CAMERA speaker Jonathan Elkhoury just completed a two week tour spanning 10 campuses. Read his amazing testament posted to Facebook below on the power of sharing the facts and being a proud Zionist.
How do I define success?
Success for me is knowing that the audience pro-Palestinian activists, supporters of BDS activists SJP (Students for Justice in Palestine- anti-Israel movement) are enthralled. They were listening rather than interrupting or protesting or exploding. They were not overly excited, but listened to what I had to say. And at the end some of them asked more questions and simply said Walla, this was new to us.
This success tells my true story about my ordinary life – as they are in Israel, with no need to embellish reality, without the need to go deep into politics, and people just listened and were interested to hear more. Then on their own time explore more.
Success for me is over 10 lectures across the United States which taught me something important about myself – always to be who I am, to fight for my rights, for my country and the world – and be proud of my identity.
Yes, I risk losing some ‘Friends’ along the way, people might look at me differently even, my family and in my surroundings – what can be done – less accepting of me but in the end I am who I am and that’s the beauty of my story.
Jonathan’s tour was picked up by Ohio State University campus paper The Lantern and Binghamton University’s Pipe Dream.
