10/ The people who built Emek Sholom refused to disappear. Refused to let the broken glass be forgotten. That was their defiance.

86 years after Kristallnacht, we’re still here lighting candles and asking to be seen.

Some of us are still sweeping up the shards.

9/ Solidarity either means something or it doesn’t.

So my ask is simple: Call out antisemitism when you see it, even from your own side. Believe Jews when we say we’re scared. Understand that remembering isn’t dwelling — it’s how we survive.

8/ My whole life, I’ve believed this: when someone says they’re afraid, you listen. You don’t explain their fear away. You don’t tell them they’re wrong about their own experience.

That shouldn’t be conditional based on whether it’s politically convenient.

7/Jews are 0.2% of world. Synagogues still need armed security. Jewish students get harassed on campuses — from the left & right. Antisemitic incidents are spiking everywhere.

But when we say we’re scared? People tell us we’re being dramatic. Or weaponizing trauma. Or 2 white 2 count as vulnerable.

6/ Look, I know most of you genuinely care about protecting vulnerable communities. That’s not performative — it’s real, it’s who you are.

So I’m just asking you to keep that same energy here.

5/ Memory is the only thing standing between “never again” and “here we go again.”

Antisemitism didn’t disappear in 1945. It got quieter for a bit. Now it’s loud again, and people are mad that we’re pointing it out.

4/ Here’s what gets me: these survivors built this memorial after they’d already escaped. They were safe. They’d started over, raised kids, became our neighbors.

But they still needed to carve those names in stone. Because they understood something most of us don’t want to believe.

3/ The stone says “O LORD NOT HAVE BEEN IN VAIN” with 459 names carved underneath. Each one representing thousands more.

They weren’t statistics. They had favorite songs. Plans for Tuesday. People they loved who were waiting for them to come home.

2/ Tal, JCFR’s community shlicha, spoke. And Alex Perelman got up and told us about his grandfather Mendel — what he survived, what he carried for the rest of his life. Trauma that doesn’t heal, just gets carried forward.

That’s what intergenerational memory looks like in real time.

13/ Silence normalizes cruelty. Accountability and education repair it. Our children are watching what we tolerate.

12/ To FCPS: Investigate thoroughly. Hold students accountable under your conduct codes. Implement restorative justice that includes meaningful dialogue with affected Jewish students. Communicate transparently about what happened and what you’re doing.

11/ We’re all responsible for the kind of community we create. When we stay silent about cruelty, when we look away from dehumanization, we make it easier for the next person to cross that line. Not this time.

10/ There’s another rabbinic teaching: “Who is wise? One who learns from every person” (Pirkei Avot 4:1). Can these students learn from this moment? Can we? Can we learn to see each other’s humanity, even, especially, when we disagree about politics?

9/ You can passionately oppose government policies while recognizing the humanity of those suffering. I oppose Netanyahu’s extreme right-wing government and its policies, but opposing a government never makes it acceptable to dehumanize people or mock their pain. Those are different things entirely.

8/ These students need to understand why this hurts so many people. They need to hear from Jewish students and families. They need to learn about those who were taken, their names, their faces, their families’ anguish. Real accountability means reckoning with the real harm caused.

7/ FCPS has clear conduct codes about harassment, intimidation, and creating hostile environments. These videos violate those codes. There must be accountability and education. One without the other doesn’t build empathy or change behavior.

6/ What in our discourse made simulating kidnapping seem acceptable? We need to ask these questions.