Antisemitism is real, but it cannot be weaponized to ignore persecution of Palestinians
Concerned by reported attacks on Jews linked to a recent surge in Israeli-Palestinian violence, I attended a May 27 rally against antisemitism organized by the Sacramento Jewish Federation. I stood aside, however, put off by the Israeli flags waved by and literally draped over the crowd of about 100.
Remarks from legislators and Federation leaders mostly avoided conflating criticism of Israel or Zionism with antisemitism. Some, admirably, called for protecting other communities, notably Muslims, when they come under attack. Business leader Kais Menoufy, who is of Egyptian heritage, emphasized, to some consternation, the importance of differentiating “between the state of Israel and (being) Jewish.”
But the loudest applause came when Rabbi Lionel Moses proclaimed, “Whether we live here as Americans or live in Israel, for Jews, the state of Israel is our homeland. … Anti-Zionism is a synonym, an identical word, to antisemitism.”
That’s wrong and dangerous. It paints all Jews with a pro-Israel brush; it feeds the trope of disloyalty to our actual home; and it negates sincere concerns about the displacement, occupation and systemic discrimination inflicted on the Palestinian people — what two widely respected human rights organizations, one Israeli, recently concluded constitutes apartheid.
Unlike the vast majority of American Jews, I’m also an Israeli citizen and lived there for a decade. If ever asked, “Do you feel a strong emotional attachment to Israelis?” I would say yes, as hundreds of close relatives and friends, Jewish and Palestinian, remain. But I would then be wrongly construed a strong “supporter of Israel.”
I joined hundreds of local Palestinian Americans at recent protests downtown against Israel’s violent assaults on Jerusalem worshipers and Gaza civilians.
Rejection of Zionism, a political movement that has always been opposed by significant numbers of Jews, is not antisemitic — nor is criticism of Israeli state policies. But those who insist on conflating “Israeli” or “Zionist” with “Jew” should not be surprised when, occasionally, anger at Israel wrongly targets Jews.
In the Arab world, anti-Jewish sentiment is not a major cause of enmity between Palestinians and Israeli Jews but mostly a consequence of it — and of misguided insistence that Israel represents all Jews.
As for the recent attacks, every prominent leader of the movement for Palestinian rights has rushed to denounce actual antisemitic acts when they occur. Moreover, some witnesses have disputed who actually started the melees, alleging that some of the viral videos were tendentiously edited.
More problematic, however, is that such reports mostly cite the Anti-Defamation League regarding the “surge” of attacks, despite its history of conflating political critique with antisemitism. Here are two examples from ADL’s current antisemitism tracker:
“A Jewish man … was walking in downtown Chicago … when a demonstrator from a pro-Palestinian rally yelled at him, ‘Jewish people yes! Zionism no!’ “
“A rally in Houston included signs that read, ‘One Holocaust doesn’t justify another.’ “
The first makes a clear distinction. The second comment’s Holocaust citation may be insensitive and counterproductive, but there’s a vast difference between accusing Israel of Nazi-like behavior and actual Nazi-like behavior that attacks Jews as Jews.
The Trump years witnessed a resurgence of the latter, from “Jews will not replace us” chants in Charlottesville to swastika scrawling, cemetery vandalism and synagogue shootings.
Antisemitism is real, but it’s one particular form of racism, to be denounced and fought. It’s not okay to weaponize it to deflect from the persecution of Palestinians. Instead, let’s commit to the principle that safety for any group depends on safety for all.