The Greatest Betrayal
“The number of Jews killed within the past decade was reached eight million. From Greece to the Ukraine to France, we were captured as slaves and massacred. I draw your attention to the fact that, as we have been for three thousand years, we are persecuted against even when we should be safe in Brooklyn! As much as the Americans and British claim to stand against injustice but they are doing nothing! Today in Tripoli, the Jewish quarter was burnt by a mob while British soldiers, assigned to maintain order, failed to protect them.” Carmel leaned forward as he spoke in Polish to the crowd of pale, dejected faces. They were thousands of miles away from Zion, having recently completed their Yerida. They didn’t speak English and only had lived with other Jews, rather than assimilating. But even that wouldn’t have saved them as German Jews fell from the top of the hierarchy of the Second Reich to a negligible presence. Syman looked up to Carmel as if he were his father. The ringing Syrian artillery shells attacking the steel boat as it escaped Nahariya could never escape his ears. He only barely could hear the speech. How was it possible that there was a secret group that withstood millenia of hatred and he happened to be among the survivors? Nothing made sense, all he wanted to be was back in the fields of Goworowo, but circumstance had separated him from his old life. The old man up there had more to say. “The goyim who said we were traitors? The men who call themselves more civilized? They refused to let us into their countries until it was too late. And look at all we did for them! We served in large numbers against the fascists and made inventions like the atomic bomb that won the war! And then they left us to drown in the sea as Zion was overrun and the last Wall of the temple was demolished! Truman said nothing and did nothing, while Stalin continued persecution no different than the czar! We have no friends! And yet we, who traveled the ocean from our homeland with nothing, are still as “stateless” as we have been for millenia! There is no greater betrayal than that which occurred to the Jews! We only wanted to live! But what use is there in compiling every injustice which ever happened? The dead remain dead. A new generation of Jews must be highly protective of culture, ethnicity, religion and lives. If we lose any of those elements, we will lose everything.” Incredulous, Syman thought, how could we be in danger when our whole life is trying to escape? “I tell you all the truth - Adonai’s truth. We must keep the covenant and withstand through the tough times as our ancestors did in Egypt.” The refugees solemnly nodded their heads in agreement. Syman looked around. “We must donate our funding to the Jewish Defense Forces as they exist today. However futile it may seem, it is justified to help Jews in self-defense. We are obligated to serve a greater community” How was this speech going to help him? He already knew what he had to know, he already knew the Jewish history. He felt his black leather jacket, tapping the cigarettes in his pocket. He excused himself and ran into the gravel street. Brooklyn looked much more glamorous in pictures. He pulled out a lighter and ignited the cigarette, sitting down on the grass between Eastern Parkway and the tan front face of Union Temple. Emaciated men, women, and children sleeping filled the sidewalks. What could he do? He didn’t remember his parents. He tore up grass and shoved it into his mouth. It didn’t feel good but it felt kind of like eating. He smoked some more, but it didn’t seem to do anything. He sat for a few minutes. An officer in the dark blue button down outfit approached him, but Syman couldn’t hear him. The officer could only get a few words out, “Go away, kike!” before Syman threw his hands up. Syman was shoved backwards into the gravel as the back of his head started to bleed. He was dragged a few feet further before being abandoned on the road and the officer cheerfully ran back into his car.