I believe I have a sound reason for being 'Touchy"

Submitted by Seamus Dafydd Dives MacNemi (United States), Oct 15, 2009 at 19:10

When I returned from Israel with my pregnant wife in 1974 one thing made a singular impression on me. It was a graffiti smeared on a train station wall,' Burn Jews Not Oil". I remember when I was in high school in Miami there were certain hotels and restaurants in Miami Beach that would not serve Jews. When I was in college tha fraternities would not accept Jews in their ranks. Neither would they accept Irishmen for that matter. If you weren't a white Christian, preferably a non Catholic you were on the outs in many places. I am not Halachically Jewish but neither am I a Christian although I am Irish with strong Jewish ties in my family so no matter what I was a loser in many places. I got used to being thought of as a pariah and I didn't expect any better from a lot of folks. I lived a pretty insular life for most of my growing up. My only real friends were Jews and those of my own community and we all tended to be rather clanish. We didn't look too much to the out side world for anything. We stuck to ourselves and to our own. Things didn't change much for us until after the Six Day War when all of a sudden we were some kind of heros. One wonders what brought this sudden change in the attitudes of those who had been previously loathe to accept us.

To date the US State Department is a hot bed of anti semitism as are many other branches of the Government. The Churches approach to us is rather difficult for us to clearly percieve or understand. What do they want in return for their support? We certainly don't think for one minute that theirs is an expression of brotherly love. It's never happened before, why is it happening now? NO, They all want something from us and the Jews. The question is,'What is it?"

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