You must accept that people hate you for a reason and there's nothing you can do.
And it's hard to accept this reality.
What are your experiences with anti-Semitism?
I was on the night train when at a certain moment a boy walked by.
He had already been looking at me.
He walked by and spat in my face and yelled: Fucking Jew.
And then he got off the train.
I was left standing there and everybody was looking at me as if to say:
What happened? Feeling very ashamed, I wiped my face off.
Weren't there any people, let's say bystanders who...
People don't do anything, that's the thing. -That's ridiculous.
Or that somebody who saw it, turned to you later on?
No, people were looking at me.
I think people were... -Totally surprised.
You're in shock. -I just can't imagine it.
I didn't know what to do either.
At the time, I was very scared.
You're totally gobsmacked and you're shocked.
Suddenly, people notice it.
Or people are so pre-occupied with it or that they feel so hurt by a necklace
that it triggers these kinds of reactions.
From my background, we actively practised the Jewish faith for a long time.
We had a Menorah, that's a Jewish candelabrum, in the window.
And it has happened that people threw eggs against our window.
Or when we'd celebrate Hanukkah and we'd put the candles in the window
that indeed, we'd get negative reactions from the neighbourhood.
I was born in Israel and I've known situations
in which I had told somebody I was born in Israel
and this person wouldn't talk to me anymore.
I've even been spat at because I told someone I was from Israel
while we were having a normal conversation prior to that.
That has an effect on you, it gives you a very unsafe and insecure feeling.
A good childhood friend of mine is Israeli and Jewish.
I never really thought about it when I befriended him.
I think we were fourteen.
My friends from a migrant background would occasionally say:
Yes, why are you hanging out with that Jew?
And he heard from family and friends: Why do you hang out with a Muslim?
It's ridiculous. We didn't think it was relevant, we didn't care.
But because I befriended him and because I loved him as a friend
it started to hurt me if people made anti-Semitic remarks.
Sometimes he'd hear people say: You're a barbarian. You don't belong here.
Somebody made a bizarre, grotesque joke about the Holocaust.
That hurt him and that hurt me, as well.
If I hear people making jokes about
the Holocaust or about Jews, I can get quite angry.
Sometimes, I can let go of it more easily. Particularly if they're my age or children.
Then I get the feeling that they don't know any better.
And I can handle these kinds of jokes.
But often I get the feeling that I want to be angry
or tell them that it's unacceptable.
If they're older people, I get the feeling that they should know better.
If it comes out in the media, it can make me feel very sad
to see the vast number of people who can express so much hatred.
Sometimes I get the feeling that I adapt my behaviour
to the possible prejudices people may have about me.
Such as, for example, that I...
this stereotype that Jewish people are stingy.
Then I don't want to be careful with my money
because I'm afraid that people will think that I'm stingy because I'm Jewish.