Persephone Arbour

This piece came in originally as a comment on my article: Living Near Golders Green, which appeared recently. I thought it deserved more prominence, as I found it both moving and interesting.

Persephone, I thoroughly enjoyed your piece on Golders Green. Your words brought back memories of so many things I experienced when deciding to journey through “The Holy Land.” I was not one of those that do not remember the sixties. In fact, I remember them sometimes too well.

My experience was similar to Jehane’s. (Ed. who had commented on the original article.) My mother was born into a Jewish family, but decided to marry my father who was anything but. He grew up in a small Yorkshire fishing town, amidst Catholic guilt and alcohol. On both of which he turned his back. Because of their decision to marry, my maternal grandfather disavowed all knowledge of his daughter, thus leaving me and my sister without the pleasure of grandparents. Having no real direction as far as religion was concerned, I simply followed the instruction that was served up at school.

However, in the latter part of 1966, I began to feel a strong desire to carry out volunteer work in Israel. Being half Jewish, as the Rabbi put it, he could assure me a place to stay and work. But the Jewish agency would not pay the fare. This meant that I was left to my own resources. So, I hitch-hiked from London to Israel, the journey taking twenty eight days. I arrived in the early part of 1967, the year of the Six Day War. I stayed for the duration, and celebrated with both soldiers and civilians at the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem. It was then it became clear that my idea of Israel, and the reality, were most definitely not the same. Jews and Israelis are not the same.

When people talk of Israel in general, one assumes they are talking about a land full of Jewish people. It isn’t so. It would be like talking about England, and therefore expecting it to be inhabited only by the English.

There are more followers of Judaism outside of Israel, than in it. Firstly, Judaism is a religion steeped in the belief of “The One true God and The Chosen People.” And secondly, it is a true believer in the sanctity of the family. The females of the family do not share the same satus as the men. However, the mother runs the family, and to be a ‘half’ Jew – that ‘half’ has to be through the mother.

A state, or a promised land just for the Jewish people, was what Heaven is to the Christians. A place to believe in, a prayer. It was not meant to be a place to live in. When Israel was first established very few Jewish people lived there.

If you talk about Israel today, you talk about Israelis, as today I am called British. And as such, you owe alleigiance to the Israeli flag, not the Rabbi. Israel is not the land of the free. It is, and has been for a long time, a military state under constant threat of all out war. And Zionism today is strongly concerned with upholding and increasing the influence of Israel – internationally. How do you think a follower of Judaism looks upon Israel today? I would think, with despair. Surely God would not have wanted his chosen people to live in such a place.

Jehane writes: “How different the world would be if the Holocaust had not taken place.” I also believe it was an event that shouldn’t have happened. But, our history books are full of events that also shouldn’t have taken place. But they did! No one can honestly say we would be living in a “better world” if they had not. The world is as you want to see it, good or bad.

I think we sometimes miss what is right in front of our eyes. The promised land was a gift from God not the Israeli army!