OPINION
Just a few days after my 57th birthday, on April 1, I did something I had never done before: I participated in a protest on behalf of my own Jewish community, here in America.
Many years ago, I protested on behalf of Jews who were trapped in the former Soviet Union, but that was something we did for people trapped in dysfunctional Jew-hating countries.
This week it hit in my home of Teaneck, New Jersey.
Why did I have to protest?
This synagogue was holding a fundraiser for ZAKA, an Israeli non-profit that does what we Jews call chesed shel emet, or true kindness, the kind that can never be repaid.
ZAKA volunteers gather all the remnants from the bodies of Jewish victims of terror so that all may be dignified with a proper burial.
ZAKA first responders were often the first to observe and document the horrors of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023 massacre.
Those who work for this organization are honorable, and their sacrifice is significant.
The scarring that must come with encountering the evidence of Hamas’s barbarism is hard to comprehend.
But there are others who took a very different view to ZAKA’s of the value of Jewish life.
They gathered to yell obscenities at Teaneck’s Jews for supporting ZAKA and Israel.
Their stated reason is that the evidence ZAKA publicized, of mutilated Jewish bodies, raped Jewish women, and every horror imaginable, provided the basis for Israel’s ongoing war against Hamas in Gaza.
Their other reason was hatred of Jews, Israel and those who support Israel.
More than a thousand of us, Jews and non-Jews, gathered in front of the synagogue to wave American and Israeli flags.
I brought several of my kids with me. I told them that this was a new frontier for us all.
Thankfully, they never had to protest their own harassment before.
Neither had I.
We wanted to show that we would not be intimidated by those who came — mostly from other places, targeting Teaneck’s large Jewish community — to try to harass us for openly supporting Jewish life and Israel.
It was disconcerting to see these protestors, even after seeing similar demonstrations across the country since Oct. 7.
Across the street were not our neighbors, but strangers — in every sense. They did not come to seek common cause or to have rational conversations. They frothed and spewed.
The anti-social nature of this hate-fest has its origins in the pro-Hamas demonstrations that have sprung up around the country.
These agents of chaos have long spread hate and instill fear on university campuses across the country, where they have not faced serious consequences for pulling the same stunts they do now.
Emboldened, they treat our neighborhoods like new campuses to conquer.
Now they are targeting towns with large Jewish populations.
Teaneck, which has one of our nation’s largest Jewish populations — which, like nearly all Jewish communities globally, is also overwhelmingly pro-Israel — has become a favorite target.
This is especially — and sadly — ironic to me as a former diplomat who has spent years traveling the Mideast.
When I travel through the Mideast, even now, I meet many people who disagree with me, often strongly, about Israel and its conflict with the Palestinians.
But no one there has tried to shout me down, call me horrible names, accuse me of crimes, or display Jew-hatred.
To me, that reveals something important about those who did exactly those things in Teaneck. Those who I see and interact with in the Mideast are builders.
They are trying to construct a future of hope, stability, safety and prosperity.
They are willing to engage respectfully.
The chaos agents who visited Teaneck are destroyers.
They think that to achieve their ends, they must tear the social fabric that holds Americans together, turn communities against themselves, and trash the values that have allowed Americans to flourish together for so long.
They act destructively because they seek destruction.
Jason D. Greenblatt was the White House Special Envoy to the Middle East from 2017-2019. He is the author of the widely acclaimed book "In the Path of Abraham." Follow him on X: @GreenblattJD and Instagram: @Jason.Greenblatt
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