I recently attended a “Stand With Israel” rally near my home and was surprised — and saddened — by the sizeable police presence outside of the JCC (where it was held) when I drove in. I though I was going to get patted down upon entering, but thankfully that did not happen. But it was fairly obvious that there were numerous plainclothes security people inside the center.

Most of my non-Jewish friends are Christians. Most of them just aren’t very aware of this stuff. The ones who are, have learned it over the years, the way I have learned some of what my non-white friends face daily.

As the daughter of an interfaith marriage, this was made extremely clear to me–when I go to shul we have security. When I go to mass with my father, we don’t. Not unless the pope is in town. Real simple.

Imagine, for a moment, Christmas day, and the police checking to make sure you’re safe, that you can come in to church. Don’t feel ‘bad’ for not having this in your life–depending on who you are, you may be facing other oppression, or NOT, and that’s also fine–the goal here is to end oppression, not compete to garner more of it–but be aware of the experience. Think what it would be like. And remember that, when you wonder why American Jews seem so paranoid at times.

That’s all. We all have to imagine each other’s worlds to understand them, because no one has all experiences. Thank God.

My guess is that the original post is spurred by loneliness. When Jews feel threatened in America, we feel lonely. Most of our friends (unless we are orthodox and maybe even if we are) will be Christians.
Normally we feel more kinship with our good neighbors. But when we are targetted, we feel more isolated because our neighbors, although they may be concerned for us, do not share this experience.
We are at the TOP of the hit list for a larger group of nutcases than any other group on Earth. Whenever they lose it (Mel Gibson w/ inherited anti-semeticism+alchohol or Naveed Al Haq w/ Suras 2-9 +untreated bipolar or NeoNazi w/ gun+liberty or FR after losing to GER or GER after losing to FR., they go after US.
Christians get verbally attacked by Athiests/Socialists but are the majority or at least the plurality of the country. You are seldom isolated when attacked. Attacks bring you together with most of your friends. Attacks tend to isolate us from most of our friends–not because of our friends but because of us. This is a poinient feeling which has nothing to do with any fault of Christians.
I talked with both Chr. and J. friends after the Seattle attack. All were concerned, but the Jews remembered the California attack and were aware of attacks in OTHER places. Jews share a calculus of risk. Christians know that if they stick together in America, they will defeat any attacker. Jews know that if we stick together, we can still be obliterated as a community. We don’t expect it here, but it can happen. If cities get too hostile, we leave. There is a calculus of fear which isolates us.

When the nut in Seattle killed, Seattle protected Mosques with police at city expense.
All the synagogues already had offduty police at their own expense, since 1999. If it gets too dangerous, their congregants will leave. Christian Seatlites will only vaguely wonder why their neighbors are leaving.
Jews are not alone in America. But we are still lonely. It isn’t a flaw of America. It’s a flaw in the world.

P.S. For any jihadi reading this: The reason Israel has Nukes is so that if jihadis make the Israel uninhabitable for Jews, the world will be uninhabitable for you.

The point is that Christian schools in America do not have to have armed guards, bulletproof windows, and full-time security to prevent terrorists from coming into a Christian school and murdering the children there.

Jewish day schools do.

The point is that when you go to church on Christmas, you don’t have to show an armed police officer your ticket, proving you belong there and are allowed to come to services. Jews do. I have had to show my High Holy Day tickets to police officers since the 1990s. When I was growing up, the most I had to do was wait for the nice policeman to stop traffic and wave me across the street.

The reason I brought up Christians in the first place is because as far as I know, this situation is endemic across Jewish America, and nonexistent across Christian America. That is the only reason. I thought that perhaps Christians might be shocked to find out Jews have to have armed guards during services on the holiest days of year, and have had to have them for many years.

The point is not that Christians are never threatened for their faith. The point is that the situation is getting to the point where Jews are being threatened for their faith all of the time. When you compare Christians going into non-Christian countries and risking their lives for their faith, you are utterly confusing the point.

Jews in America aren’t risking their lives for their faith by going to other countries on missions. They are risking their lives for their faith by doing the everyday things that most Americans take completely for granted.

That is the point I was trying to make. It has nothing to do with evangelicals and the way some Jewish leaders think about them. It has nothing to do with Christian missionaries. My point is this: In this country, Jews are increasingly at risk simply for the fact that they are Jews going to synagogue, or work, or school.

That is as clear as I can make it. I hope it makes you understand what I was saying above, because I’m done now.

What’s not to understand, already?
Methinks a lot of people doth protest too much.

Cheers from this Christian to you! Carry on.

As for putting words in your mouth, I quoted directly from your original post and your comments thereto. If, in trying to understand your point, I reached an erroneous conclusion about what those things meant, I apologize.

And I’m sorry that you aren’t inclined to enlighten me further, because I am genuinely interested in trying to understand what Christians have to do with the circumstances you describe.

The US is an incredibly free and tolerant society and I give thanks every day (quite literally!) that my granparents came here in the early days of the 20th century. But it still startles me how the freedom to worship and live as a jew here has begun to come under threat. I do know people who choose not to send their children to day schools, at least in part out of a sense of danger. This is very troubling to me, and I have a sense that many other people in the country are oblivious to the problem. In some ways that’s perfectly normal — different constituencies have different issues and priorities of concern to them — but this seems somehow very fundamental to me and I can’t help wanting to let other people know.

For me, the mood of fear for the safety of my own children began around six or seven years ago, when that neo-nazi shot up the JCC in Los Angeles. This may have to do with my own age, and the age of my children — Maybe I was just oblivious to earlier threats, certainly I had occasionally encountered mild antisemitism, but it never deeply concerned me. Still, this one hit home — and it certainly led to lots of changes in the security of our own JCC summer camps and day school.

I think I’m rambling, so I’ll stop for now.

The only American Jewish “leader” I know of by name is Abe Foxman, and I don’t agree with everything he says. But I don’t speak for him, and frankly, he doesn’t speak for me. I didn’t elect him. Nobody did. He has a job as the head of the ADL. Don’t think that means that I—or the American Jewish community–agree with everything he says.

And as for mandating a moral obligation onto my readers: You are mistaking me for someone else.

Both you and Yorkie Lady have managed to change the subject from Jews having to install greater security on their places of worship, gathering, and even businesses, to the relationship between Christian evangelicals and Jews.

But while we’re on the subject of my readers, they tend to be mostly Jewish, and as such, are greatly concerned about their personal safety. We’re just like everyone else that way. We want our children to grow up.

You feel free to take whatever moral obligation out of whatever you’re reading into my words. But let me point something out to you: I am, and have always been, a plain speaker. I write what I mean, plainly, and leave my readers no reason to infer, interpret, or otherwise analyze my words.

If you don’t read it in my posts, it isn’t there.

Don’t ask me to argue a point I haven’t made.