By Howie Silbiger
There is a sickness that has worked its way into Jewish life, and it has been there for so long that too many people now mistake it for wisdom. Keep your head down. Do not make noise. Do not provoke. Take off the kippah if the street feels rough. Tuck in the Magen David. Walk away. Wait for the police. Wait for the government. Wait for the community organizations to issue statements. Wait for the same tired press releases from the same tired people who have spent years teaching Jews that survival means being polite enough to be tolerated.
That kind of Judaism is finished. Or at least it should be. The old instinct came from a real place. Jews were powerless for a long time. We lived at the mercy of kings, churches, mobs, bureaucrats, police chiefs, university administrators and governments that could decide, with a signature or a shrug, whether Jews were protected or abandoned. There were times when lowering your profile was not cowardice. It was survival. There were places where a Jew did not have the luxury of making a point. But that was then.
Today, too many Jews are still living with the posture of exile even when they live in free countries, in large communities, with money, institutions, schools, synagogues, lawyers, political access and the State of Israel standing as the great historical answer to Jewish helplessness. And somehow, after all of that, the first lesson some Jews still teach their children is how to disappear.
After every attack, every stabbing, every beating, every synagogue threat, every school threat, every campus riot, every mob screaming outside a Jewish institution, the same conversation begins. Maybe we should be careful. Maybe we should not wear the kippah in that area. Maybe the kids should hide their uniforms. Maybe the school should take down the sign. Maybe the synagogue should lower its profile. Maybe Jewish life should make itself a little smaller so the people who hate us do not notice. That is not safety. That is surrender dressed up as caution.
There is a difference between being smart and being scared. Of course Jewish schools need security. Of course synagogues need cameras, guards, locked doors and trained staff. Of course parents need to know their children are protected. Nobody serious is arguing for recklessness. But there is a huge difference between protecting Jewish life and shrinking Jewish life, and we have confused the two for far too long.
Jewish power does not mean violence. It does not mean gangs roaming the streets looking for fights. It does not mean stupidity, chest thumping or fantasy heroics. Jewish power means organization. It means discipline. It means visible Jewish confidence. It means Jews walking into public life as Jews and not as nervous guests begging for permission to exist. It means our schools stop apologizing for being Jewish schools. It means our synagogues stop acting like they are embarrassing relics. It means our community organizations stop measuring success by how many non-Jewish politicians they can get into a photo op while Jewish parents are wondering if their children are safe walking home from class.
It also means rabbis stop preaching weakness as if it is humility. It means Jewish leaders stop confusing interfaith cocktail diplomacy with actual protection. It means we stop raising a generation of Jews whose first instinct is to explain themselves to people who already decided they hate them. The problem in the Diaspora is not only antijewism. The problem is the Jewish response to antijewism. We keep treating it like a public relations problem. We keep thinking that if we issue the right statement, host the right dialogue, invite the right minister, use the right language, explain Israel more gently, explain Judaism more softly, explain ourselves one more time, then maybe the world will understand.
The world understands enough. The people screaming outside Jewish buildings understand what they are doing. The people targeting Jewish schools understand what they are doing. The university radicals who harass Jewish students understand what they are doing. The politicians who go silent until the polling tells them it is safe to speak understand what they are doing. The media outlets that twist themselves into knots to avoid saying Jews are being targeted understand what they are doing. The only ones still pretending not to understand are Jews who have built entire careers on managing decline.
Jewish life cannot be built around fear. It cannot be built around hiding. It cannot be built around the hope that if Jews are quiet enough, useful enough, progressive enough, Canadian enough, British enough, French enough, secular enough, universal enough, the hatred will pass over us. It never works. The Jew who removes his kippah today is not safer tomorrow. He is only teaching the next Jew that the street does not belong to him. The parent who tells his child not to look too Jewish is not protecting Jewish identity. He is training that child to associate Judaism with danger and embarrassment. The community that hides its symbols is not avoiding trouble. It is advertising weakness. And weakness invites more pressure.
A serious Jewish community has to think differently. It needs real local networks. Not just fundraising dinners and committees with long names. Real networks. Parents who know each other. Schools that communicate with each other. Synagogues that coordinate. Volunteers who are trained. Lawyers ready to act. Political leaders put on notice. Police held accountable. Security taken seriously. Public presence maintained. When Jews walk alone, they are easy to intimidate. When Jews move as a community, the entire equation changes.
This does not require some grand revolutionary theory. It requires backbone. It requires the end of the embarrassed Jew. It requires the end of the passive Jew who believes that dignity means silence. It requires the end of the communal leader who thinks every crisis can be solved by another roundtable discussion with people who will smile for the camera and do nothing the next day. Jewish power begins with a very simple decision. We are not leaving. We are not hiding. We are not removing the kippah. We are not taking down the mezuzah. We are not making Jewish schools less Jewish because activists hate Jewish education. We are not watering down Judaism to make it more palatable to people who never liked us in the first place.
There is nothing noble about Jewish weakness. There is nothing sophisticated about Jewish passivity. There is nothing moral about teaching Jews to disappear from the public square. A Jewish future cannot be built by people who are always looking over their shoulder, lowering their voice and hoping someone else will handle the problem. The future belongs to Jews who are willing to stand up straight, not reckless, not violent, not stupid, but visible, organized, serious, proud and done hiding.
Howie Silbiger is the host of The Howie Silbiger Show on truetalkradio.com and Political Hitman on Israelnewstalkradio.com. He is the Editor-in-Chief of The Montreal Jewish News.Â
