Ник

This day (April 15) in 1881 saw the start of 1,000 violent pogroms in 40 years (the “Holocaust before the Holocaust”) against Jews; it began in the Ukrainian town of Elisavetgrad. Here's what you need to know: At the time, Russia was reeling from corruption, military disasters, and the assassination of Tsar Alexander II; and using Jews as a scapegoat for institutional problems is a society's "go-to" move. Instead of fixing their problems, emissaries from St. Petersburg told the people exactly where to direct their rage: the Jews. Unfortunately, the people obliged with great enthusiasm. For several days, Jewish homes, shops, and synagogues were looted and destroyed. Jews were beaten, raped, and murdered in the streets while local authorities either looked the other way or actively encouraged the violence. Over the next four decades, the pogroms saw: At least 100,000-150,000 Jews murdered; As many as 100,000+ Jewish women and girls raped; and Hundreds of entire Jewish villages/communities completely destroyed. The terror triggered one of the largest mass exoduses in Jewish history. Between 1881-1914, roughly two million Jews fled Eastern Europe with the overwhelming majority fleeing to the United States. But first in 1921 and then especially in 1924, the U.S. slammed the door shut to mass Jewish immigration with the Emergency Quota Act and the National Origins Act. While others fled to British Mandate Palestine, those doors were also slammed shut with the illegal White Paper of 1939. Jews in Eastern Europe (and everywhere else the Nazis would later come to occupy) were left trapped with nowhere to go. Forty years of pogroms followed not long after by the Holocaust proved one brutal truth to the Jewish people: no matter how loyal, how integrated, or how useful they tried to be, they would always wind up blamed and attacked as the scapegoat when things went wrong. That's why many Jews are so protective of their right to a homeland. Jewish sovereignty in Israel is the only guarantee that Jews will never again be powerless victims waiting for the next mob, the next regime, or the next closed border to decide their fate.