The Anti-Semitism Diet

While I’ve lately gotten compliments on my svelte shape, I would like to credit Hamas and anti-Semites around the world for helping me to lose those stubborn ten pounds I have been carrying around since the onset of menopause. Due to my near-constant state of sadness, shock and fear, I have lost my appetite and find myself capable of consuming only the following items, not necessarily in this order: sharp cheddar cheese, salted almonds, Mary’s Gone Crackers, Chobani yogurt, coffee, Pinot Grigio and tequila.

Just yesterday, I bought a pair of Gap Sexy Boyfriend jeans TWO sizes smaller from what I normally wear. In fact, the Sexy Boyfriend jean shorts I bought at the beginning of the summer – long before we knew that there were terror tunnels leading from Gaza to Israel and that anti-Zionism really was the same as anti-Semitism and Israel was going to be condemned for the fact that Hamas was using innocent Palestinians as human shields and the media would decide to cover the story in a manner that defies the basic journalistic ethic of being fair and even-handed – were practically falling off my hips when I attended the New York Stands With Israel rally at Dag Hammerskjold Plaza in the middle of the day.

(The solidarity I experienced at yesterday’s rally calmed me enough to be able to eat a salad from Amish Market afterwards. Surrounded by ten thousand supporters of Israel’s right to exist, including politicians, I felt hopeful for the first time in several weeks.)

Let’s be honest -- the weight loss is welcome as in one month from yesterday, my beautiful, smart, industrious, kind, funny and otherwise fabulous daughter, Emma, will be getting married. Losing weight prior to a wedding is a goal of brides and mothers of the bride alike. In its service, personal trainers are procured, gym memberships hastily bought, masochistic regimes are adapted, extreme diets adhered to.

Yes, Emma and I have gasped our way through several sadistic spin classes – the upscale type with low lights, pounding music and fellow cyclists who have more in common with Lance Armstrong than us – and I continue to go to the gym regularly and hike for miles.

Still, it has been my inability to eat in the face of extreme stress that has done the trick for me. Realizing the potential of this revelation, in the manner of entrepreneurs everywhere, I have begun to write the book that I am sure will become a blockbuster.

I call it The Anti-Semitism Diet.

Like many weight loss programs that are bad for you, The Anti-Semitism Diet offers a successful way to knock off pounds, virtually overnight.  Instead of planning carb-rich meals, The Anti-Semitism Diet recommends that readers plan safe places where they might escape to if violence against Jews comes to their hometown. Instead of reading pages of recipes, The Anti-Semitism Diet advocates reading the news. Headlines announcing North Korea’s offer to fund Hamas, the rising numbers of Israeli soldiers killed, the German synagogue that was firebombed, the Jews in Paris who were hunted down through Facebook and beaten, and signs at rallies throughout the world featuring swastikas and such slogans as “Death to the Jews” are all proven methods of successfully suppressing one’s appetite.

If one is a Jew or person of conscience.

The fine print in the book’s introduction does indicate that, as a complete loss of peace of mind is necessary for this diet to work, the dieter should be aware that the weight loss will also likely be accompanied by crying, inability to sleep, continual shock, a sense of betrayal, panic, horror, foreboding, exhaustion and general jitteriness.

Which is why The Anti-Semitism Diet wisely includes wine and tequila and permits the ingestion of other calming substances, which have little or no calories.

The Anti-Semitism Diet does have a special section on the importance of exercise and core strengthening as it recognizes that being able to escape missiles (if one is in Israel) or hate-fueled attackers (if one is anywhere else) is dependant, in part, upon physical fitness. You will have a far better chance of making it into a bomb shelter or outrunning the angry mob that thinks that Hitler had the right idea if you are in top cardio-vascular shape.

A disclaimer in the book states that regrettably, The Anti-Semitism Diet cannot help with feelings of grief if you happen to be a family or friend of a fallen Israeli soldier. But it helpfully states that the Palestinians in Gaza, who are also victims of Hamas’s apocalyptic anti-Semitism, might wish to adapt The Anti-Semitism Diet for themselves if they have a special event looming, or just always wanted to lose some weight.

Or if any of them survive being used as human shields by Hamas.

The reason I am so confident that The Anti-Semitism Diet will be a bestseller is based on three reasons:

A – It has a built-in global audience

B – It is extremely topical, written for this very moment

C – It is really short

Indeed, to appropriate a well-known Jewish joke (what is a Jewish telegram?), The Anti-Semitism Diet can be summed up as follows:

Stop eating. Start worrying. Details to follow.