My aunt forwarded this to me; unfortunately I don't know the source of it, but it sure sums up the history of the Jewish people and of Israel. Pass it on. Those who wish to destroy Israel won't get it, but we Jews can certainly appreciate the sentiment.
AN OPEN LETTER TO THE WORLD, FROM ISRAEL
7/16/06
Dear World, I understand that you are upset by us, here in Israel.
Indeed, it appears that you are quite upset, even angry.
Indeed, every few years you seem to become upset by us. Today, it is
the "brutal repression of the Palestinians"; yesterday it was Lebanon;
before that it was the bombing of the nuclear reactor in Baghdad and
the Yom Kippur War and the Sinai campaign. It appears that Jews who
triumph and who, therefore, live, upset you most extraordinarily.
Of course, dear world, long before there was an Israel, we - the
Jewish people - upset you.
We upset a German people who elected Hitler and upset an Austrian
people who cheered his entry into Vienna and we upset a whole slew of
Slavic nations - Poles, Slovaks, Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Russians,
Hungarians and Romanians. And we go back a long, long way in the
history of world upset.
We upset the Cossacks of Chmielnicki who massacred tens of thousands
of us in 1648-49; we upset the Crusaders who, on their way to liberate
the Holy Land, were so upset at Jews that they slaughtered untold
numbers of us.
For centuries, we upset a Roman Catholic Church that did its best to
define our relationship through inquisitions, and we upset the
arch-enemy of the church, Martin Luther, who, in his call to burn the
synagogues and the Jews within them, showed an admirable Christian
ecumenical spirit.
And it is because we became so upset over upsetting you, dear world,
that we decided to leave you - in a manner of speaking - and establish
a Jewish state. The reasoning was that living in close contact with
you, as resident-strangers in the various countries that comprise you,
we upset you, irritate you and disturb you. What better notion, then,
than to leave you (and thus love you)- and have you love us and so, we
decided to come home - home to the same land we were driven out 1,900
years earlier by a Roman world that, apparently, we also upset.
Alas, dear world, it appears that you are hard to please.
Having left you and your pogroms and inquisitions and crusades and
holocausts, having taken our leave of the general world to live alone
in our own little state, we continue to upset you. You are upset that
we repress the poor Palestinians. You are deeply angered over the fact
that we do not give up the lands of 1967, which are clearly the
obstacle to peace in the Middle East
Moscow is upset and Washington is upset. The "radical" Arabs are upset
and the gentle Egyptian moderates are upset.
Well, dear world, consider the reaction of a normal Jew from Israel.
In 1920 and 1921 and 1929, there were no territories of 1967 to impede
peace between Jews and Arabs. Indeed, there was no Jewish State to
upset anybody Nevertheless, the same oppressed and repressed
Palestinians slaughtered tens of Jews in Jerusalem, Jaffa, Safed and
Hebron.Indeed, 67 Jews were slaughtered one day in Hebron in 1929.
Dear world, why did the Arabs - the Palestinians - massacre 67 Jews in
one day in 1929? Could it have been their anger over Israeli
aggression in 1967? And why were 510 Jewish men, women and children
slaughtered in Arab riots between 1936-39? Was it because Arabs were
upset over 1967?
And when you, dear world, proposed a UN Partition Plan in 1947 that
would have created a "Palestinian State" alongside a tiny Israel and
the Arabs cried "no" and went to war and killed 6,000 Jews - was that
"upset" caused by the aggression of 1967? And, by the way, dear world,
why did we not hear your cry of "upset" then?
The poor Palestinians who today kill Jews with explosives and
firebombs and stones are part of the same people who when they had
all the territories they now demand be given to them for their state
-attempted to drive the Jewish state into the sea. The same twisted
faces, the same hate, the same cry of "itbach-al-yahud" (Massacre the
Jew!) that we hear and see today, were seen and heard then. The same
people, the same dream - destroy Israel. What they failed to do
yesterday, they dream of today, but we should not "repress" them.
Dear world, you stood by during the holocaust and you stood by in 1948
as seven states launched a war that the Arab League proudly compared
to the Mongol massacres.
You stood by in 1967 as Nasser, wildly cheered by wild mobs in every
Arab capital in the world, vowed to drive the Jews into the sea. And
you would stand by tomorrow if Israel were facing extinction.
And since we know that the Arabs-Palestinians dream daily of that
extinction, we will do everything possible to remain alive in our own
land. If that bothers you, dear world, well think of how many times
in the past you bothered us.
In any event, dear world, if you are bothered by us, here is one Jew
in Israel who could not care less.
AN OPEN LETTER TO THE WORLD, FROM ISRAEL
7/16/06
Dear World, I understand that you are upset by us, here in Israel.
Indeed, it appears that you are quite upset, even angry.
Indeed, every few years you seem to become upset by us. Today, it is
the "brutal repression of the Palestinians"; yesterday it was Lebanon;
before that it was the bombing of the nuclear reactor in Baghdad and
the Yom Kippur War and the Sinai campaign. It appears that Jews who
triumph and who, therefore, live, upset you most extraordinarily.
Of course, dear world, long before there was an Israel, we - the
Jewish people - upset you.
We upset a German people who elected Hitler and upset an Austrian
people who cheered his entry into Vienna and we upset a whole slew of
Slavic nations - Poles, Slovaks, Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Russians,
Hungarians and Romanians. And we go back a long, long way in the
history of world upset.
We upset the Cossacks of Chmielnicki who massacred tens of thousands
of us in 1648-49; we upset the Crusaders who, on their way to liberate
the Holy Land, were so upset at Jews that they slaughtered untold
numbers of us.
For centuries, we upset a Roman Catholic Church that did its best to
define our relationship through inquisitions, and we upset the
arch-enemy of the church, Martin Luther, who, in his call to burn the
synagogues and the Jews within them, showed an admirable Christian
ecumenical spirit.
And it is because we became so upset over upsetting you, dear world,
that we decided to leave you - in a manner of speaking - and establish
a Jewish state. The reasoning was that living in close contact with
you, as resident-strangers in the various countries that comprise you,
we upset you, irritate you and disturb you. What better notion, then,
than to leave you (and thus love you)- and have you love us and so, we
decided to come home - home to the same land we were driven out 1,900
years earlier by a Roman world that, apparently, we also upset.
Alas, dear world, it appears that you are hard to please.
Having left you and your pogroms and inquisitions and crusades and
holocausts, having taken our leave of the general world to live alone
in our own little state, we continue to upset you. You are upset that
we repress the poor Palestinians. You are deeply angered over the fact
that we do not give up the lands of 1967, which are clearly the
obstacle to peace in the Middle East
Moscow is upset and Washington is upset. The "radical" Arabs are upset
and the gentle Egyptian moderates are upset.
Well, dear world, consider the reaction of a normal Jew from Israel.
In 1920 and 1921 and 1929, there were no territories of 1967 to impede
peace between Jews and Arabs. Indeed, there was no Jewish State to
upset anybody Nevertheless, the same oppressed and repressed
Palestinians slaughtered tens of Jews in Jerusalem, Jaffa, Safed and
Hebron.Indeed, 67 Jews were slaughtered one day in Hebron in 1929.
Dear world, why did the Arabs - the Palestinians - massacre 67 Jews in
one day in 1929? Could it have been their anger over Israeli
aggression in 1967? And why were 510 Jewish men, women and children
slaughtered in Arab riots between 1936-39? Was it because Arabs were
upset over 1967?
And when you, dear world, proposed a UN Partition Plan in 1947 that
would have created a "Palestinian State" alongside a tiny Israel and
the Arabs cried "no" and went to war and killed 6,000 Jews - was that
"upset" caused by the aggression of 1967? And, by the way, dear world,
why did we not hear your cry of "upset" then?
The poor Palestinians who today kill Jews with explosives and
firebombs and stones are part of the same people who when they had
all the territories they now demand be given to them for their state
-attempted to drive the Jewish state into the sea. The same twisted
faces, the same hate, the same cry of "itbach-al-yahud" (Massacre the
Jew!) that we hear and see today, were seen and heard then. The same
people, the same dream - destroy Israel. What they failed to do
yesterday, they dream of today, but we should not "repress" them.
Dear world, you stood by during the holocaust and you stood by in 1948
as seven states launched a war that the Arab League proudly compared
to the Mongol massacres.
You stood by in 1967 as Nasser, wildly cheered by wild mobs in every
Arab capital in the world, vowed to drive the Jews into the sea. And
you would stand by tomorrow if Israel were facing extinction.
And since we know that the Arabs-Palestinians dream daily of that
extinction, we will do everything possible to remain alive in our own
land. If that bothers you, dear world, well think of how many times
in the past you bothered us.
In any event, dear world, if you are bothered by us, here is one Jew
in Israel who could not care less.
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