The Banality of Betrayal

The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil.”

— Hannah Arendt, The Life of the Mind

There are betrayals that come with fury — and then there are those that arrive quietly. The polite kind. The kind that nods with sympathy, sends a heart emoji, and disappears.

After October 7, I learned what Arendt meant. The people who once filled my world with solidarity and moral outrage — the ones who marched for justice, posted black squares, and declared “never again” for everyone else — fell silent. Not because they were cruel. But because empathy, it turned out, had limits.

They were there when I spoke out against Lukashenko stealing the Belarusian election in Belarus. They stood with Ukraine. They believed in freedom, democracy, human rights — until the victims were Jews.

Then suddenly, everything became “complicated.”

Suddenly, suffering required “context.”

When I refused to stay silent, I was told to tone it down. I was told it wasn’t worth losing my network over being too loud in my pain. I was told I misunderstood — that “from the river to the sea” wasn’t really a call for the destruction of my people.

I was told I was too emotional. Too sensitive. Too Jewish, maybe.

And finally, that by speaking out against the murder of Jews, I had somehow become political.

That was the moment I understood what Arendt meant by the banality of evil: not monstrous intent, but moral laziness. The willingness to float with the current — to stay comfortable, to protect one’s social belonging even at the cost of one’s soul.

I became inconvenient. The uninvited guest, the name left off the list. My absence was easier than their discomfort. Some of them now applaud those bringing down the very institutions that once stood for open thought — not from courage, but from conformity.

This is what betrayal looks like in our time. It doesn’t arrive in the night with a knock on the door. It comes in the form of silence, avoidance, and the cowardly luxury of moral neutrality.

I am not the problem.

I am simply no longer willing to live among those who confuse civility with conscience.

I don’t need performative allies who show up only when it’s easy. I need people who understand that standing with Jews after October 7 isn’t politics — it’s humanity.

To those who reached out, who refused to hide behind slogans, who saw beyond the noise — thank you. You reminded me that decency doesn’t expire.

As for the rest, Arendt might have said it best:

Hell is not other people — hell is the ordinary betrayal of those who should have known better.