
The Jewish Report Editorial

Defying the denigrators
The misreading and denigrating of what it means to be Jewish is particularly hurtful in this week of Yom Hazikaron, when we commemorate those who have lost their lives in ensuring the future of the Jewish state.
As we hear the stories of those who lost their loved ones, we feel their pain. In some cases, families have lost several family members in terrorist attacks or serving in the Israel Defense Forces.
It seems to me that there are many South Africans who are determined not to hear Israel’s side of the war on Hamas. For them, it’s simply a case of genocide, and they are only willing to hear how disgusting Israel is. They don’t even question what genocide is or what is actually happening in Gaza. This fits the popular narrative, and unfortunately, Israel and Jews are the evil ones in this narrative. So be it! They can find copious information to fit their narrative because there’s so much fake news out there. The saddest thing is that many of them are so-called “thinking people”, but have chosen to take the popular narrative as fact.
The truth is, thousands of Palestinians have died in this war, and any unnatural death is devastating, especially when it involves innocent people. This isn’t lost on our community. However, the fact that the war was brought on by the worst massacre of Jewish people since the Holocaust isn’t in the popular narrative. The violent, depraved way that Hamas and their followers mutilated, gang raped, and burnt people alive also isn’t in their narrative. Although many of them insist that they are 100% against gender-based violence, there’s no word about what happened to women on 7 October and to the hostages. Also, there’s not a word about the fact that this war cannot be stopped unless the hostages come home. No word about the vile treatment of the hostages. This is somehow lost on those I always assumed were thinking people.
Instead, they claim to side with those handful of Jews who “stand up to the genocide”, because in their minds, it’s a given that a genocide is occurring.
I realise that tackling them on social media over their views is pointless because it becomes a battle of wills and descends into people ganging up against rather than listening to each other. However, we cannot ignore what is so clearly antisemitism, although they still claim it isn’t.
I was told this week on social media what Jewishness is. Apparently, it’s “humanity and compassion” and “kindness and generosity”. Jewish people may be all those things, but that’s not what Jewishness is. And against these ideals, we as a community apparently fall short and disappoint, especially when it comes to the war against terror. Hence, they deduce that we aren’t good people.
As British author and comedian David Baddiel said this week while visiting South Africa, antisemitism, not religion, made him feel Jewish. We, like the Jewish state, are apparently held up to far higher standards than anyone else, especially Hamas, Hezbollah, and other evil groups.
In reality, the sanctity of life is at our core, as are our children. If we’re looking for what being Jewish is all about, rather look there for a start.
And so, on Yom Hazikaron, we feel the pain of every mother and father who lost a child they sent into the army to protect and defend the Jewish state against its many enemies.
Sending young people into the army isn’t something done lightly. A parent doesn’t do it because they believes it will do them good. They don’t do it because their children haven’t figured out a career path yet. They do it because there’s no choice.
Every young adult who goes into the army is there to protect and defend Israel from its many enemies. And they are there to ensure the survival of Israel and the Jewish people. It’s a heavy burden, but there is no choice.
Today, youngsters go into an army at war, and I don’t have to reiterate the dangers of that. That’s why we commemorate Israel’s fallen this week, both soldiers in war and those murdered at the hands of terrorists.
There have been way too many deaths. In just one day on 7 October 2023, 1 200 innocent Israeli men, women, and children were brutalised and murdered, and another 3 300 injured. Since then, Israel has been forced into a war against terrorism, and it hasn’t ended yet. Since 7 October, 932 soldiers and security personnel have been killed and since Yom Hazikaron last year, 79 civilians have been murdered in acts of terrorism.
Fifty-nine hostages are still being held in Gaza, at least 24 of whom are still alive. Israel cannot end this war until they are all home. It cannot do that to their families and loved ones, let alone the entire country, which won’t allow them to be left behind.
To date, 25 420 soldiers and security personnel have been killed in ensuring the future of the Jewish state. As many as 5 229 civilians have been killed in acts of terror.
Nobody in Israel takes war and death lightly. Nobody wants to be at war. This I say, despite the ongoing hatred towards us and the insistence that Israel is perpetrating genocide and we’re all somehow genocidal maniacs.
As Israeli President Isaac Herzog said at the Yom Hazikaron ceremony at the Western Wall on Tuesday, “Saving Israel from the oppressor is a sacred duty, written in blood, and every community of Israel must take part and shoulder the burden.”
As Herzog so eloquently put it, “We have never sought to live by the sword. We are not war-loving people. On the contrary, peace was – and remains – our greatest yearning.
“We will never give up on reaching out for peace. Never! At the same time, we will never renounce, even for a moment, our duty to defend ourselves, and our historic and natural right to exist – like every nation – sovereign in our homeland.”
So, while there are those who have chosen to hate us or disguise their aversion to us in whatever they want, we will continue to remember that being Jewish means being a part of the Jewish world. We will also continue to do what we can to ensure the survival of the Jewish state.
Shabbat Shalom!
Peta Krost
Editor

yitzchak
May 2, 2025 at 1:13 pm
All the DIRCO big guns( a real troika) were out again at the ICJ in the case about Israel blocking supplies.
None mentioned Hamas, none mentioned the hideous conditions the hostages were held under.nor the reason for this war viz . 7.10.2023
A ceasefire is plausible only if all our hostages are released.
One must take one’s burqa off to the star of the show ,the samoosa guzzling Zayin Dangor who makes no bones of the purpose of UNRWA as a holding manoeuvre until all refugees return to their 1948 abandoned hovels,, so much for a 2 state solution. This week the UN delivered food to starving Sudanese in Khartoum ,,, no problem.
When we have evidence that our hostages are well treated and properly housed with full involvement of the ICRC ,then things will change. They are equally able to deliver food etc to the poor Palestinians.
All 3 referred to the Geneva Conventions (esp no. 4) regarding treatment of civilians…yes those rules apply to Israelis as well. One of the arguments put forward always involves cherry picking the IHL rules when it suits them.There is a course at UJ : How to pick your nose 101.Having passed that it progresses to selective picking at the Geneva Conventions.Those at the Media Review Network, a front for radical Islamists are offered free manicures after delving up to their nasal cribriform plates.
A PhD course is also entertained…with field work obligatory.
They never analyse the failures in the Moslem world.,especially all the one state solutions with very heterogeneous populations. They cannot see that Islamic and Islamist hierarchies are the single most impediment to democratic progress.
Hamas ran Gaza all these years politically and militarily,leaving social services, health care, and importantly hateful and inciteful education with anti semitic material against Israel and Jews.,to UNRWA.
I agree ; Israel must defy these morally torpid politicos.No more UNRWA: NEVER AGAIN.South Africa is spending more on the bleatings at the ICJ than it contributes to UNRWA.
Shabbat Shalom 77!!