back to the hostages. Mothers make speeches pleading with anyone who can help secure their return, but who is listening?
Installations appear in Tel Aviv, Hollywood, London, New York. Empty high-chairs at empty Shabbat tables.
We light blue candles.
The posters go up and get ripped down again.
More rockets. Stockpile estimates as high as half a million. Rockets fired relentlessly. No longer newsworthy but they continue to come. Israelis going back and forth to bomb shelters and ‘safe’ rooms. Friends and family in Israel are reeling – the incessant noise, high-alert, traumatised kids and teenagers sleeping in their parents’ beds.
Hezbollah rubs its hands and fires up its guns. More reserves, more fundraising, more displacement.
But we’re only getting started on antisemitism; dust off your yellow stars, this bout is sticking around. And really finding form in university campuses across the world. Once lauded institutions now guided by extreme activism, perversions of history, identity politics, unrecognisable and irreconcilable world views intimidating Jews scuttling across the college green.
Scholarly, nuanced, compassionate leadership, conspicuously absent.
The middle ground, the sacred space where debate and dialogue thrive, gone. Sucked into a vortex of hate and fear. One side or another. Starkly binary in a non-binary world.
Can’t watch the news anymore, but we can’t stop either. The slogans; Human shields, Collective responsibility, collective punishment, War crimes, Humanitarian crimes, Genocide.
Airstrikes continue. Death toll in Gaza rises.
Four hostages released. A small mercy. Too small.
More posters go up. More posters are torn down.
Calls for a ceasefire. Who? Israel? What about Hamas?
Maybe the UN could ask them to surrender and stop hiding among their own people?
Or ask Iran to stop funding them?
Or Qatar to stop hosting them?
Or Egypt to help defeat them?
Or Saudi Arabia to get involved if we send our football teams to their World Cup?
No?
The complex geo politics largely absent in the blame game when there is a such an effective cause celebre and easy to identify perpetrator.
The list isn’t finished but who can go on anymore?
There is barely time to catch your breath, when the next horror unfolds in this immeasurably dark and ghastly episode and our broken heart emojis get posted and posted and posted.
Our thumbs ready to express solidarity and pain and sorrow in an instant. On repeat.
A month of depravity, despair and heartbreak.
Antisemitic incidents continue to rise.
Air strikes continue. Death tolls rise.
And the hostages. The babies and children.
The posters go up and get ripped down.
7 November… please let the light in.
Thank you for helping to make Jewish News the leading source of news and opinion for the UK Jewish community. Today we're asking for your invaluable help to continue putting our community first in everything we do.
For as little as £5 a month you can help sustain the vital work we do in celebrating and standing up for Jewish life in Britain.
Jewish News holds our community together and keeps us connected. Like a synagogue, it’s where people turn to feel part of something bigger. It also proudly shows the rest of Britain the vibrancy and rich culture of modern Jewish life.
You can make a quick and easy one-off or monthly contribution of £5, £10, £20 or any other sum you’re comfortable with.
100% of your donation will help us continue celebrating our community, in all its dynamic diversity...
Engaging
Being a community platform means so much more than producing a newspaper and website. One of our proudest roles is media partnering with our invaluable charities to amplify the outstanding work they do to help us all.
Celebrating
There’s no shortage of oys in the world but Jewish News takes every opportunity to celebrate the joys too, through projects like Night of Heroes, 40 Under 40 and other compelling countdowns that make the community kvell with pride.
Pioneering
In the first collaboration between media outlets from different faiths, Jewish News worked with British Muslim TV and Church Times to produce a list of young activists leading the way on interfaith understanding.
Campaigning
Royal Mail issued a stamp honouring Holocaust hero Sir Nicholas Winton after a Jewish News campaign attracted more than 100,000 backers. Jewish Newsalso produces special editions of the paper highlighting pressing issues including mental health and Holocaust remembrance.
Easy access
In an age when news is readily accessible, Jewish News provides high-quality content free online and offline, removing any financial barriers to connecting people.
Voice of our community to wider society
The Jewish News team regularly appears on TV, radio and on the pages of the national press to comment on stories about the Jewish community. Easy access to the paper on the streets of London also means Jewish News provides an invaluable window into the community for the country at large.
We hope you agree all this is worth preserving.
