This article is not intended as a platform for politics and whatever your view of the current State of Israel, let’s put that aside for a moment. For despite your opinion of the actions of the State of Israel, there is one overarching factor that should not be up for sale.
I visited America a few years ago and was struck by the men and women that work at passport control. So you don’t have to smile, that’s okay. You don’t have to wish me well or slap me on the back or give me a slither of your mother’s home made fruit flan, that’s fine. But you don’t have to ask me that question. You don’t have to be so unwelcoming, especially not at the very moment that I arrive. I don’t need to be challenged, when meeting the very first American on their soil, the first conversation that I have with an actual government official, asks me when I am leaving!!! That’s the first thing they need to know??? What ever happened to the art of hospitality? Imagine if I did that whenever anyone came into my home, before they stepped foot into the doorway, before allowing them to bring their bags inside, I would coldly ask them when they are leaving. It’s not exactly polite is it?
The truth is that they are reminding me of a very basic fact: I don’t belong there, I am not an American. Yes I can come and visit and look at the beauty and industry that the USA has to offer, I can behold the cultural splendour of all that it has to propose, but then I must go back to where I came from. I am merely passing through. I do not belong.
I think we can all agree that wherever you are in the world, there is no place like home. For within that hallowed sanctuary I am always wanted and within its walls I am comfortable, necessary and at peace. As John le Carre once said “Home's where you go when you run out of homes.”
And yet, for a Jew, where is their home? Where is that place that calms us at the end of a long day? Where is the place where we can find acceptance, regardless of who you are and what you may think? Where is that place where you don’t have to be afraid of anyone? Where things just make sense to you? Where you aren’t being asked to leave as soon as you arrive? Where is that place that a Jew calls home?
According to Wikipedia, there are 119 countries in the world that have 50% or more of its population who are Christian. There are around 50 Muslim countries in the same proportions and approximately eight for Buddhist countries. There is one country for the Jews. Israel. The next nearest is America where less than 5% of the population is Jewish. There is only one home for Jews, and that has always been Israel.
There are some who question Jews having a place in this world to call home, some who feel that they don’t deserve that basic human right, that Jews have wandered for so many years, they will find a place of their own one day, just not today, not now.
Many years ago I ripped the following letter out of the Jerusalem Post newspaper, written by Evelyn Toch, Jerusalem. It made such an impression on me and it still does to this day. I think it sums things up perfectly:
When I was a little girl of seven in Vienna, Hitler's soldiers entered Austria. Soon after, on my way home from school one day, a gang of teenagers threw stones at me, calling me a "dirty Jew". The policeman, from whom I sought help, as I had been taught by my parents, not only did he not rescue me, but egged the boys on shouting "We want these dirty Jews out of Austria".
I was among the lucky ones who escaped with my life, though little else
After wandering the world most of my life, I came to Israel in 1975 to find my homeland. Thousands of years ago, my forefather Abraham dug a well where Beersheva now stands. He also purchased land from the Hittites to bury his wife Sarah. Later he and his descendants were buried there, in the Machpela Cave Hebron.
Now that I am 70 years old, gangs of teenagers again throw stones at me. This time they are Palestinian and they shout "Go back from where you came from, this is our land"
Where shall I go now?
