The Big Reveal

Children of Israel Are Never Alone

Hey, beloved tribe.

A slightly belated shavua tov.

A lot happened over the weekend, and last week as well. And there’s no way to sidestep the darkness of much of it.

A 12-year old girl in France was gang-raped for being Jewish. Her family’s attorney, Muriel Ouaknine-Melki, told a French television station, C News:

I don't have sufficient words to actually tell you how much this little girl endured, the ordeal she suffered, the violence of the acts imposed on her, the humiliations, the fear she had of seeing herself die when they brought lighters close to her long hair to try to set it on fire.

I’ve been begging Jews to get out of France since 2017, when retired Jewish physician and teacher Sarah Halimi was brutally murdered in her own home for being Jewish and her known killer went unpunished. Kobili Traore shouted “Allahu akbar” during the act, and afterward declared that he had killed the “shaitan” which signifies an evil spirit in Islam.

Traore broke into Halimi’s apartment as she lay asleep and bludgeoned her with his fists as well as a phone, fracturing several of her bones, before throwing her out of a third-story window.

Not one but two French courts found him to not be criminally responsible for her death because he was high on marijuana. That is: this verdict was declared in a regular court and upheld in its appeal by France’s supreme court.

Now French Jews are heading into an election where they’re facing a harrowing catch-22.

On the left is passionately pro-Palestinian Jean-Luc Melenchon, leader of the France Unbowed party, who has relentlessly gaslit French Jews and dismissed charges of anti-Semitism in anti-Israel rallies, labeling it “absent” and “residual”. He has also persisted in repeating the lie that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.

On the right is the historically anti-Semitic National Rally party, running on a platform of xenophobia.

It’s the rough equivalent of having to choose between Donald Trump and Rashida Tlaib or Ilhan Omar.

Yet again, I beg French Jews to flee the country. The situation calls to mind a tweet by American attorney Louis D. Dice a few weeks after October 7th:

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The other thing keeping me awake at night is the worsening situation with Hezbollah in Israel’s north.

Everyone I trust says a full-throttle war between Israel and Hezbollah is most assuredly not a matter of if, but when.

And when it comes to when, I trust no one more than Chief Malcolm Nance, who very recently had this to say:

Naturally, Israel is being framed as the aggressor despite many months of relentless provocation from the terror group. I’ve found no better illustration of that than this pair of tweets, which includes first a declaration from UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres…

…followed by this response from Haviv Rettig Gur:

Perhaps when you read his retort, you can see why I and so many others adore Haviv.

At any rate, the bad news is that Hezbollah is a far more formidable enemy than Hamas, and as Malcolm Nance warns us, it will not be the only enemy Israel is facing.

The good news is that we have every indication, including President Biden’s stated promise, that the U.S. will back Israel when that happens.

(Please support and vote for Biden, for this and ten thousand other good reasons.)

The good news is also the bad news, because no one in America wants to be drawn into another war. The Jews will be blamed for this, as we are for everything else, including capitalism, communism, rootlessness, statehood, organ harvesting, the decline of the west, police brutality in America, Covid, and even the weather.

It’s tempting to look to the past as a way to downplay the threat of this inexorable multi-front reckoning. Yes, Israel has very successfully defeated several enemies at once at least a few times before. But the reassurance offered by this fact is limited, because everything is very different now. Our enemies are much better funded now; they are much better organized now; their weaponry is much more sophisticated now.

From the marrow of my bones, I believe Israel will still prevail, but I shudder to consider the cost. I’m already so heartsick and I know you are too.

These events are beyond our control. Here’s what is within our control: we can and must fortify ourselves emotionally and spiritually for what’s to come. Build and cherish your Jewish community with all your heart, all your soul and all your might. Support morally admirable and antisemitism-fighting candidates to the hilt. Support Israel to the hilt. Figure out what you’re able to do to help and do it.

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This brings me to what I’m personally doing, in addition to the above.

You already know I have a book club. In fact, I have added a Never Alone Book Club tab to this substack that you can click on to join. I’m told by my mensch-in-residence at Substack that people can subscribe to the club either in addition to this newsletter or separately. That is, if you have no interest in receiving this newsletter but still want to be in the club, you can choose to receive Book Club missives only.

And yet, I’m still not entirely sure how that works. My skill set does not extend to anything tech-related. My wheelhouse includes writing, editing, networking, business development, Jewish enthusiasm and Zionism. But when something I want to do requires even the most minimal tech prowess, I have to beg my husband and son for help.

Luckily my substack guru is going to provide me with a little more guidance tomorrow and I hope after that I will be able to competently address member questions. Please bear with me until then.

But in addition to the Book Club, I’ve also alluded that I have an over-arching plan to combat anti-Semitic ostracism in the publishing world and now the cat’s out of the bag. Over the weekend, a lot of book club members were agreeing that someone should start a Jewish publishing house. And I couldn’t resist revealing what I’ve been holding back until now: that I am in the process of building just such a house.

At this moment, I’m assembling a dream team of Jewish book people to partner with and we are filing lots of paperwork. This includes Howard Lovy, Jewish essayist and former managing editor of the JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency) who has his own great substack here, and Sarah Einstein, author of MOT: A Memoir and founding editor of Signal Mountain Review, who also has her own excellent substack here.

We are founding this press as a direct response to what’s happening to Jews in publishing at this time. In a world where lists of Zionist authors to boycott are circulating among millions of readers (and by “Zionist” they literally mean any Jew and even many a non-Jew who has ever visited or mentioned Israel in a non-hateful-way) and a staggering number of lit mags now have submission guidelines that say things like: No racism, homophobia or Zionism, we will be explicitly and unapologetically Zionist-friendly and we will promote our writers to the hilt. We will also do everything in our power to promote as wide a range of Jewish voices as possible.

I’m also going to launch our own literary magazine in order to promote even more Jewish writers and artists. If substack can support all the features I want to include, I’ll create yet another tab here where you can choose to read that at any time you need an infusion of Jewish beauty.

All these offerings will be fully and permanently FREE — and yet to build them all, we will very gratefully welcome any support you can offer. Paid subscriptions here will be used to support all these initiatives. I will state for the record that I have no interest in monetizing my Jewish advocacy on behalf of myself. I want to have enough to survive and to do this very demanding work full-time and then some, but beyond that, every dollar will go toward our community projects.

Okay, fam. I will be back with you on Wednesday. I love you all beyond words and can’t wait to bring you all the good things that are brewing behind the scenes here.

Am Yisrael Chai.