The Innocent

 Of all the horrific reports to emerge from the terrorist attack this weekend at Bondi Beach in Australia, one image stands out to me: that of a mother trying to distract her toddler from the violence and mayhem unfolding around them by telling them a story. 

It brought to mind another image, from two years previously: a mother in Israel bent over her young son in October 2023, trying to distract him with a comic book in order to lessen his terror from the air raid siren that was blaring overhead. 

Both of those mothers were trying to distract their children from the fact that someone—some stranger—was trying to kill them for the crime of being born Jewish. 

And that of course brings to mind the millions who were killed for that same offense just a few generations ago. 

All this in the midst of Hanukah. 

Of course, hate and antisemitism were not the only forces on display in Bondi beach. There was human decency there too—in the Syrian immigrant who put himself at risk in order to tackle one of the gunmen and wrestle the weapon from his hands. 

But we also suspect somehow that these won't be the last such attacks—the last murders. Not with the right now openly inviting Neo-Nazis and antisemites into their ranks; nor with the Left still shouting slogans like "globalize the Intifada." 

Oh they all have their explanations. There is no one happier to talk your ear off than an antisemite. 

They have their own narratives of persecution and victimization that they are sure can justify these atrocities. 

But look again at that child with their story; that child with a comic book—surrounded by men with assault weapons looking to kill them. 

And remember the words of the poet Stephen Spender: "No cause is just unless it guards the innocent/ As sacred trust: no truth but that/ Which reckons this child’s tears an argument."