President, Prime Minister, Ministers, VIPS: Why do our letters go unanswered

Dedicated to the President and Prime Minister of the State of Israel

Long before October 7, 2023, long before supporting Israel became fashionable for some and dangerous for others, long before social media suddenly filled with people who discovered Israel overnight, I was already standing up for this country.

I was thirteen years old.

After my father’s mission ended and our family returned to the Netherlands following two years in the Middle East, every cell in my body knew that Israel would remain part of my life.

I was deeply unhappy to be back in the Netherlands, or “Horrorland,” as I sometimes still call it. I was a highly sensitive, naturally shy girl who felt everything too deeply. I was bullied relentlessly. I fought injustice when keeping quiet would have been much easier. I had seen more of the world than most children around me, and suddenly I found myself in an environment where Israel was increasingly discussed through stereotypes, political slogans and claims that simply did not correspond with what I knew.

And I refused to stay silent.

When my history teacher presented only one side of the Arab Israeli conflict, I challenged her. She became furious and threw me out of class.

So at thirteen years old, I wrote my first article for a newspaper.

I argued that a teacher had a responsibility to educate rather than indoctrinate. I demanded that the political posters in the classroom either be removed or balanced with material presenting another perspective.

And something remarkable happened.

My teacher listened.

She investigated the history herself. She removed the propaganda. Years later, when I graduated with the highest grades in history, she told me she was proud of me. More importantly, she admitted that she had previously known far less about the conflict than she thought she did. She did not become a Zionist or a pro Israel activist, but she became more careful, more informed and more neutral.

That taught me something I have never forgotten.

Speaking up can make a difference.

Defending Israel became part of my DNA.

After the horrific Har Nof synagogue massacre in Jerusalem in 2014, I founded Time To Stand Up For Israel. From that moment onward, I combined my regular job with what effectively became another full time job: advocating for Israel, voluntarily, day after day, year after year.

I was told LinkedIn was a business platform and that Israel did not belong there.

I disagreed.

Facts belong everywhere.

Education belongs everywhere.

Fighting antisemitism belongs everywhere.

For years I participated in campaigns, supported Israeli interests, gathered and shared information, organized initiatives and stood physically on the streets confronting BDS and anti Israel demonstrations. Week after week, including at Amsterdam’s Dam Square.

Eventually, after mass reporting, LinkedIn closed my account and I remained banned for four years.

I reached out to people who today are major pro Israel influencers but were much smaller then.

Silence.

No help.

No response.

Nothing.

And that silence has followed me for years.

Over roughly twelve years, I have written more than one hundred letters and messages to Members of Knesset, Israeli officials, influential public figures, major advocates and people with the power or connections to actually make a difference.

I wrote about dangerous websites and information that I believed deserved attention.

I proposed cooperation.

I offered my experience.

I asked about opportunities to work professionally for Israel.

I asked for guidance regarding Aliyah under unusual personal circumstances.

I explained my family’s extraordinary connection to Israel and the important things my parents once did for the State of Israel.

I even wrote to the offices of the President and Prime Minister of Israel.

And overwhelmingly?

Silence.

Not even:

“Thank you for writing.”

Not even:

“We cannot help you.”

Not even:

“We have forwarded your message.”

Not even:

“No.”

And THAT is what I want to confront.

Because this is no longer simply about me.

How many dedicated supporters of Israel experience exactly the same thing?

How many volunteers spend years defending Israel, raising awareness, fighting antisemitism, losing friendships, damaging careers, sacrificing their time and sometimes putting themselves in uncomfortable or even threatening situations, only to discover that when they knock on Israel’s door, nobody answers?

Do Israel’s leaders understand what that does to people?

Do influential Israelis understand what message they send when ordinary supporters are apparently important enough to defend Israel, donate to Israel, campaign for Israel, travel to Israel and fight Israel’s battles online, but suddenly become invisible when they themselves ask for five minutes of attention?

I am not demanding that every request be granted.

I am not demanding a meeting with the President.

I am not demanding that the Prime Minister personally pick up his phone.

I understand perfectly well how government works.

I am asking for basic respect.

A rejection is an answer.

A short acknowledgement is an answer.

“We cannot help you” is an answer.

Silence is also an answer, but it is the worst possible one.

And please do not tell me that Israel is busy.

Of course Israel is busy.

Israel has faced terrorism, wars, political crises, international pressure and unimaginable challenges. Since October 7, the burden has become almost incomprehensible.

But I am talking about twelve years.

At some point, “we are busy” stops being an explanation.

Public diplomacy does not begin with another multimillion dollar campaign.

Sometimes it begins with answering a letter.

Sometimes Israel’s greatest ambassadors are not sitting inside embassies. They are ordinary people standing in hostile streets, workplaces, universities and social media spaces defending the country when nobody asked them to.

Those people should not have to beg to be acknowledged.

Israel rightly asks the world:

Stand with us. Speak for us. Fight the lies. Do not abandon us.

Many of us answered that call long before October 7.

We stood up.

We spoke.

We fought.

We stayed.

Now I am asking Israel’s President, Prime Minister, ministers, officials and influential public figures one uncomfortable question:

When the people who have spent years standing up for Israel reach out to you, why is it apparently so difficult to stand up for them, or at least answer them?

Israel is not a banana republic.

It is the democratic nation state of the Jewish people, a country I have defended since I was thirteen years old and a country I will continue defending.

But loving Israel does not mean remaining silent when Israel can do better.

Sometimes love means having the courage to say:

This is not good enough.