Mixed bag

There are so few of us in the world, we barely rank a blip on census meters. Information on the internet suggests about 14.6 million total worldwide population, or less than 1/4 of 1 percent of the total world population. Only a small handful of countries in the world have Jewish populations that amount to more than 1% of the nation's total: Argentina, Canada, France, United States, and of course, Israel. I guess if the world was a school playground, we'd be the ones everyone picked on, because there just aren't very many of us to fight back.

While it is true that, as a people, we do our best to become educated and strive to attain the highest level of success possible within our capabilities, I don't see how that's different from the goals of any group of people. I know few people beyond certain religious orders that aspire to poverty. What few people know is that, as a group, a very large percentage of us still live below the poverty line in our respective countries. In Canada, for example, nearly 20% of Jews live below the poverty line.

With nearly everyone else in the world blaming us for everything that goes wrong, it's easy to form a persecution complex. So, I relish those times when people who have been particularly vocal about our destruction get their just desserts. Thursday, on the whole, was a good day. Both the U.S. and Israel bagged some really bad guys on the terrorist list; and that's a good thing. In Canada, on the other hand, a native-Canadian leader of the Assembly of First Nations tribe who had been convicted of spouting hatred against the Jewish people had his conviction overturned. Ahenakew will possibly face a new trial.