Opinion – Page 81

Such hypocrisy

Hypocrisy is everywhere, perhaps, and it can be a full-time occupation to call it out. For years, the anti-Israel movement, which generally comprises advocates of social justice who envision themselves as defenders of human dignity and respect for the diverse experiences of peoples, has employed the most toxic language and imagery imaginable against Israel. This includes the routine equation of Zionism with Nazism, apartheid and even Satanism. “IsraHELL” is commonly used in online commentary, and how frequently have we seen images of Israeli leaders with devil’s horns drawn on them?

Such language and imagery are often condemned as antisemitic, because, well, they are – regardless of the insistence of perpetrators that the target is Israel, not Jews. It is sheer hypocrisy when concern about antisemitism is dismissed as Jewish posturing to “silence” criticism of Israel or deflect attention from Israel’s “war crimes” and other “atrocities.” There is almost certainly no other ethnic or cultural group whose expressed concerns would be so summarily disregarded by people who proudly carry the mantle of social justice and human equality.

Criticism of Israel is not necessarily antisemitic, of course. But sometimes it is. And well-intentioned people will take the time to distinguish when it is and when it is not. Instead, while asserting that Zionists equate “any” criticism of Israel with antisemitism, the anti-Israel side goes full-tilt in the opposite direction, claiming that no criticism of Israel is tainted by antisemitism. Antisemitism, in their narrative, is not a bigotry to be confronted, but an always-false assertion used to deflect or negate criticism of Israel.

Antisemitism, as we have said here before, has its own name because it differs in critical ways from other forms of discrimination and bigotry. For instance, where many forms of racism are premised on the idea that the perpetrator perceives themselves as better than the victim, antisemitism, in some instances, is founded on the assumption that Jews perceive themselves as better than other people – see how often the “chosen people” concept is raised in online dialogue as criticism of Israel and Jews.

Similarly, anti-racism activism sees race as integral to economic and class division, which it often is. But, because one of the key prejudicial assumptions about Jews is that they are both economically and socially advantaged, Jews de facto cannot be victims of discrimination. The corollary of this is twofold. Jews do not (in the narrative of contemporary anti-racism activism) experience economic disadvantage, therefore, there is no evidence of antisemitism. Ergo claims of antisemitism are a cynical attempt to gain sympathy by a group of people who have long since exhausted the world’s reserve of empathy.

Alternatively, there are those who accept that antisemitism may exist. After all, it is hard to ignore the Jew-hatred spray-painted on walls, prevalent on social media and filling the comments sections after almost any news story involving Israel or Jews. Yet even this evidence may not elicit sympathy or allyship. In fact, there may be a counterintuitive response. Given the prejudiced idea that Jews consider themselves superior – usually founded on an ignorant misreading of the concept of chosenness – there may be a frisson of satisfaction among some that the uppity Jews are getting taken down a notch.

In the face of this reality, what should we do? For one thing, we should not allow the hypocrisy of others to distance us from the values we share with those others. We must not abandon the fundamentally Jewish commitment to racial, social and economic justice that has been central to our identity for hundreds of generations before this postmodern incarnation of social justice emerged a couple of decades ago. We should not cower from the concept of chosenness, because we know this is not a symptom of superiority but of a humble role in service of tikkun olam, of a better world.

Shul etiquette “commandments”

There’s no use in pretending it doesn’t bother me. The woman has invaded my sacrosanct space and time! But what can I do about it?

Let me explain.

I have a precious and brief time that I dedicate to enhancing my well-being each week. I attend a yoga class on my doctor’s order to become mindful of my time and space. I have come to cherish this opportunity to shut out the constant and disparate white noise that my brain exudes during the rest of my week. It’s the noise that reminds me to pay a bill, check my calendar for meetings, and note the items I have to remember to add to the shopping list. Not to mention all the family obligations that must be juggled. I’m anxious just writing these items, worried that my life is spinning out of my control, hence my doctor’s suggestion-cum-order.

In the first few minutes of each class, I focus my energy, breathing in and exhaling slowly. Recently, just as I was reaching the plateau that allows me to connect mind and body, the door to the quiet room opened with a woman who was not quite finished a phone conversation.

“Yeah, I know just what you mean, Sally. I had the same issue with her. I’ll have to tell you about it after my yoga class. I’m just getting in to it now.” Sally’s friend looks around, finds a spot, dumps her bag and continues to talk. “Oh, you do? Which one do you take?” She tucks the phone between her ear and shoulder, then unrolls her mat. “Really? Uh huh. Oh, and how much is it? Wow, that’s a lot less than I’m spending.” She upends her bag, looking for her water bottle. The instructor looks at her and smiles, suggesting she is ready to begin. “Listen sweetie, I gotta go, this class makes the British rail schedule look slack! Yeah, let’s do that, I’ll check my schedule for next week. No problem, I’m always here for you.”

As the instructor takes us through the first movement, Sally’s friend declares that this first stretch is feeling good, especially after such a stressful day. I am regaining my initial plateau, reminding myself that I need to judge others favorably. But with each position shift Sally’s friend has a comment. I’m finding these verbal utterances very intrusive.

Sally’s friend is not content with oohing and aahing. Now she is complimenting other classmates on their yoga attire. My desired state of mind is now wishful thinking. The only thing I am mindful of is how aggravated I am getting. Doesn’t Sally’s friend realize that this space and time is sacrosanct to me and to the others? Surely she must realize that there is a time and place for everything, and that this is neither the time, nor the place for her behavior. How can she be so oblivious to her poor yoga etiquette? Can she not see the distress she is causing?

This is related to my other dilemma. I don’t go to yoga to enhance my well-being and connect with my soul and my soul-maker; for that, I go to shul and pray with my community. And Sally’s friend’s behaviors reflect behaviors that regularly occur each Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and on any given Shabbos, from people both religiously observant and not. So, I humbly submit for consideration and hopeful implementation “10 commandments of etiquette for shul attendance.”

Remember in whose house you are a guest. The sanctuary is G-d’s domain, not yours. People often comment they don’t find shul a “spiritual experience,” but a little preparation can help. Just as you ready yourself for a day of work, ensuring you have briefed yourself for an upcoming meeting, for example, so you should ready yourself for prayer. Avail yourself of the many sources of Jewish inspirational writings for the appropriate holy day. It’s up to all of us to bring our own spiritual thoughts and emotions to the sanctuary.
No cellphones. Just as theatres request that you refrain from talking, texting or photographing, shul is not a place for cellphone use during Shabbos or Yom Tov. If G-d needs you, He’s got a better way of getting your attention. And, if you can’t separate yourself from your communicator for the length of services, you’ve probably got an addiction and may need some professional help – perhaps even a yoga class.
Stop the chatter. Shul is not a baseball diamond, and you are not in the outfield yelling, “batter, batter, batter, swing batter.” The rabbi, chazzan and Torah reader do not require a cheering section and you are not there to provide color commentary. They do require your respectful attention.
Socialize outside the sanctuary. Any conversation longer than the prerequisite greeting of “Good Shabbos or good Yom Tov” should be held outside of the sanctuary. Nobody else wants to hear about your bad back and why you can’t golf or play tennis anymore.
No market reports, please. Whether it’s Bloomberg, BNN, the Wall Street Journal or the costs of buying kosher meat and poultry, if it is important enough to discuss at length, see Commandment #4.
Wear comfortable shoes. Women, you are not walking the catwalk in a Jimmy Choo or Louboutin fashion show. There are lengthy periods of the services that require standing in front of the open ark. Sitting down while the ark is open is disrespectful unless you’re over 70 or have a serious medical condition or impairment. If you regularly suffer from foot fatigue, pinched toes or aching bunions, bring a pair of flats.
No beach, cocktail or lingerie wear. It should be obvious but if your outfit suggests you need to apply sunscreen, then don’t wear it to shul, as it’s unlikely that there will be a tanning bed provided. Likewise, men, jeans – no matter if they are considered “dress wear” – are not appropriate unless you are under the age of 6, and even then it’s questionable. As well, unless your shul sports a disco ball from the ceiling over the bimah, leave the booty-shaking togs at home.
Don’t show off your offspring. Bubbies and zaidies, your grandchildren are not fashion accessories. They are small human beings, worthy of your respect. If you insist on traipsing them through the sanctuary to have your shul mates ooh and aah over them, you are doing yourself and your grandchildren a disservice, and creating a distraction for all around you.
Bribing children into the sanctuary. From a small child’s point of view, the sanctuary is crowded and there are a bunch of strangers wanting to pinch their cheeks or kiss them. Offering bribes in the form of candy, juice, cookies or an iPad or other tech gadget often results in major negotiations that would impress even the most accomplished CEO. Save yourself the grief and sign the kids up for shul programs for their age group, or leave them at home with Mary Poppins.
No electronic gadgets. This is for shul attendees of all ages. Just as police are cracking down on distracted driving, there should be a penalty for distracted davening. Do not engage your smartphone or Star Trek communicator during “slow parts” of the service. Answering your email, checking Facebook or sharing your latest photos are not earning you any extra credit with G-d.

We all have a lot to be grateful for and Rosh Hashanah is the time to express our gratitude to our creator on the anniversary of the creation of the world. At a time when we ask for emotional, physical and spiritual help on behalf of ourselves and others, we should be mindful that we are being judged by the king of all judges regarding our behavior, our attitudes, our compassion and our consideration for our fellow human beings.

Ellen Freedman is a native Vancouverite. She is a longtime reader and first-time writer.

Love for country is earned!

You don’t have to be a sports fan to have been intrigued by the biggest story in the National Football League the past month.

Colin Kaepernick, the now back-up quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers made a stand (or a kneel, per se) in support of the imbalance he sees in how African Americans are treated in the United States by refusing to stand for the US national anthem before games.

Kaerpernick, who is of mixed race, stated that he will not stand for the anthem of a country that does not offer African Americans proper respect and equal treatment.

The response has been mixed, with either loud voices calling Kaepernick’s actions a distraction to his team or screams from patriotic Americans raucously booing the quarterback any chance they get for betraying his country.

A seemingly small few have supported his right to take a knee (although his jersey soon became the hottest on the market).

I am not here to get into a debate over the Black Lives Matter movement or even to discuss the issue of equal rights in the United States. That’s for another forum.

While I appreciate all sides of the argument around pro athletes using their platform to make political statements, my take on this issue lies within the question of what a national anthem is supposed to represent.

Whether you agree with Keapernick’s opinion on the state of affairs in his country or not, a national anthem is a show of pride, of patriotism, of love and affection for the country you live in. It is a way to say “I love you” to your country.

But if you are not proud of the country you live in, pay taxes in, work in, contribute to society in, then you should not be expected to unconditionally stand and sing her praises.

Just as a child who is abused by her father should not be expected to unconditionally say “I love you” simply because he is her father, citizens of the United States should not be expected to sing The Star Spangled Banner unconditionally if they feel their community is being abused by their country. Nor should they be asked to leave “if they don’t like it.”

Kaepernick, and the many athletes who have since followed his lead, are staying. And they are asking more from their country if their country wants them to stand and say “I love you.”. Kaepernick has stood in front of any microphone that asks the question and stated exactly what he expects for from his country. He is not proud to be an American right now and he is not wrong to feel that way.

I have also heard many argue that the singing of anthems are a time to show respect to the many men and women who have given their lives for their country, and I respect that take. However, I also suspect those men and women would be rolling in their graves right now if they knew what the country had done with those rights and freedoms they fought to defend. Did they die so that political corruption and immoral behavior would lead the way in their country? Did they die so that America would have only two legitimate political choices at each election? So that children would be born into homes that identified themselves as either Republican or Democrat regardless of the petulant child that was leading their party

I’d like to think not.

Rather than starting every conversation on the topic with the words “I’m proud to be an American, but…”, ALL Americans should be demanding more from their country.

Clashes with police, race wars, mass shootings, ridiculous gun control debates, and the ultimate embarrassment of Donald Trump being considered a legitimate candidate to run their country are embarrassing for the so-called leaders of the free world.

I respect any American for feeling proud of many of the things their country has stood for over the years. More specifically, I respect the challenges of managing the responsibility of playing the worldwide role the USA accepts on a daily basis. But today, in the United States, it is ok not to be so proud.

Standing for a national anthem should not be a requirement of being a citizen of a country. Doing what you can to support, advocate for or improve that country should be. Kaepernick’s actions were designed to instigate much-needed debate and awareness in his country. This will serve them far better than unconditionally standing for a song.

Let’s hope he decides, once again, to stand proud.

In the mean time….”Ohhh Canadaaaaa!!!”

Moments with Elie Wiesel

Robert Krell, left, and Elie Wiesel. (photo from Robert Krell)

I met Prof. Elie Wiesel in 1978. I was 38 years old. He was 49. Elie, as he insisted I call him, came to Vancouver to speak at a commemorative event. It was for Yom Hashoah, the day of Holocaust Remembrance.

He arrived Friday afternoon and I fetched him at the airport and brought him to our home for a few moments pre-Shabbat and then to his hotel. He had agreed to a press conference on Saturday morning stipulating only that no microphone be used. Elie was observant.

I moderated that morning. He was engaging, handled difficult and peculiar questions equally graciously, and made a deep and lasting impression on the journalists and religious leaders who attended. I learned that morning that his book, Night, a slim 120 pages, had once been nearly a thousand pages written in Yiddish and published in Argentina. How had he reduced it to its present size? By eliminating every paragraph without which the book would not lose its essence, and then by eliminating every sentence in those paragraphs that was not needed to sustain its narrative. Ever since, I have tried to practise that in my talks and writings.

Elie asked me to visit at the hotel on Sunday for breakfast and we ended up talking all day. That evening, he spoke to an audience of 500. I had the honor of introducing him. I used two minutes. How long does one need to introduce Wiesel? He was known to all, even though he had not yet received the Nobel Peace Prize; that was to come in 1986. His lecture that evening was astonishing. One could listen to him forever, one of the few speakers in the world who commands attention and seldom, if ever, loses his audience.

We remained friends. He was the kindest, gentlest, wisest person in my life. And he always made time for me although he was also the busiest and most prevailed upon person imaginable.

So, I took it upon myself to do two things. One was to call him from time to time and briefly visit when I was in New York. Famous people sometimes have no one who inquires as to their own lives. I did not ask him for anything unless the idea began with him. No demands, requests, or favors. The other was to assist wherever I could with whatever little I could do. For example, he asked whether I could arrange for him to be in touch with Rudolf Vrba, one of only four or five escapees from Auschwitz and the author of the Vrba-Wetzler Report (Auschwitz Protocols) warning of the imminent deportation of Hungarian Jews in 1944.

Vrba lived in Vancouver and I knew him well. Elie and Rudi subsequently corresponded for years and I can only guess that some of it concerned the fact that the Wiesel family was not informed by those who received the report in Hungary when there was still a chance to flee into the nearby Carpathian Mountains. Did they ever meet? I offered Elie the opportunity. His response, “I do not think I can look into his eyes.”

One time, when in New York, I received Elie’s return call. Yes, he had time for me to have a brief visit on Monday morning. I went to his home and we caught up for perhaps a half hour. During that time, he excused himself only once, to take a call from the White House. Presidents, secretaries of state, governors and senators, all sought his counsel. He often flew at short notice to speak, to warn, in the midst of various crises around the world.

It was close to Passover. He asked who was traveling with me and I told him, my wife Marilyn and our oldest daughter and granddaughter. Elie was upset not to greet them and he insisted we all visit the next Thursday so he could personally wish them a happy Pesach. How he made time in his wildly busy schedule, I will never understand.

I saw Elie speak in Israel at the 1981 World Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors at Lohamei HaGeta’ot (the Kibbutz of the Ghetto Fighters) and at the closing ceremonies with then-prime minister Menachem Begin. While in Los

Angeles in 1982, I heard him speak at Cedars-Sinai Hospital on “the Holocaust patient” and on “talmudic tales” at UCLA Hillel House. Spellbinding.

For the very first International Conference of Child Survivors and Their Families – the 1991 Hidden Child Foundation/Anti-Defamation League conference – the New York-based committee asked if I could convince Elie to speak. Since Elie seldom said no if he was able to attend, wherever in the world he was needed, this request for my involvement was puzzling. After all, this was New York, his home and the site of the gathering. But he had declined. My guess is that the situation had become complicated by competing factions.

I called him and reminded him that this was “the gathering of the children.” Where else would he want to be? He graciously agreed to give the closing address. I introduced him on the closing night and wondered out loud how it was possible that I had heard him lecture at Yale, in Israel, New York and Los Angeles. Somehow, wherever he was, I found him. I must be his groupie! I certainly never missed an opportunity to hear him and to learn from him.

In 1998, in New York, Elie presented me with the Elie Wiesel Holocaust Remembrance Medal for my work in Holocaust education, my psychiatric contributions to the care of Holocaust survivors and the founding of the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre. Elie had visited the VHEC and served on its international advisory council along with Irwin Cotler, Yaffa Eliach and Sir Martin Gilbert. My family was there and my children all came to know him better. His loving presence is seared into their memories. Children, for him, were like a magnet. All who wrote to him received a personal response. How he managed this, in between teaching at Boston University, speaking around the world and publishing at least one book every year, I do not understand. But that is what he did.

In 2008, I went to Boston to celebrate his 80th birthday, which consisted of a three-day Festschrift devoted to his scholarship and writings, as well as a tribute concert.

Although surrounded by his friends and fellow scholars, I found him sitting alone in the front row and joined him. At one point, I turned to him, “Elie, what is it like to hear all these scholars speak about your contributions all day long?” His response, “I am a good listener.” And, indeed, he was. He listened attentively, to individuals and to humanity.

I nominated Elie for an honorary doctorate from the University of British Columbia and, although he was still recovering from open heart surgery (and wrote a book Open Heart), he traveled to attend the 2012 ceremony and to participate in An Evening with Elie Wiesel, held at the Orpheum theatre, attended by some 3,000 people. Our cab driver said, “Oh, look, Elie Wiesel is speaking.”

As the interviewer for the evening’s proceedings, I asked questions, some “naïve,” as in “Why remember such awful events?” referring to the Shoah.

Elie’s response: “How can you not? Memory is part of who you are, your identity. I have so many wonderful memories of my family and being in shul and it’s all I have now of my family except my two surviving sisters, of whom one has since passed on. Without memory, who would I be? The moments are so important.”

“Elie,” I asked, “you were asked to be the president of Israel. Can you tell us about this?” He answered that the thought had tormented him. How could he turn down the highest honor that could ever be bestowed upon him? He felt he was letting down the state of Israel that wanted him and his leadership. But, he explained, he was without political experience and all he really has are words which, as a politician, would no longer be his. “And besides,” he joked, “my wife would have divorced me.”

“How do you choose the language in which you write?” (Elie speaks Hungarian, Romanian, Yiddish, Hebrew, French and English.) “I prefer the eloquence of French, which is the easiest for me. And, sometimes, my choice is determined by what I am writing about. And I like to write to classical music, preferably a quartet, as an orchestra is too distracting.”

“What message would you send to our young people here tonight?” His response, “Your life is not measured in time and years. It is a collection of moments. You will look back and have so many moments in time that remain fresh, memorable and meaningful. I would tell all of you young people in the audience to enjoy all these moments in time. Being here in Vancouver this weekend has been one of those moments for me.”

With his passing, I shall be without more such moments with him. His death leaves an enormous void, for his moral strength and inspiration will be missing from all who benefited. We must resolve to step up and commit to continuing to learn from and emulate this remarkable human being who returned from the depths of despair and loss to provide a measure of hope.

I urge you to read Night and Elie’s brilliant memoir in two parts All Rivers Run to the Sea and And the Sea is Never Full. Having absorbed at least these books, you may then reflect upon, and hopefully act upon, the lessons learned. They will last you a lifetime.

Dr. Robert Krell is professor emeritus, department of psychiatry, University of British Columbia, distinguished life fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and founding president of the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, in whose newsletter, Zachor, this article has also been published.

Concerns about the alt-right

There used to be just conservatives. Then there came the neo-conservatives, a largely American variation on the theme that venerates free markets, but marries it with an interventionist foreign policy. Neo-conservativism got a black eye after the interventionism its proponents advocate led to the quagmire in Iraq. In a resurgence of old-fashioned conservatism, stalwarts proudly adopted the self-deprecating paleo-conservative, a blatant rejection of the neo-conservative moniker.

In recent months, a new term has come into common usage in American politics: alt-right. The contraction of “alternative right” is a sort of whitewashing umbrella for a range of ideological streams that were, until recently, considered well outside the mainstream. White nationalism, itself a whitewashed term for white supremacy, is chief among these. While not precisely defined, alt-right has also been said to encompass the anti-immigration and xenophobic nativism that has been articulated by Donald Trump, the Republican candidate for U.S. president. Populism is a term also associated with the alt-right, although Bernie Sanders’ challenge to Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination was also defined as populist.

The banality of the term “alt-right” – it almost sounds like something you do with a computer keyboard – masks the mainstreaming of terrible ideas. Concurrent to, and not the least bit unrelated to, the rise of alt-right as a term is the rise of Trump as a political phenomenon. The Republican standard-bearer has said, on an almost daily basis, things that would eliminate any other candidate in history from contention. Yet his supporters dismiss (or embrace) his hateful, ignorant and, seemingly as often as not, outright false statements. The litany is endless. Last week, he suggested that Clinton’s secret service details should disarm and “see what happens to her.” This unsubtle allusion to violence is not at all uncommon in Trump’s rhetoric. That he remains a contender for the presidency is alarming. That he is rising in the polls, almost tying Clinton in aggregates and leading her in many polls, suggests that Americans are seriously considering taking a dangerous political turn.

Trump idolizes “strongmen.” He has reveled in the admiration of Vladimir Putin, the Russian leader who has undone that country’s nascent steps toward democracy. He is unequivocally a solo act, openly insisting that he will run roughshod over Congress and the judiciary, the institutions that the founders of the United States set up as checks and balances on the presidency. He has stated that the electoral system is rigged against him and predicted rioting in the country should he lose. The image he projects of America is of a third-world economy, and the vision of political violence he purveys is more suited to an unstable dictatorship than to the reality of American government.

It is in the nature of human beings to take for granted what we have the moment we possess it. Readers of a certain age remember The Jetsons, with its incredible futuristic gadgets, a cartoon we can now watch on a device we carry in our pocket that contains all the accumulated knowledge of humankind, and we have the ability to speak face-to-face with almost anyone in the world instantaneously, in real time. And yet, when this gadget alerts us that we have a message or a call, we are as likely to respond with a weary, “Oh, what is it now?”

Likewise, perhaps, with democracy. In its modern incarnation, democracy was born 240 years ago in what is now the United States of America. In the span of human history, this is the blink of an eye. About Trump, many commentators, most recently this week in the Washington Post, have said, “This is how fascism comes to America.”

On numerous occasions over the years, we have used this space to condemn flippant use of such terms as fascism, warning that overuse will dull sensitivity to the seriousness of the language and its threat. We are less reticent to condemn the use in this case. The rise of Trump and the “alt-right” ideologies he empowers are cause for very real concern.

Cancer makes me angry

Cancer. Now I’ve said it. Just saying it tightens up my gut. It makes me want to swallow. I look around to see if anyone can sense the anger, the blind rage that surges through me. I find myself breathing faster. The fight-or-flight chemicals prompted by fear are racing through my body. Mostly, I try not to think about it because of the instant effect it always has upon me. I don’t know about others, but I hate it. Just the thought of it makes me angry.

To me, the idea of cancer is like a living presence, dressed up in the image of death, stalking through our lives, the destroyer of health and happiness. It looks this way and that, it looks for those at whom it will swing its lethal scythe. I know it’s really like spores in the wind, poisons in the soil, air and water, or genetic predispositions hiding in our DNA, waiting for the merest provocation to flower like a deadly bloom of nightshade. I know it is like an evil charlatan that smilingly gives way to our defensive measures, only to strike back with deadly force when we have let down our guard. I know it has so many disguises and tricks that we have to learn the new ones every day that we are alive. It takes some of our best minds to keep us relevant in that battle.

I know about all the new promises, new hopes yet to be realized. We learn something new every day. But, so does cancer, reacting to counter every twist and turn we make. We are not there yet in spite of all the public promises that are made. It is not politically correct to say it, but the same promises were being made during the time cancer was a living presence in my home. So I retain the hate that I learned.

When it struck in our home, we reacted with shock. We marshaled our resources and radically changed our lifestyle. My late spouse gave up her stressful and demanding work. She was a simultaneous translation interpreter. She was the manager and creator of her own firm, one that was preeminent in Canada, but she delegated her work and ceased professional activity. She underwent a mastectomy, radiation and chemo. We changed our diet toward the completely macrobiotic and a shelf full of recommended natural products. The result – in six months all traces of the disease were eradicated! We declared victory. My spouse became a poster child, a survivor, to rally the spirits of all victims of the disease. After a year, we relaxed our guard and returned to our previous way of life.

Four or five years later, two cancer cells were discovered during the regular screening that had been maintained. The number of cells quickly multiplied and, after a time, a regular regime of chemotherapy was reintroduced, accompanied by multiple discomforts. This continued for years. No material effect on the disease’s progress was ever noted. Eventually, several metastases were discovered, until the cancer was generalized. None of the chemotherapy offered appeared to have had the least effect.

My role changed over time, as I became a full-time caregiver. Indeed, after years of feeling like a helpless bystander, there was great consolation in, at last, being able to play a useful role. I had the feeling I was witnessing hand-to-hand combat with the cancer, a living, breathing adversary. I hated the losses we were sustaining on a daily basis. The success of radiation sessions in fighting off the external manifestations of the cancer felt like victories.

At one point, the cancer prevented the kidneys from working. The doctors asked if we wanted them to intervene. Although my late wife declined, because she was suffering the effects of uremia, which impairs judgment, my resounding yes won the day. The intervention was successful. We went off on a two-week holiday in Italy. I treasure to this day the sight of her dancing to her own music on a sunny balcony in Tuscany.

The medical resort to radiation to eliminate ugly lesions that appeared, time after time, on various areas of the body, seemed like a blessing. But, the ultimate effect of these sessions was to destroy the ability of the body to produce the red and white blood cells we depend on for life. I did not understand that these were a signal that the medical profession had given up any hope of a remission, because the doctors continually talked to us of impending victory. I did not question it, full of continuing hope as I was. In effect, they were offering palliative care, while continuing to test drug combinations on my late wife.

Eventually, these blood cells could only be provided for her by external means. We learned, after a time, that these infusions of blood cells, enormously costly, were the only way to keep my late wife alive. I always assumed these would continue, but I marveled at the generosity of the system on which her life depended. The various chemotherapy combinations, with all their accompanying distress, continued to be presented by doctors as the answer and the cure. She followed every prescription faithfully in spite of the discomfort they engendered.

Suddenly, we were informed by the hospital administration that my late spouse was to be assigned to hospice care in our home. Calls to the doctors went unanswered. Any assistance I could provide was replaced by outside help. We were told that the life-giving infusions were being withdrawn. She expired after three weeks, 10 years after first contracting the disease.

I do not know if the doctors ever confided to my late wife the real state of the struggle in which we were engaged. If they did, she never shared the details with me. We never ever spoke of her impending demise.

I remain a survivor of the experience, full of anger at the caregivers, anger at my helplessness and ignorance, and full of rage against the inexorability, the implacability of the disease. Its overwhelming power in the face of our defences, even after once having been initially repulsed, gives me little faith in the happy claims of any early relief in our struggles against the disease.

I appreciate that there have been some small victories, that some conditions have become treatable instead of fatal. I am grateful for that. I appreciate that we must encourage those who are facing the challenge and the threat. I know that they, and we, have to continue fighting it like soldiers on the frontline, despite our many losses. Cancer, I hate it!

Max Roytenberg is a Vancouver-based poet, writer and blogger.

Will state be free?

Binyamin Netanyahu may not have expected the international reaction he received when he accused opponents of Jewish settlements in the West Bank of supporting the ethnic cleansing of Jews. While he went too far, there is some truth to be learned from the fallout.

The Israeli prime minister made the comments in a video, where he noted that nobody suggests that two million Arab citizens of Israel are an obstacle to peace. Yet the presence of Jews in the areas most people assume will eventually be Palestine under a two-state solution, he said, is repeatedly held up as proof that Israel is not acting in good faith toward a two-state objective.

Netanyahu was pointing out one of the glaring hypocrisies in the discussion of an eventual peace agreement and a two-state solution. He was intentionally inflammatory but, in the process, he set off a reaction that is illuminating and worth consideration.

First, we need to understand this basic fact: nobody expects Jews living outside the Green Line to voluntarily become citizens of a future Palestinian state. The entire discussion is an exercise in rhetoric. But this fact, too, raises other issues. Not many believe that Jews in an independent Palestine could live as citizens the way Arab citizens of Israel do under law (however imperfect this ideal might be in practice), partly because it’s probable that nobody would be free in an independent Palestine. If history is any measure, an independent Palestine might be a theocracy run by Hamas, a kleptocracy run by Fatah or some hybrid thereof. Regardless, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, among others, has insisted that no Jews will be permitted to live in an independent Palestine. The world ignores these racist statements, or excuses them as the legitimate reaction of a people long oppressed by the Jewish state.

Since most Jews would flee of their own volition if they found their homes outside the new borders of Israel, Netanyahu’s claims of ethnic cleansing can be seen as inflammatory and false, since it is not the Palestinians who would evacuate the Jews from the West Bank, but the West Bank Jews themselves, knowing the place held no future for them. But, while Netanyahu should be criticized for exploiting the term ethnic cleansing, perhaps to deflect criticism from the settlements, he has also drawn attention to the uncomfortable truth that the dream of Palestinian “freedom” for which so many in the world (including, for instance, most delegates to the recent Green Party of Canada convention) have devoted so much of their energies, is in fact a cause that may instead create a country that is nobody’s dream of a free and independent homeland.

Netanyahu is guilty of poking a hornet’s nest. However, his critics, too, should look at their own assumptions and motivations. The prime minister went too far in summoning imagery of mass deportations, but others have not gone far enough in addressing the reality that the movement for Palestinian independence in infused with unhealthy ideologies, of which excluding Jews from citizenship is just one.

Poland’s wartime contradictions

In August, Poland’s right-wing cabinet approved a bill that would criminalize using the phrase “Polish death camp” or “Polish concentration camp,” with punishments including fines or imprisonment.

The bill raises questions about Poland’s role in the Holocaust. It echoes the country’s communist-era stance on the Second World War – that Poland was a victim and heroically saved Jews.

Growing up, I was told the opposite by my family, my Jewish day school and the broader community – that Poland was antisemitic and complicit in the Holocaust.

But recently, I’ve come to believe that both narratives are true. As we approach the High Holy Days and Yizkor, I think it’s worth reflecting on whether we as a community can see Poland’s role in the Holocaust differently.

This summer, I visited Poland for the first time with my sister, and the trip was full of contradictions. For example, we learned that Christian Poles – including our local guide’s grandparents – were sent to concentration camps, too. The Nazis killed two to three million Christian Poles and three million Jewish Poles. In total, Poland lost one-fifth of its prewar population – more than any other European country. But, those numbers represent roughly 10% of the Christian Polish population and 90% of the Jewish Polish population.

At the POLIN Museum in Warsaw, I learned about Zegota, the Council to Aid Jews. The Polish government-in-exile created it to support and fund Jewish resistance in Poland, including the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising; it was the only such organization created by a European government.

At Yad Vashem, Poland has the most Righteous Among the Nations of any country. Yet, it also lost one of the highest percentages of Jews of all European countries.

We found that Holocaust memorials were also inconsistent, dependent on local policies rather than a unified national one. In our baba’s hometown of Wlodawa, the Jewish cemetery is now a park, without a Holocaust memorial, unlike the many memorials around Warsaw, Krakow and the preserved camps. This inconsistency seems to reflect the divisions within Polish society about whether, and how much, Poland took part in the Holocaust.

In our zeyda’s (z”l) hometown of Bilgoraj, we spoke with three people (through our guide) who live near his former house, which was recently torn down to build a shopping mall. One of them, who had the same build and attire as our zeyda, recognized our family name and said that our zeyda’s next-door neighbors were rumored to have hidden Jews (including, possibly, one of our zeyda’s younger sisters). Another neighbor said her mother hid a Jewish man for three days before he fled town, and that Jews and Christians lived in peace before the war. (Our grandparents never expressed that.)

Nearby, a new development claims to recreate the town shtetl, including Isaac Bashevis Singer’s house, a Belarusian-style (not a local-style) synagogue and luxury apartments. We called it “shtetl Disney.” We didn’t see any information on display about why the real shtetl disappeared, and I only hope that no one will want to live in a place that seeks to profit from nostalgia for a lost community. But that, too, depends on how people see their country’s role in that loss.

At the Krakow Jewish Culture Festival, we took a synagogue walking tour with a guide who, like a growing number of Poles, has discovered her own Jewish ancestry since communism ended. (She’s now a Yiddish lecturer at Columbia.) We learned that Polish-Jewish history dates back 1,000 years, since Jews fled the Crusades and got special protection, including freedom of religion, from a series of Polish kings. We also saw “Jewish-style” restaurants run by and for non-Jews, and “shtetl rabbi” statuettes being sold in the Old Town – we felt uncomfortable seeing people exoticize and capitalize on our culture.

We also saw a play, based on a true story, about a Jewish Torontonian with Polish roots who visits Poland for the first time, confronts the history and legacy of the Holocaust and witnesses the country’s “Jewish revival,” led by Jews and Christians. Seeing some of our experience reflected back at us emphasized, for me, that Polishness and Ashkenazi Jewishness are partly intertwined, whether or not we acknowledge it.

Realizing that our family is more Polish than we’d thought was both heartwarming and heartbreaking. On our way to Wlodawa, we bought fresh forest blueberries along a highway, and realized our grandparents would have grown up eating them, rather than discovering them in Vancouver as adults, as we’d assumed. In Wlodawa, the restaurant where we ate lunch could have been our baba’s dining room: the walls were peach, the curtains were lace and doilies covered the tables. In Lublin, flea-market stalls sold porcelain figurines just like the ones in her glass-doored cabinets. Were we in Poland, or at home?

Several times, I’ve wondered what to make of these contradictions.

The Jewish community, coming from collective trauma, can insist that Poland was a perpetrator; the Polish government, wanting to avoid collective reflection or partial responsibility, can insist it was a victim or martyr.

The truth is, some Christian Poles collaborated and killed Jews; some joined the partisans or hid Jews; most did nothing. The country was occupied and partitioned, and no one (Jewish or Christian) knew what was going to happen. There was a death penalty for resisting or hiding Jews. The truth is, societies are messy and heterogeneous, and we can’t make universal statements about them.

My question is, do Jews and Polish society want to perpetuate narratives that deny the differences within Polish society during the Second World War? Or do we want to heal?

If we want healing, I believe both communities need to accept that Poland was both perpetrator and victim, complicit and righteous – much as we may not want to, and much as that may feel difficult or even impossible. If we can accept this paradox, maybe then we can move from our respective pain to some kind of healing.

Tamara Micner is a playwright and journalist from Vancouver who lives in London, England. Her work has appeared in the Globe and Mail, Wall Street Journal and London Review of Books.

We have our own issues

American politics, these days, attracts global disbelief and revulsion. The contest pits against each other two of the most unpopular candidates since polling began. One of them, the Republican nominee Donald Trump, is endorsed by the country’s leading white supremacists.

There is no question that Trump has tapped into something. Most of his supporters are not now and never have been members or supporters of the Ku Klux Klan or similar fringe groups. They are, in fact, a large and mainstream enough group that he won the nomination of the Republican party and now stands just a couple of points behind Democrat Hillary Clinton in polls, with at least two in five Americans saying they intend to vote for him. Among white Americans, if they alone were the electorate, polls say Trump would win a landslide.

Leaving aside his nonchalance about the fact that David Duke, the former imperial wizard of the KKK, and other of America’s most prominent racists think he would make a top-notch president, Trump has legitimized a host of barely more discrete forms of bigotry, chauvinism and hatred. People who strive for human respect have responded with two approaches. They have condemned the most overt examples of Trump’s racism, while acknowledging that many Americans are experiencing economic and social displacement that could justify their scapegoating of other groups or otherwise find reason to support a candidate whose policy positions are nothing more than accumulated Twitter tantrums.

If Trump wins, there will be more issues to address than this space can accommodate. If he loses, there will still be a divided country where parents have to explain to their children why it is inappropriate for them to express ideas that have been so effortlessly articulated by one of the two leading candidates for the highest office in the country.

Incongruously – or is it? – we are also in a time when the United States is engaged in a deep public reflection on race. The Black Lives Matter movement, which is partly a result of the murder of young African-Americans by police officers but also of broader systemic racism, has opened an overdue public discussion. Decades after legal racism was upended, there remain serious issues that the country needs to confront. Small gestures like that by Colin Kaepernick, a football player who is refusing to stand for the national anthem as a protest against discrimination, have aroused outrage but also raised legitimate awareness. Can you love your country and still condemn aspects of its nature?

Israelis, perhaps foremost among others, have faced this question for decades. And Canada is also engaged in a discussion around race. While we, too, have a history of racism against people of African descent, this history is different from that of the United States in myriad ways, including the absence of slavery in our history. But our past includes racist and antisemitic immigration policies, social and systemic antisemitism, racism and mistreatment of women, degradations of many varieties and, in something we are only beginning to come to terms with, treatment of indigenous Canadians that was intended to erase their cultural identities. And these are not the only areas where our society fails to live up to our ideals.

It is certainly tempting to look at what is happening to our south and feel superior. It would be more productive as a society for us to acknowledge that, while we see fault in others, we will be a better country when we keep our gaze closer to home, and use our stones for repairing, not throwing.

Beneath burkini

The burkini fiasco, if it has had any positive effects, should have opened some eyes to how silly human beings can behave when we become enmeshed in a fabricated social panic. The issue, for those who have not seen the image of French police standing over a woman at a beach, requiring her to remove articles of clothing, is the idea that Muslim women in modest beach wear are a threat to Western civilization.

About 30 coastal towns in France banned the “burkini,” swimwear that generally covers all but a woman’s face, hands and feet. Even after a French court ruled the ban illegal, most of the mayors insisted they would continue enforcing the dress code.

The irony is jarring. Ostensibly based on the idea that Islam or Islamism – the motivation and the perceived threat are blurry – oppresses women by forcing them into extensive body-covering clothing, police in a democratic Western country force a woman to disrobe. (It was inevitable, also, that photos would soon go viral depicting nuns frolicking in the ocean in full Christian religious regalia, unmolested by authorities.)

France’s Prime Minister Manuel Valls has called the burkini a “provocation” and “an expression of a political project, a counter-society, based notably on the enslavement of women,” an “archaic vision” in which women are “immodest, impure and that they should be totally covered. That is not compatible with the values of France and the Republic.”

We can leave to the French what is compatible with the values of France and the Republic, yet surely a nation founded on the pillars of liberty and equality must find something amiss when its police devote their time and resources to enforcing swimwear rules.

France is singular among European countries for its stated commitment to laïcité, the prohibition against religious involvement in government affairs in service of a secular ideal. Similar issues have been addressed in Quebec, where overtly religious Christian symbols, including the crucifix, were deemed part of the province’s cultural heritage and thereby conveniently exempted from the ban on religious imagery. But, in France, as elsewhere in Europe, more is at play than ideas of secularism. In fact, the imperfect heritage of secularism is being manipulated as an excuse to target a particular group.

On the one hand, let us not pretend that there are not legitimate concerns and issues raised by the increasing population of Muslims in Europe. Among this population, both among immigrants and those born in Europe, are a small number who have become radicalized and are a genuine threat to society. A larger number holds ideas that challenge the European consensus on the role of women in society, pluralism and the rights of people to live free from religious coercion. These are legitimate concerns that require addressing through long-range integration strategies and societal accommodation between traditions – as does the rise in Europe of nationalism, xenophobia and racism.

But the burkini is, at best, a side issue; a symptom of a few things, none of them healthy. Regardless, the “solution” to any social coercion around women’s clothing is certainly not legal proscription, at least it should not be in a Western democracy. Burkini-banning has more in common with religious extremism – modesty “police” exist in various communities around the world – than the Western freedoms the burkini-bashers claim to defend.