Survival and Sensibility in Israel

 After weeks of hysterical liberal tantrums against the new conservative Israeli government, Muslim terrorists struck killing Israeli Jews of all ages: seven of them near a synagogue. 

And after a moment of silence for the dead, who include a 14-year-old boy, the demands that Israel make deals with the terrorists, the claims that the government is "extremist" for trying to stop the terrorism, for trying to reform a judiciary that is biased toward the terrorists, will resume.

Along with the protests and official boycotts.

The part of the Torah that the 7 dead Jews in Jerusalem never had a chance to hear was Parshat Bo which describes the final plagues on Egypt.

Pharaoh began the enslavement and genocide of the Jews by enlisting Jewish collaborators. There are Jewish taskmasters to manage the Jewish slaves and even the midwives are enlisted to kill newborn children. When Moshe rises up and kills an Egyptian who is beating a Jewish slave, it is the slave himself who tells on him. Egypt has succeeded in getting the Jews to oppress themselves, to inject slavery into their souls and it will take some of the greatest miracles the world has ever seen to change that.

Yet this time Pharaoh is wrong. The midwives do not collaborate with him. They do not kill Jewish children, instead, "VaTehayena Et HaYeladim." They let the children live.

The failure to collaborate with the murderers of your people should not be a big deal, yet it is, whether in ancient Egypt or in contemporary America, from J Street conferences to If Not Now protests, to elements of the so-called pro-Israel community who had been clutching their pearls over the new Israeli government some of whose members have committed the sin of actually calling for the death of terrorists. 

"VaTehayena Et HaYeladim." Let the children live. Put their survival ahead of your sensibilities.

That is all that is being asked of the fussy American liberals, some who are anti-Israel, but claim to be pro-Israel, and some who are pro-Israel, but not to extent of supporting the Israelis doing anything about terrorism, get out of Israel's way. Let the children live.

Today Jewish children in Israel are being murdered and the liberals occasionally make some weak charade of caring even as they pester Israel to go back to surrendering to the terrorists. Their level of outrage over mass murders like this is far quieter than their outrage at the existence of the present Israeli government or some politically incorrect remark by Israelis reeling from another act of horrifying brutality.

VaTehayena Et HaYeladim. Let the children live. That is all that is being asked of liberal Jews today. 

You have a problem with a state that has to exist by force, don't live there. Someday you'll learn the hard way that every state has to exist because men are ready to do violence to keep it safe and free. Slather your humanism, your bleeding heart social concerns on the whales, the trees, the shrubs, anywhere but on us. Stop pressuring Israel to negotiate. Stop sending money to the New Israel Fund and J Street and other groups whose goals are the ethnic cleansing of Jews from Israel. 

And stop being outraged that Israelis want a government that will fight terrorism instead of gratifying your sensibilities.

No government capable of assuring Israel's future will meet the delicate sensibilities of American liberals.

Israelis should not have to choose between the good opinion of Silver Spring and the Upper West Side and their survival.