Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Jonathan E Burack's avatar

I agree with this and admire David Bernstein and the Jewish Institute for Liberal Values in just about every particular. However, I am not so sure about the statement that, "deteriorating fealty to the Jewish State does not by itself constitute antisemitism."

No, I suppose it does not in many specific cases, but Israel is central, not peripheral, to the forms real antisemitism takes now, especially on the left. Israel was the most important Jewish response to the Holocaust (as opposed to an embrace of perpetual victimhood). The best way to ensure "never again" was and is the IDF, not maudlin handwringing about image after image of emaciated Jews in the camps. The Jew as strong, not weak, was the response, a correct response.

But it is precisely that which the left with its BDS campaigns, it's "river to the sea" chants, its intimidation of Jews on many campuses (regardless of their views about Israel), is angry about. The audacity of Jews standing up and demanding the world's acceptance on their terms, not the world's. When Ilhan Omar said "Israel hypnotizes the world, Allah protect us against Israel," she was not making a statement about specific Israeli governmental policies. She was translating an ages-old story about Jews as all-powerful deceivers and parasites, the standard trope used time and time again (about Jews as insidious powers behind the throne). Israel takes the place of Jews in this tapestry of contempt. Hence it is Israel that Jews MUST defend now as absolutely essential to the preservation of their existence as a people.

Expand full comment
Frank Rowley's avatar

LOL the compassionate left was going to deny hospital beds to people that would not get vaccinated during covid. The Canadian government was canceling people's bank accounts and our own Society ostracized people including firing them from the workplace for not doing as they were told. Only a complete moron doesn't see the parallels with the holocaust... wagging your finger at the past while at the same time not looking in the mirror has become a national pastime...

Expand full comment
80 more comments...

No posts