I'm an October 8th Jew. And an October 9th Jew. And a March 17th Jew, a June 7th Jew, a January 22nd Jew.

First, last, and always. A descendant of generations of leaders, of exiles who traced their path from the hills of Judea through the Roman Empire, Spain, France, Germany, back to Italy, Bohemia, Poland, and back to our homeland.

I disarmingly have said to anti-Israel activists in mid conversation that I am Palestinian as well, as that is where my grandfather was born. But it was Judea and Israel before it was anything cohesive, other than a collection of warring Canaanite city states beholden to the Egyptian, Hittite, or other overlords who set them against each other and ruled from afar.

I wear an artifact of that homeland on a chain around my neck every day, a 2200 year old coin minted in the eternal capital of Jerusalem in the Hasmonean Kingdom of Judea. No one, anywhere, can tear me away from my land.

Rabbi Gunther Plaut, z'l, one of the foremost scholars of Reform Judaism of the last 100 years, and a longtime resident and leader in my hometown of Toronto, put forward an idea that has been called the 614th commandment, after the 613 positive and negative commandments articulated in the Torah.

In the aftermath of the Holocaust, Rabbi Plaut demanded of each and every one of us to commit to perpetuating Jewish life in all of its panoply of observance, learning and celebration. He said that if Jews assimilate, abandon their heritage, or let Jewish identity fade in the modern world, they would in effect complete what the Nazis set out to do—erase Jewish life and culture. Therefore, surviving, thriving, and recommitting to Jewish traditions and ethics is the ultimate act of resistance and historical justice, denying Hitler a posthumous victory.

Rabbi Plaut makes this demand, as a "b'dieved", a rationale that is sufficient if not primary. But just as I carry the very metal of my identity on my chest every day, I wear the talit, kiss the mezuzah, gather the four fruits, and bless my children with the words of Aaron every day, every week, every year. My choice to identify as a Jew is the intertwining of the peoplehood of Judea and Israel with the inheritance of the Torah at Sinai.

I don't give way to anyone in the battles and the war to defend our people. But I am more than that. Each one of us is more than that. We are not defined only by our scars and our traumas. We are not defined by our enemies and their lackeys. We are defined by our history, our ethics, our tradition, and the beautiful legacies of our families.

October 8th is no more or less than another day after another tragedy, but also another day before another victory, before more pride, more scholarship, more kindness and more love for each other.