As well-intentioned as the ad was, it reflects the continued failure to Jewish organizations to recognize and adapt to post-10/7 antisemitism and its alter ego antizionism. Victimhood is not a badge of honor. People like Robert Kraft and Jewish organizations would do well to remember and emulate Menachem Begin’s response to then Senator Joe Biden . . . “I am not a Jew with trembling knees.”
Last year Kraft attempted a stronger statement. It was rejected and a really generalized anti hate ad was run. I believe he has limitations on what he can do.
I hate Schumer more than any other figure in America including the anti-Semites because he has utterly betrayed his people for the Democratic party. I just hate him.
Schoff Raskin and Nadler never told their Jewish constituents they were the guardians of Israel. Sanders has been a Marxist anti-Zionist for many decades. I loathe them all but none truly betrayed us like Schumer has because none promised to always stand with us like Schumer did. He's unique.
Here is a thumping success story from the Diaspora in London. A group of us, Jewish and Non-Jewish, have smashed the re-formed Nazi Party by setting them up and exposing them for all to see across the world using Documentary monitoring and Full recording, since 1945, an eighty year operation in fact. We are VERY strong, and also minutely subtle, both Bookish and tough. The British State and The American State have formally thanked us, and the story is now being discretely told. We won, for Freedom and Democracy, by beating Nazi Germany which was trying to cloak a Nazi revival run from Berlin. Inspiration is taken from the fantastic fables handed down to us of the Heroes of World War Two. And there are many! Next year, take this as your guide, Mr Kraft! We won.
And, at the end, the black guy who came to the rescue revealed himself as a Muslim. If kids wait for that to happen, they will be waiting a long time. It could happen but it is vanishingly rare.
I get it. But…Youse guys is being really harsh on Kraft. Agreed, the message was an old trope, kid included, and the Black kid (who was Muslim?) was “sticking up” for him. Victimhood with others protecting us.
Well… Kraft’s from that generation. He’s 84, was a baby during the Shoah… this has been that generation’s way.
At least he put his $$ where his mouth is. Props to him for that.
If we are assuming enough Jew hatred in the Superbowl crowd to justify the ad, no such ad can help, and probably worse. One of the strongest Jew-hating - formerly called anti-semitic- tropes is that the Jews use their past weakness to get off the hook for their present " genocide". Such as overuse of the Holocaust, as they claim. Today's Jew is an infinity far from that diminished one. And the monsters in high schools are not other kids, but their teachers. I much prefer that they should fear us, as the IDF must be feared, and respect us , as bearing a huge portion of the brunt of defending their taken-for-granted Judeo-Christian free civilization from Arab Muslim savagery, totalitarianism , supremacy and enough money to buy their souls.
I think as a message to the average Gentile sports fan it was effective in one thing. It equated antisemitism with racism - unfair, ignorant, and wrong. It hit a nerve for me when the black kid said something to the effect, yeah I know, racism sucks. One marginalized kid to another.
When he put Jew-hatred in the same category as Black hatred he dismantled the whole anti-Zionist thing. It is NOT liberal and progressive to hate Jews. Libs think they are so righteous hating the "oppressor" but they ARE the oppressor. That is what came through the screen whether the sound was on or not.
Was it what the Jewish kid needs to hear?- no. Its the Superbowl. The subliminal message was right on target for the Superbowl crowd.
Symbolism NEVER equates to real action. Yes, Mr. Kraft means well, I suppose, but the anti-semites will ignore that while the hangers-on like Schumer will claim virtue while doing exactly nothing as mentioned in the text. All I can say to the Jewish folks here is stand your ground, unify, and as an old movie was titled, "Never give an inch."
1000% right on! The ad is the classic leftist drivel we get from our organizations who want us to be victims not agents. The problem they don’t want to admit is that neomarxist and Islamist progressives along with antizionist Jews are as much of or more of a problem than neofascism. Because they’ve been allies with them for decades and they still haven’t come to grips with their failure to see it.
A message to Robert Kraft coming from the past. In 1968 Eric Hoffer wrote this about Israel and Jews. “The Jews are a peculiar people: things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews. I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish, the holocaust will be upon us.”
A well-meaning but useless ad and approach. Let's be candid, these pleas are meaningless. It might reach a small number of minds, but Jew hatred is now fully inculcated into our culture including the Hollywood and entertainment "anti-zionists", our schools at all levels, even unions which Jews were instrumental in forming in the 20th century. It is deep within the political left and has taken over the Democrat party and now is emerging in the Republican party.
It is nice to say be unafraid, stand firm, be proud, but that has to be backed up by action. It is long past. The old approaches of 'education', 'lobbying', 'building alliances' is no longer applicable. We are witnessing the very structure and foundations of cohesive western liberal democracies being torn apart.
Our Jewish leadership has been slow to recognize this fact and is in denial. Isn't it time for new approaches. Isn't it time for a true leadership to appear (like the Zionist movements in Eastern Europe did in the 1900s) that recognizes reality. Is it radical to say that every Jewish child, teen and adult learn self-defense and even how to handle weapons? Is it radical to say that we need to develop our own education systems including university level where Jews and non-Jews can attend without the indoctrination of Jew hating professors? Is it radical to say we need to form alliances with our non-Jewish friends by working with community churches that are pro-Israel, and do not spew liberation doctrine from the pulpit? Is it radical to say that yes, while the legal system is still viable that we use lawfare to get at the heart of those funding Jew hatred? None of this precludes us from being part of the social fabric of the country and we must continue to be engaged. If the principles that define western democracy is unravelling, shouldn't we be prepared to protect our community by all means necessary?
Isn't it time (to paraphrase a great line in A Streetcar Named Desire) that we no longer rely on the kindness of strangers for our survival and well-being?
This essay powerfully exposes the moral and psychological failure of empathy-only responses to antisemitism, but it also highlights a deeper institutional problem: the absence of strategic clarity among our major Jewish organizations. Good intentions are not strategy.
The Jewish community, and especially the CEOs of our major institutions, must confront the limits of what has become blue-square politics: a performative, empathy-based response that signals concern while demanding little, risking little, and changing almost nothing. Performative allyship may reassure donors, politicians, and well-meaning outsiders, but it does not prepare Jewish children to live openly, proudly, or safely as Jews.
Leaders should be asking harder questions. How do pride- and confidence-forward messages resonate with Jewish teens and college students compared with empathy-based appeals aimed at the broader public? Who exactly is the target of any given message, Jews, non-Jews, policymakers, or donors, and why? How do context and delivery channel (Super Bowl ads, social media, campus life, cultural moments) shape not just public perception, but Jewish self-understanding?
Most critically, where are the feedback loops? Too much communal spending is driven by symbolism, habit, and donor comfort rather than evidence. We rarely test, measure, or adapt based on real-world outcomes. And if today’s antisemites are not a monolith but can be segmented by ideology, motivation, and susceptibility then a hybrid approach may be necessary, with different strategies tailored to different groups.
Absent this discipline, blue-square politics becomes not just ineffective but harmful: it trains Jews to seek reassurance instead of agency, symbolism instead of substance, and borrowed protection instead of self-respect. That is precisely the failure this essay names and precisely what our leaders must now abandon.
As well-intentioned as the ad was, it reflects the continued failure to Jewish organizations to recognize and adapt to post-10/7 antisemitism and its alter ego antizionism. Victimhood is not a badge of honor. People like Robert Kraft and Jewish organizations would do well to remember and emulate Menachem Begin’s response to then Senator Joe Biden . . . “I am not a Jew with trembling knees.”
Well said.
Last year Kraft attempted a stronger statement. It was rejected and a really generalized anti hate ad was run. I believe he has limitations on what he can do.
Kol hakavod! Perfect response to that ad. And extra credit for calling out that horrible embarrassment Chuck Schumer.
I hate Schumer more than any other figure in America including the anti-Semites because he has utterly betrayed his people for the Democratic party. I just hate him.
Me, too. Along with Adam Schiff, Jamie Raskin, Jerry Nadler…I just cringe when they speak.
I forgot him!
and Bernie Sanders---maybe the worst of the worst.
Schoff Raskin and Nadler never told their Jewish constituents they were the guardians of Israel. Sanders has been a Marxist anti-Zionist for many decades. I loathe them all but none truly betrayed us like Schumer has because none promised to always stand with us like Schumer did. He's unique.
I agree with you. But all of them harm us as a people.
Here is a thumping success story from the Diaspora in London. A group of us, Jewish and Non-Jewish, have smashed the re-formed Nazi Party by setting them up and exposing them for all to see across the world using Documentary monitoring and Full recording, since 1945, an eighty year operation in fact. We are VERY strong, and also minutely subtle, both Bookish and tough. The British State and The American State have formally thanked us, and the story is now being discretely told. We won, for Freedom and Democracy, by beating Nazi Germany which was trying to cloak a Nazi revival run from Berlin. Inspiration is taken from the fantastic fables handed down to us of the Heroes of World War Two. And there are many! Next year, take this as your guide, Mr Kraft! We won.
And, at the end, the black guy who came to the rescue revealed himself as a Muslim. If kids wait for that to happen, they will be waiting a long time. It could happen but it is vanishingly rare.
I get it. But…Youse guys is being really harsh on Kraft. Agreed, the message was an old trope, kid included, and the Black kid (who was Muslim?) was “sticking up” for him. Victimhood with others protecting us.
Well… Kraft’s from that generation. He’s 84, was a baby during the Shoah… this has been that generation’s way.
At least he put his $$ where his mouth is. Props to him for that.
He can do better but it’s a start.
Schumer's a human piece of drek.
If we are assuming enough Jew hatred in the Superbowl crowd to justify the ad, no such ad can help, and probably worse. One of the strongest Jew-hating - formerly called anti-semitic- tropes is that the Jews use their past weakness to get off the hook for their present " genocide". Such as overuse of the Holocaust, as they claim. Today's Jew is an infinity far from that diminished one. And the monsters in high schools are not other kids, but their teachers. I much prefer that they should fear us, as the IDF must be feared, and respect us , as bearing a huge portion of the brunt of defending their taken-for-granted Judeo-Christian free civilization from Arab Muslim savagery, totalitarianism , supremacy and enough money to buy their souls.
I think as a message to the average Gentile sports fan it was effective in one thing. It equated antisemitism with racism - unfair, ignorant, and wrong. It hit a nerve for me when the black kid said something to the effect, yeah I know, racism sucks. One marginalized kid to another.
When he put Jew-hatred in the same category as Black hatred he dismantled the whole anti-Zionist thing. It is NOT liberal and progressive to hate Jews. Libs think they are so righteous hating the "oppressor" but they ARE the oppressor. That is what came through the screen whether the sound was on or not.
Was it what the Jewish kid needs to hear?- no. Its the Superbowl. The subliminal message was right on target for the Superbowl crowd.
Well said.
Most people don’t even know what Zionist or Zionisam means. They think it’s a bad word. That needs educating first!
Symbolism NEVER equates to real action. Yes, Mr. Kraft means well, I suppose, but the anti-semites will ignore that while the hangers-on like Schumer will claim virtue while doing exactly nothing as mentioned in the text. All I can say to the Jewish folks here is stand your ground, unify, and as an old movie was titled, "Never give an inch."
עם ישראל חי!
1000% right on! The ad is the classic leftist drivel we get from our organizations who want us to be victims not agents. The problem they don’t want to admit is that neomarxist and Islamist progressives along with antizionist Jews are as much of or more of a problem than neofascism. Because they’ve been allies with them for decades and they still haven’t come to grips with their failure to see it.
A message to Robert Kraft coming from the past. In 1968 Eric Hoffer wrote this about Israel and Jews. “The Jews are a peculiar people: things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews. I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish, the holocaust will be upon us.”
A well-meaning but useless ad and approach. Let's be candid, these pleas are meaningless. It might reach a small number of minds, but Jew hatred is now fully inculcated into our culture including the Hollywood and entertainment "anti-zionists", our schools at all levels, even unions which Jews were instrumental in forming in the 20th century. It is deep within the political left and has taken over the Democrat party and now is emerging in the Republican party.
It is nice to say be unafraid, stand firm, be proud, but that has to be backed up by action. It is long past. The old approaches of 'education', 'lobbying', 'building alliances' is no longer applicable. We are witnessing the very structure and foundations of cohesive western liberal democracies being torn apart.
Our Jewish leadership has been slow to recognize this fact and is in denial. Isn't it time for new approaches. Isn't it time for a true leadership to appear (like the Zionist movements in Eastern Europe did in the 1900s) that recognizes reality. Is it radical to say that every Jewish child, teen and adult learn self-defense and even how to handle weapons? Is it radical to say that we need to develop our own education systems including university level where Jews and non-Jews can attend without the indoctrination of Jew hating professors? Is it radical to say we need to form alliances with our non-Jewish friends by working with community churches that are pro-Israel, and do not spew liberation doctrine from the pulpit? Is it radical to say that yes, while the legal system is still viable that we use lawfare to get at the heart of those funding Jew hatred? None of this precludes us from being part of the social fabric of the country and we must continue to be engaged. If the principles that define western democracy is unravelling, shouldn't we be prepared to protect our community by all means necessary?
Isn't it time (to paraphrase a great line in A Streetcar Named Desire) that we no longer rely on the kindness of strangers for our survival and well-being?
Spot on and passionately written.
Maybe Kraft will donate an equal amount of his money and clout to deliver your message (and mine) to an equal amount of sports fans eyes.
This essay powerfully exposes the moral and psychological failure of empathy-only responses to antisemitism, but it also highlights a deeper institutional problem: the absence of strategic clarity among our major Jewish organizations. Good intentions are not strategy.
The Jewish community, and especially the CEOs of our major institutions, must confront the limits of what has become blue-square politics: a performative, empathy-based response that signals concern while demanding little, risking little, and changing almost nothing. Performative allyship may reassure donors, politicians, and well-meaning outsiders, but it does not prepare Jewish children to live openly, proudly, or safely as Jews.
Leaders should be asking harder questions. How do pride- and confidence-forward messages resonate with Jewish teens and college students compared with empathy-based appeals aimed at the broader public? Who exactly is the target of any given message, Jews, non-Jews, policymakers, or donors, and why? How do context and delivery channel (Super Bowl ads, social media, campus life, cultural moments) shape not just public perception, but Jewish self-understanding?
Most critically, where are the feedback loops? Too much communal spending is driven by symbolism, habit, and donor comfort rather than evidence. We rarely test, measure, or adapt based on real-world outcomes. And if today’s antisemites are not a monolith but can be segmented by ideology, motivation, and susceptibility then a hybrid approach may be necessary, with different strategies tailored to different groups.
Absent this discipline, blue-square politics becomes not just ineffective but harmful: it trains Jews to seek reassurance instead of agency, symbolism instead of substance, and borrowed protection instead of self-respect. That is precisely the failure this essay names and precisely what our leaders must now abandon.