Israel vs. Iran for the world – Operation Rising Lion

Posted on June 15, 2025 by Keith Dvorchik

The day we have been waiting for arrived. More than a decade after warnings about the need to stop Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon began, Israel was finally forced to take action to ensure that this would not happen. The world has had many, many opportunities to avoid this action yet continued to believe in old, failed policies when it comes to the biggest state sponsor of terrorism in the world.

As Iran was reported to be days away from having enough refined nuclear material to make 12-15 nuclear bombs and the 60 day deadline given to Iran from President Trump passed, Israel could no longer wait. In a daring attack, planned for the past 20 years, Israel did truly amazing things. The Mossad secretly built capabilities inside Iran aimed at damaging Iran’s strategic missile array and air defense systems. Mossad agents smuggled large quantities of specialized weaponry into Iran, deployed them across the country, and launched them at targets with precision and effectiveness. What Israel has publicly disclosed includes:

1. Commando Units: Mossad commando teams deployed precision-guided weapon systems in open areas near Iranian surface-to-air missile (SAM) sites to disrupt Iranian attempts to down Israeli aircraft.

2. Vehicle-Based Technology: Sophisticated technologies were installed on vehicles. At the start of the surprise attack, the weapons were launched and completely destroyed targeted Iranian defense systems.

3. Drone Base: Mossad established an explosive drone base inside Iran, which launched attacks on surface-to-surface missile launchers at the Aspehbad base near Tehran—launchers considered a strategic and civilian threat to Israel.

***The NY Post posted this incredible graphic, outlining what the situation is like.***

The Iranian military leadership has been decimated with more than 20 of their key military leaders assassinated in the inital attack with additional military leaders eliminated in the next two days. They are in shambles and what is left are sending drones and firing ballistic missiles at Israel.

Key nuclear scientists who were building the nuclear weapons for Iran were also eliminated. This included top nuclear scientists Fereydoon Abbasi, former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran and a former member of the Iranian parliament who had conducted nuclear research at the defense ministry and Mohammad-Mehdi Tehranchi, a theoretical physicist, the president of the Islamic Azad University of Iran, and somebody who was on the US Department’s Entity List of actors “acting contrary to the national security or foreign policy interests.” Four other top scientists developing Iranian nuclear weapons were killed. Two Iranian nuclear sites have been decimated. Iran’s efforts to gain a nuclear weapon have been set back years, if not longer.

***The Iranian nuclear scientists eliminated, keeping the world safer.***

Iran has responded by firing more than 200 ballistic missiles at Israel. Most have been shot down but there have been strikes that landed, killing civilians. Imagine this happening to us in the United States. Ballistic missiles coming at New York, Chicago, LA, Miami and Washington DC. This is what Israel is facing.

Rockets intercepted over Tel Aviv – imagine this image over NY, Chicago, LA, or Miami.

I have many friends and family in Israel. As I talk with them regularly, some are in their ‘safe room’ that has become the family bedroom. Some have been traveling and are now stranded in the United States, Europe, or other locations. They are all worried. We are all worried. One of the leaders at Dror Israel, a client of mine doing amazing work with children and families in Israel, wrote to us, sharing what they are going through. It’s a harrowing description. It broke my heart. It also reminded me what Iran must be defeated, why we must always fight to eliminate evil. I’ve watched her endure a year of daily rockets being fired from Hezbollah towards the north of Israel. I’ve seen the stress, worry, and concern every day. It must stop. The only way it will stop, is to defeat the Iranian regime and return Iran to its people. With her permission, I have posted her note below.

Dear friends,
I’ve never wrote you an email on Shabbat morning. But this Shabbat feels nothing like Shabbat…
Over the past two days, Israel has entered a state of war with Iran. The situation is still unclear and unpredictable, and we don’t yet know how long this reality will last.
I wanted to share a personal update with you.
On Thursday, June 12, my sisters and I flew to Athens for a weekend with our parents, who are spending three months in Greece. We were excited—this was our first trip together as a nuclear family in 30 years, just the five of us, without partners or children.
At 3:00 a.m. on Friday, we were awakened by alerts from the Israeli Home Front Command on our phones—because even abroad, Israelis remain deeply connected to what’s happening back home. Slowly, we began to grasp the severity of the situation. Since then, all flights to and from Israel have been canceled, the airport is closed, and we have no idea when we’ll be able to return.
For those of you who know my partner and our son: they are safe. At 4:00 a.m. on Friday, they drove to Kiryat Motzkin because being alone at home was too frightening. Both of them have been experiencing post-trauma following the recent escalation in the north, and she was especially anxious to be alone during such a tense time. They are now staying with her parents and will remain there for the time being.
Meanwhile, at 8:30 p.m. on Friday evening, my parents’ building in Tel Aviv was hit directly by an Iranian missile. The damage is extensive. We feel incredibly lucky that my parents weren’t there. On most Friday nights at that hour, our entire extended family gathers in their home. We can’t begin to imagine what might have happened. The building was fully evacuated to hotels, and residents cannot return—not even to assess the extent of the destruction.
In times like these, I’m proud to be part of Dror Israel. Over the past two weeks, and even more so in the last six months, we’ve worked hard to prepare our communities for moments like these. Many teenagers, members of our youth movement are now running programs in their local bomb shelters, arriving with emergency activity kits, and helping to calm and support children and neighbors around them. Thanks to major efforts in recent months, Arab communities across the country are now much better prepared—signs were printed, videos were distributed, and people are more aware and equipped to protect themselves, more educated about the recomandations of the home front commend.
In the coming days, Dror Israel will reassess the situation and continue doing everything possible to support, calm, and educate our communities.
I hope we’ll be able to return home soon. It is incredibly difficult to be far away at a time like this. Outside, everything looks like paradise—blue seas, white beaches. But inside, it’s worry, helplessness, and fear.
I feel deeply grateful for the messages of concern I’ve received from friends, supporters, and partners throughout the U.S. and the U.K. Your care means more than you can imagine.
Praying for quieter days
Dror Israel Educator

Video of a rocket fired by Iran, hitting a private home. Imagine this was your house, in your neighborhood. Two 70+ year old civilians were murdered by this rocket.

What has amazed me is not the brilliance of Israel’s attack on Iran. It’s not the resilience of the Israeli people who are enduring the indiscriminant ballistic missile attacks. It isn’t the success of the attack and the potential for regime change, making the world safe. What amazes me is the people, both Jewish and non-Jewish, who are defending IRAN! The people who argue publicly that the attack was unprovoked, even after Iran has had two prior attacks of Israel with ballistic missiles. Even after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) formally found Iran non-compliant with its nuclear obligations. Evan after Israel presented proof to the United States and many other countries of the enrichment capabilities and how close they were to obtaining nuclear weapons, so convincing that none who have seen it have done anything but support Israel.

The worst of those Jews who so hate Netanyahu and are so out of touch with reality that they would rather defend Iran, a regime dedicated to their destruction, than acknowledge how Israel has just made the world incredibly safer at her own peril. They would rather defend a regime that is committed to their murder than give Israel credit for doing what had to be done. I find myself lost and truly understanding the sin of Sinat Hinam (baseless hatred).

I was sent a powerful video clip of an Iranian Jew this week, not only reminding me that while ‘it starts with the Jews but never ends with the Jews’, but also reminding me of how the Iranian regime came to power. It was the radical Islamists partnering with college students who, in 1979, overthrew the Shah and installed this theocratic government that has continued to abuse and terrorize the Iranian people. As I listened, I thought about what we have seen on college campuses and the influence of radicals who drive their agenda and create chaos. Listen, think, and learn.

If we don’t stand up against the hatred of the Jews, the hate will spread and consume many other groups.

We live in challenging times. I spent this weekend in Central Illinois, hanging out with a group of friends. It’s an annual gathering. We spent time talking not only about Israel, Iran, October 7th and the war in Gaza but also about where we are as a country. After talking about how broken our system is and how both political parties are controlled by the extremes, one of my friends said, “I almost feel like I have to choose a side, even if I hate them both.” I challenged him that there is a third option. We can demand better. We can push and fight and argue for normalcy. For kindness. To allow people to live their lives especially when it doesn’t impact us in any way shape or form. Love who you love. Use the pronouns that you want to use. Give me grace if I make a mistake. I reached out to a friend of Iranian descent who still has family in Iran to check on her and her family. Because that’s what friends do. I had an online debate with a friend where we very much much disagreed. I made sure to tell them that despite our different views, I still loved them.

These are challenging times. There are many people struggling. Many people living in fear. It’s a dangerous time. From the story of my friend that I shared to those who have lost loved ones in the attacks by Iran, from those stranded both inside and outside Israel who can’t get home to those scared to leave their homes for fear of what might happen to them, and for the hostages in Gaza, who we must always remember until they are back home, the world is not a nice place right now. The least we can do is be kind. That kindness makes a difference. As we wait to see what happens in the war between Israel and Iran, remember that while we cannot control that, we can control if we choose to be kind.

Image from Joanne Fink at Zenspirations.

The living dead

Posted on June 8, 2025 by Keith Dvorchik

I use a lot of sources to keep up to date on the news. Unlike the days of Walter Cronkite on CBS news, there is no single trusted source in today’s media. One of the people that I read is Danny Gordis. His “Israel from the Inside” substack posts are filled with a great deal of facts, stories, opinions, and thoughtful pieces. Today’s post was extremely powerful and hit me deeply, bringing tears to my eyes. Having been to Israel 3 times last year (May, July, and September), and working with many different organizations in Israel with daily contact with Israeli’s, it hit home. It’s what I have seen, heard and felt. While on a zoom with one of my partners last week, she let us know that she may have to leave in a few minutes because she got the “10 minute alert” that the Houthi’s had fired a ballistic missile at Israel. Sure enough, a few minutes later she said, “I have to go” and off she went to her safe room. The rest of us stayed and talked until she returned a few minutes later.

I urge you to read this story from Danny Gordis’s “Israel from the Inside”. It is an English translation of a Facebook Post (in Hebrew)from yesterday. And if you subscribe (paid or free), you won’t regret it.

I died on the 120th day of the war, but I didn’t tell anyone

I was killed on the 120th day of the war, but I didn’t tell anyone. The battles were raging and I didn’t want to hurt the guys’ morale. At the end of the month, I got leave.

My wife Talia picked me up from the train and hugged me tight, as if she were drowning in a frozen sea and I was a wooden door. So of course I didn’t tell her I was dead; everything had already fallen on her shoulders these past months. The moment I entered the apartment, Romi, my four-year-old daughter, came running from the neighbors, jumped on me and refused to let go—so I didn’t tell her either that Daddy was dead. Why break her heart?

After Romi fell asleep, Talia waited for me in bed with white wine. “I missed you,” she wrapped her warm thighs around my cold body. We made love. Not because I wanted to (the dead don’t need sex), but just to make her happy. It didn’t work; she stayed distant (or was it me?), and when she asked what I’d been through—I stayed silent (no reason to bring horrors into bed).

A few days later I went back to the battlefield, and two weeks after that I saved five soldiers from death.
“You’ve got balls of steel!” the battalion commander slapped my back. I wanted to say I was dead, so I hadn’t really risked anything, but since my actions had revived the unit’s spirit, which still hadn’t recovered from the death of Gilad the platoon commander, I replied, “Thank you, sir.”

At some point I was sent home, back to “normal life,” but between me and it stood a transparent, impassable border, behind which I watched them like a fish in an aquarium. And the world that once excited me—turned faded; work at the computer store no longer interested me, nor did poker games with friends, and at home, with Talia and Romi, I felt like an invading germ.

Until… One Saturday, Romi fell in the living room. “Daddyyyy!” she cried and I froze, hypnotized by the sight of blood trickling down her forehead, the clear tears dripping from her eyes, the yellowish urine that escaped her, and I thought about how many shades of fluid are in the human body, and remembered Sergei and the bullet he took to the head. That night, after we got back from the ER, Talia said I had to get help, that she couldn’t reach me, that she was out of strength. But all I heard was blah-blah from someone who doesn’t understand how the world works and how bloody and stinking and monstrous it is.
Better she doesn’t know. Let her put on an avocado mask and go to sleep.

But she kept nagging, so I went to the living room and stared at the sidewalk, seven floors down, and wanted to jump, because I felt like a foreign body that life had rejected. The window wouldn’t open. Turns out the frame was bent by a rocket that fell nearby. So I gave up and went to bed.

The next day, Assi, who’d been with me in high school and in the unit, came into the store. Since it was already noon, we went to the hummus place, gossiping about Victor who learned to jump with his new leg, about Barry who got a better hand than the one he lost, and about Udi who finally proposed.
At some point, there was silence and I asked if Talia had asked him to come talk to me. Assi nodded, because there’s no bullshit between us.

“So why is she worried?” he asked.
“It’s hard for her to accept that I’m dead,” I answered honestly, because I no longer had the strength to hide it.
Assi wasn’t fazed and speared a pickle from the plate. “Remember when you died?”
“The day Sergei was shot.”
“Mmm… half a year.” He bit into the pickle. “And what’s the hardest part about being dead?”
“That I don’t feel anything.”
“Really?” He looked at me, picked up a fork and stabbed my hand.
“Ow!” I jumped, “Are you nuts?!”
“Turns out there are some things you do feel,” he grinned, like a kid who just egged the principal.
I glared at him. Really? Seriously?! That’s your reaction to my death?! Seven years of psychology studies for this?! I got so angry I threw an olive at his eye.
“You son of a—” he flung pita at me.
So I threw a shish kebab at him.
A wave of stupid laughter took over and we kept pelting each other with fries and falafel until the owner lost it and kicked us out.

“What if…” Assi wondered as we walked back to the store, “it’s not that you don’t feel, but that… you’re afraid to feel?”
“Afraid to feel what?” I asked, and immediately thought of Ortal, Sergei’s wife, who after years of fertility treatments finally got pregnant, and how he came back from leave beaming and showed us the ultrasound of the boy. “Check out this mega-penis! Just like his dad!!!”

48 hours later, he took a sniper’s bullet. A bullet that wasn’t even meant for him. I was supposed to go to the window, but I was breaking a record on a dusty Game Boy I’d found, so I asked him to go instead and… I started to cry, because he didn’t deserve it. He didn’t.

“Now I know you’re alive,” Assi said, “Know why?”
“Why?”
“Because dead men don’t cry.”

He put a comforting hand on me and suddenly there was wild gunfire, fighter jets tearing through the sky, which stank of smoke, of decay, someone cried “Yama! Yama!!” Or maybe it was “Mama! Mama!!” And my hands searched for a weapon, but I was in civilian clothes, in the middle of Bialik Boulevard—

“I’m losing my mind,” I told Assi.
“You’re not, bro! You’re feeling, don’t run from it, don’t run!” And he hugged me tight and didn’t let me fall.

That evening I went to Talia, who was folding clothes, and said I wanted, like before, to read Romi a bedtime story. “Not sure that’s a good idea,” she refused to look at me. So I pinched her butt, like we used to do to annoy each other when we were dating. It surprised her, even confused her.

“Assi came to visit me at the store,” I said.
“And…” she glanced at me.
“He stabbed me with a fork.”
“Too bad it wasn’t a pitchfork,” she looked at me for a few seconds and must have seen something that changed her mind, because she picked up a book from the couch and handed it to me.

I read Romi a story about a turtle who wanted to be a butterfly, and the night lamp painted colorful animals on the walls. She fell asleep before the end, where the turtle, drawn in black and white the whole book, suddenly glowed with colors. And even though it was a predictable and silly ending, I teared up, and stroked her tiny, sweet fingers, moving with the rhythm of her dreams, and I couldn’t understand how in the same world horror and love could live side by side.

And I thought of Sergei, of his wife, of the baby in her belly, of corpses and kisses, screams and butterflies, and everything inside me stormed and raged and cried… and I didn’t run from it… I didn’t run. I didn’t run.

I know far too many people like this brave man. Far too many Israeli friends that have been through hell and back since October 7th. Rami Davidian, the farmer who saved 750 people from the Nova Festival on October 7th – the look in his eyes as he told us how he untied dead women from the trees he was looking at, their bodies abused, to give them dignity, is something I will never forget.

I have heard stories from my friend Yaron about October 7th, the first four months of the war in Gaza, and the most recent hostage release during the last ceasefire, that I will never forget. There are more that he cannot share. My friend Tal goes back into reserves in what seems like every other week. I’ve been to army bases, had barbecues with IDF soldiers and families from Kibbutz Alumim. Hearing the members of Kibbutz Alumim who fought the terrorists on October 7th is something I will never forget. As one member pointed out the 3 places he was shot that day, the places where bullets still remain in his body, I often wonder how, or if, they will ever recover.

Then I think about the work Dror Israel is doing with children and families in Israel. I think about Hapoel Jerusalem Football Club and the work they are doing with Trauma Soccer and their neighborhood leagues which get Jewish and Arab children in Jerusalem to play and learn together. I think about Hersh Goldberg-Polin (z’l), one of the leaders of their fan club and how much a future of peace and healing mattered to him. I think about Israel Volunteer Corp-Sword of Iron, mobilizing a community of over 44,000 people who want to volunteer in Israel to help rebuild both the physical and emotional state of the country. I think about what I do and what else I could do, to make a difference.

The Jewish people and the citizens of Israel have a long road ahead of us – first to win this war against evil and get the hostages back, and secondly to recover from what we have seen and what we face on a daily basis. It won’t be easy but we can do it together.

My question to you is what will you do? Will you be like Talia and Assi and do the difficult thing to help? Will you stand by while the author of that piece and so many others suffer in silence? Will you shake your head in sadness at the murder of Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim as they left a Jewish communal event or at the firebombing in Boulder during a peaceful march to have the hostages in Gaza returned or will you take action and do your part.

History is waiting to be written – the question is what will your role be. I hope that the writer of the piece in Danny Gordis’ “Israel from the Inside” inspires you to take action. I know it inspired me to do more.

If not now, when?

Posted on June 7, 2025 by Keith Dvorchik

This week, the bodies of Judi Weinstein Haggai, 70, an Israeli who held U.S. and Canadian citizenship, and her husband, Gad Haggai, 72, a dual U.S.-Israeli citizen, were recovered in Gaza and returned to Israel. Let that statement sink in. They were innocent civilians, murdered by Hamas on October 7, 2023. Murdering them wasn’t enough for Hamas. They had to take their dead bodies and bring them back to Gaza, further tormenting their families. Almost 20 months later, their bodies were found by the IDF and returned to Israel for burial.

This is outrageous. Murdering innocent senior citizens is horrific. Kidnapping their bodies to cause more emotional harm is inhuman. Yet the world wasn’t bothered by this. It was almost a non-story with no outrage. The fact that there remain 56 hostages in Gaza, 20 months later, and that 36 of them are dead bodies doesn’t cause the world any agita.

***Judi Weinstein Haggai (z’l) and Gad Haggai (z’l). May their memories always be a blessing.***

The United Nations security council, on the same day that the bodies of Judi and Gad were recovered, attempted to pass a resolution demanding an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza without linking it to the release of hostages. The United States veto stopped the other 14 other members of the council who voted in favor of the resolution from this bigoted resolution. The resolution described the humanitarian situation in Gaza as “catastrophic” and called on Israel to lift all restrictions on the delivery of aid to the 2.1 million Palestinians in the territory while not assessing any of the blame to the UN or Hamas. The UN doesn’t deliver the aid and Hamas steals the aid and sells it on the black market. The UN fails to support the efforts of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) who on its most recent day of operations distributed 1,441,440 meals and who over the 8 days of their operation have delivered approximately 8.48 million meals, all without the corruption of the UN or allowing Hamas to steal from them. How do we know that the GHF is actually working? Hamas and the UN are doing everything they can to shut it down. It’s a threat to their power. It’s a threat to their control. We see Hamas shooting those trying to get food from GHF.

Video of Hamas shooting and killing Gazans lining up to get food

With Hamas losing control and the people of Gaza believing they can speak their minds without the risk of being killed or having their family killed. As they speak out publicly, a different story is being told that what the media and the UN have been feeding the world. This is why you don’t see it on any media – it goes against their agenda. Watch and listen yourself.

Listen to the people of Gaza speak directly without the lies of the UN or the media

Despite the words of the people of Gaza, despite the proof of no famine and food getting directly to the people in Gaza through the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, countries such as England, France, and Canada continue to blame Israel and try to force peace without the hostages being returned and without Hamas being removed from power. The antisemitism is coming from leadership of many countries along with people who need to have a cause to fight for because they have no meaning in their lives and need to find somebody to blame or need a cause to fight for, regardless of whether it is just or righteous. People like Greta Thunburg, who had her fifteen minutes of fame and needs to find a way to be back in the public eye. What better than to blame the Jews to become popular again? Why not take a small ship with enough food for those on it and a few people in Gaza, publicize it to the world, knowing you won’t make a difference but will get lots of media coverage. People like her care more about their own image and their own PR than the people of Gaza. They’d rather align themselves with Hamas, a terrorist organization, to get visibility and remain in the public eye.

***Greta Thunburg once stood for something – now she’s just another Jew hater***

Nattapong Pinta, a Thai national, was working in agriculture in the south of Israel on October 7th. He isn’t Jewish, isn’t Israeli, but was working in Israel which was enough for Hamas to kidnap and then murder him. This week, Israel recovered his body. That’s the evil of Hamas. They are born of hate. They feed on hate. If you are not part of Hamas or supporting Hamas in some way, you are a target of Hamas. Too many people don’t want to accept the truth. They want to find humanity where there is none. They’d rather see an underdog than true evil. They chant ‘Globalize the intifada’ and when it comes to them, to their city, to their neighborhood, and affects their lives, they will wonder what happened and try to find somebody else to blame.

So we continue to fight. We fight Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iran. We fight the Jew haters in the UN, France, and England. We fight those in Ireland and Australia who are terrorizing Jews under the guise of Israel. We don’t let people like Greta Thunberg, the members of the band Green Day, Mark Ruffalo, Susan Sarandan, Kanye West, Cynthia Nixon, John Cusak, Roger Waters and others get away with their lies, hatred and bigotry. We wear our Stars of David, Chai’s, and Kippot proudly while ensuring we have a mezzuzah on our door to signal our pride. We thank our allies like Patricia Heaton, who has chosen to publicly support the Jewish community and created a movement of non-Jews who are putting a mezzuzah on their home to show their support publicly.

***Actress Patricia Heaton putting a mezzuzahon her front door, showing her support of the Jewish community***

And we both give money to help support Israel, Israelis, and our local Jewish communities while also going to Israel to volunteer and show our support. I’ve been to Israel 23 times and the last 3, all after October 7th, have not only been incredibly meaningful to me but have also been meaningful to Israelis. I will never forget all the thank you’s I received, the stunned Israeli’s who couldn’t believe I would come in the middle of a war, the leaders of the town of Shlomi, a small religious town in the north of Israel who had been relocated to a hotel in Jerusalem for well over a year who not only were inspired by seeing us in Israel but that we prayed, learned, and were proud to be Jewish.

If you have been fighting, keep fighting. If you haven’t begun fighting yet, it’s time to begin fighting. If you’ve been to Israel since October 7th, go back. If you haven’t been to Israel since October 7th, it’s time to go. As a friend of mine’s mother told her right after October 7th, “If you don’t go, you’ll never forgive yourself.” The time in now to fight for the Jewish people, for Israel, and for yourselves and your family. The words of Rabbi Hillel are often quoted and sometimes sound like a cliche. Today, they mean more to me than ever. I hope they inspire you. As he famously said, “If not now, when?”

It’s not safe to be Jewish in public any longer

Posted on June 2, 2025 by Keith Dvorchik

I have spent the last few years writing and talking about the rise of Jew hatred. I have called out the increasing bigotry and been very vocal about the violence that was going not come if this continued. We saw it happening in Europe and I wrote and said that it was going to come to here, to the United States. We saw it in Canada and I wrote and said that it was going to come here. We saw individual assaults that were played down by the media and many in the Jewish community as ‘isolated incidents’ and I warned that it was now here and was going to get worse.

On Wednesday May 21st, two Jews, Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim, were fatally shot outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., after attending an American Jewish Committee (AJC) event. The media chose to call them “Israeli Embassy staffers” which is where they worked, but not why they were shot and murdered. That was because they were Jews.

Many people were suddenly shocked. They had been to AJC or other Jewish events and for the first time, they realized that it could have been them. Those of us who have been warning that this was coming took no joy in their sudden realization. Two Jews were murdered because of the lies of the media, of our politicians, of the UN, and many others. For the first time, the conversation began to shift, just a little. For the first time, Jews in America had been slapped in the face and came to recognize the danger they face just for being Jewish.

Yesterday, Sunday June 1st, a domestic terrorist, filled with hatred of Jews fueled by many of our leaders, our press, and other Jew haters, threw molotov cocktails into a peaceful rally to support freeing the hostages still held by Hamas for over 600 days. Eight victims, including a holocaust survivor, were injured with a number seriously injured. A few are in critical condition. Two to Eight in 2 weeks. Being publicly Jewish or Jewish in public has become a life threatening condition.

Yet the media continues to lie. Today’s front page of the Orlando Sentinel, above the fold, highlighted a debunked claim, an outright lie, about Israel. The claim was made by Hamas and was unsubstantiated, yet many news outlets ran with it. A day after it was debunked, it was front page of the Orlando Sentinel. What about the terrorist attack in Boulder? Molotov Cocktails being thrown into a Jewish crowd? Where was that coverage?

The proof of the lie is video evidence. It was released after the claims were made. One security footage shows what was happening at the time of the alleged Israeli attack on civilians. What was happening? People peacefully lining up to get food from the new Israel NGO, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which has been successfully getting food to the people of Gaza. The people of Gaza receiving the food from GHF were stunned that the food was free. Since humanitarian aid has been coming into Gaza since the war began, you may wonder why they are so stunned that the food was free. It’s because the UN has allowed Hamas to take the food and Hamas has been selling the food. The complaint from the Gazan people wasn’t that there was no food, it was that the food was too expensive. That’s the free food being given as humanitarian aid. Yet the world, the media, and many of our leaders, chose to ignore this. The Free Press had a powerful article about this. I urge you to read it.

Video of what things looked like in the location of the reported Israeli shooting at the time of the alleged shooting. One problem – it’s a peaceful group of people getting their food and no shooting.

A few hours later, more video evidence was provided. This time it was footage of the shooting of Gazan people. One small problem with the lies being told that it was the IDF that murdered Gazan people. The shooter is Hamas. Our wonderful media chose not to report that either. And we wonder why people beileve the lies? It’s because the media keeps telling them. Nobody holds them accountable. Even with video evidence shown above and the video evidence below.

Video evidence of Hamas shooting and killing Gazan people. The media prefers an unverified Hamas claim to video evidence.

Where do we go from here? I was talking with a friend of mine in Denver today who said there are conversations now about whether observant Jews should walk to synagogue on Shabbat due to safety concerns. Wearing a kippah and a suit or a nice dress or outfit while walking on Saturday morning or evening is a clear indicator that you are Jewish. It’s no longer safe to do that.

I have attended many Jewish events in my life and while there was security at the venue, I walked undisturbed to my car from the venue at the end of the event. The shooting at the AJC event in DC has no longer made that safe. Walking to your parked car after a Jewish event now makes you a target. Being Jewish in public makes you a target.

A few years ago, as the rise of Jew hatred was clearly moving towards violence, I reached out to somebody I know and trust to ask if when the time came, they would hide me and my family. When I shared that, people were shocked. That reality comes a little closer every single day. When people like Bernie Sanders rail against Israel and incite people to violence and then post things like this on social media after Boulder, it’s offensive.

The recent antisemitic attack in Boulder is disgraceful and unacceptable. We must all condemn it in the strongest terms and wish a rapid recovery to those injured.

Violence only begets violence, and we must allow no place for it in our politics.
— Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) June 2, 2025

Bernie helped create the monsters who killed the two Jews in DC and threw the molotov cocktails in Boulder. He takes no responsibility for his part. When US Representative Rashida Tlaib still keeps up a post that has been proven to be a lie for more than 20 months after the proof, we know we are in a battle for our lives.

Israel just bombed the Baptist Hospital killing 500 Palestinians (doctors, children, patients) just like that. @POTUS this is what happens when you refuse to facilitate a ceasefire & help de-escalate.

Your war and destruction only approach has opened my eyes and many… https://t.co/mZYoifT7bj
— Rashida Tlaib (@RashidaTlaib) October 17, 2023

I spoke to a friend of mine yesterday who is physician. He glumly said to me, “I guess I have to go get my conceal carry now.” That’s the world we live in. To be Jewish and feel safe, you have to consider carrying a gun. To be Jewish and feel safe, you need to consider being armed to walk to your car, to go to the grocery store, or be anywhere in public.

The question is what are you going to do about it? Our members of Congress have issued statements but what are they going to actually do? Are they going to stay in the partisan lanes, write posts on social media, and allow (and sometimes encourage) Jew hatred or are they doing to put aside their political differences to keep us safe? Are there going to be consequences for inciting hate or are we going to allow it until the violence kills more Jews? Have we had enough or do we need to wait for the mass shooting of Jews event that will be on the horizon if we don’t act.

If you keep your head in the sand, stick with your partisan beliefs, and don’t speak out, all you have done is made yourself an easier target. I’m going to stand up, speak out and not stay silent. I’m going to do all that I can to live in a country where we don’t tolerate hate, even against Jews, who remain the only group that it is ok to publicly hate. The title of Dara Horn’s 2021 book is no longer ironic. It’s no longer acceptable

Nor is the title of David Baddiel’s 2021 book allowed to be true. Jews do count and I hope you will join me, whether you are Jewish or not, in making sure that Jews do count, that violence against Jews is not tolerated, and that Jews can once again feel safe being in public.

It’s a sad day in America when American citizens don’t feel safe being in public because of hatred and bigotry. Because our leaders and the media incite hate and then, like Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ihan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, vocal antisemites and Jew haters, try to distance themselves from the violence they helped create by issuing pithy statements on social media. It’s time to call them out. It’s time to call out the media for their lies. It’s time to stand against hate including antisemitism. Or find the person who will hide you and your family. The choice is yours.

Speaking out against Jew hatred

Posted on May 21, 2025 by Keith Dvorchik

A college friend forwarded me this post on LinkedIn by a friend of hers from childhood. In her own words, “I grew up w Joel. He is the best in his profession. He composes music for ads & commercials. He wrote the music for 7 commercials that ran during this years Super Bowl. He is a giant in the industry.” When I read his post I was horrified and inspired. I was angry and I was proud. I could relate. It’s personal. For all of us.

Last year, I was honored to be named Jury President for Music & Sound Craft at the 2025 The One Club for Creativity. I’ve supported The One Club for decades as a sponsor, advocate, judge, and multi-award winner. JSM has earned dozens of One Show Pencils and topped the One Show Global Creative Rankings both globally and domestically.

Shortly after accepting, I received an email from the CEO and Board stating that my personal social media posts unapologetically condemning antisemitism and supporting the Jewish people were “too much” and “triggering” to some at the Club. They said such posts would not be “tolerated.” They objected specifically to my use of the word eradicate when describing what I hoped would happen to the terrorists of October 7. They didn’t like my post celebrating the IDF’s elimination of Sinwar, the architect of 10/7, who raped, mutilated, burned babies, and held hostages. My expression of joy in his demise, they said, was also “too much.”

I refused to accommodate and resigned.

They knew my nephew serves in the IDF. This isn’t theoretical. It’s personal. My values, my family, my identity, my people were under attack. Again.

In a follow-up call, TOCC leadership asked what they could do to keep me. I requested one simple thing: a specific, standalone statement condemning antisemitism—like they’ve done for BLM, LGBTQ+, AAPI, Ukraine, and others. Instead, they sent a vague, diluted message grouping antisemitism with racism, xenophobia, homophobia, Islamophobia, etc., scheduled to run on Holocaust Remembrance Day.

I told them how tone-deaf and offensive that was. They refused to revise it. And then… said nothing. Complete silence. No statement at all. No support for Jewish creatives in our industry. No condemnation of antisemitism.

I also pointed out that only 1 of 42 board members is Jewish, despite generations of Jewish creatives who helped shape this industry. I can name at least 100 deserving Jewish creative leaders off the top of my head. That silence and lack of representation speaks volumes.

I formally cut all ties. I won’t support any organization, especially in my industry, that refuses to condemn antisemitism. This was a choice. And a refusal.

Many urged me to stay quiet. That going public might hurt the business I’ve built over 35 years.

I can’t.

I will not be silenced. Not now. Not ever. And certainly not by an ad awards show that acts as moral authority on every issue and condemns all forms of hate, except Jewish hate by consciously and purposely remaining silent while Jews are hunted, threatened, and murdered. Again.

I was a Jew before JSM. I’ll be a Jew after JSM.

Am Yisrael Chai.

Joel isn’t the only one who faces this type of Jew hatred, discrimination, and expectation to just accept it. It happens to most of us every day and we don’t even see it or realize it. Some of us even think it’s acceptable because we have ‘privilege’. We cannot stay quiet in the face of this hatred. We cannot stick our heads in the sand and hope that it will just go away or leave us alone. History has shown us that it never does. It comes for us all in the end. We must fight back. We must stand up and speak out. Staying quiet isn’t an option. Joel isn’t. Neither should any of us.

Britain suspended free trade talks with Israel and the EU said it will review whether Israel is violating the human rights clause of the EU-Israel Association Agreement. France, the U.K. and Canada threatened sanctions against Israel. All because Israel refuses to let Hamas, a terrorist organization still holding Israeli hostages, stay in power to murder, rape, and kidnap more Israelis. They think we are the same Jews of the past who meekly hid and accepted our fate. They are 100% wrong. Prime Minister Netanyahu spoke up powerfully about this today.

“The world is telling us to end the war,” Netanyahu said, in the first press conference he has held in Israel since December. “I am prepared to end the war according to clear conditions: Hamas lays down its weapons, steps down from power, returns all the hostages, Gaza is demilitarized and we implement the Trump plan” to relocate residents of Gaza. Whoever is calling for us to end the war is calling for Hamas to stay in power,”

Love him or hate him, Bibi won’t just accept our fate as Jews to be that of victims. Neither should we. Joel showed us how to stand up and speak out. Bibi showed us how to do it. The question is, what will you do? Will you be like Joel and stand up and speak out despite the personal risk? Will you stand up to Jew hatred in the face of your ‘friends’ like Bibi is doing to the UK, France, Canada, and the EU or will you fold because they are your ‘friends’?

The choice is yours. Take the risk now or wait for the inevitable that has happened over and over again for thousands of years? I know what I am doing. I’m going to stand up and speak out. I’m going to fight Jew hatred publicly, no matter the personal cost.

A love for life – we will survive

Posted on May 18, 2025 by Keith Dvorchik

The world seems to get crazier and crazier. The stock market plummets and then returns. Tariffs are high and then are gone, delayed, or small. The only constant seems to be Jew hatred, lies, and the hostages being ignored by the UN, Red Cross, and the world.

May 15th is the day of Israel Independence on the secular calendar. 77 years ago, David Ben Gurion stood in Tel Aviv, in what is now Independence Hall, and declared Israel to be a State. Every time I stand in Independence Hall, look at the seats set up as they were that day, and listen to Ben Gurion’s voice declaring the State, I get chills.

That declaration by Ben Gurion was a statement about the Jewish love of life. Of how we never forget. Of how we place life ahead of everything. This week, there were two examples of this. It was recently announced that Israel had recovered a number of documents and items from Syria that belonged to Eli Cohen. Captured as a spy by Syria and hung as punishment, Cohen is one of the great stories of Israel. I knew about what he did long before I knew his story. The actor Sasha Baron-Cohen played him brillantly in the Netflix mini-series, The Spy.

Top row, center: Cohen’s final will, handwritten in Arabic just hours before his death on May 18, 1965. Addressed to his wife Nadia and children, the letter is a heartfelt farewell filled with guidance, dignity, and emotional clarity.

Top row, right: A forged Argentine passport issued under the alias Kamel Amin Thaabet, the identity Cohen used to infiltrate the highest levels of the Syrian regime.

Middle row, right: The official death sentence, signed by Syrian military judges, condemning Cohen for espionage.

Bottom row, center: Scotch-brand audio tapes, used by Syrian intelligence to record Cohen’s interrogations and radio transmissions

While we have now retrieved more than 2,500 documents and artifacts related to Eli Cohen, we still don’t have his body back. Executed in 1965, 60 years ago, we have never forgotten him or the desire to get his body back.

This past week, the IDF and Mossad were able to recover and return the body of Sergeant First Class Tzvika Feldman. 43 years after he was killed in the Battle of Sultan Yacoub during the First Lebanon War. Syrian soldiers transferring his body to Syria until this past week when his body was returned to Israel. We love and treasure life. We don’t ever forget.

This week, Tzeela Gez and her husband Hananel, left their home in the northern West Bank community of Bruchin to head to the hospital so she could give birth to their fourth (4th) child. A terrorist shot at their car, wounding them both. A few hours later, after an emergency C-section to deliver their newborn son, Tzeela died.

The media barely covered this brutal attack. They don’t cover the violence against Israelis in the West Bank. They don’t cover the rockets that are launched at the citizens of Israel. They don’t address or condemn the ballistic missiles fired by the Houthis from Yemen targeting civilians. It is up to us to remember, to never forget. It is up to us to ensure that the souls of Eli Cohen, Tzvika Feldman, and Tzeela Gez are never forgotten. It is up to us to ensure that future Hersh, Carmel, Alex, Eden, Or, and Almog’s know who they are named for and what their obligation is to honor those they are named for.

The message below from Tzeel’s husband Hananel is the essence of Judaism. We have never and will never let them break us. We will fight for our people no matter how sad or downhearted we are. We will survive, succeed, and thrive under any and all circumstances.

Our effort to survive, succeed, and thrive means that we fight for truth. Even when it is inconvenient. Even when it is difficult. Even when the world doesn’t want to see, hear, or recognize it when it’s right in front of their face.

A friend of mine shared this piece about the history of the term Nakba that was written by Adam Louis Klein. It is a fascinating history that shows the power of the media and of repeating a lie long enough and loud enough that people think it is the truth

The term Nakba, now central to Palestinian national memory, was coined by Constantin Zureiq, a Christian Arab nationalist and key figure in shaping modern Arab nationalist ideology. As detailed in a recent article in Fathom Journal by David Szeftel, Zureiq was part of an intellectual movement in the 1930s and 40s that openly admired fascist and even Nazi models of anti-Western power, seeing them as templates for Arab revival.

When he introduced Nakba in his 1948 book Ma’na al-Nakba (The Meaning of the Disaster), it did not refer to Palestinian suffering or displacement. It referred to the Arab League’s failure to destroy the newly declared State of Israel and the humiliation of Arab armies. It was a political lament over defeat, not a humanitarian reflection on refugees.

Only later was it linked to the “right of return” for Palestinian refugees, a policy heavily promoted by the Arab League and eventually formalized through the United Nations. But this “right of return” wasn’t about refugee welfare—it became a political tool designed to prevent Israel from continuing to exist as a Jewish state by flooding it demographically.

This strategy also led to the unprecedented perpetuation of refugee status across multiple generations (see Einat Wilf’s work on this). Unlike any other refugee situation in history, Palestinians were deliberately kept in a state of statelessness by Arab regimes, denied full citizenship rights even in places like Egypt and Jordan, which directly controlled Gaza and the West Bank after 1948. In effect, the Arab League actively denied Palestinians the right to rebuild their lives in order to weaponize their suffering and make Israel appear impermanent and illegitimate.

Over time, the meaning of the Nakba shifted. It became less about the Arab world’s military failure and more about constructing a permanent Palestinian grievance narrative. The historical record was rewritten to erase the Arab invasion and rejection of the UN’s two-state partition plan, portraying the events of 1948 instead as unprovoked Israeli aggression. This narrative also conveniently erased Jordan’s displacement of Jewish communities from the West Bank, the appropriation of their land and property, and suppressed the mass dispossession of Jewish communities across Iran and Arab countries after 1948.

Eventually, the displacement of Palestinians was rebranded as a case of “ethnic cleansing” and “settler colonialism,” rather than what it historically was: the tragic outcome of a war of independence triggered by the Arab world’s invasion of the newly declared Jewish state—though it’s important to acknowledge that some forced expulsions of Palestinians did occur amidst that war.

In short, Nakba has evolved from a term describing the Arab world’s military failure to a political myth that erases historical complexity in favor of a one-sided narrative of perpetual grievance.”

I’ve been the Aida ‘refugee camp’ in Bethlehem. It is a city. They live in apartments, not tents. They have schools and community centers. Their schools and community centers teach them hate. In 2019, I met with and talked to the head of their community center. He bragged about the suicide bomber that he helped raise and create. Openly. Publicly. The world loves their Jew hatred and they will continue to use whatever and whoever they can in their effort to eliminate us. From the Assyrians to the Babylonians to the Persian to the Greeks to the Romans to the Byzantine empire to the Spanish Inquisition to the pogroms in Russia to the Nazis in the 1930s and 40s, to today, whatever it takes to attack us is free reign.

The difference is that today we fight back. Today we don’t cower in fear. We don’t allow others to determine our fate. The world can hate us and we will still fight. The world can lie about us and we will still fight. Survival isn’t an option and we won’t allow survival to be under the control of anybody else. Today we have the IDF. Today we have Israel. Today we won’t stay silent and we will fight back.

Am Yisrael Chai.

Lessons – will we ever learn?

Posted on May 6, 2025 by Keith Dvorchik

My youngest son graduated college on Friday. It was a momentous occasion in his life and in ours. My mom came in to celebrate and attend the graduation. I treasure these moments more and more as time goes on. We sat in the auditorium, watching where he was sitting (he helped us find him, texting us his location and turning around to us and waving), and waited for him to have his name announced and walk across the stage. As a parent, it was an incredible moment for many reasons.

***My mom and Matthew at graduation – I treasure these moments more and more.***

I noticed a few things surrounding his graduation that got me thinking. They may seem totally unrelated, but for me, they all tie together.

On the drive to campus for graduation, I noticed a few things. First, how many people drove as if they were the only car on the road. Turning right from the left turn lane. Going straight and trying to outrace cars from the left turn lane. Where was the common courtesy? Where was basic rule following? I laughed as one car that did this ended up far behind me – they almost caused an accident to end up behind the car they had to cut off.

The second thing was that when I tried to be kind, to let cars in ahead of me, how they wouldn’t accept the kindness. They wouldn’t go in front of me. It got me thinking, “When did kindness become so rare that people don’t recognize it?”

At the graduation, it was the same conflict. They asked not to scream and yell when your loved one’s name was announced as it meant the next name couldn’t be heard. Yet people screamed, drowning out the name of the next person graduating. Rudeness and lack of caring was all over the place. As I went to video my son about to walk across the stage, the people in front of me had to stand up, blocking my view. No awareness of people around them. I stood up, moved slightly, and was able to video and watch him walk. Had they done that a minute later, I would have missed it.

Yet the number of people willing to take pictures of my family when asked, the number of families who I took pictures of when asked was remarkable. The wishes of congratulations to strangers because they were celebrating the graduation of a loved one was remarkable.

What a dichotomy. It got me thinking that perhaps America isn’t really as lost as it appears. Perhaps there is hope. Perhaps we can regain our country from the extremes and return to a world of kindness, caring for others, and awareness of the world around us. Perhaps we don’t have to live in a world where it is ‘my way or the highway’ on every single issue.

I do know one thing for sure. It starts with each of us. We may not be able to change the entire country but we certainly can change our own behavior. We certainly can change the world of those around us. I hope we can all make a commitment to do our best to be kind. To be aware of those around us. To celebrate with those who are celebrating and to embrace joy rather than hate. It is how we will save our country and our world.

A little more than 10 years ago, I began writing about the rise in Jew hatred. It was controversial at that time to use the words Jew Hatred. I used them anyway because that’s what I was seeing. Swastikas being drawn on buildings in Seattle. This article in the Seattle Times on June 26, 2016, got pushback that it wasn’t happening and that this was all being overblown and exaggerated. We see now that unfortunately, I was right. This article, almost 9 years old today, is hard for me to re-read because of what has happened in those 9 years. Because of what was being called out then that was ignored by so many. Because of October 7, 2023 and what has happened since then. The signs have been there and far too many of our ‘leaders’ have chosen to ignore them.

Take for instance, this harrowing exchange between David Horowitz and a student at the University of California San Diego in 2010. This was FIFTEEN (15) years ago. The only difference between then and now is that Horowitz would be booed offstage now, this vile, hateful woman would be cheered, and the University would defend HER hatred instead of protecting Jewish students on campus.

The Jew hatred on campus was clear in 2010 but we ignored it

We saw things like this years ago but failed to take it seriously and failed to act. As a result, our Jewish students on campus today are faced with incredible antisemitism. I spoke with one of the leaders of Mothers Against Antisemitism from the Dallas chapter this week and the stories she shared about the University of North Texas were horrifying. Students afraid to be publicly Jewish in any way. Jewish/Israel speakers being spirited to campus at night, under the cover of darkness, to an unadvertised speech because had it been advertised, students would have been too afraid to show up. The work we have been doing has simply failed and we must admit it. We built building on campuses while the Jew haters built departments, programs, and hired Jew hating professors and administrators. We put Jewish names on libraries and centers for performing arts while the Jew haters invested in teaching that Jews are evil, are powerful and responsible for all the bad in the world, that Israel is a genocidal country that doesn’t want peace and are colonialists that want to take over the entire middle east and the world.

My friend Adam Bellos wrote a powerful piece last week. Most of you likely did not see it or read it. I encourge, no I implore you to read it. To think about what he writes. To take action to change the current reality. He writes:

This is the tragedy: we trained kids to explain checkpoints without explaining Herzl. We taught them to debate apartheid without introducing them to Ahad Ha’am, Rabbi Kook, or the Book of Joshua. We armed them with casualty charts, not courage. With U.N. resolutions, not roots. With talking points, not Torah. Hasbara failed because it tried to outsource pride. Because it assumed the average young Jew could fight for Israel while remaining estranged from Hebrew, from Zion, from the soul of their people. Because it traded the moral complexity of the conflict for the false clarity of press releases.

Why Hasbara Failed: We Fought the PR War, Not the Real One

His summary is a beautiful and powerful statement that I believe in, have advocated for, and continue to push to create.

And so, this moment demands something entirely different: a revolution of Jewish education. A renaissance of context. A return to knowing who we are, not just what we’re defending. We don’t need more content creators to explain why Israel is right. We need Jewish children who know why they are Jewish. We don’t need another “crisis comms” playbook. We need people who speak Hebrew, dream in Zion, and learn how to walk into a room not begging for understanding but embodying truth.

We need to make sure we are providing quality and meaningful education to our children and, in all honesty, to our adults. As my friend Ari Shabbat often says, “The Torah is playbook for life”. If we don’t know this, don’t know how to use it, don’t bother every learning that it can be interesting, fun, and meaningful to learn Jewishly, how can we survive? If Israel becomes just another country rather than our spiritual homeland, Judaism will never be more than meaningless rituals that we do because our parents did them. There will be no meaning in hanging a mezuzah, putting on tefillin, or identifying as Jewish. We will merely be Jewish because we have been told we are Jewish. To me, that is unacceptable. I hope that you find it unacceptable as well.

I was deeply saddened to hear the news that Rabbi Sholom Lipskar (z’l), the longtime leader of The Shul of Bal Harbour and founder of the Aleph Institute, died this week. I had the privilege of meeting Rabbi Lipskar a number of times and the community he build at The Shul of Bal Harbour is extraordinary. I found him to be a man who didn’t accept the impossible. His vision impacted not just the South Florida Jewish community but the entire South Florida community and the world. I found him to be a kind man, always willing to listen, always seeing the good in people, and working to make the world a better place. If you want to read a little about him, you can do so here. The world is certainly a bit dimmer without him in it, however his teachings and life’s work remain to inspire us all.

At the end of the day, we are left with one simple question. What are we going to do? Are we going to be like Rabbi Lipskar (z’l)? Are we going to take action as Adam implores us? Are we going to take the time to learn what being Jewish is really about? Are we going to make the effort to be kind to others? The world we live in today is one that is short on kindness, on wisdom, on compassion, and on knowledge. Are you going to believe whatever somebody decides to tell you or are you going to actually learn something? Are you going to only listen to one narrative or are you going to engage with others and learn both with and from them?

The choice is yours. Just remember that choices have consequences. We are where we are today because of the choices we made years ago. When we look back in a decade or two, I hope that we are happy with the choices we make now and that we have the type of world so many of us desire and want to work to build.

My struggles the past two weeks

Posted on April 19, 2025 by Keith Dvorchik

For nearly 18 months now, I have been inspired to write on a very regular basis. My passions were inflamed. There was so much to think about, the ponder, to challenge. There was so much to be angry about, to be inspired by, and to write about.

The past two weeks have been challenging to put pen to paper. It isn’t that there aren’t crazy things going on in the world. It isn’t that my passions haven’t been inflamed. I have started writing many different pieces and left them unfinished. I think in part that it has felt like talking to a brick wall. The same issues keep happening over and over again. Railing against the same people telling the same lies. The same news agencies buying into the same lies. Politicians on both sides of the aisle continuing to push an agenda based on hatred.

Take for example Kilmar Abrego Garcia who was mistakenly deported to a notorious El Salvador prison by the US Government. Abrego Garcia, living in the United States, is a citizen of El Salvador. At the age of 16, Abrego Garcia fled El Salvador and illegally entered the United States in 2011. In October, 2019, Abrego Garcia applied for asylum and withholding of removal. His request for asylum was denied, however he was granted “withholding of removal” status, preventing deportation to El Salvador due to the likelihood that of him being harmed if he was returned to El Salvador. He was approved to be deported from the United States to any other country in the world. The court also found that he was a member of the terrorist organization MS-13. He was then released from custody, ICE did not appeal, and the Department of Homeland Security granted him a work permit. He appealed and the appeals court upheld the original findings. These are the facts. No matter how the media spins things, the facts don’t change.

So let’s start with the truth. He should not have been deported to El Salvador. The courts ruled on this. The administration was wrong to do this and should be held accountable for it. The Supreme Court recently ruled that they must facilitate his return. They did not agree with the finding that they must effectuate his return. That means that should he be released by El Salvador, a sovereign nation, the administration is required to do whatever is required to return him to the United States.

To say that he shouldn’t have been deported at all is simply a lie. He had due process. The courts ruled that he could be deported, just not to El Salvador. The Free Press had a great article about this issue and the claim that the Executive Branch is defying the Supreme Court. I encourage you to read it and learn a bit more.

Some members of the U.S. Congress are outraged that he was deported and are now going there to lobby for his release and return to the United States. Should this happen, the government could detain him immediately and legally deport him anywhere else in the world. We are spending time, money, and effort on an issue that is really all about the government not following the court’s specific ruling where they should be held accountable rather than returning him to the US so he can be deported to another country.

I find myself wondering where these elected officials that are going to visit him have been since October 7, 2023, when Americans were kidnapped by Hamas and taken hostage. None of the hostages were given any due process. None of these politicians attempted to visit the hostages. None of them advocated or pressured the Red Cross to visit these American hostages or to ensure they were getting medicine or humanity. None of them attempted to pressure the leadership of Hamas to release the hostages. They currently use the term ‘disappeared’ when green card holders are detained for a deportation hearing yet fail to acknowledge that the hostages in Gaza have truly been disappeared – so much so that Hamas isn’t even sure where they are.

Edan Alexander, now 21 years old and the sole remaining living American hostage in Gaza, has been used in a propoganda video. Hamas has lost contact with whatever faction currently has him. We know from the reports of recently released hostages that Hamas is starving and torturing the hostages. Unlike Abrego Garcia, who we know where he is and people have seen him in the past week, we don’t know where Edan is. We don’t know his condition. At this point, we don’t know if he is even still alive today. Yet there is no outrage. There are no demands to the Hamas leaders who lived in luxury in Qatar without being held accountable until November, 2024, are now living in luxury in Turkey, a US ally and member of NATO. Without consequence. Without demands.

***American-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander***

The difference between Abrego Garcia and Edan Alexander? One is a Jew. Citizenship doesn’t matter. Legal status doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters is that one is a Jew and one isn’t. I’m tired of having to write this and point it out, time after time after time. Too many of our leaders fail to do their duty to protect American citizens who are Jewish.

In Pennsylvania, the Governor’s mansion was lit on fire by a domestic terrorist because Governor Josh Shapiro is Jewish. While the Governor and his family slept after holding a Passover Seder, their home, the people of Pennsylvania’s home, was lit on fire in an attempt to murder them. There was minimal outrage and it quickly fell off the radar. An actual attempt on the life of the sitting Governor of Pennsylvania was minimized. Social justice warriors like Bernie Sanders, AOC, and the rest stayed silent.

My childhood friend, Rabbi Neil Zuckerman of Park Avenue Synagogue wrote a powerful piece about this. Neil and I went to Hebrew School together and hung out at the JCC. We went to different schools – his school was where the children of Governor Richard (Dick) Thornburgh attended so he spent time at the mansion playing with those friends. How far have we fallen as a society when more than 4 years later we remain fixated on the events of January 6th and yet the burning of the Governor of Pennsylvania’s house isn’t an issue a week after it happens. Once again, the difference is that one instance involved a Jew so it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t count.

***The Pennsylvania Governor’s mansion after being lit on fire***

We have lost the ability to talk with each other. To treat people as human beings even if they have different opinions or beliefs from our own. The nastiness that exists not just in politics but between individuals is horrifying. Families divided. Friendships ended. There is an old saying that “I would rather be happy than right. In today’s world that is no longer true. Too many people would rather be right than happy.

Almost every Friday, I join a group of 80+ year old men for lunch. At 57, I am the baby of the group. These are incredibly intelligent men who were titans of their professional lives. Doctors, lawyers, judges, money managers, journalists, and leaders of major businesses. It is a diverse group politically. I love our discussions and the topics we cover. I learn new things every single week. The perspectives they have are fascinating and the deep, respectful conversations inspire me. I find myself wondering where these conversations have gone in our public discourse. How has the old Dan Akroyd-Jane Curtain Point/Counterpoint skit on Saturday Night Live in the 1970s, designed to mock intelligent debate and discourse, actually become reality? I remember watching these and laughing because they were so absurd and rude. How did this become our reality in 2025?

I have become a bigger fan of Bill Maher in the past year. He remains one of the few comedians who actually makes fun of what is happening in the world regardless of who needs to be made fun of. He criticizes all those who should be criticized, regardless of if they are a Democrat or a Republican. He has interesting guests on his show and talks about topics that should be discussed. He isn’t afraid to hold people accountable for what they say. Recently, he was invited to dinner at the White House with President Trump and rather than reject it immediately, he chose to go have dinner and talk with him. To engage and to learn. He shared what he learned on his April 11, 2025 show. Maher is a liberal. He publicly states that without pause. He is also more moderate and believes in conversation and discourse. Watch his report on his dinner at the White House with President Trump. It is an interesting insight into what can happen when you engage rather than withdraw.

Some people think Bill Maher drank the Kool-Aid. Some people think President Trump put on an act for him. Both may be true. I think Maher discovered that there is a deeper truth to what goes on than the media reports. I think he realized that perhaps he can disagree with the policies without burning down America. It is another lesson for us all to learn about the power of conversation and listening. It is a reminder that we really should be working to understand rather than to be understood.

So instead of writing, what have I been doing the past two weeks to deal with all that is going on in the world? I chose to infuse my life with joy. I have spent most of my time with my almost 4 month old chocolate lab puppy, Charlie (full name Charlotte). She is pure joy. She is happiness. In a world filled with so much trauma, so many challenges, and so much to worry about, time with Charlie is simple love and joy. Spending so much time with her, I get to focus on being happy with her unconditional love. I thought I’d finish this by sharing a few pictures and two videos to bring some light and joy to you.

The life of a dog – Charlie sure has it rough

Fester, our cat, showing Charlie who is boss. Watch his face as he walks away from Charlie.

The past two weeks have reminded me that while I must continue to fight, I don’t have to be consumed by the negativity. I can find those who care and want to work together to find solutions. I can spend time making sure the information I am consuming is factual. Most importantly, I can find joy in daily life and make sure to invest in that joy.

Leslie Stahl, CBS, and the media should be embarrassed and ashamed

Posted on April 5, 2025April 5, 2025 by Keith Dvorchik

On their website, CBS states, “One of America’s most recognized and experienced broadcast journalists, Lesley Stahl has been a “60 Minutes” correspondent since 1991.” She should be embarrassed for her lead in to the interview she just did with Yarden Bibas for 60 minutes. Planting a false narrative to blame Israel, stating that Israel broke a ceasefire that expired when Hamas refused to move into phase 2 of the ceasefire, and holding Israel accountable for hostages being scared while kept in captivity, she showed herself to be a stooge for the media and their anti-Israel narrative.

When Yarden told her that the Hamas terrorists wouldn’t give them much food, she took the side of terrorists, trying to blame Israel by stating that perhaps they just didn’t have any food. Yarden corrected her that they did have food and would eat it front of her. That Hamas terrorists would tell them that they were giving them just enough food to keep them alive for 5 years in horrible conditions. He further told her that they learned that one of the terrorists liked massages so they would give him massages for extra food. Her response? Silence. No condemnation.

Watch the 60 minutes piece in which Yarden Bibas is interviewed.

Yarden tells her that they told him he would find a better wife and have better children after telling him that Shiri, Ariel, and Kfir were dead. Her response was “did they really say that?” and nothing more. It’s disgusting. As I watched the interview, I found her repugnant and the CBS angle an attempt to take the barbaric actions of Hamas and make them Israel’s fault.

The pain of the stories told in the piece were clear. The horrific actions of Hamas were clear. Yet Stahl and the editors at CBS were unmoved. There was no condemnation. No shock and awe at this inhumane treatment. As I watched it, I got the feeling that both Stahl and the bigwhigs at CBS believed that they deserved what they got. They seemed only sad that they had to cover it at all and shed any light on the proof of Hamas being evil and terrorists.

The piece ended and they transferred to 60 minutes Overtime, and additional online peace to extend the “conversation.” In 60 Minutes Overtime, Stahl talks with Keith and Aviva Siegel, the “Hamas militants” according to Stahl. She can’t even call them terrorists. Once again, she begins the interview and piece by framing Hamas as simply “militants”. She talks about Kibbutz Kfar Aza and shows a little bit of video from the Kibbutz but nothing that comes close to what it really looks like. I’ve been to Kfar Aza twice since October 7th and the things I saw there will never leave my mind. The brutality that occurred there is something I will never forget. The stories I heard from the IDF and from residents who lived there and had just returned are beyond horrific. Yet Stahl and CBS show none of these images. They minimize what happened that day.

***The roof in one of the young people’s apartments, destroyed by grenades while she was there.***

Listen to the description of what happened at this house in Kfar Aza. CBS and Lesley Stahl won’t tell you

When she reports on Keith’s release from captivity, she calls it a ‘bizarre ceremony’, quite an understatement for what it really was. Ongoing terrorism. Brutal treatment of a hostage.

The emotion from the hostages and the videos was clear. How anybody can watch and listen and not be horrified, not be offended, not believe that what happened is not just criminal but also not want to outwardly speak out against it is beyond my comprehension. Stahl and CBS show their bias throughout.

The CBS Overtime interview with Keith and Aviva Siegel

It goes beyond just CBS and Lesley Stahl. This week, Tal Shoham testified at the UN in Vienna. The UN has showed itself to hate Jews and hate Israel. There are decades of proof that they treat Israel and the Jews differently than any other group or country in the world. Read Shoham’s testimony – it’s difficult to get through. After reading it, try to defend Hamas in any way. Try to defend Hezbollah, the Houthis or Iran. It’s pure evil that must be eradicated.

***Tal Shoham testifying at the UN in Viennna***

“During these 50 days in isolation, shackled and starved, it was not ordinary hunger, but survival hunger, where a crumb becomes your entire world. When your body aches constantly from hunger pains.

On day 34 two human skeletons entered my room. Evyatar David and Guy Gilboa-Dalal. They told me they were beaten daily, forced to sit facing the wall, with bags over their heads, unable to move. If I thought my hunger was extreme, their was even worse. Their thirst was so intense that they would drink foul smelling salty toilet water contaminated with metals and filth.

In an act of deliberate cruelty, the terrorists forced Guy and Evyatar to watch me being released. Why, I ask you. Why would any human go to such length to inflict such torment.

During 505 days in captivity we were rarely not starving. There were many times we received just one pita bread for an entire day. We begged our captors, flattered them, even agreed to give them massages. Anything for another crumb of food. Traumatized by hunger, we collected crumb after crumb, dividing any grain of food after careful counting. Guy would sometimes spend an hour, ensuring fair distribution of every ounce.

You might assume this is the situation throughout Gaza. But the terrorists holding us always had abundant food, including fresh vegetables and fruits.

For the final 8 months of my captivity, we were held in a dungeon dozen of meter underground, with only a hole serving as a toilet. The humidity left our clothes and matrasses perpetually wet. We sweated and choked from lack of oxygen. In conditions so deplorable, no animal has ever been kept this way. We were constantly hungry and thirsty. Severe vitamin C deficiency caused Evyatar and me develop muscle inflammation.

Sadistic guards tortured us daily physically and mentally. Sometimes we were in darkness so profound, we could not see our hands in front of our faces. Meanwhile next door Hamas terrorists enjoyed a well-lit air conditioned room with plenty of food.

Hamas most dangerous weapon is not their rockets or their cruelty. It’s the fundamentalist education used to raise the next generation of terrorists. This education rejects the possibility of any state or people not governed by extreme Islamic law. In Hamas value system human life holds no worth. If we don’t recognize this, we live in illusion that will first doom Israel and then threaten the entire world. The International community must reject beliefs that foster terrorism.”

This is the reality of Hamas. They are not freedom fighters They are terrorists and pure evil. Those defending them are fools, bigots, and evil as well. Imagine being so thirsty that you would want to drink contaminated toilet water. Imagine being forced to humiliate yourself and give terrorists torturing and starving you massages for crumbs of food. Imagine living with constant hunger pains, choking from lack of oxygen…

Then imagine you are Leslie Stahl, hearing this firsthand. Talking to the parents of a current hostage who is being beaten, starved, and abused. Watch how she reacts with a flat affect. Watch and listen to how she responds. It’s as if she is a robot. No empathy. No compassion. As I watch her, I find myself thinking that she is trying to find a way to defend them, as she did earlier in the interview, and is upset that she can’t.

Watch and listen to Lesley Stahl and her lack of empathy, flat affect, and inability to condemn Hamas.

I am disgusted by Leslie Stahl and 60 minutes. How does she sleep at night? How do the higher ups at CBS keep their jobs? How do these people live with themselves?

How can the main stream media not make a major story as Hamas reduces their reported death toll by 3,400 names? They actually removed people’s names from the most recent death reports in Gaza, admitting they lied about people being killed who weren’t. For those who pay attention, this raises new concerns of inflated figures by Hamas.

This change included removing 1,000 children that had previously been reported killed in the war. Andrew Fox, associate fellow at the UK-based think tank Henry Jackson Society, was quoted stating, “If you were seeing indiscriminate killing, you would expect roughly 26% adult male deaths.” He continued, “In the 13 to 55 age group, which is Hamas’ fighter range because we know they use child soldiers, it’s 72% male in that age group.”

“So all these things clearly point towards combatants being targeted rather than just indiscriminate killing.”

Yet the media remains silent. CBS, 60 minutes and Lesley Stahl make sure to tell their story based on lies. You won’t see this in the NY Times or Washington Post. None of the other major networks will cover this. They prefer the lies.

I know that October 7th and the aftermath has become a part of who I am. I spoke out against all hatred before October 7th. Now, I will never stop speaking out against evil and hate. There may be consequences as a result. It may impact my business and who will work with me. I don’t care. The fight against evil and hate is too important. If people like the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Anwar Sadat, and Yitzak Rabin can risk, and lose, it all, then who am I to not be willing?

***The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Anwar Sadat, and Yitzhak Rabin (A.I. generated picture).***

At the end of the day, we all have to live with ourselves and our decisions. When I close my eyes at night, I must live with my decisions and actions. How I sleep is determined by my decisions and actions. I want to be an example of morals, ethics, and values to my children and eventually my grandchildren. My children know what I have done, said, and written since October 7th. They can answer the questions my future grandchildren may ask with stories of my visits to Israel, volunteering there, and show them what I have written to stand up to hate and evil. What about yours? What do you stand for? Will you be one of those people that your grandchildren look back upon and ask where you were? What you did? Why you were silent? Only you can answer that question. Know that it is NOT too late to start now. The fight against evil and hate is nowhere close to being over. Join in the fight. Stand for something that is based on morals, ethics, and values.

Or don’t, and let the future generation judge your inaction.

The world is the way it is because we allow it. It’s beyond time to speak out and no longer allow it.

Posted on March 24, 2025 by Keith Dvorchik

On his TV show this week, the comedian Bill Maher made fun of the Republicans and the Democrats and their unwillingness to cut the defense budget. He noted that there were only two things that they could agree on. Defense spending was one. The other, he joked, was to “Keep your eye on the Jews. You never know what they are up to.” He was kidding, sort of.

We live in a world I never imagined. A world which I read about growing up. Pogroms in Poland. Jews rounded up in Germany. Antisemitic propoganda believed as truth. Media spewing Jew hatred as facts. Growing up in a Jewish home where we went to synagogue every week, where I went to Hebrew school 3 times a week, we were taught about our history of being oppressed, of being outsiders, of being beaten and abused. We learned about the destruction of the first and second temple. We learned about the pogroms and the Shoah. We thought it was history and would never reoccur. We believed in the saying, “Never Again” and that the world believed it too. We were naive. Our parents were naive. Even our grandparents, who lived through the Shoah, were naive.

This week, Eli Sharabi, one of the hostages taken by Hamas on October 7th and held for 491 days before his release, spoke at the United Nations. He has previously spoken with President Trump and with Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister of England. His stories of torture and captivity are horrifying. They prove that Never Again was a lie. They prove that Jew hatred is alive and flourishing and what will happen to all of us if we allow it. If we stay silent. If we don’t fight back.

Eli Sharabi addressed the UN. It’s a must listen and watch.

I was talking with a friend today who, out of the blue, thanked me for my public advocacy and outspokenness since October 7th. I told him that we could not afford to be silent. We were no longer those Jews who were silent and went quietly. There are still plenty of Jews who think we can assimiliate and be accepted. They think that if we just go along, if we just put others before ourselves, if we just don’t make big fuss, they will leave us alone. They fail to learn the lessons of the Jewish people throughout our history. Those who hate us will never leave us alone. There is nothing we can do to just fit in and be ignored. As my friend Fleur Hassan Nahoum has so powerfully and eloquently stated, “The problem is not that there is no Palestinian State. The problem is that there is a Jewish State.” The problem is that we exist. When I listen to people like Bernie Sanders and Peter Beinart, I get sick to my stomach. They think we can survive by hiding, by helping those who want us dead.

Life is short. I was lucky to know all four of my grandparents until I was in my early 20s. My wife knew both my grandfathers. I knew all four of her grandparents. My kids knew all four of her grandparents. It makes life seem long. It’s a fallacy. My father died a few months before I turned 55. It wasn’t long enough and I wasn’t old enough. Life is short. We have to treasure every moment and we have to fight for it. Judaism teaches that those who save a life, save a world. That’s how precious it is to us. It is why we make these terrible deals with Hamas to get our hostages home, dead or alive.

***My four grandparents with my brother and me***

It is why we need to maximize what we do with our time. Just trying to wait things out doesn’t work. It’s why we need to treasure the relationships we have and not waste a minute of them. It’s why we have to speak out and speak up against evil and injustice. No perceived injustice but real injustice. Our world today loves to make up injustice. Lie on your green card application? Incite violence? Spew hatred? Violate the agreements you made to get your green card? As soon as there are consequences for your actions, you are the victim of injustice. Not those that you harmed. Not the system that you abused.

Our time is not guaranteed and we never know when our time is up. Today in Israel, an 85-year-old man, Moshe Horn from Kibbutz HaZore’a, was killed in a terror attack in northern Israel. The terrorist, 25-year-old Kerem Jabarin from Ma’ale Iron, carried out a car-ramming and shooting spree before being neutralized by Border Guard soldiers. Horn’s son, who was driving the vehicle with his father as the passenger, witnessed the attack and stopped the car. As he did so, his father was struck by the terrorist’s gunfire. A 20-year-old soldier suffered injuries caused by the vehicular attack and was evacuated to the Ramabam Hospital in Haifa.

Hate and terrorists ended an innocent man’s life. A man who wasn’t done living but who’s life was stolen from him. And, I found out a few hours after his murder, a man who is who related to a friend of mine. Jewish life is like that. There is no 7 degrees of separation (or Kevin Bacon) in the Jewish world. It’s one or two. I didn’t know Moshe, yet I know his family and now I grieve a little more with them. I will continue to stand up and speak out in Moshe’s (z’l) memory.

This past week, my friend Dave also died. It was unexpected. We spoke that morning and things were good. He died unexpectedly that night and was found the day after. I miss our daily conversations. I miss his jokes and how we laughted together. It is a reminder that we never know when our time is up. There are no guarantees in life.

***Me with my friends Ron (left) and Dave (z’l) in the center.***

Both Moshe and Dave woke up on the day they died with plans for that day and the future. Neither of them got another day to live. If we don’t know when it is our time, why would we waste a single day? Why would we tolerate the intolerable? Why would we enable hate? Why would we accept evil? Eli Sharabi experienced true evil for 491 days. Despite the horrific things he endured, he is choosing to speak out. He is choosing to share his pain with the world so that people understand what is really happening. If a man who endured 491 day of hell, who lost his wife and children to murderous terrorists, who came out of captivity looking like a Holocaust survivor, can have the courage to stand up and speak out, why can’t we? If you don’t have the courage to do it on your own, watch Eli do it and draw your courage from him. Draw it from Mia Schem and Emily Damari, two hostages who refuse to be silent about what they endured. Mia, who recently shared what happened to her and her fears of being pregnant. If they can do it, we have no excuse for not speaking out.

Mia Schem sharing what she experienced and her great fear

In memory of my friend Dave and Moshe Horn as well as all of those murdered by Hamas terorrists, in honor of Eli Sharabi and all those who are fighting through their own pain to speak out and share the horror with the world, I vow to never be silent. To stand up and speak out. To fight evil no matter the cost.

The world is the way it is today because we have allowed it. It is past the time to stop allowing it. If you want to live in a different and better world, it is up to you to take action. It is up to each of us to fight evil. We have our heroes to inspire us. I choose a better world. I choose to take action. What about you?

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