On Stepping Up but Laying Low

The reality of Jewish advocacy in 2026

I’ve always been a gregarious, outgoing person.

For 22 years as a local publisher, I didn’t just cover community events — I was often part of them. Some were historic moments in the storied towns I served. Being public came naturally to me, and I loved it.

After October 7, I made a different choice.

I chose to speak up for Jews and for Israel, devastated by the massacre and the ongoing hostage nightmare. At the same time, I chose to say no — to antisemitism, to antizionism, to the hatred spreading here at home.

Not long after selling my company in early 2025, I found myself doing something I never expected:

I deliberately began making myself smaller.

No recent photographs. No videos. Just words.

I’ve declined invitations to appear on several podcasts. I considered starting one of my own, then decided against it. I convinced myself that perhaps words on social media pages, via a Substack column, Facebook and Instagram; and so almost entirely self published, were enough — that I could quietly do my part, refuse to be silent, and leave it at that.

What I never anticipated was the community that would begin to form around those words.

It has been comforting to discover that I’m not alone in trying to make sense of this madness. As the daughter and granddaughter of Holocaust survivors, I find myself catching unsettling glimpses of how ordinary societies can begin sliding toward something much darker.

At the same time, I’ve been immersed in my family’s Holocaust memoir, spending countless hours with the voices and experiences of those who lived through history’s worst catastrophe.

Those two journeys have changed me.

I am not the same person I was before I began to understand the nature of the antizionist movement and the role I believe it is playing in fueling hatred against Jews today.

Yesterday, I shared one particularly vile comment directed at me.

It was hardly unique. I’ve received others, both publicly and privately. Every single Jewish advocate with any platform size at all has been on the receiving end of such comments which are not being addressed adequately by Meta and the site owners. They are rampant. That needs to change.

Meanwhile each message is instructive as to where we are and reinforces the same conclusion.

Taking precautions isn’t hysteria. It’s common sense. And only you can decide what that looks like for you.

Let’s be clear though: The people spreading this hatred are normalizing the idea that Jews — and Zionists in particular — deserve contempt, exclusion, and eventually worse.

History teaches us that violence rarely appears out of nowhere. It is prepared for. Rationalized. Normalized. Then, one day, it arrives.

I feel sadness over the adjustments I’ve made to my own life. I resent that they feel necessary. And on some level, I know they may not ultimately protect me anyway.

That’s the part I find hardest to accept.

But while I lay low, I still keep my head held high.