I am scared by the division in our own Jewish communities

Before Oct 7th, I was already a proud, religious Jew, something I never tried to hide but also not something that I purposefully focused on either. Since Oct 7th, I feel like my whole understanding of reality has flipped and the world is a different place now. Over the past 11 months, I have educated myself thoroughly and it has taken a lot of grief, a lot of questioning and a lot of internal and external struggle to finally be able to say that I understand now what is true. Initially, the real time worldwide denial and misrepresentation of Oct 7 and the groups that we are fighting, along with all the antisemitic incidents worldwide, scared me. Now, it is not how the rest of the world views the Jews/Israel that scares me, but the division that I am seeing within our own Jewish communities. If we cannot come together and understand our purpose as a people and to say it proudly, then how can we expect the rest of the world to understand us? Now is the time for us to be united against our common enemies that DON’T care what political belief we have or whether we’re religious or not. A Jew is a Jew is a Jew. And that’s not something to fear, but something to celebrate. As Rabbi Sacks once said – There is dignity in difference.