With the attack on Israeli soccer fans in Amsterdam, the reality that much of the world is getting smaller for Jews hit home.


Jews for thousands of years have been welcomed and banished from various lands. England expelled its Jews in 1290. Other lands welcomed Jews, most recently the Muslim lands that signed the Abraham Accords. Sometimes the Jewish world grows; oftentimes, it becomes smaller.

The synagogue where I pray in Jerusalem has no locks on it. In over 30 years, I remember only one time when someone tried to lock the place up. In the US, synagogues and Jewish centers have key codes to enter and security cameras to monitor. On the Sabbath, when the use of electronic codes is prohibited, armed guards are posted outside. Both in LA and here in Las Vegas, guards with weapons stand outside “shuls”, something that never existed when I was a kid growing up in a Chicago suburb. In Europe, there are guards there all of the time. During a brief visit to Vienna last year, I found a guard outside of every Jewish institution weekdays and on the Sabbath.

Both the US and Europe have made major errors in importing large numbers of Muslims into their countries. While I have no doubt that some percentage are patriotic and some other percentage integrate into their new Western homes, there clearly is a large number of such guests who bring their customs, rivalries and hatreds from home. In the US, this phenomenon of Muslim extremism is........

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