I don't understand that some Jews complain that I'm too negative about Jewish life too often in my column. But whenever I am positive, when I say there is effectively no more anti-Semitism, that Israel is an incredibly strong and powerful country, that American Jews are amazingly accepted in the society, that Jews living today are incredibly fortunate, able to live freely and to live fully as Jews, well, then I'm told I'm hopelessly naive, out of touch, out of my mind.

So it's not good when I'm negative and not good when I'm positive. I don't understand.

In fact, there are many things in the Jewish world today that I don't understand.

I don't understand the lack of gratitude that American Jewry shows to former Israeli prime ministers.

In the United States, when a president leaves office, he builds a big, fancy library full of his papers and artifacts, makes lectures all over for big bucks, continues to be the focus of attention, is celebrated for his accomplishments and contributions.

In the American Jewish community, former Israeli prime ministers, the leaders of the Jewish people, are forgotten and ignored.

I've written before about the shameful neglect we continue to show for Ariel Sharon, a Jewish hero, a man of courage, a man who waged war that saved us and tried to make peace to save us. Today, he lies in a coma and none of us, no shul, no organization makes any point of saying prayers for him. Shameful.

So with Yitzhak Rabin, of blessed memory. I was but eight years old when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Though it is 46 years later, to this very day, I am aware every Nov. 22, the day he was killed, feel sorrow every Nov. 22, remember him every Nov. 22. I dare say that anyone who was alive on that Nov. 22, 1963 feels the same.

Well, it was another November day, Nov. 4, that Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated. Though it was only 14 years ago, the Jews of this country do nothing, nothing, to in any way mark that day. Nothing. I know of not one service in any shul, of any memorial by any organization. The day came and went.

How shameful our behavior is was brought vividly home to me when I read that a concert was held in Rome's most prestigious concert hall to commemorate the Rabin yahrzeit.

World famous conductor Lorin Maazel led the Symphonic Orchestra of Italy in playing composer Dov Seltzer's 'Lament for Yitzhak.' The concert was organized by the Italian Friends of the Israel Museum.

Good for them, shame on us. Why is it that tiny Italian Jewry can arrange for a world renowned conductor to lead a tribute to Rabin in Rome's leading concert venue, and powerful American Jewry did nothing even close. Did nothing.

Yitzhak Rabin was the army chief of staff who devised the military strategy that won the Six Day War, gave the Western Wall back to us. He took the brave and vital step of recognizing the reality of our Palestinian cousins, next door neighbors. He literally devoted his entire life, from his teen years in the Haganah to the day he was murdered by a Jew, to Israel. And yet we cannot even once a year honor his memory.

I don't understand.

I don't understand the astonishing insensitivity shown lately by so many Jews who seem to feel the Holocaust is an easy way to make a political point.

The memory of the Holocaust should be sacred, should not be used to shock or provoke, should not be compared, ever, to anything else, for it was unlike anything else. Jews, especially, should understand that and be sensitive to that.

And yet in but the latest obscenity, B'nai B'rith Canada took out a full page newspaper ad in which it solicited donations by equating radical Islam with Nazism.

I ain't no fan of radical Islam. But as horrible as it is, as evil as it can be, it is nowhere in the same universe as the Holocaust and the Nazis. Radical Islam has brought us suicide bombers that have taken the lives of thousands of innocent Israelis, grandmothers in a pizza shop, kids on a bus, families in their homes. The Holocaust was the systematic devastation of the Jewish community of Europe, forcing Jews from their homes, putting them in concentration camps. The Holocaust was the systematic extermination of six million Jewish men, women and children.

As one Canadian survivor put it, "we survivors have fought everybody that tries to trivialize the Shoah. We get very, very angry when it is done by Jewish leaders. I think they should know better."

One would think. One would hope that they do not dare, ever, to compare anything, anything to the Holocaust. It is without precedent or equal in all of human history.

I don't understand how B'nai B'rith Canada did what it did.

I don't understand another Jewish obsession of the moment, namely to boycott anyone and anything we don't like, including any Jew who doesn't see things just like we do.

Boycott. We do it more and more. So it was recently when a journalist for a Swedish newspaper wrote an article making the absurd claim that Israeli soldiers harvest the organs of Palestinians.

As is so typical of Jewish life today, Israeli officials way overreacted to that. And, of course, when the journalist, Donald Bostrom, wanted to take part in a media conference in Israel, the response by many top Israeli officials was to not let him, to keep him out of the country. That would show him. Jews today are big on dismissing people.

Thankfully, sanity prevailed, and Bostrom was allowed into Israel. And guess what? While we think boycotting is the way to deal with everything and everyone we don't like, acting like menschen is actually more effective.

Here's what Bostrom said. "The visit to Israel and the fact that I was part of a fair dialogue made me rethink the whole issue." So much so that he cancelled his plans to fly to Lebanon after Israel to take part in a conference there set to be an anti-Israel hate fest.

Having been let into Israel, not kept out, having been engaged in a fair dialogue, not slammed as an anti-Semite, he came to admire Israel, say he would be reconsidering his article.

I hope we learn something from this. I don't understand why we so much increasingly want to shut the door on people, rather than reach out to them.

I don't understand why we are so fast to point fingers, except at ourselves.

Judaism is very big on cheshbon hanefesh, doing a spiritual accounting, recognizing when we have fallen short, so we can atone.

Many many Jews were very fast to label the Fort Hood killer, Major Hassan, a terrorist. I happen to agree. To his mind, he was engaging in an act of jihad, was advancing his political goals by killing innocents, shouted 'Allah Akhbar' as he opened fire. To my mind, that is terrorism and should be labeled as such. We need to stop excusing the Islamic penchant to express their grievances by murdering people, all the while wrapping themselves in a perverted claim of religiosity.

Too many Muslims do just that. And should be condemned for it, not have political correctness protect them.

Thankfully, almost no Jews do that. It is not the Jewish way to murder, to express grievance, achieve political aims, show religious fidelity by acting in that way.

And so, when such a very rare occurrence does take place, we need to acknowledge it. So it is with 37-year-old Jack Teitel, an American Jew from Miami who made aliyah, and who has four young children.

This is some of what Teitel has done in the last several years: having smuggled a handgun into Israel, he killed a Jerusalem cab driver in 1997. Two months later, he killed someone near a Jewish settlement in the West Bank. In 2006, he planted a bomb inside the Israeli police station in Eli. Thankfully, it was discovered before it went off or it would have killed a lot of people. In 2007, he planted a bomb in Bet Shemesh which a tractor driver ran over, being injured in the process. In 2008, he planted a bomb at the home of an Israeli professor, seriously wounding him. This year, he planted a bomb at the home of two Israelis in Ariel. And there's more.

Bottom line is that he is a terrorist. A Jewish terrorist. But for some reason, too many Jews have been reluctant to acknowledge that very obvious fact; indeed after his recent arrest, too many Jews mocked the notion there could be such a thing as a Jewish terrorist, referred to him as a "so-called terrorist," but not a real one.

All his targets were civilians, were those he had political differences with, were not armed. He did all he did out of his political convictions and because he believed he was doing what his Judaism called for. Indeed, in court after his arrest, he said, "It was a pleasure and an honor to serve my G-d. I have no regret and no doubt that G-d is pleased."

He is a terrorist. A Jewish terrorist. A very rare thing, thank G-d, but when there is one, we need not to pretend or excuse, justify or rationalize, ignore or minimize. We need to acknowledge, condemn and work to ensure he is the only one.

I don't understand how, as Jews, we can do anything else.