But now I do worry. Not that I feel in any immediate danger, I
don’t. But the fact is that my neighborhood borders another that is highly
populated by Arabs, most of whom are devout Muslims. Many may very well be of
Palestinian heritage.
Last Sunday, on the eve of Shavuos, one of the most horrific
attacks against Jews in America that I could have ever imagined occurred:
Mohamed Sabry Soliman, a 45-year-old Egyptian national who federal authorities say was living in the U.S. illegally, shouted “Free Palestine” and threw two of the 18 Molotov cocktails he was carrying, injuring more than half of the estimated 20 people demonstrating in support of Israel. Officials said he expressed no regrets about the attack.
According to witnesses, one Jewish woman was engulfed in
flames. Although there were thankfully no fatalities, there were serious
injuries to at least 12 Jews attending the rally.
If such a horrific attack can happen in Boulder, Colorado,
there’s every reason to believe it could happen anywhere devout Muslim radicals
are found. And as noted, there are certainly devout Muslims here too. So yes - it
has felt a bit scary of late. Although, thank God, there have been no incidents
here. Yet.
That Mr. Soliman was a devout Muslim is not in doubt. He
recorded and shared his virulent, religiously-motivated antisemitism on a
social media app - something even the mainstream media has reported.
This savage incident followed the recent murder of
two Israeli embassy employees in Washington D.C. by Elias Rodriguez, a radical
leftist who declared he had ‘no choice’ but to kill Jews to spread his message
of “Free, Free Palestine!” Which he screamed as he was being arrested. Though
neither Palestinian nor Muslim, he was clearly influenced by their rhetoric.
There was a time not long ago when the primary threat of
antisemitic attacks came from the right - from white supremacists, Neo-Nazis,
and other extremist fringe groups. Even though they were few in number, it only
took one to perpetrate the massacre in Pittsburgh a few years ago. While hate
crimes like that were relatively rare, that threat was always in the air, and
still is. We must remain vigilant against that brand of antisemitism too.
But today, the greater and more immediate danger of violent
antisemitic attacks comes from devout Muslims and their sympathizers on the far
left.
So yes, we Jews live in precarious times. Even here in
America. And yet…
The broader American public is not antisemitic. Not even
most on the left. They are as appalled by what happened in Boulder and D.C. as
we are. Law enforcement is aggressively pursuing both cases, and these vile
individuals will likely never see the light of day again. While many Americans
may not agree with what Israel is doing in Gaza, that does not mean they
question Israel’s right to exist. To the extent that they think about Israel
beyond Gaza, they generally see it in a positive light.
This is not 1939 all over again. Not even close. In fact,
one could argue that this might even be the opposite of that era. Think about
how the government of each era treated antisemitic acts. Compare the German government’s
reaction to Kristallnacht to the American government’s reaction to Boulder and D.C.
That said, there are very real differences of opinion about
how our government should respond to the rise in antisemitism. As far as I’m
concerned, the Trump administration is taking the right approach by targeting
the primary source of contemporary antisemitism in America: college campuses.
The left has refused to acknowledge this problem, accusing
the government of using the issue as a pretext to stifle free speech and control
what they teach. Thus stifling academic independence. There may be some truth
to that concern. But there is also a great deal of truth to the claim that
antisemitism has festered on these campuses for decades.
Led by Palestinian professors recruited under the banner of
diversity - and supported by far-left professors these institutions have
created a culture of anti-Israel hatred so intense that it has deeply
influenced student governments to support the BDS movement. BDS pretends to
advocate for Palestinian rights, but in truth, its goal is the destruction of
the Jewish state.
Long before October 7th, student governments at
top universities were demanding that their administrations divest from Israel.
Jewish students were being harassed simply for being Jewish assuming all to be Zionist
supporters of ‘Apartheid’ Israel. This was widely known, but few spoke out, and
fewer still did anything about it.
The prevailing attitude was best illustrated by the
now-infamous testimony of three university presidents who, when asked whether
calling for genocide against Jews was antisemitic, responded with: ‘It depends
on the context’. Their answers revealed a willful blindness to antisemitism on
campus.
But the Trump administration and its supporters in congress saw
it and called it out in front of the entire country.
That ended those university presidents’ careers. It also
exposed the worst-kept secret in academia: that these institutions had an
antisemitism problem they were either ignoring or denying.
Guess what happened next? They admitted it. And claimed
they’re now doing something about it. Whether they are or not is beside the
point. The fact that it had to be dragged out of them shows that they were
never serious about combating it. Until now. When they are now finally being seriously
sanctioned for it by the government.
Previous administrations turned a blind eye too. But not
Trump. He hit these institutions where it hurts: in their funding. Now,
university administrators are crying foul - claiming that withholding research
grants is unfair because the research has nothing to do with antisemitism.
What about the research that supposedly benefits all of
mankind? My response: The government does not owe them a thing. They want to continue
vital research? Where there's a will, there's a way. Schools like Harvard have
endowments worth billions. Some of which can surely be used to fund their ‘vital’
research.
So, are we living in 1930s Germany all over again? The way
to answer that is to compare what the German government did then to what the
American government is doing now. Thank God, we have a president who
cares enough to bring antisemitism in academia to the national spotlight. Something
no previous president was willing to do.
That doesn’t mean I’ve changed my mind about the president’s character. But it does mean I appreciate what he is doing for the Jewish people. Something many of my coreligionists on the left are too blinded by hatred to recognize and, sadly, see in a negative light
