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is also critical as mechanisms 
to affect change. Like a Venn 
diagram, engagement and being 
well-informed each overlap 
with politics in helping shape 
public policy. Those precepts 
are what led me to choose a 
career in journalism.

LEARNING OPPORTUNITY 
 I also thought the rally would 
provide a perfect civics lesson 
for my 16-year-old daughter, 
Bella, a rising senior at Frankel 
Jewish Academy. I forwarded 
the flyer to my wife, Amy, sug-
gesting the three of us attend 
the rally and make a weekend 
getaway out of it. 
After toying with the idea 
of making it a road trip (note: 
I’m not a fan of long drives), 
we found an affordable travel 
package, pulled the trigger, 
and headed out of town — not 
knowing what to expect, but 
hoping it would be impactful.
I never had attended a rally 
before, political or otherwise; I 
always felt it could challenge my 
integrity as a reporter. However, 
Amy and I agreed that Bella 
would benefit from this real-life 
lesson in civic engagement. 
Sheltered in the arms of her 
family and a tight-knit 
suburban Jewish community, 
she will soon graduate and face 
the larger world, with all of its 
facts and alternative facts; and 

the timing has never been more 
urgent in my lifetime. Hostility 
toward the U.S. Jewish popu-
lation — all 2.4% of us — is at 
a fevered pitch I wouldn’t have 
thought possible just a few short 
years ago.
 During the last several years, 
reports of overt aggression and 
violence directed at U.S. Jews 
— perpetrated by our fellow 
countrymen — are events I 
once deemed as either the prov-
enance of our historical record 
or dispatches from far-off 
European capitals. Regrettably, 
those days have since changed: 
bomb threats called into Jewish 
Community Centers and day 
schools nationwide (including 
here in Detroit); multiple acts 
of desecration at Jewish ceme-
teries; diners harassed at kosher 
restaurants; beatings — or 
worse — taking place in broad 
daylight as people walk to and 
from synagogue; white nation-
alists marching, tiki torches 
in-hand, shouting “Jews will not 
replace us”; senseless massacres 
of congregants at synagogues in 
both Pittsburgh and San Diego. 
Even as I write, I fight a 
cognitive dissonance believing 
these incidents don’t happen 
here. Yet they do, and there is 
no indication of the existential 
threat abating. It is no longer 
background noise.
I am not alone in my con-
cern. A May 2021 report pub-
lished by the Pew Research 
Center found that three-quar-

ters of American Jews think 
there is more antisemitism in 
the U.S. today than there was 
five years ago. Moreover, slightly 
more than half say that, as a 
Jewish person in the U.S., they 
personally feel less safe than 
they did five years ago.

STANDING FOR ISRAEL
As Bella begins her last year of 
high school, it won’t be long 
before she finds herself outside 
of the day school bubble where 
she has been kept fairly insulat-
ed from all this ugliness. As her 
parents, the best thing we can 
do for our daughter is empower 
her to use her voice and learn 
how to act. 
 Action for social justice 
through civic engagement is 
more than just placing a placard 
in one’s window or throwing 
up a lawn sign. Action is stand-
ing toe-to-toe with those who 
hijack legitimate criticisms, 
employ “what aboutism” and 

purposefully spread misinfor-
mation in an effort to delegiti-
mize Israel’s right to exist. 
Israeli government policies 
can and should be reasonably 
debated, but only in an earnest 
attempt at finding common 
ground. Government is not 
some infallible, omnipotent 
concept, but is composed of 
human beings making policy — 
and people can get it wrong. 
However, unlike any other 
liberal democracy on Earth, 
Israel’s government is subject to 
an untenable level of scrutiny, 
and not just from its own cit-
izenry, but much of the world 
writ large. More insidiously, 
debate is often just a guise used 
by anti-Semites as a red herring 
to provide cover for their use 
of debate as a cudgel to spew 
vitriol.
Of particular concern to us, 
the veracity of debate when 
it comes to Israel that takes 

Bella Gottlieb and 
her mother, Amy 
Gottlieb, withstand 
the heat at the “No 
Fear” rally.

Daniel Raab, a University of 
Illinois student leader tar-
geted for supporting Israel, 
speaks at “No Fear: A Rally 
in Solidarity With the Jewish 
People” on the National Mall 
in Washington, D.C., on July 
11, 2021.

BRYAN GOTTLIEB

CHRIS KLEPONIS, JNS.

