83 Comments

The world hates Jewish power and loves dead Jews. And now denies Hamas atrocities so maybe doesn’t even love dead Jews

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You do not have to stand alone!

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As the mom of three beautiful Jewish redheads (3,3, 18mo), thank you.

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Unfortunately I don't know how to find this specific section of the Comments, but from what I remember of the article, it seemed like she was empathizing with the tragedies and feeling what those families must feel.

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Oct 30, 2023·edited Oct 30, 2023

Nani, thank you for sharing your fear and pain. I can't stop weeping with you. I will call my friend, a Jewish mother, to let her know i stand with her, that no one should face this hatred. My new lens whenever I hear the words terrorist, Hamas, or Hamas supporters adds their well-earned title: Human Butchers. Period.

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Oct 30, 2023·edited Oct 30, 2023

It’s hard to hit “like” for this essay because there’s nothing to like. Yet it perfectly encapsulates the tragedy of our collective story - Be a good Jew be a quiet Jew be a dead Jew.

It’s not just American naïveté. Israelis too believed they were safe from harm. And we were good Jews - here is more land, here is more proportional response, this time they’ll like us, this time the world will see it’s them, not us. Our crime is our existence and this is an unforgivable sin.

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God bless you for writing this. I have had similar intrusive thoughts every day since the massacre. I’m not Jewish, but I’m a mom and a physician and I just can’t find the words to express how horrified and broken this evil has made me feel. My kids attend elite colleges where pro-Hamas rallies, pro-Hamas faculty, and terrorist propaganda reign, and they worry for their Jewish friends’ safety. I worry for all of them, and I light candles and pray for safety for all of us, especially those still held captive by demons. May God protect and deliver them.

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There is not much for me to say here. It is terrible. The grim reality of this world is terrible, and we are sliding into another dark period of history.

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Good. You at least see the world as it IS - rather than how you might wish it to be. Now you can be rational, clear-eyed - and effective- in your opposition to the propaganda and gaslighting that awaits.

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Thank you for this - I knew I wasn’t the only one who felt this way, but you have so well articulated what I feel. Heartbreaking, devastating these past three weeks.

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Most protesters are people who were not born here, they are from those barbaric countries, they've been raised like this. The colleges give them fake degrees and protection, yeppp called safe places.

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Do you have no sympathy or compassion for the thousands of civlians killed in Gaza ? I am Jewish, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor. Hundreds of members of my family were killed in the Nazi genocide in the former Czechoslovakia. Honestly, I find your article pathetic. You live in the US and your children are in NO DANGER of being held hostage. so why are you whining about the fear you feel for them? I am also horrified by the violence of Hamas' Oct. 7 attack, but I'm just as horrified by the response of Israel to retaliate by killing thousands of citizens in Gaza, as well as depriving many others of medical care. Please , don't pretend your kids are in any danger, they are not.

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Ora, if your daughter had been raped, repeatedly, and then was left naked in the middle of the road, or your family had been tied together with wire, and burned alive, then Grandma was beaten, loaded on a motorcyle and taken as a hostage, and then the perpetrators went and hid behind a bunch of civilians, what would YOU do?

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Also, half of my family actually was killed in the Nazi genocide, in the former Czechoslovakia, hundreds of people. My father and his parents and his maternal grandparents and one aunt were the only survivors. My Dad is at the end of his life, not doing well. After he dies there will effectively be no one left of the Gelleys, a large family with many rabbis. So I'm not speaking here from total ignorance. Why do you talk of someone having witnessed their daughter raped by a member of Hamas when that is so obviously not the story this woman was telling? this woman is living in suburban DC. I used to teach at a fancy private high school in DC, and know exactly where she lives, around how much she makes, etc. I just find it problematic that someone who lives very safely in the US, who must be wealthy if she lives in DC and sends all of her kids to private school, as she says she does, to be complaining about how terrified she is for her children. And yes, while of course I feel huge sympathy for the Israeli victims and hostages, that doesn't mean I will condone killing thousands of Palestinian civilians, many children, elderly people, babies, women, sick people, in retaliation. this cycle of retaliating so viciously has not worked in the past, and has only further radicalized militants such as from Hamas. Why on earth does anyone think it will work now?

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Should Israel just leave the innocent hostages to die? And let the EVIL perpetrators go on to kill, rape and torture some more? What do you suggest? Do you have children? Were they ever punished for misbehaving?

Slam Hamas in self defense and sadly there IS collateral damage to Palestinians. Should Israel just back off and die at the hands of evil? This evil is not going away.

And you are naive if you believe that Americans are safe. Americans are not safe. Unknown migrants are pouring in every day. Home grown indoctrinated terrorist are here. This mother’s fear and vulnerability is justified. My grandchildren in Houston are threatened by this eruption of evil. Our way of life is threatened. We all need to stand up and push back. Sad for the innocents on both sides but there is no other way.

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Unfortunately, that is what they are doing. Obviously, all the hostages are going to be killed because Israel decided to wage all out war. How can you be so naive? Terrorism is wrong and what Hamas did was horrible. However, killing thousands of cilivilians with the arms you got from US funding isnt' going to solve the problem. we have seen that time and time again. Israel is now creating thousands of Palestinians who will do anything to retaliate against all of their family having been killed, and I don't blame them, tbh.

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Wait, was the daughter of this woman raped repeatedly and left in the middle of the road? NO she was was not. Did you actually read the article. ? her kids are safe adn sound in suburban DC.

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The Jews of Germany thought the same as you 100 years ago. You have the advantage of learning from that history, but you refuse. There are already crowds marching in Brooklyn baying for Jewish blood. After all, what do you think ‘from the river to the sea’ means? Jewish college students are hiding to avoid anti-Semitic rampages at our finest institutions of higher learning. That’s how it starts.

You say you are horrified by the deaths of Gaza’s children. Are you just as horrified that German children died during WW 2? Or was it necessary to eliminate an even greater evil from the world? Like those Germans, Palestinian kids are brought up to hate Jews, to regard them as sub-human. In spite of that, you and I both know they would be safe if Hamas unconditionally released the hostages.

I’m the son of a Holocaust survivor, named for my grandfather whose bones are in a mass grave in what today is Lithuania.

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Oct 30, 2023·edited Oct 30, 2023

Actually, half of my family, hundreds of people, were killed in the Nazi genocide. I am very sympathetic to Israel and to those killed in the Oct. 7 attack and the hostages. However,I find it very depressing the way so many who subscribe to this paper are able to see Jews/Israelis as humans but not Palestinians. About 1,400 people were killed in the horrific terrorist attack by Hamas. In retaliation, so far, Israel has killed around 7,000 Palestinians. I do not feel that Israeli/Jews lives are more valuable than those of the Palestinians. While I deplore Hamas and their tactics,I do think that we should punish all Palestinian civilians, children, mothers, sick people, for their crimes. I also find it kind of pathetic that a mother who lives in Washington D.C., where she is in NO DANGER whatsoever of being harmed by Hamas, talking about her fear of her children being killed. Her children are not in danger. and her energies would be much better served in working for peace in the Middle East. If she is not comfortable helping Palestinians, then help the Israelis who are suffering froom this attack. But please do not whine and talk about how "afraid" you are, when you live in a very expensive city in the US, one where your children are not in danger of being attacked by Hamas. Clearly the author of this article is very privileged, wealthy, and protected, and so I just didn't appreciate hearing about her fear when so many are dying and suffering in this war. it seems to me the typical American self-obsessed individualistic response.

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Why do you have to repeatedly insult the author? If you can’t make your points without doing that, get the fuck out of here. You won’t be missed.

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I hear you on the fate of Gaza's civilians, but what you have Israel do? Just wringing your hands is not an answer, and if Hamas is allowed to continue, the next time it will be 14,000 Israelis killed, not 1,400. Hamas has started a war, and unfortunately civilians also die in wars.

Hamas' charter not only calls for the destruction of Israel, but in its original version quoted Islamic scripture that calls for genocide of the Jews. How would you deal with a genocidal enemy living right next door to you?

You say that 7,000 have died in Gaza already. Where does that number come from? Hamas controls the health ministry, as well as all the other levers of government in Gaza. Does that figure include the 500 supposedly killed in an Israeli strike on a hospital that has already been debunked by both Israeli and U.S. experts? No Israeli ordnance struck that hospital, and there is plenty of evidence that it was a Palestinian rocket misfire that landed in the hospital parking lot, with little or no damage to the building itself. The truth is that I don't know how many have been killed in Gaza, and neither do you. Repeating Hamas propaganda is not helpful to your argument.

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I am Irish Catholic from New York. We are with you always, and will not pro-hamas voices stand in our state, in our cities. Never.

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I feel you in this. Together we stand. Am yisrael chai.

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Thank you for writing this piece. We stand with you and with Israel and all Jewish communities everywhere. What happened on October 7th has engulfed my thoughts and heart as well, and you described it perfectly, everywhere you turn you see the precious hostages' faces. All the emotions, the desperation, the anger at the vile hatred towards Jews and Israel, we feel it with you.

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