(RNS) — I keep on returning to one story in the Book of Numbers — the story of Balaam, the pagan prophet. As the prophet is proceeding on his mission, he rides a donkey that traverses a narrow path. An angel of God blocks the way:
“The ass, seeing the angel of the LORD, pressed herself against the wall and squeezed Balaam’s foot against the wall; so he beat her again. Once more the angel of the LORD moved forward and stationed himself on a spot so narrow that there was no room to swerve right or left.”
“There is no room to swerve, right or left.” Welcome to my Jewish world. Antisemitism is pressing in from both sides, squeezing our collective feet against the wall. Or, rather, walls.
Let us start with the wall on the right. White supremacist and antisemite Nick Fuentes appeared on Tucker Carlson’s podcast, where Fuentes’ antisemitic views went unchallenged. Carlson himself said he “dislike(s) Christian Zionists more than anybody.” Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, defended Carlson and denounced a “venomous coalition” attacking him.
Here is the good news. There was massive pushback against Roberts, who subsequently apologized for his actions.
Beyond that, conservatives are sounding the alarm about the growing antisemitism within their ranks. Sen. Ted Cruz said: “In the last six months I’ve seen more antisemitism on the right than I had in my entire life. This is a poison … an existential crisis in our party and our country.”
He has every reason to be concerned. To quote Richard Hanania, a conservative writer: “The distance between Fuentes and the mainstream Republican Party isn’t really that large.”
And the wall on the left? There, antisemitism is more veiled, coming in the rhetorical form of anti-Zionism.
And, as on the right, Democratic leaders are criticizing this development.
Ken Martin, chair of the Democratic National Committee, expressed it this way: “Being a big tent doesn’t mean there’s space for hate … at a time of rising antisemitism, there’s no room for rhetoric that can be seen as a call to violence. There is no room in the Democratic Party for hate speech or calls to ‘globalize the intifada.’”
Rep. Ritchie Torres put it bluntly: “If you refuse to condemn Hamas for the murder, maiming, mutilation, rape, torture, and abduction of thousands of Jews and Israelis, you have no business calling yourself a humanitarian. A humanitarianism that devalues Jewish life is no humanitarianism at all.”
Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania has said what many feel: “Israel deserves much better from my party.”
Into this landscape steps Zohran Mamdani, the newly elected mayor of New York City. His anti-Zionist/anti-Israel positions have unsettled many Jews, and others. To name a few: Mamdani has pledged to review and potentially end the Cornell Tech-Technion partnership on Roosevelt Island, calling Technion “an Israeli university that has helped to develop a lot of weapons technology used by the IDF” (Israel Defense Forces); he said he would not attend the annual Israel Day Parade; he also called for divestment of New York City’s pension funds from state of Israel bonds.
I will not pile on. Those are not simply critiques of current Israeli policies or its government. They question the legitimacy of Jewish nationhood, which is central to the identity of the vast majority of Jews. Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch has warned: “When public figures refuse to condemn violent slogans or deny Israel’s legitimacy, they delegitimize the Jewish community and encourage hostility toward Judaism and Jews.”
To quote Rabbi Donniel Hartman in his podcast (with Yossi Klein Halevi), “For Heaven’s Sake“:
I believe that the level of vilification of Israel, by the mayoral candidate Mamdani, is a moral corruption …
Hate [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu from now to kingdom come! Some of my best friends hate Netanyahu. You want to distance yourself from Israel until the government changes? Call Israel genocidal in its war in Gaza? All of the above. But the level of obsession with Israel as the great evil of the world is morally corrupt. And so that’s why Jews are so upset.
How do we move forward from here? A memo to both sides — Democrats and Republicans:
- Name antisemitism clearly. Condemn antisemitic tropes. Condemn the targeting of Jews.
- Vocally defend Israel’s right to exist as a secure, Jewish, democratic state. Party platforms should affirm that anti-Zionism, when it denies Israel’s right to exist or recycles classic antisemitic myths, is unacceptable.
- Hold accountable those who cross the line into antisemitism.
- Refuse to elevate candidates who conflate Jews and Israel with oppression, or who speak of a “Zionist lobby” in conspiratorial terms.
- Police your institutions. To quote Ross Douthat: “While the right’s elites and would-be leaders can’t control the information ecosystem, they can exert real control over conservative institutions — who gets hired and fired, promoted and sidelined and, more generally, what kind of culture obtains inside think tanks and congressional offices and political campaigns.” The same is true of the left.
And, most importantly, fight the temptation to gloat over the other side’s failings. You cannot tolerate bigotry in your own ranks or normalize eliminationist slogans — even if such actions wear the belated Halloween costume of social justice (I am looking at you, my friends to my left). If your side welcomes extremists like Fuentes and shrugs at their hate, you must answer for that rot (I am looking at you, my friends on the right).
This is not a contest of whose bigots are worse. Rather, it is a race for who will clean house first. Rather than jeer at your political opponents, when they start naming the truth about antisemitism in their ranks, cheer them on.
I return to my biblical text. Balaam’s donkey could turn neither right nor left. That is where the Jewish community finds itself today. To paraphrase Stealers’ Wheel: “Stuck in the middle with Jews.”
Reb Nachman put it this way: “The world is a very narrow bridge. But the essential matter is not to make yourself afraid.”
Rather, walk that narrow path with clarity. Reject antisemitism wherever it lives, and demand accountability from allies as from opponents.