What is happening in the US is not what was happening from 1960 to 2020.
As I mentioned previously, I do look at the comments. I do so to see if there is something that I can learn and at times to see how the naysayers respond to my thoughts. As to the latter, there has been no shortage of responders who claim that there is no great antisemitism in the United States or that the Jews/Israel caused it, or that people like Tucker Carlson haven’t said anything unusual regarding Israel and American Jews. He just said that nobody in the US has been killed by Muslim terrorists "in the past 24 years," while the real number killed is over 100. He said that Israel is pushing a Muslim terror lie.
The United States has known antisemitism in the past. Harvard’s President Lowell set strict quotas for Jews to enter the college. There are many stories of Jews arriving from Europe and starting to work in New York, being told, “If you don’t come to work on Saturday, your Sabbath, don’t bother coming back to work on Sunday. You’re fired.” But the events of the past two years have less to do with not being invited to a given country club and more to do with threats and physical harassment and assaults. Some on the right claim that the Jews are to blame. When people claim that Ben Shapiro or Mark Levin is “Israel First," I honestly don’t know what they mean. Ben Shapiro’s recent speeches focused on the US, the conservative movement and MAGA. He did not mention Israel. He didn’t ask the US government to do special favors for the Jewish state. Donald Trump has chosen to be a steadfast friend of the only democracy in the Middle East. So the “Israel First” canard is the same as “I don’t like Zionists--that doesn’t mean that I don’t like Jews”. I have never seen any Jew hater interview a Jew as to his or her views on Bibi Netanyahu, the state of Israel or the war in Gaza before screaming, “Genocide!” or physically attacking. Israel First and Zionist are simply covers for “Jew”. I don’t hate Jews! I only hate Zionists. Sure.
When those in the comments claim that there is no increase in antisemitism, they are contradicting FBI and police data that say otherwise. For years, Jews have been the subject of more hate crimes than all other ethnic groups combined. Whom did good old Tucker have in mind when he mentioned the “hummus eaters” who killed Jesus and/or Charlie Kirk at the latter’s funeral? When he said that Israel intentionally attacked Christian sites in Gaza, he did not bring a bit of evidence to support his claim. When he said that Bibi is running around the Middle East telling leaders that he controls Trump, he did not bring one such leader to repeat it. When Candace Owens peddles that Jews are behind drugs and suggests reading a discredited book with fake quotes from the Talmud, is that not antisemitism? Should any group be subjected to any of the events below? Jews for the past two years have experienced them all. Why, during the past two years? Because the number of Muslims has exploded, as has the funding of the Muslim Brotherhood by Qatar.
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- Harassment on the way to a place of worship
- Places of worship violated with broken windows, graffiti or simulated blood
- Broken windows at Jewish-owned restaurants
- Verbal and, at times, physical assaults of diners at Jewish restaurants
- Physical attacks, including one fellow killed by a Palestinian protester in Los Angeles and another Jew stabbed in New York
- Being prevented from entering one’s place of worship
- Being told that any concern for the well-being of another country means that the US is in last place
- Being prevented from moving freely on campuses from Harvard to Berkeley
- Being spat upon by fellow college students
- Sitting in a college course in which you and your people are clearly loathed or even hated
What is listed above has been the lot of the Jewish community of the United States of America since the start of the Gaza War. Has every Jew experienced the above? Of course not. Has every synagogue been defaced and defiled? Obviously not. But my question is whether Christians would find having the same experiences acceptable to them? Imagine a Catholic student at Yeshiva University being told that she cannot enter a courtyard she needs in order to get to class. Picture a beautiful Presbetyrian church having its windows smashed and fake blood on its front door. Imagine a Mormon governor of Utah having his home set alight while he and his family were sleeping. Even blacks in America would have a hard time putting together such a list of attacks due solely to the color of their skin. A Jew walking to synagogue on Saturday, having his yarmulke knocked off his head in front of his children, would have been something we would have expected from the Nazi Youth. We would not have ever thought to see the same in the United States. And again, don’t sell me this Zionist or Israel First rubbish. Nobody asked the guy stabbed recently by someone, saying that he “wants to kill a Jew,” about his feelings for Zionism. There are massive numbers of ultraorthodox Jews in Brooklyn who reject the idea of a secular state of Israel. When a couple of young men were accosted by two blacks on the subway in New York during Chanukah, was the choking attack preceded by a panel discussion on Zionism Today? Nope. They attacked them because they were Jews, and in the United States, that should never happen and our leaders should make it clear that it should never happen. But our leaders don’t want to offend the Carlson wing of the movement or Qatar, so all we get are platitudes and silence from the top.
I am glad that Jews are buying guns and learning how to properly handle them. The authorities are either so terrified of offending Muslim immigrants or are so closely aligned with antisemitic lefty groups that a Glock may be a very good thing to have. Every synagogue that I have visited in the past few years has both a combination lock and at least on Saturday, an armed guard. These features would have been unheard of 10 years ago, when the synagogue door was always unlocked, and who would want a cop or uniformed guard standing outside the entrance? But times have changed, and as Victor Davis Hanson just recently wrote, we are slouching towards open season on Jews.
Whereas some clowns in the comments have claimed that I am only pro-Israel, the reality is that I, like good old Tucker, hold only one passport—an American one. My status here is one of a “permanent resident, and we all file tax returns in both countries. When our kids were born, we took them within the first two weeks of their lives to get them US citizenship, passports and social security numbers. For our grandkids to become US citizens, they will have to complete the process in the US. I want them to become citizens, as do their parents. But I want them to be citizens where they are treated like everybody else. I want them to visit the US and feel at home and not threatened because they are Jews or Israelis. I want them to see the national parks, the big cities and all that the US has to offer. If gays experienced the things I listed above, every level of law enforcement would be out to eradicate the problem. But as it has been throughout history, it’s just the Jews and that means that it’s ultimately okay.
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