Letter To The Editor: Arthur Camins And Tina Bernstein-Camins, Beacon Jews, Call On Beacon City Council To Pass Ceasefire Resolution
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Editorial Note: Tina Bernstein can be heard in a podcast interview with ALBB recorded days after Israeli’s aggression on Gaza in response to the October 7th attack by Hamas.
Dear Editor:
The Beacon City Council is discussing a possible humanitarian ceasefire resolution. As Jews, we support passage.
Jews speak with many voices from varying values and politics. Like other Jews of our age, we grew up in the dark shadow of the Holocaust. Though our parents were not survivors of the Holocaust, we had family members who survived fighting with the resistance, were hidden by a kind Polish family, and survived by playing dead in a pile in Treblinka and then lived to testify at Nuremberg.
“We know deep in our marrow that Jews cannot be safe anywhere in the world, while Palestinians who share the same piece of the Earth are not free. Not all Jews of the diaspora–now or in the past–regard a Jewish state as central to their identity or safety.”
We grew into adulthood amidst the conflicts of the civil rights and anti-Vietnam War movements. We have direct, devastating familial experience of government-led efforts to silence dissent during the McCarthy period. As Jews, we learned vital lessons that we’ve carried through our lives into retirement and in how we raised our two children.
Lesson 1: The German and world silence as the Nazis attacked and eventually rounded-up and murdered Jews, Roma, Homosexuals, and dissidents taught us to never relinquish our power to speak up and stand against injustice, no matter how intransient the perpetrators or how dim the prospect for justice. During the civil rights movement, the segregationists argued that "You can't legislate people to love one another." Maybe not. However, in the face of pitched conflict, the moral and political power of direct action and legislative demands for new laws led to an end to egregious de jure discrimination. We know that no path to mutual empathy and respect, peace, democracy, and justice for all is possible while people are killing one another. In the face of the Hamas October 7 attack and Israel’s murderous attack on innocent Gazans, we call on our City Council to not remain silent.
“In the face of pitched conflict, the moral and political power of direct action and legislative demands for new laws led to an end to egregious de jure discrimination. ”
Lesson 2: Never again means never again for anyone. That is why some of our grandparents organized labor unions, fought for school integration, and marched on Washington in 1963. It is why we’ve followed in their footsteps. It is why we joined others to protest the U.S. horrific napalming of North Vietnam. It is why we've fought racism our whole adult lives. It is why we demand that our government cease its diplomatic and financial support for Israel's wholesale annihilation of Palestinians—entire families, children, educational institutions, mosques—anything that remains. We know deep in our marrow that Jews cannot be safe anywhere in the world, while Palestinians who share the same piece of the Earth are not free. Not all Jews of the diaspora–now or in the past–regard a Jewish state as central to their identity or safety.
Silence is the face of injustice is acceptance. We call on the Beacon City Council to stand up and pass a resolution to demand:
1) An immediate permanent ceasefire between Hamas and Israel;
2) An end to U.S. military aid to Israel;
3) A release of all Hamas-held hostages and Israeli-held political prisoners;
4) Condemnation of any killing of innocent civilians;
5) Condemnation of hatred against Arabs, Muslims, Palestinians, Israelis, and Jews.
Arthur Camins and Tina Bernstein-Camins
Beacon, NY
