Remove jQuery (and other assets)?

I am trying to build a very minimalistic and fast website. At the moment bootstrap, jQuery and fontawesome are the biggest resources, not counting images. Whilst I am still deciding whether to use bootstrap, jQuery seems to be core part of Grav.

What is jQuery used for in Grav?
Can I safely remove it?
I know jQuery is used by many other libraries / plugins, but is it required for Grav to work properly?
Or only if the theme / plugins need it?

Thanks!

Grav core doesn't need it unless you're using the debug bar (if I remember correctly). It's theme related.

Thanks! We decided to keep jQuery.