A Message for UK Jews

The Labour Party and Jeremy Corbyn in particular did not win the UK elections…but it was close…damn close…too close.

Labour gained 28 seats, which is a victory in itself, but they are not in control. Not yet. This morning in the UK is very different than it was yesterday. It has to be. I’m not in the UK; I don’t live there. I visited a few times and thought it an extremely beautiful country. The train from London to Manchester took way longer than a flight would have, but I marveled at the rolling green land, so different than my beloved Israel. Different, natural beauty – different than Israel but amazing. I prayed for rain while I was in England. Much to the annoyance of the Brits, for nearly all of the 6 days I was there, I got what I wanted.

England was an easy place to visit. So much easier than Italy, where I could find very few people who spoke English. Easier than Germany and Poland because I didn’t feel that I was walking on Jewish blood. Easier than India because I didn’t have any problems finding kosher food and other Jews to make me feel less alone.

England was sent a message yesterday; and sent a message as well. The Conservative party won in seats and votes, but lost 11 places in the Parliament. A stunning victory by Labour puts them at 259, a gain of 28 and puts Jeremy Corbyn within striking distance of the Prime Minister’s office. Not this time, but maybe next time.

If you are a Jew in Britain and you are not looking for your own “Brexit,” you are making an appalling and perhaps even costly mistake. Read that sentence again. Does it scare you – it should. It frightens me. But what you’ll find, if you search deep in your heart, is that it may annoy you, but you can’t quite deny it, can you?

When I was in Golders Green, I saw many beautiful homes, with magnificent cars that would get my sons talking for hours, taking pictures, and gawking. And in many of the cases, if not all, what you would find, is a mezuzah on the door of that lovely home.

And each time I noticed it, I fought the urge to knock on the door and beg them to move to Israel. Sell your Jaguar and come home. But Israel isn’t home to the people in Golders Green – not yet.

And so I have no message for the British people, no words of consolation. It’s too soon after the last terror attack to rub in the agony by telling you that this is what it was like in Israel 20 years ago – bombs exploding so often we couldn’t heal from one attack before there was another.

We responded then – and the world condemns us for it. They call us apartheid despite the huge numbers of Arabs you can find in every university, working in every hospital, in our Knesset and on all our streets. The only apartheid that takes place in Israel is in Arab areas, where Jews are legally not allowed to go for fear of being attacked, stoned, stabbed, lynched (as has happened many times).

We responded then and now – by putting guns on our streets in capable hands that know when and how to take out a threat in seconds, certainly not in 8 minutes.

We responded then and now – by profiling so that we catch guns and knives, not perfumes and toothpaste. We search young men who ring the suspicion bell we all carry in our heads, rather than women like my 80-year-old mother sitting in a wheel chair, who was recently ordered to stand, take off her open sandals with the dainty heel, and spread her arms to be frisked. How many Jewish Israel great grandmothers have blown up planes? So long as you search great grandmothers in their 80s, men such as the Manchester bomber and the London Bridge rammers and stabbers will go free.

But that is something England has to decide for themselves. And I will tell you that they already have, just not openly and obviously, as Israel does. Try standing in a security line in Heathrow in the middle of a planeload full of passengers that just flew in from India. As an American and Israeli, I was asked two or three questions, wished a pleasant stay in England and sent on my way, while men and women from India were subjected to 10 minute cross-examinations lest they plan to stay and work illegally in England. When are you leaving? How long are you staying? Where are you going? Who do you know in England? What do you do for a living?

No profiling? Hogwash. England profiles today – just for money and not for life.

In the coming years, thanks to this election and the trend to which this hints, England will be facing two things in the future – more attacks like Manchester and the London Bridge, and some very tough choices about how they will have to respond.

This too is something that England will have to think about. But I want to speak to the Jews of England today. You wake in shock this morning to a day you probably prayed would never come. But it has.

You are safe today. It hasn’t started…yet.

Don’t wait until it does.

7 thoughts on “A Message for UK Jews”

  1. Paula, I strongly agree with your main thesis.

    I just want to point out that in several places “England” should be “UK”–these were the UK general elections (Scotland, Wales, and N. Ireland also voted). Plus there’s no apostrophe in “Golders Green” 🙂

    1. Paula R. Stern

      thank you…I’ll correct it above…and I loved Golders Green…the people were amazing. I wish them health, safety, prosperity.

  2. Hahaha. MRs May vote with Obama in 2016 december. Now is the fee! She will feel like any israeli. With the spade allways at her neck. The first moment of weakness and she is done, with new elections in 2018! Congratulations for your vote with Obama! Corbyn friends shows you mrs. May, your hypocrisy condemning Israel,s democracy and security management. Your lack of actions, indulgence with terrorism when happened with jews, your eyes wishing not to see that terrorism is terrorism and there is only one way, fight it. Like a predator corbin will be allways behind you, untill you decide to fight. But you wont! You wont joint Israel letting her fight alone hamas and plo. Do I Wish you luck? No. You deserved!

  3. Norman_In_New_York

    British voters faced a no-win choice between an incompetent and a lunatic. Will the political establishment there get its act together? I’m not holding my breath.

  4. Jeff, You may be right to condemn Tory racism (though it isn’t as high as you think), but you have clearly bveen out of the UK for too long now. The Labour Party (for which I used to vote, as did most British Jews) is deeply anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist. It is a far-left party now and follows many decades of Soviet-inspired anti-Zionism (that first grew within the Youth Wing of the Liberal Democrats, though the Lib Dems as a whoile are not as bad as that). Read Dave Rich’s well researched ‘The Left’s Jewish Problem’, which was pubished last year. I strongly recommend it. The Tory government signed up to trhe IHRA definition of anti-Semitism. Corbyn would never have done so. It is worth adding that Corbyn has for many years been a supporter of terrorists – first the IRA, whose atrocities he refused many times to condemn, then Hamas and Hizullah. He appdeared regularly at anti-Israel demos by al-Quds Day (run by Hamas-funding Friends of al-Aqsa), chaired the anti-Israel Stop the War Coalition, met with Hamas leaders in Gaza. He is surrounded by acolytes who strongly share those views, many thousands of them. I am not a Tory, but I had hoped for a better Tory win in order to guarantee a strong anti-radical and anti-terrorist raft of legislation. That will not happen now.

  5. The Tories ran a very flawed campaign that flopped big time. They need to get a smart and energetic person to replace May. Perhaps they will be able to reverse some of Labour’s gains.

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