Anti-Semitism

Words make good clubs, and the title has been a favorite of some conservatives and others who should know better. Some time ago I got an email from an influential member of the Temple lambasting NPR for anti-Semitism. Their crime - presenting a multi-part historical report on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that didn't sufficiently adhere to the official propaganda line. Eric Alterman, a practicing Jew and Zionist who studied in Israel, was called an anti-Semite by some Boston columnist because she didn't like his opinion on some conservative shiboleth. Columbia University launched a rather farcical investigation of what were probably mainly imaginary slights suffered by Zionist students.

Jews above all should object to this debasement of the term. Some still alive were victims of the vicious anti-Semitic crimes of the Nazis and others. It is only recently that most of the overt discrimination against Jews has largely disappeared in major American instituions of education and business. When these crimes are conflated with the real and imaginary slights of paragraph one, the term becomes meaningless. If every criticism of Israel or any Jew is anti-Semitism, then everything is. If everything is, nothing is.

A few suggestions, based on reserving the term for genuinely offensive, threatening, or discriminatory behaviors:

Criticizing Israel isn't anti-Semitism unless it's based on religion or ethnicity.

Anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism (though advocating or practicing violence against Israel certainly is).

Suggesting that America's interests are not congruent to Israel's is not anti-Semitism.

Recognizing that Palestinians have legitimate human rights is not anti-Semitism.

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