To say that I was disappointed in many of the remarks on El-Sayed coming from academics (even some historians), political organizers, politicians, and pundits is an understatement. This is a man who has consistently engaged in antisemitic rhetoric, imagery, and policy positions.

El-Sayed’s attacks on Jews is a long list: the refusal of him to recognize that Jews have a right to a homeland while not denying it to any other group; relentless references to AIPAC and Zionism; his refusal to acknowledge that Jews are a people, not just a “faith” or a “religion”; his campaign with Hasan Piker right to the end of the primary and primary election day (as you know, Piker has a said a lot of vile things, especially about Jews); rarely and reluctantly referencing what Hamas did on October 7, 2023 (which he again omitted in a fundraising email referencing that day).

Maybe I should repeat what Hamas actually did on October 7 since it’s apparently easy to forget: they murdered civilians in their homes and at a rave concert; they raped scores of people; they cut off body parts of every kind; they burned people to death; they brutalized and tortured people in countless ways; and on and on. It was the largest massacre of Jews since the Shoah. 

When you talk about Zionism, you have to remember that 90% of Jews support a democratic, Jewish state. That’s effectively Zionism. When you attack “Zionists,” you are effectively attacking virtually all Jews.

El-Sayed also praised Mohammed Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood President of Egypt, and asked him to remove anyone from government or employment who was part of the Hosni Mubarak regime. Hamas is in fact a part of the Muslim Brotherhood.

El-Sayed said that “hurt people hurt people” after the terrorist attack on the Michigan synagogue, Temple Israel (see below for more commentary) where 150 pre-k children were located. The terrorist was trying to murder everyone. More recently his own campaign produced an advertisement featuring Tucker Carlson and “America First” (you know, referencing Charles Lindbergh, well known admirer of Adolf Hitler) apparently as a way of cozying up to MAGA. This ad was clearly an antisemitic reference to Jews, Israel, and dual loyalty. The antisemitism is gross and almost impossible to miss, though a lot of people try. Now he has refused to condemn an advertisement produced by Rebellion PAC that blamed the only Jewish country in the world for high grocery prices, especially for eggs. Nor has he asked that the PAC take it down. Blaming Jews for high prices is one of the oldest antisemitic tropes around. Take “Israel” out and put in “Jews,” and it sounds virtually same as the rhetoric of Joseph Goebbels and Hitler during the 1930s that sought to blame Jews for high inflation.

As a scholar of antisemitism, associating Jews with money and inflation is one of the most classic antisemitic tropes there is. If you can’t see it here, you’re not going to be able to see it anywhere. You simply have decided that you don’t want to see it. There’s probably nothing I can do to dissuade you. You have put on blinders and will not take them off. Taking “Jews” out and putting in the only Jewish state in the world–Israel–is not some kind of skilled rhetorical trick, but an obvious word game that anyone with the most primitive analysis should be able to see. If I were teaching a course on this topic, I would use this advertisement as a perfect illustration of blaming Jews for economic problems. It’s one more example in a long list of virtue signalling where attacking Jews is viewed as a virtuous act because Jews are allegedly greedy, power hungry, clannish, and violent, among many other things.

On the Temple Israel attack, El-Sayed had two different apologies, one public and one private. They were not the same (the public one angered a lot of Jews). But (1) an apology can lead to forgiveness, but that does not mean Jews and others who are upset will vote for him. Forgiving is not the same as forgetting. (2) Non-Jews do not get to determine what counts as an apology. It’s up to the aggrieved party to make that decision. There may be some Jews who see it differently, but the vast majority have made their views known. (3) An apology is not merely a series of words. An apology is even more importantly a commitment to a behavioral change. That shows that the person means what he/she has said. If anything, however, El-Sayed’s rhetoric and advertising about Jews have gotten worse. That makes his apology–which was confusing at best–seem empty and meaningless.

I watched El-Sayed’s “hurt people hurt people” video. It was atrocious. If this was said about any other group within twenty-four hours of the event, it would have been roundly condemned. Can people imagine anyone referring to the Sandy Hook mass-murderer shooter within twenty-four hours of the event by saying that he grew up in a difficult family situation? Can people imagine someone saying “hurt people hurt people” after the shooting at AME Mother Emmanuel Church in Charleston, South Carolina,” Can people imagine saying to the family of a murder victim or a rape victim, “Well, it’s awful what happened, but hurt people hurt people.” This is revolting. Anyone with an ounce of therapeutic skills in a difficult situation should know that, once you say something like that, everything else you say is ruined. Honestly I don’t know how any reasonable person can watch that video and think that he isn’t minimizing the potential slaughter of a 150 children. I watched it a second time a few days ago, and I was even more appalled than the first time. Do others not understand what this feels like to people under assault and threat? 

I’m a strong liberal Jewish voter. I have almost always voted Democratic. To say what I’m saying goes against every fiber of my political being.  I would, however, never vote for El-Sayed (though I don’t live in Michigan) or anyone who engages in anti-Jewish racist rhetoric. That is a no-go for most Jews, and you will likely see a significant decline in Jewish support for him. Even most of those Jews who vote for him will do so holding their noses, knowing that he makes them unsafe, but that democracy is also crucial.  

Talk about a “multi-racial democracy” means nothing if one of the groups in this democracy are vilified, shunned, mocked, threatened, and face crimes and violence that has massively increased in recent years. History has shown time and time again that societies and representative democracies which treat Jews in this way don’t end up staying very health, Weimar Germany being the prime example. One of the people who has helped to create this climate is Abdul El-Sayed. The antisemitic wave we’re seeing is much bigger than him, but he seems happy to surf it. 

Jews are only .2% of the global population (16 million out of 8 billion) and only 1.3% of the Michigan population (maybe 2% of those who will vote). I doubt that their opposition to him will prevent him from winning.

We Jews have learned over the years that most people don’t care about us, that, when push comes to shove, we will be abandoned and left to our own devices. That’s what it feels like now and that’s what your words about El-Sayed feel to me. Other than African Americans, Jews have been the most loyal constituency of the Democratic Party since FDR. We have voted against our own financial interests, because we know that there are bigger dangers and issues at risk. But when the national mood shifts and everyone starts focusing on Gaza, the Democratic Party apparatus and especially those on the left abandoned us like a hot potato. 

At Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, there’s the Avenue of the Righteous Gentiles memorializing those non-Jews who helped save Jewish lives during the Shoah. They were people who decided not to be bystanders and to risk their lives against the surging torrent of Jew hatred. We’re always on the lookout for people like that. Sometimes we’re right about our predictions. Sometimes we’re wrong. But we have a decent idea of what looks like moral courage. That’s why what other supposed “allies” and “progressives” are saying is so disappointing for those of us who have respected them and looked up to them. 

I know it’s silly because almost everyone ends up disappointing you if you’re Jewish in moments of crisis. Rarely do people get up in public and say “this is wrong; stop it.” There are many on social media and elsewhere praising El-Sayed, and they’re doing what most people do when Jewish well-being and lives are at stake. They did not speak up when they could have done so. Maybe that makes me kind of a chump to expect anything, but I would still rather live with hope than despair. Top put it mildly, its disappointing that so many people who claim a mantle of compassion and empathy are not any different from the other bystanders across the centuries who did not call out antisemitism when they had the opportunity to do so.

When a group of people broadly conclude what constitutes bigotry against them and point this out, most serious observers accept the truth of this and move on to discuss how to address things. Right now, however, many people refuse to accept what most Jews are telling them. They assume that they know as much about antisemitism as Jews do. They’ll also often engage in tokenization, which means in this context finding a tiny minority of a group who agree with them and then holding up those few individuals as representative of that group when they’re not (like claiming that Candace Owens and Clarence Thomas are representative of most African Americans when they’re clearly not). This is also bigotry, however.

Non-Jews do not get to tell Jews what antisemitism is. They don’t have the requisite knowledge and experience to do so. When you’re a minority, especially a tiny minority like Jews  and have suffered persecution, discrimination, and violence for thousands of years, you know a lot about the topic of anti-Jewish bigotry about which others are simply not sufficiently informed.

Jews have historically not been safe anywhere globally. I believe that El-Sayed and others who share his views, especially the DSA (though El-Sayed is actually a Democrat), want to drive Jews out of the public square and possibly out of this country. You may think that’s far-fetched, but history tells us otherwise. Of course, things can change just as quickly as they started, but anyone who knows Jewish history, knows the signs when the tide turns against Jews: money tropes, clannishness tropes, dual loyalty accusations, complaints about Jewish power, accusations of Jews causing plagues and murdering children. All this and more is what’s happening now, and El-Sayed is a big part of it.

My expectation is that it will burn itself out, as hate usually does, but it’s certainly reasonable for American Jews to take this into consideration. Countries that have vilified Jews or driven Jews out of their lands have not fared very well after doing so. For those who who are concerned about the future of the U.S., you should know that Jews are the canary in the coalmine. What starts with Jews, never ends with Jews.

Original article: Abdul El-Sayed and Antisemitism

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Note 1: There are candidates on this endorsement list who have been very critical of the current Israeli government (including Adam Hamilton and James Talarico, among others) and support conditioning some aid on the actions of the Israeli government.

Note 2: for obvious reasons, this list does NOT include Abdul El-Sayed, Troy Jackson, and Charles Booker (among others) since they don’t prioritize Jewish safety and don’t seem to care much about antisemitism. They don’t even clearly support the right of Jews to have their own homeland while never denying that right to any other group: that is simply bigotry.

For that reason, I cannot support any of those individuals (El-Sayed, Jackson, Ch Booker), among others. I will NEVER support candidates who don’t care about anti-Jewish racism and who apparently believe that every other group has fundamental human rights, but not Jews.

I will NOT vote for, or support, any DSA (Democratic Socialists of America) candidates. It is a blatantly and openly antisemitic organization that expresses hatred for Jews. Also, despite the claims of many that the DSA shares the socio-economic platform of Scandinavian countries, that is simply untrue. Their own literature states that government should “own the means of production” and does not accept the idea of public or private markets. Scandinavian countries are actually very capitalist with thriving business markets and stock exchanges. To deny people basic commercial and property rights has always been terrible for Jews.

At the same time, I cannot support virtually any Republican candidates. That party is currently neo-Fascist, opposed to freedom and democracy, a personality cult, in direct opposition to liberal (and even traditional conservative) values, does not care about marginalized groups, and is morally bankrupt. That also is bad for Jews. Healthy representative democracy is fundamental for Jewish safety.

MAGA (which is now basically the Republican Party) will turn on us, no question (just consider JD Vance for a moment). Even awful Ted Cruz has expressed this sentiment frequently. Many far-right-wingers with a lot of influence in the Republican Party are currently attacking the Jewish community. That is going to infiltrate Republican politics. Young Evangelicals don’t agree with elders about Jews or Israel.

The Democratic Party has serious problems. It has failed the Jewish community in many regards, especially allowing DSA candidates to run in their primaries. This was always wrong and a disgrace. Other than Black voters, Jews have been the most loyal Democratic constituency since FDR in the 1930s.

But … Democrats are still fundamentally a mainstream party that accepts Jews as part of their coalition. They also support democracy, the Constitution, human rights, and care about struggling people. So I remain a Democrat–for the time being at least.

https://jewishdems.org/endorsements

Original article: CANDIDATES WHO VALUE JEWISH HUMAN RIGHTS: THOUGHTS ON THE POLITICAL STATE OF THINGS FOR JEWS AND THEIR ALLIES

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_________________________

“Elica Le Bon – Iranian American attorney and activist – argues that because so few people understand where many of today’s antisemitic and antizionist narratives came from, who created them and the purpose they originally served, they mistake inherited propaganda for independent reasoning.”

“The result, she says, is a cycle of moral inversion in which Jews are permanently cast as an oppressor – and ultimately, as the enemy behind every tragedy and catastrophe.”

“Watch the full episode, ‘The Origins of Left-wing Antisemitism’, on Elica Le Bon’s YouTube channel.

Original article: Elica Le Bon on Anti-Jewish racism:

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When Mamdani singles out such an organization on a repeated basis, calling them “monsters”&focuses on “dark money,” he’s using 2 common slurs against Jews. Jews have heard these vile slurs for centuries, way way before AIPAC.

Jews have for centuries been called monsters, reptiles, rats, vermin, and spiders. This is classic dehumanizing language that led to pogroms, antisemitic riots, and the shoah, with millions murdered and lives destroyed–and not only Jews. Ever since the Middle Ages, others have described Jews as money-grubbing monsters working in the shadows to ruin the lives of non-Jews. Most know about the stories of Jewish bankers, the Rothschilds, and now George Soros (used by the right actually). This is the language reminiscent of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion that popularized and mainstreamed antisemitism in the early 20th century.

If Mamdani were to talk about other political&ethnic PACs or groups rather than singling out a Jewish group, it would make it more difficult to say this, but that’s not what he chose to do. This is bigoted rhetoric, no question.

Many seem happy to tell Jews they’re not antisemitic. I’m used to the far right telling ppl they’re not bigoted about this or that group. But now it’s the left doing it to Jews.

It’s usually understandable when people use the wrong words and make mistakes. Then it’s time for apologies and forgiveness. That’s not what’s happening here, however. This language is used repeatedly by politicians and candidates in spite of how often Jews have told them it’s antisemitic.

And here’s the thing. When the vast majority of a group tells ppl something is bigoted, &the response is total denial, that’s called gaslighting.

Jews have always historically been the canary in the coal mine. When Jews are singled out for hate, other minorities&women are sure to soon follow. Even many White Christians will have to face the music at some point. Globally this kind of process has often started with Jews, but never ever ends with them. People might not know it and might think that they’re safe, but they’re not. The dark maws of bigotry will come for them soon enough.

Scapegoating Jews–a 2,000 year-old tradition–is an indicator that society is fragmenting&falling apart. So many decide to blame all their problems on Jews. This has happened in countries on a regular basis for two millennia–Europe, the Middle East, North Africa.

Scapegoating Jews seems an easy solution, but it leads to authoritarianism&societal decline&economic costs. Societies that do this only damage themselves, but the bigotry is so powerful that it overwhelms reason&common sense&moral values. Sadly most have not learned the lessons of history. Let’s hope that they don’t have to learn it once again.

Original article: ON THE MAINSTREAMING OF ANTISEMITISM

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I’m not a professional expert on socialism or the Democratic Socialists of America. But I do know something about the subject given that my grandmother was an avid registered socialist in NYC (she was also a socialist in Poland before she emigrated to the USA), as was my father until some time in the 1950s or 60s.. And I went to a Jewish socialist summer camp as a child. My father’s family was close to David Dubinsky who was originally a committed socialist and one of the founders of the modern American labor movement. They were so close to one another that they were all buried next to another in an NYC cemetery (as part of the cemetery’s Lodz Workmen’s Circle–which had socialist roots). Socialist rhetoric and ideals were something I heard constantly as a child and were a formative part of my upbringing.

Very few of the people in that world, however, stayed socialist (like Dubinsky who became a progressive capitalist), as most realized that in the USA socialism came to mean something very different from what it has come to mean in Europe.

In Europe, social democratic movements are generally NOT anti-capitalist. In Scandinavian countries, social democratic parties are part of the fiber of political culture, but their leaders don’t believe that the state should “own the means of production”–which is what classic socialism argues for. Scandinavian countries strongly support small business and the importance of a market economy that is not dominated by monopolistic corporations. They all have publicly accessible stock markets and private markets as well. They generally emphasize a regulated free market economy with a strong social safety net that keeps business competitive with one another and protects the interests of the middle class and poor. These social democratic parties are close to what Dubinsky and many others thought of as progressive capitalism. This was also true for FDR who believed in a regulated market economy.

Obviously socialism doesn’t mean one thing, but the Democratic Socialists of America (founded in 1982) are committed to opposing capitalism and a market economy. Unlike most social democratic parties across Europe, they oppose a profit-based economy, they oppose stock markets, and they oppose open, free markets.

So, if you think that American socialism is just like liberal capitalism with a strong safety net (e.g. FDR, most of the American labor movement, liberal Democrats), you would be incorrect. There are some members of Democratic Socialists of America who share that view, but it’s not the view of their party. The DSA is in fact committed to replacing the free enterprise system with a collectivist economy–though it’s not always clear to me what precisely they mean by that.

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Original article: SOCIALISM IN THE U.S. AND EUROPE

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I criticize Netanyahu and his government all the time, as do most American Jews and most (believe it or not) Israelis. In fact, Netanyahu isn’t popular at all right now with Jewish Israelis. I don’t know what will happen tomorrow, but that’s where it is right now.

Obviously when critics of the Israeli government say that Israel does not have the right to exist as a Jewish state, that’s almost certainly antisemitism. Unless you’re willing to criticize every country with ethnicity or religion enshrined by law (including virtually every country in the Middle East, many counties in Europe, India, Japan, and many other nations), you are singling out Jews for special criticism. That is wildly inconsistent and therefore antisemitism. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anyone actually do this. It’s possible, but it’s really more theoretical and than actual.

When people start using the words “Zionist” as a slur, that’s antisemitism. While the word, “Zionism” has come to mean Netanyahu and his policies to some, it really means the right of Jews to have their own state (as countless other ethnic/religious groups do). Whether or not Jews call themselves “Zionists,” about 90% of American Jews believe in the legitimacy and desirability of a Jewish state (i.e. Israel). Clearly for some on the far-left, the word, “Zionist,” is simply a proxy for Jews. If 90% of Jews believe in a Jewish state, and people slur them, well we know how Jews view that. We also know that much of the rhetoric is not ultimately about Israel, but about Jews themselves.

Even worse than “Zionist” is “Zio.” That’s clearly not an abbreviation for ease of speech, but out-and-out hate speech. It’s not much different from other slurs used against various minority groups

Zio” is everywhere in far-left circles, especially on social media. On X/Twitter I see it every day–unless I stop myself from looking at post comments (but I don’t have enough self-discipline for that).

Personally I don’t regard “Free Palestine” as inherently antisemitic. Palestinians have a right to their own state IMHO (as do Kurds, for example). So in isolation it’s not a problematic phrase.

If “Free Palestine means “Free of Jews” (as some have clearly said), that’s antisemitism. If “Free Palestine” is accompanied by attacks on the idea of a Jewish state or a desire to annihilate Jews, that is antisemitism. If Free Palestine is used alongside “From the River to the Sea,” that’s a promise of annihilating Jews, which is clearly antisemitic.

I support a two-state solution. So for me “Free Palestine” is reasonable as long as it’s about Palestinians getting their own state.

“AIPAC” is another hot word these days. I should say that I have criticized AIPAC for years now. Honestly I can’t stand them, and I have been ripped for criticizing them. I have told a few AIPAC reps what I think and I’ve said a certain amount on social media, and they just ignored me and moved on.

The problem is that politicians are using the word “AIPAC” repeatedly as if it’s a magic word or an obscenity. It’s essentially become e a code word for “Zionist.” While it’s certainly not antisemitic to criticize AIPAC (I’ve done so for years well before the current flood), to repeat it ad nauseam is a problem–especially if you don’t criticize other ethnic advocacy groups (Armenian, Turkish, Irish, etc.). If all you do is repeat “AIPAC” as a mantra, yes, you are wandering into the land of antisemitism.

Using “AIPAC” repeatedly also enters in the classic antisemitic trope of accusing Jews of ‘dual loyalty’. This goes back hundreds of years. This was one of the main accusations Nazis hurled against Jews and was effective in their murderous propaganda.

If you want to criticize AIPAC (as I have), explain precisely what you’re criticizing them for and make sure that you don’t solely focus on Jews when you discuss loyalty to foreign governments.

If you want to criticize AIPAC and not be problematic, you have an obligation not to simply repeat the word as a slur, but to explain what exactly you’re criticizing.

Another word thrown around regularly is “genocide.” I have taught courses on the Holocaust/Shoah, genocide generally, and mass murder,. I have studied it quite a bit, though I’m not an international lawyer. With that caveat, the word is deeply problematic.

For one thing, the population of Gaza is approximately the same as it was before the conflict (there are competing statistics here, but all in all there’s not much of change in population totals). Genocide laws require that a perpetrator target wiping out an entire population or wiping out a substantial portion of the population. No such evidence exists, however.

Second, you can’t just kill a lot of people in a genocide. You have to prove “intent” to eradicate a group or large part of a group. Without getting into the weeds (there are a lot of weeds), there’s not enough evidence that the IDF are attempting to do this.

So I think this is very likely not a genocide in a legal sense. Is it possible for a kangaroo court to conclude otherwise? Possibly I suppose (though the evidence is almost non-existent). People hate Jews for whatever reasons. In fact, the accusation of genocide is echoed in Nazi propaganda of the 1930s. The Nazis claimed that they had to kill Jews because Jews were trying to annihilate (exterminate–a word I don’t like) Aryans and Germany. You might think this sounds silly or crazy, but this is precisely what Nazi propagandists argued.

So in some ways, the word, “genocide,” is for Jews a kind of red herring–because it’s not based on facts or truth. Rather it’s an old trope without evidentiary basis that allows people to treat Israel and Jews badly. In fact, it’s the kind of language that encourages physical attacks on Jews globally–as some of the perpetrators themselves have acknowledged.

Also a substantial portion of those killed are members of the Hamas military. Hamas recently said that it was sending out payments to about 30,000 widows of Hamas soldiers. That makes a genocide accusation even less likely.’

Jews have been accused of targeting children since the 4th century C.E. This is one of the most common tropes used against Jews. Many of the Jews in the USA today have grandparents who fled Eastern Europe partly because they were facing mass attacks of local populations. We call them pogroms. The mobs murdered Jews in part because they accused Jews of killing Christian children or putting children’s blood in their matzoh during Passover. So when Jews hear about Israelis targeting children, and there’s not much evidence of intentional targeting, then Jews hear the sounds of 2,000 years of people calling Jews child murderers.

Also many of the deaths in Gaza occurred because Hamas used civilian locations, including neighborhoods and hospitals, to protect their soldiers and equipment. This is clearly an issue for any war crimes charges. This policy is often referred to as using “human shields.” It would be a difficult legal argument to overcome in any prosecution of war crimes.

Again I’m not an international lawyer, but killing civilians is not a war crime per se–especially if Hamas embeds itself in civilian locations. In war, militaries have the right to attack civilian areas if military units are located there. This is an intentional Hamas strategy. At Nuremberg and in other trials, Nazis (including Herman Göring) claimed that Allied bombing campaigns like Dresden were war crimes. This was rejected consistently by the courts. If we were to examine the Allied bombing campaign, we would be horrified by the level of death and destruction. We have seen how awful things were recently in the battles of Mosul and Fallujah in Iraq. If we examined WWII battles and civilian casualties and property destruction, we would be horrified. War is always brutal, but that in itself doesn’t make it a war crime. War may be wrong or even immoral, but that doesn’t make it necessarily a crime.

Netanyahu might well have committed war crimes in certain areas, such as denying food to come into Gaza. Also obstructing medical assistance could be a war crime conceivably. There are probably other potential crimes I have not thought of. I don’t know the evidence, and obviously the fighting isn’t over, but we would have to wait and see what might qualify as a war crime legally.

If we were to examine the Allied campaign in WWII, both in Europe and Japan, there were very likely war crimes committed. Were Hiroshima and Nagasaki war crimes? Didn’t the atomic bombs intentionally target civilian populations? This is a subject of debate.

In Europe, Allied soldiers often killed POWs (because having to use fighting soldiers as POW guards was viewed as hindering Allied military advances). Allied troops sometimes denied medical care to German and Japanese soldiers in WWII. Are these not war crimes? These kind of things happen in virtually ever war I’ve studied. The question is: are they isolated incidents or are they part of an intentional policy?

The biggest issue for me when it comes to Gaza is proportionality of protest.

This is very, very important. In Syria, there were between 500,000 and 1,000,000 killed by the Assad government in Syria. Most of them were civilians. We did not see protesters marching in the streets about that even though the total number of dead and wounded was far greater than in Gaza.

In Yemen approximately 150,000 people have so far died in the civil war (most civilians) and another 225,000 died of malnourishment. This was caused by the Houthi (Shiite-Iranian) revolt. Where have been and are the protests against this?

2.5 million people have died in the ongoing conflict in Sudan over the years. Where are the protests about this?

In February of this year, the Iranian government murdered (executed) between 30,000 and 40,000 people simply for the crime of protesting against the current government. Did we see protests in the streets of NYC or SF or anywhere? No we did not. In fact, many on the far-left have defended the Iranian government and criticized the protesters.

The Chinese government has placed 1,000,000 Muslim Uighurs over the past two decades in concentration camps and murdered thousands more. Are there people on the streets about this?

I could go on and on. The question is: Why do protesters focus on Israel and not on other countries? Why do some on the far-left and the far-right defend Assad in Syria and the Iranian government for what are more obvious violations of morality and war codes? If protesters treated all these cases seriously, including Israel, then we would have a far different landscape to look at. Why don’t protesters do this: For most Jews the answer is obvious.

If protesters were consistent (more or less) and applied their protests tactics equitably on various forms of violence, the Jewish community would feel a lot differently. But they don’t and have shown no indication of doing so. Criticism of Israel doesn’t occur in a vacuum. There’s over 2,000 years of history. Christians don’t have a lot of credibility here, given centuries of persecution of Jews, including the Crusades (which targeted Jews along the way, as well as Muslims). They are not neutral arbiters or observers. So when protesters focus on Israel at the expense of other brutal situations, this is what it looks like to Jews and those who understand the history.

Btw, I would say the same about Christian Zionists who blindly support Israel and Netanyahu. They honestly have no clue what they’re talking about. Sure the Israeli government loves their support and their money, but they’re wrong IMHO. They care about themselves and their theology and want Jews to convert. Many younger Evangelicals are not supportive of Israel or Jews. So the landscape is going to shift again probably–not too far away either. In any case, I’m under no illusion that they care about us. They don’t.

Some have argued that disproportionate criticism of Israel is justifiable, since the U.S. provides significant military and economic assistance. As far as economic and military ties go, do observers really think that there would be no protests against Israel if this had not been the case? In Europe where there is much less connection (and a lot more connection to Arab governments), there are massive protests against Israel and more attacks against Jews than in the USA. It’s clearly worse now there than in the USA for Jews. The diminished connections between European countries and Israel has not changed the protest landscape at all. There are no significant protests for any of the countries I mentioned.

Israel knows its days of U.S. support are coming to a close. It’s already established close relations with the Gulf countries (especially UAE, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia). It has peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. With Hezbollah weakened there are now talks with the Lebanese government–which is weak but wants a change from constant war status. It’s in a state of non-belligerence with Syria. It is developing close relations with India–and is probably cutting deals with China. It has relations with several countries in West Africa and improving relations with Morocco.

In fact, many in Israeli leadership would be happy not to have U.S. support at some point in the future. It would give them more freedom to operate independently. This might not be a good thing for Israel because the USA has had a positive influence overall. And it won’t probably be a good thing for the USA–since it provides jobs for Americans and since it gives the USA a lot of influence over an important area of the world. U.S. influence is already dissipating with the Iran war and with our current incompetent government, but the dissipation of influence will accelerate as U.S. aid diminishes to Israel. That is the reality of where we’re headed I think.

Jews in the diaspora are a whole different story. Many of our neighbors dislike us and conflate us with Israel. There’s also the 2,500 years of antisemitic history that we have to face daily. Israelis think all Jews should live in Israel and so they don’t really care that much about our lives here. We’re alone at this moment.

As I talk with my friends in the Jewish community, I hear lots of talk of moving outside the USA. We’re a nation of travelers, migrants, and nomads. That might happen again. But where? Is it really a good idea for all Jews to live in one place (Israel)? One or a few bombs can kill us all. I don’t think that Israelis have thought the diaspora issue through.

There’s a scene in Schindler’s List where a Russian soldier finds the Schindler Jews wandering around somewhere after Schindler had to flee. They’re trying to figure out where to go. He tells them that whichever way they travel, the people they meet will hate them (and probably murder them–which actually happened historically). So most of them ended up in the USA or Israel. It was a very claustrophobic situation, and it is now once again.

I still believe in the USA, even with MAGA, Trump, an authoritarian government, and the massively increasing antisemitism. It still can be a good place for Jews. I believe most Americans don’t like what they see with antisemitism on the far-right and the far-left. I believe that they’re overplaying their hands, but … I’m not sure about that. We just don’t know what’s going to happen on anything these days. I’m still an optimist at heart, but I’m a realistic optimist. Much as it pains me, I have to embrace uncertainty.

I’m betting that Jews in the USA will eventually get through this and that Israel will be ok.

Israel’s problem is no longer primarily strategic, but political. Except for Iran, Israel’s relations with its neighbors are much better than they’ve ever been. That said, Israel’s Public Relations are just dreadful across the globe. If the Israeli government can think of something to alienate people–even its supporters–then they almost always do it. It’s honestly breathtakingly dumb. How can really smart leaders do stuff so stupid?

Also Netanyahu has been pushing hard against democracy and freedom in his own country. Like Trump he’s trying to rig the courts and the political system so that he can stay in power and avoid prison time. This is is a serious problem, though it could prove (I hope) temporary. We’ll see. The next government after Netanyahu will be a big test.

In the USA, we’re experiencing a massive wave of antisemitism and Jew hatred, especially on the far left and far right. Jews in the U.S. have never experienced anything quite like it. Ultimately this has almost nothing to do with Israel, and everything to do with Jews. A lot of people despise and resent Jews in ways that they previously hid. How do we get past that? As someone who spent a large part of my life trying to address antisemitism, it’s disheartening to say the least. This is part of a populist surge, however, and those kind of waves usually wear themselves out over time and dissipate–as we just saw in Hungary.

“Populism” is almost never good for Jews. Historically, when the lid comes off and people start expressing (and acting on) how they really feel about one another, then the resentment and frustration almost always turns to attacking Jews–who are the world’s eternal scapegoat. It’s clockwork.

Original article: Miscellaneous Thoughts on Antisemitism and Israel

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Platner didn’t remove/cover over the tattoo until he was shamed into doing so by the media. This tattoo is a TotenKopf tattoo, the death head image used by the Nazi Waffen SS who were in the front lines murdering Jews in the death camps and in the East. He has never apologized. He seems to have known what the tattoo meant over the years, but has tried to make that go away. To my knowledge, while he has generally condemned antisemitism, he has not explained what his specific views of the Shoah are. Calling the tattoo a youthful mistake is way, way insufficient. If he had apologized and explained why he did what he did was wrong, he would have a much better reception.

On this basis, if Platner is the future of the Democratic Party (as some have suggested), Jews don’t have much of a place in such a party.

Most Jews and many African Americans have warned Democrats about Platner, but White people haven’t bothered to listen. They apparently have already forgiven Platner. There aren’t many Jews or African Americans in Maine. So there you go. Apparently they know more than we do. When most Jews tell Democrats that someone has an antisemitism problem and they don’t listen, we already have a clear answer on how a large number of people view Jews. It’s honestly hard to miss.

I hope Platner proves me wrong by taking a more humane path. I truly do. But, if history has lessons to teach, we shouldn’t ignore obvious warning signs.

If I lived in Maine, unless something changes, I could not vote for either Platner or Collins. I’ve already explained Platner. But Collins is a coward who enables Trump, and she does virtually nothing to support democracy. Every step of the way she undermines our freedoms and only does what’s best for her politically. It’s gross.

I’m watching Trump, Republicans, and SCOTUS undermine and try to wreck our democracy, but many Democrats care more about ostracizing Israel and Jews than they care about the Constitution and the values that underlie it. Yes, we’ll likely get through this, but living through it sure is painful and exhausting.

Original article: Graham Platner, Jews, and Israel

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I am a life-long Democrat. I administer a Facebook group devoted to opposing far-right global nationalism. I have always supported civil rights, LGBTQ rights, abortion rights, Medicare for All, fairer taxation, reasonable regulation of markets, and liberal democracy. I could go on and on here, but you get the point. I have actively supported Democrats over decades and worked hard for them–both through volunteering and through contributions.

But I’m also Jewish, am an historian of Judaism and have studied and taught on antisemitism. I have spent my professional life teaching and writing about both Judaism and Christianity, trying to help heal the wounds of two millennia of pain. I’m sure that I was in part motivated by the Holocaust and the horrifying experiences of many of my fellow Jews during the Holocaust, including members of my own family. Though I strongly oppose the government of Netanyahu and support a two-state solution, I also believe that Israel has a right to exist as a Jewish state (just as numerous other countries rely on ethnic and religious identities).

What I’m seeing now in the Democratic Party is disappointing to me to say the least when it comes to the Jewish community. At a time when Jews are facing a massive upsurge of hate and threats (synagogues on average are spending upwards of 14-15% of their budgets on security), I’m watching the DNC and Democratic voters enable candidates like Graham Platner and Abdul El-Sayed. Of course, they are just the tip of the iceberg, with numerous Democratic candidates at lower levels espousing all kinds of crazy ideas about Jews. All this is happening while the FBI reports that about 68-69% of religious hate crimes are against Jews.

For example, Platner’s infamous tattoo is not just a Nazi insignia, but a death head (TotenKopf) SS insignia of the Waffen SS–the most vicious of Nazi storm troopers who wore it on the clothes as they led Jews to the gas chambers in death camps and swooped into eastern Europe to murder Jews. They were the most vicious and vile of the the Nazi murderers. They were responsible for the murders of countless Jews in Europe, including presumably members of my own family. Yet the DNC and voters do not seem to care about that, even though Platner has never apologized for wearing it and seems likely to have known what it in fact meant. If I lived in Maine, could I really vote for someone like that? I mean he wore a tattoo that the SS used when murdering millions of Jews and members of my family. That would be for me a violation of what I owe to them and their legacy. I’m not even mentioning the misogynist and racist rants in which he engaged on Reddit.

In addition to El-Sayed’s controversial comments on the West Bloomfield synagogue attack, he has campaigned with Hasan Piker who has called Orthodox Jews “inbred” and said that he supports Hamas and Hezbollah. Piker is avowedly anti-Zionist. Effectively in a speech a few days ago, El-Sayed essentially said that for Jews to be ok, they have to reject Israel and the Jewish state. He says that’s not antisemitism. But for most Jews that is in fact antisemitism. He doesn’t get to define what antisemitism is any more than I get to define what anti-Black racism or misogyny are.

Is it possible to be anti-Zionist and not antisemitic? Theoretically, yes, as long as you condemn all nations with ethnic and religious identities in parts of their constitutions. This would include basically the entire Arab/Muslim world, many countries in Europe, and Japan, as well as other nations. If people aren’t willing to do that, then, yes, they’re espousing an antisemitic idea by supporting anti-Zionism.

These are just two examples. I’m seeing all kinds of crazy stuff about Jewish money, Jewish power, Jewish dual allegiance, and on and on. This is happening all over the place in “progressive” Democratic circles. Of course, the far right does the same thing and is just as dangerous, but somehow I was naive enough to think that liberals and Democrats wouldn’t fall prey to that. I was clearly wrong, as I’m watching a sea of hatred against not only Jews, but also against African Americans and women on the far left. I know that this site is mainstream liberal–not far-left–but the Democratic party is not pushing back very hard against this. On the other hand, I’m very impressed by the British Labor party’s efforts to eradicate antisemitism from its ranks. They have not allowed far-left antisemitism to take hold. Unfortunately that’s not yet happened in the U.S. Democratic Party.

Maybe they figure that Jewish voters are too small a number to matter, that there will be such a blue wave that they don’t need Jews. Maybe they’re right. I’m not sure. The Jewish vote has generally been about 70%-30% Democratic. If that vote goes down to let’s say 55%-60% Democratic, that will cause problems for Democrats as some point, especially in 2028. Jews vote at a much higher rate than almost any group and are key voters in many state elections. Of course, Democrats need also to ask themselves whether this is the kind of party they really want to be. Do they really want to be a party that traffics in bigotry? If they do that, what makes them different from Republicans on issues of diversity and prejudice?

For many of us in the Jewish community, this is a painful time. I intend to vote Democratic as much as I possibly can and to support Democrats where I can. Antisemitism is my red line, however. Democracy is so important to me that I might even consider making some uncomfortable choices, but not when it comes to blatant bigotry. I will not be gaslighted. I hope the Democratic ship rights itself on this. Otherwise I have no party any more and will just float around as a free agent I guess. My ideas about liberal democracy and liberal values will continue, but not necessarily my party affiliation. This is the conundrum for many Jews who aren’t sure at this point what they’re going to do.

Original article: Democrats and Jews

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First, we have to define what Zionism is. Zionism means the right of Jews to have their own state. That’s it. There are many different versions of Zionism, but it essentially comes down to the right of self-determination.

Since the destruction of the 1st Temple in Jerusalem in in the 6th century BCE and then the 2nd Temple in 70 CE, diaspora Jews longed to return to their homeland. Some continued to live there, but most did not. Jews preserved this longing in their daily&shabbat prayers&throughout Jewish writing.

In the 19th century, a formal movement arose that sought to make this longing into a political reality. This is what most refer to as the beginning of Zionism. But…the desire to return to what we now call Israel has been a part of Jewish identity for 2,500 years.

We can debate all the events that led to Israeli independence in 1948&what transpired afterwards, but supporting “Zionism” doesn’t mean that one agrees with everything that Jews in Israel did prior to 1948 or that one agrees with all that that the Israeli gov did after 1948.

Criticizing the Israeli gov or Netanayhu or the conduct of the Gaza war does not make one anti-Zionist. It simply means that one disagrees with Israeli policy. Even finding Israeli Gaza policy repugnant in some ways does not make one anti-Zionist. Jews everywhere do this every day.

To understand this, we probably have to understand that Judaism is not solely a religion. E.g. I grew up in a family that was not religious at all, but my parents saw themselves as part of a people, a nation, a civilization. This view of Judaism is common among Jews.

The religious part is only part of being Jewish. For many Jews in the U.S. I would say that it’s not even the central part. I would say that this is true for many Jews in Israel as well. “Religion” is a problematic category for understanding what Jews&Judaism are.

In fact, the word “religion” as a category of identity&meaning is a modern one that arose primarily in a Christian context, especially in German academia in the 19th century. Other movements which we call now “religions” have a similar issue (e.g. Hinduism, Confucianism).

So “Zionism” can have a religious meaning to some Jews, but to many it does not. What non-religious&religious Jews generally share is the idea that Jews need their own state to thrive&to avoid the prejudice, hatred, discrimination, persecution that has plagued Jews for millennia.

My guess is that about 85% of American Jews are effectively Zionist, since they support the idea of a Jewish and democratic state, meaning Israel. That would probably be higher in other countries& in Israel. But the remaining Jews could be either non-Zionist or anti-Zionist (not the same thing at all btw: non-Zionism means that Zionism is not a central orienting point for that person’s Judaism and/or Jewish identity).

So if they are anti-Zionist, those individuals are in opposition to the overwhelming majority of Jews in the world. They are essentially saying to Jews that they are wrong&that their c. 3,000 year-history is misguided.

Yes, there are some anti-Zionist Jews–that is Jews who don’t believe that Jews have their own right to a state. That would put them way out of the mainstream, but they certainly exist as a minority.

Back to the question: Is anti-Zionism antisemitism? The answer is most likely Yes.

I have not met them, but it’s possible that there are some people who believe that there should be no ethno-states globally. So if they reject the right of all people—e.g. Japan or Saudi Arabia or India–to have their own ethno-states because they don’t see that as legitimate and if they speak out vociferously against those states in favor of some other form of governance (as intensely as they focus on Israel), then they are not engaging in antisemitic discourse. They would have to be clearly consistent in their opposition to such states, not focused on Israel.

But this would at best be a rare position, which is not the kind of thing you normally see on social media or at protests or elsewhere.

It’s important to make a distinction here between antisemitism&Jew hatred. Some of the people espousing anti-Zionism don’t necessarily hate Jews. There may not be personal animus involved. But…they are engaged in a discourse that is structurally antisemitic. It’s often an unconscious or subconscious prejudice that is so deeply embedded in human consciousness for centuries that they cannot see or sense what they are doing.

It doesn’t matter whether the anti-Zionists are Jewish or not. Most Jewish anti-Zionists&some non-Jewish ones don’t hate Jews, but they are in fact espousing a view that is very likely antisemitic.

I realize that there are problems with the word, “antisemitism” (partly because the word was actually invented by someone who strongly disliked Jews), but there really currently aren’t better words or phrases.

“Racism” is probably the closest word to describe prejudice against Jews, but “race” is how the Nazis categorized Jews. Jews for good reason are leery of using a word that allows Nazis to dictate the terms of Jewish identity. Plus, “race” has no biological basis and is effectively a social construct.

In any case, anti-Zionism is an idea that in a practical sense is likely antisemitic. Human beings are naturally prejudiced, since it’s the way they learned to survive in a hostile world. So prejudice against Jews is a natural phenomenon that isn’t really surprising.

What is notable is that prejudice against Jews has lasted for 2,500 years&has now seen a massive resurgence in the last few years. Why do people fixate on Jews? That’s a question for another time.

Original article: IS ANTI-ZIONISM ANTISEMITISM

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I’m writing this to Jews, particularly to Israeli leaders and to global Jewish organization and institutions.

With Netanyahu and his political allies, we have a group whose betrayal extends almost beyond description. We have a leader who has spent the last months busily trying to dismantle Israeli democracy through a judicial coup while cozying up to global, antisemitic dictators. Alienating the majority of Israelis and mocking members of the IDF who disagreed with him (particularly in the air force and special forces), he divided Israel and helped make its enemies think it was vulnerable. The military was in open revolt, as were many Israelis. Despite his support for the judiciary earlier in his career, he nevertheless pressed on, bullying all those who opposed him—presumably to keep himself out of prison due to an ongoing bribery trial. He was willing to rip apart Israel, which responded with the largest protest demonstrations in its history. Is time in prison really that bad that he would divide the nation and destroy the democratic tradition that had served as a model in the Middle East? Apparently for him and his cronies, it was.

We have a man, one of whose signature policies was to work with Hamas in Gaza in order to degrade the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank. Now he talks tough, but he and his buddies were the ones who enabled Hamas which then fooled him into thinking that all was under control and that he knew what he was doing: obviously he did not. He’s an over-confident know-it-all (*chacham* in Yiddish) who thought he could outsmart terrorists, but he was the one outsmarted.

While doing this, he removed IDF troops from the Gaza border to help out his settler allies who were celebrating Sukkot in the West Bank, confident that he had Hamas under control and that Israeli hi-tech could protect the border fence. He left Sderot and all those left-wing kibbutzim to fend for themselves. He abandoned all of them, left them alone to fight against heavily armed murderous barbarians. How much did he care about civilians in Sderot and kibbutzim? Not much. He left them (the ‘little people’ for him) alone to be tortured, mutilated, beheaded, raped, and burned alive. That is his government’s legacy. You don’t leave an extremely hostile border area without physical protection of actual troops. That says it all right there–how little he and allies care about Jewish life.

For Gaza border residents, the basic contract was: “You live there, and we’ll protect you.” The government reneged on that contract. How many other contracts have they broken and will they break?

Netanyahu and his allies aligned themselves with fundamentalist Christians to get their money and political support, even though these far-right advocates dislike most actual Jews, want to convert Jews, frequently use antisemitic tropes, and even cite Nazis with approval. Would anyone really be surprised how that’s going to work out down the road?

Netanyahu allied himself with the ultra-Orthodox/Haredim most of whom don’t serve in the military. In fact, he’s been busy trying to pass legislation to make de-facto military exemptions for yeshiva students a legal fact (de iure). If you talk to many Israelis, especially those with children, you’ll get an angry earful about how most Haredim live off the welfare of the state through citizen tax dollars and don’t have to send their children to war. How do you think most Israelis feel right now when many Haredim live their lives as if nothing were happening while the rest of Israel goes to war, potentially to face trauma, injury, or even death?

As a member of the diaspora Jewish community, I look to Israel as a safe place and a protector of Jews everywhere. Netanyahu abandoned us, left us alone, made us more vulnerable to antisemitism, to the violence of hate, to the indifference of a world that views Jews (.2% of the global population) as disposable.

Then we have have the organized Jewish community in the U.S. and globally. What have they been doing?

Well, through most of my career, they’ve spent time defending Israel no matter what (including the Netanyahu government) or promoting outreach to non-Jews.

I’ve never been able to stanch my criticism of Israeli policies. So I’ve never really done very well with that first category. That said, as far as promoting Israel goes without criticism, we can easily see the shortcomings of this approach by simply looking at the anger of most Israelis toward the current government. The extent may be broader now with the Hamas massacre, but it’s always been there. Yet, during the protests, most Jewish organizations downplayed the protests or avoided discussion altogether. How seriously will upset Israelis and diaspora Jews take these organizations now?

As for the second category, I’ve done my share of outreach and “dialoging” and know that, as important as it is, it is nowhere close to a panacea. For many of the participants in dialog groups, it’s often more of a gig than an encounter with reality and pain. I’ve always said that these kinds of groups are more about feeling good than about the truth of hatred and antisemitism, the truth of Christian and Muslim antisemitic discourse and persecution of Jews, the exposure of authentic prejudice and pain. For that reason, we’re unprepared for what we’re seeing now on college campuses and city streets. Institutions preferred the ease of comfortable discussion with support from sympathetic granting agencies to the more unpleasant task of actually being present to real pain, anger, hatred, and fear.

As far as general outreach goes, the idea of making allies sounds good and is good, but, no matter how many friends you think you have, just look at places like the former Yugoslavia to see what friends can do to one another when push comes to shove. Look at how neighbors treat neighbors, former friends, and meal companions. When hatred emerges, friendship and even family relations are tested and often fall short. That’s one of the lessons of genocide around the world. Of course, we need to cultivate allies, but we also have to recognize that we’re ultimately doing this as Jews on our own and that we Jews have to take care of of one another as a starting point

It’s that last part of taking care of one another that Jewish mainline organizations have fallen short. Many members in mainline Jewish communities feel alienated, alone, unsupported, unvalued, uncared for, unacknowledged, and unprotected. Volunteers who take on a disproportionate amount of the work feel those emotions even more strongly, with the added feelings of burnout and exhaustion. Leaders who want to know why people aren’t more engaged might want to start by examining how we care for and appreciate one another in mainline Jewish communities and organizations, many of which are not known for their warmth and openness.

In this way, I, as a diaspora Jew, feel a kinship with Israelis who feel a sense of abandonment and betrayal from their government. Obviously my complaints are less existential in comparison, but that’s what Jews across the world are experiencing. There’s a sense that Jewish political, religious, and social institutions have their own agendas set for their own perpetuation, that they’re not authentically committed to the well-being of Jews as a whole, that they’re more concerned about power and money than human relations, that they place a greater emphasis on institution building than on quality of life, and that they do not truly value the efforts and lives of their citizens and members.

Original article: ABANDONMENT AND BETRAYAL: HOW I FEEL ABOUT THE ISRAELI GOVERNMENT AND THE ORGANIZED JEWISH COMMUNITY AFTER THE HAMAS MASSACRE

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