There’s an elephant in the room, he’d like some attention and frankly, he should get it. This elephant has been around as long as the Jewish people, but he is getting bolder and meaner. That elephant, of course, is antisemitism. There’s the familiar white supremacy movement that pretty much hates everyone who doesn’t look like them, the run-of-the-mill antisemites, and a relatively new form of hate directed at Israel which crosses the line to antisemitism too often.

Hate is hate. Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, atheists… everyone is worse off for it. Are we going to end it? No. But that doesn’t give us permission to throw our hands up and accept it, make excuses, or discount it. It’s exactly the opposite. We must talk about it, write about it, learn about it, and call it out. This is a time for all Jews and allies to be extra courageous.

Now that we’ve acknowledged the elephant, let’s not let him plunder the table. If we do, we’ll never get to the Four Questions, and besides, the matzah ball soup will get cold. Seders end with the phrase Next Year in Jerusalem. We may be going out on a limb here, but we’re guessing that most of us won’t be in Jerusalem next year. We’ll probably be sitting right here. But we can’t take that for granted. We’ve already learned the bitter lesson that true hate is never little, it is never unimportant, and it should never, ever be ignored.
-A JewBelong Original