That was the first thing that went through my mind when I heard about the bombing of the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza, which claimed the lives of between 200 and 300 people.
Palestinians, much of the Arab world and various organizations immediately blamed Israel. There is now ample evidence, accepted by the United States, that the bombing was the result of a failed rocket that had been launched by Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Here is the audio and transcript of the Hamas terrorists discussing that fact.
Many cannot and will not believe that Israel was guiltless. Their knee jerk assumption is that Israel is guilty — of whatever. They simply believe that the Jewish State is evil and blood thirsty.
Why do they believe that? Because they have inherited and inhaled the oldest antisemitic myth in history — the blood libel — the accusation that Jews would kidnap a Christian child, kill him and use his bones for Passover matzah and his blood for Passover wine.
In Europe, especially, this savage and pervasive accusation dictated the choice of wine for the seder. While red wine was traditional and preferable, the blood libel prompted others to choose white wine. Just so that you could drink a wine that does not look like blood. Just to be safe.
Why did my mind go to “blood libel?”
Because we are talking about antisemitism — the most pervasive hatred in the world and the oldest “ism” in the world. It is in the DNA of Western culture. This means not a single false, bizarre and hurtful accusation and belief about the Jews has disappeared from the Western mind.
And, especially now, “the way we talk about Israel is the way we talk about Jews.”
That is one of many startling and fresh insights that Rabbi Diana Fersko offers us in her new book, “We Need To Talk About Antisemitism.”
Click here to listen to the podcast.
I have read many books on this foul topic — enough for them to have migrated from several shelves in my office to several large cartons in my storage unit.
But in many ways, Rabbi Fersko’s book stands out. It is not really a history of antisemitism. It is a large and broad conversation about the topic, and it is written in a conversational tone, and there were many times where I just simply had to stop and pause and breathe and focus and reflect.
I read it several weeks ago.
I had no idea it would be so relevant.
Relevant, because this column, and podcast, appears in the aftermath of the single worst antisemitic act since Auschwitz. I am talking, of course, about the savage attack by Hamas on Israel, the deliberate killing of civilians — little children, young people, elderly people — the taking of hostages, more than 200 of them.
So yes, we really do have to talk about antisemitism.
Because antisemitism is not only a matter of words. It is lethal.
It is front and center in the mind and consciousness of every Jew. Rabbi Fersko writes:
Every time I go to pray, I think about the possibility of being a victim of a violent crime. Every. Single. Time.
Being a Jewish American is not like being a Christian American. Physical safety is always on my mind. Being a Jewish American means that safety in a place of worship is not a given. Synagogues have metal detectors. There are security guards you can see and security guards you cannot see. There are armed guards; there are unarmed guards. There are active-shooter drills for three-year-old children.
Antisemitism is a mass of contradictory and confusing ideas:
Only antisemitism can explain that fascists called Jews communists while communists called Jews capitalists. Only antisemitism explains why poor Jews are attacked and bullied but rich Jews are maligned and resented.
Antisemitism is why Orthodox Jews are attacked for being too distinct, for clinging to their “tribal” roots, while liberal Jews are criticized for assimilating, for passing, for privilege. Jews are hated by white supremacists and yet sometimes accused of being white supremacists. For centuries, Jews were despised for being a nationless nation, a wandering people with no home. Now, Jewish nationhood is often portrayed as the source of all evil. We’ve been hated by the uneducated and by the highly educated. We’ve been hated in urban centers and in rural areas, hated by the elite but also called the elite. Antisemitism is a collection of contradictions, but it doesn’t matter. Pick the major cultural problem and project it onto the Jews—that’s antisemitism.
Antisemitism is tricky, slippery and filled with no-win situations for Jews. I have coined a term, based on Rabbi Fersko’s writing. The term is “if only-ism.”
The Jews would be acceptable, and antisemitism would evaporate: if only the Jews would stop keeping kosher, stop observing Shabbat, stop ritual circumcision, stop celebrating Jewish holidays and stop being a distinct Jewish people.
Or, as the late Lord Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, who served as chief rabbi of the United Kingdom, put it: “Antisemitism is not allowing Jews to exist collectively the way we allow others to exist collectively.”
Antisemitism is the autoimmune disease of Western civilization. It can lie dormant, and then it can come back with a vengeance.
Especially now. Especially when it concerns Israel.
If you are a young progressive on the college campus, there is a good chance that there will be a rather steep entry price. You will have to disavow any affection for, or connection to, the Jewish State. You want to join our political country club? Get rid of the pesky Jewish stuff. Oh, you can be spiritual, and maybe do a little bit of the “Jewish stuff,” but as for a commitment to the Jewish people and its greatest project in the last 2,500 years: sorry.
Why? As Rabbi Fersko writes: “Israel has become a totem for everything sinister about the West, from colonialism to white supremacy to police brutality.”
“We Need To Talk About Antisemitism” is a wonderful book. Rabbi Fersko deals with aspects and nuances of antisemitism that we usually ignore or overlook: the appropriation of Jewish symbols; the deliberate universalizing of Judaism; micro-aggressions against Jews; economic and sociological stereotypes. She is well-read, and it shows.
There is another piece to this — and I think that I might be the only person to have noticed this.
Over the last several years, almost all of the important books on antisemitism have come from women authors: Deborah Lipstadt, Bari Weiss, Dara Horn and now Rabbi Diana Fersko. (I could add to this list such luminaries as Cynthia Ozick, Ruth Wisse and Einat Wilf). Rabbi Fersko and I ask: Why?
How can Jews fight back against antisemitism?
Rabbi Fersko would suggest — with pro-semitism:
When people bring shame, respond with pride. When people spread lies, respond with facts. When people casually dissuade us from embracing our Jewish identity, respond with Jewish practice. Try more learning, more community, more religion. Try having more Jewish experiences. If we want antisemitism to wane, we must stand up and be counted as Jews.
“We must stand up and be counted as Jews.”
Especially now.
Never more than now.
