You are conflating two different things, a liberal society and the modern American Democratic party. The problem is that the Democratic party is no longer liberal. It is radical, steeped in neo Marxism (Or at least beholden to it) and therefore more and more hostile to both Israel and the Jewish people in general. Jewish liberals (that is people with actual liberal beliefs) have yet to see this and still insist on standing with the party that now at best takes them for granted and at worst sympathizes with the enemy. The Democratic party is no home for Jews who aren't hard leftists any longer. Eventually the remaining liberal Zionists will realize this.
The bigger question is can ANY society remain liberal (in the small l sense) while Jew haters can make this much noise and have this much influence. I think not. It has to be one or the other. Western Europe has chosen. It stands with illiberal Jew haters. So has Canada and Australia.
This is likely correct. Well reasoned. To which I would add that the Democratic Party has made a calculated decision to seek what they believe is the more profitable position of getting the Islamic vote and their money.
I keep hoping Europe will see the light, but is it too late to reverse the numbers of Islamists in their midst. Well, I'll be saving a lot of money NOT going to Europe anymore.
You are a rabbi. You are dismayed by Newsome and the Democratic party...I just wrote on another of the Future blogs how I feel about Jews and their dismay. Newsome acted like the scumbag he is with his "apartheid" smear.....I still am registered Dem...and I'm one of the people who remember 67 and volunteered on a kibbutz in '73 who loves and supports Israel. I don't lecture Israel on what the state should be for me sitting in Queens NYC...relatively safe compared to the kids in Sderot or my Israeli friend in TA or her parents in Beer Sheva. So a strong Israel who acts in ways that Jon Stewart for example is appalled by.....here's another American shmuck who is going to lecture Israel and the the American Jews too on how how Jews are supposed to behave......we must attend to the world and support every other "just cause" but the just cause for Israel. Hang our heads in shame that Israel can carry out beeper attacks in Lebanon and bomb the f k out of Iran's terror network of leaders. So Mandy Patinkin can bray and cry his eys for "Palestine" not for Israel. No, not dismayed....with a racist mayor I'm just angry. And repulsed by what I see and hear. Thank G d for Fetterman. Call me a Fetterman Democrat.
A good summary Rabbi about where we have been, where we are and where we are going. There is one glaring error in your article, LIBERALISM NEVER PROTECTED JEWS ANYWHERE ANYTIME! It is time for Jews to stop apologizing for the left and the few right wing Jews thinking they can control the far right. Both are dangerous for Jews and have always been so.
The Holocaust happened in the most advanced country of the world. The German nation led the world in art, science, music, medicine and military in 1930’s. They had strong labor unions, a national healthcare system and a top university system and they turned on the Jews in a heartbeat. We are safe nowhere except Israel where we can determine our own destiny.
The left in the USA is more interested in winning than they are in doing what is right. The left world over has assigned the Palestinians absolutely no agency and it completely infantilizes them. They have refused a fair peace and a two state solution multiple times. No one and I mean no one calls out Palestinian intransigence and requires of them the same sacrifices they do of Israel. The entire Palestinian national movement and the influence peddling of Qatari money is dependent on Jew hatred. It is evident everywhere from the MSM to university hierarchies!
The democrat party is set on a course for destruction not only of liberal views, but of itself and of America. It's been co-opted by the red green alliance of the DSA and I'm sorry but democratic Jews should have seen this coming.
It's been coming for over two decades but strongly in the past ten.
When the Women's March champions Linda Sarsour and when the Gay and Dyke Marches don't want Zionist Jews - the writing is on the wall. They chose to ignore it. Once again Jews are and will be the scapegoat but make no mistake: the fall of the United States and the West is in the offing. Everyone has been slow to move the narrative but Jews and Christians need to vote for anyone but the Democrats if they wish to save themselves and the nation. It is that drastic a situation.
No--he isn't. He'll sell out Israel if it's a choice between advancing in the Party and having moral clarity. I don't say this easily--I've listened to him.
He threw Israel under the bus and disavowed a college paper he wrote saying that the 2 state solution was dead because there was no Palestinian peace partner. He did so in an attempt to get the Dem VP nod. Instead, Kamala threw him under the bus, saying in her memoir that he was too Jewish for the electorate. His culture, his ethnicity and his religion is Democratic Party, not Judaism.
—"Because the bigger question may not only be whether liberalism can still protect the Jews. It may be whether liberalism can even protect itself."
While the second question is still open, the first one has been decisively answered, if we choose to see clearly. "Anti-Zionism" is now a mandatory belief of all Western liberals, as they've been baptized in the Social Justice faith, which molds their worldview and morality, and which has cast the Jewish state as an intolerable evil that must be destroyed. And this "Anti-Zionism" demands that Jews denounce and renounce Israel and Zionism if they want to maintain lives and careers in all spheres dominated by the Social Justice dispensation—meaning upscale academia, culture and media, the Dem Party and its affiliates, and just about all urban culture and society. And by 2030, this "Anti-Zionism" will be even more mainstream and accepted, as more young people processed by our Islamo-Leftist collegiate madrassas join the managerial class.
The pariah people have now become the pariah state, and the Jewish scapegoat has (again) been loaded with all the sins, crimes and anxieties of the (post) Christian West—racist capitalist imperialist colonialist apartheid genocidal ethnostate etc. Our progressive aristocracy hopes to buy itself another decade or so atop the social pyramid by feeding the Jews to the Muslims first, as a way to slake their rage and bloodthirst. There are many many more Muslims (more votes and dollars), all their leaders know exactly how to squeeze the liberal Achilles' Heel and cry Racism! and Islamophobia! when cornered, and they have another powerful weapon, the terrorist's veto. Also, the Islamo-Left alliance has spent decades molding the Palestinians into an eternal unsolvable grievance, they've been reconfigured into History's greatest most helpless (thus most sacred) victims, so abject that even their massacres are all Israel's fault.
Social Justice is turning out to be as much of a golem as Marxism was, a faith propagated by Jews in the name of universalism that gained power and immediately decided Jews needed to be eliminated for its utopia to appear. All the safe arrangements of the late 20th century are dead and buried and not coming back. Whatever people decide to do when they realize this is up to them, but the one thing they should never do is trust politicians. Heschel’s bet has long been lost and this will be confirmed by the Dem Party either just before the 2028 election or just after.
Agree 100%. Probably too late to save Western Europe and Canada. America still has a chance, but it's going to take a lot of people waking up to reality.
Western Europe and Canada have much more interest in euthanasia (long- and short-term and individual and collective) than they do in fighting to thrive and survive. Why would they fight for Jews when they won't even fight for their own peoples and countries?!
Like I said, any place ruled by the Social Justice dispensation will become increasingly "anti-Zionist" aka anti-Jewish (unless you're willing to publicly denounce those OTHER Jews who've committed the ultimate crime against the egalitarian future—they refuse to be exterminated!).
I'm guessing this means red states and other conservative locales will be the new Jewish sanctuaries.
My feeling is that these freaks are more media creations and clickbait sewers than real-life phenomena. A million or 2 followers might be a lot online, but not in a giant country like ours. Also, they don't come with the full backing of upscale academia and culture like the Left "Anti-Zionists" do.
From what I can see from these comments, I am in the minority in that I am on the right. While there has always been an isolationist, Buchananite wing of the Republican party, it is much smaller and weaker than the Nazi wing of the Democratic Party. And if you read up on the acceptance in the Democratic Party of a Senate candidate in Maine with an actual Nazi tattoo who spews antisemitic conspiracy theories and yet is expected to win the nomination, calling them a Nazi Party is not much of an exaggeration. Let’s not forget that despite the rewriting of history by leftist historians, the Nazis we’re leftists.
As a Jewish Democrat, all the pearl clutching over the party's turn to antisemitism is equal parts mystifying and amusing. Who among us spoke out when Obama derided half the country as bitterly clinging to guns and religion? Who spoke up when Clinton called half the country a basket of deplorables? When people supported the police and were called racist for doing so, who objected? When people objecting to biological males in female sports were called haters, who defended them? When people were canceled for questioning the safety of legitimately untested vaccines, or for questioning the necessity of shutting down society for COVID, or for suggesting that merit was more important than diversity, or for debating any of a variety of DNC orthodoxies, who spoke up to say that in a free society, disagreeing should be welcomed? Mostly, my Jewish Democratic friends followed the herd and ostracized the outsiders. Well, now we get to be the outsiders, the deplorables, the haters, bitterly clinging to our religion and nation. Congratulations.
And for all the lectures I have had to endure over the years about my white, cisgender, straight, male privilege, you would think that these same lecturers would consider that from the safety of America or Canada or Western Europe, they should check their privilege before dictating to Israelis what is the acceptable way to respond to a murderous, genocidal, existential threat.
Hi Rabbi. I don’t know your age , but as for me, . I was born 6 weeks before the state of Israel became a reality in 1948 . I was old enough to remember, the wars of 1956, 1967, , 1973 , the multiple in intifadas , and of course , 10/7. Your premise that liberalism has “protected “ American Jewry. I have read that in 1948the Truman administration refused to provide arms for infant , Israel. The pragmatic Jews of 1948 went to USSR for arms . With every war Israel was attacked and fought a defensive war.Regardless of whether the Israeli government was headed by Left wingers or right winger, the arabs and their allies were agnostic to their goal of killing all the Jews. Somehow , now, Bibi’s politics somehow are part of the rising tide of Jew hate. Anti Zionist Jews appeared in Exodus and for the next 3000years . As for me , I have never felt “ protected” by liberals like Your Gavin Newsom. I can feel your ambivalence in describing him . How he was so frank and standup with his Jewish donors . The fact he claimed it broke his heart to call out the Apartheid state state of Israel, and trash the government . But this is the same Newsom , who , infront of his African American donors claimed he was “ one of them”- he couldn’t read either !
I was fortunate enough to be admitted to Medical school.in 1969. My parents were high schools grades , My dad worked like dog. My grandparents were Russian and polish immigrants who became multilingual but never learned to read English We lived a in virtual Jewish ghetto in NE Philly . Of the 144 students in my Freshman Med School. Class I had 23 other Jewish classmates, and had 12 women, and 12 African American .They did not hide the quotas very well, huh ?
Please , Rabbi, do not delude yourself in believing that our people have been “ protected” by liberalism and liberals. We have been at best tolerated . In my career in practice or in my corporate second career , I heard more times than I can could count that I was “ a different kind of Jew“. The kind who are Gavin Newsom donors. I don’t trust politicians or even our allies. I am an independent . We must be proud of who we are. , and protect each other. I think it was Benjamin Franklin , in 1776, in my home town who opined: “ if we do not hang together, we will most certainly hang separately”
Thank you for the comment. I hear the experience behind it, and I do not dismiss it. You have lived through far more chapters of Jewish vulnerability than I have, and your distrust of political promises is hard-earned.
I also do not disagree with your core point: Jews survive not because politicians protect us, but because Jews protect one another, remain proud of who we are, and refuse to surrender our dignity to the good graces of others. On that, I think we are very much in agreement.
Where I would push back is here: I did not suggest that liberalism “saved” the Jews, or that liberals have ever offered something as solid as protection in any ultimate sense. Toleration is not covenant. Acceptance is not safety. And political friendship is often painfully conditional. I believe that now as much as you do.
My argument was narrower and more historical: for a period of American Jewish life, liberal democracy created conditions in which Jews could flourish more fully than they had in many other societies. That is not the same as saying those conditions were permanent, morally pure, or sufficient. Nor does it mean liberalism was free of hypocrisy, quotas, condescension, or antisemitism dressed up in respectable language. Your own life is evidence of that.
I also agree that Jew-hatred does not begin with Netanyahu, nor with this or that Israeli government. The hatred is older, deeper, and more enduring than the political categories people now use to explain it away. Too often, contemporary commentators speak as though antisemitism is merely a reaction to Israeli policy. It is not. Jewish history should have cured us of that illusion long ago.
At the same time, I do think it is fair to examine how certain political leaders and moral vocabularies in America have contributed to the present climate, whether intentionally or not. To say that is not to blame Jews, and it is not to exonerate antisemites. It is to ask how a society teaches itself whom to sympathize with, whom to suspect, and whom to cast as uniquely guilty.
So I take your correction seriously. If my phrasing suggested too much confidence in “protection” from liberals or liberalism, then that is worth refining. My own view is closer to yours than perhaps I made clear: Jews should never confuse access with security, applause with solidarity, or political usefulness with genuine friendship.
We must know who we are, stand with one another, and be prepared to defend Jewish life without illusions. On that, your Philadelphia wisdom and Benjamin Franklin’s line still hold.
Rabbi, thank you for your thoughtful response to my reply. . I wish you and yours a Joyous and holy Pesach. Look for ward to reading your future essays!
Context is completely essential in this debate. We in Israel face a Fanatical Martyrdom-driven Death Cult of a Religious War. This description of Hamas and West Bank Arabs is not fanciful. They are sworn to Destroy Israel. Compromise with that is simply impossible. Western Liberalism died YEARS AGO in the face of the Reality which is Islam. This Truth is known and accepted by President Trump and The Republican Party, because Demographic Islam now mortally threatens the Whole of The Western World. The Democratic Party and Liberalism is going to be out of power for many years now. So-called Liberal spaces of Conscience have collapsed under the reality of raw Nature and the reality of the Demographic Threat. Learn this lesson well, for the survival of the West as well as Israel depends on this. Demographics will be sorted Non-violently and with money to Repatriate all who are antithetical to The West. This is not Nazism or even Fascist. For, Done non-violently, the solutions are within the Judeo-Christian Western conscience too.
Rabbi Abraham raises an important question, but I think the deeper issue is that what we are now calling “liberalism” is no longer the liberalism that once protected Jews. Classical liberalism believed in pluralism, individual rights, and loyalty to democratic institutions. Much of what passes for liberalism today has absorbed a very different worldview — one shaped by Marxist ideas about power, oppression, and “colonialism.” In that framework, Israel and often Jews themselves are recast as symbols of power rather than as a vulnerable minority.
What many people also fail to see is that this has become a marriage of convenience between radical left ideologies and Islamist movements. Together they frame the conflict as Jews versus Palestinians, when in reality the deeper target is Western civilization itself. Jews may be the first target, but the same ideology ultimately undermines the very institutions that sustain free societies — national identity, democratic values, and cultural confidence. This isn’t just a Jewish issue. It affects everyone who believes in the survival of the West.
I was never as enamored by the Dem Party as so many Jews were. In truth--for years I considered myself a "Dem' as were my parents. But essentially --I was apolitical. That changed when I. noticed how the media covered Israel. I began to read--and examine the truth about the Party--and its history. What I found out basically made me decide to be an Independent--at first. I became Republican because in AZ you had to be one of 2 Parties to vote in the Primaries. I never regretted the decision--particularly when DJT ran.
The Dem Party is no longer "liberal" (in many ways Trump is liberal--as I am too). He is about common sense--period.
The Far Left is NOT "progressive" by any measure. A total misnomer! It is REGRESSIVE. America's youth--fresh from indoctrination--wants to relive the failure of Marxism/socialism. Riding on its back is Islam--the most worrisome part. The part that will not be easily deported--and has BIG plans for America as it had for Europe (and succeeded!).
It's no friend of Jews, Christians, or Gays For Palestine.
It is a way that the Muslim Brotherhood can thrive in the USA--while Iran is at war with us and Israel. Beware!
Jewish "Liberalism" has proven to be pure weakness... an Achilles Heel.. for centuries. It's embarrassing and reeks of sucking up so hard, it would make Eddie Haskell ("Leave it to Beaver") PUKE.
You write: “ Newsom is a lot of things, but reckless isn’t one of them.”
Oh really? During Covid he told Californians not to gather in groups. He then threw himself a birthday party at The French Laundry, a fancy and expensive restaurant in the wine area, with around 25 close associates in attendance.
Just as here, he apologized after.
I’m looking for a candidate who does the right thing first-not someone who does/says the obviously wrong thing, and then apologizes.
Both sides include individuals that are behaving badly. The western press tends to emphasize one side's misdeeds and ignores the other's. But none of this is necessary. The Palestinians could have had a state on multiple occasions and turned it down each time because in doing so they'd have to accept Israel's existence.
Jews had a right to live in Germany, Poland, Ukraine. What is happening has happened before. Hard to admit. Hard to face facts, we want to be invited to stay.
Gavin Newscum is just another empty vessel, unprincipled politician who has no core values or morals. He looks at the poll numbers of the Democrat party radical, Jew-hating base and thus shifts his position to conform.
To label Israel an "apartheid" state, where Arabs, muslims and Christians are fully integrated into its society, is an egregious lie and he knows it. Rather than pushing back against this phony charge, he amplifies it because Newscum is an ambitious lowlife politician who will take whatever position he must in order to get his party's nomination. And his party is currently in the grip of far-left radical antisemites.
Unfortunately, cowardice and conformity are rewarded in politics rather than courage and principles. So, he will likely get the nomination unless despite his pandering, the Democrat party's kook base still considers him not radical enough. After all, he hasn't yet said Israel should cease to exist.
Not only can't liberalism protect Jews, but it has become a clear and present danger to Jewish life in the west.
Liberalism of the kind practiced by Democrat Party never protected the Jews any more than it protected the Blacks or other minorities. It simply took advantage of any minority group that could be fooled to support it politically .
You are conflating two different things, a liberal society and the modern American Democratic party. The problem is that the Democratic party is no longer liberal. It is radical, steeped in neo Marxism (Or at least beholden to it) and therefore more and more hostile to both Israel and the Jewish people in general. Jewish liberals (that is people with actual liberal beliefs) have yet to see this and still insist on standing with the party that now at best takes them for granted and at worst sympathizes with the enemy. The Democratic party is no home for Jews who aren't hard leftists any longer. Eventually the remaining liberal Zionists will realize this.
The bigger question is can ANY society remain liberal (in the small l sense) while Jew haters can make this much noise and have this much influence. I think not. It has to be one or the other. Western Europe has chosen. It stands with illiberal Jew haters. So has Canada and Australia.
This is likely correct. Well reasoned. To which I would add that the Democratic Party has made a calculated decision to seek what they believe is the more profitable position of getting the Islamic vote and their money.
Yes. It's a numbers game.
Exactly. The Dems are no longer liberal. You got it.
I keep hoping Europe will see the light, but is it too late to reverse the numbers of Islamists in their midst. Well, I'll be saving a lot of money NOT going to Europe anymore.
You are a rabbi. You are dismayed by Newsome and the Democratic party...I just wrote on another of the Future blogs how I feel about Jews and their dismay. Newsome acted like the scumbag he is with his "apartheid" smear.....I still am registered Dem...and I'm one of the people who remember 67 and volunteered on a kibbutz in '73 who loves and supports Israel. I don't lecture Israel on what the state should be for me sitting in Queens NYC...relatively safe compared to the kids in Sderot or my Israeli friend in TA or her parents in Beer Sheva. So a strong Israel who acts in ways that Jon Stewart for example is appalled by.....here's another American shmuck who is going to lecture Israel and the the American Jews too on how how Jews are supposed to behave......we must attend to the world and support every other "just cause" but the just cause for Israel. Hang our heads in shame that Israel can carry out beeper attacks in Lebanon and bomb the f k out of Iran's terror network of leaders. So Mandy Patinkin can bray and cry his eys for "Palestine" not for Israel. No, not dismayed....with a racist mayor I'm just angry. And repulsed by what I see and hear. Thank G d for Fetterman. Call me a Fetterman Democrat.
Love this. Yes. I am a registered Democrat and I will vote in that primary. I will NOT vote for a Democrat like Newsom -- I'll vote Republican first.
I’m a fetterman and only fetterman D too
A good summary Rabbi about where we have been, where we are and where we are going. There is one glaring error in your article, LIBERALISM NEVER PROTECTED JEWS ANYWHERE ANYTIME! It is time for Jews to stop apologizing for the left and the few right wing Jews thinking they can control the far right. Both are dangerous for Jews and have always been so.
The Holocaust happened in the most advanced country of the world. The German nation led the world in art, science, music, medicine and military in 1930’s. They had strong labor unions, a national healthcare system and a top university system and they turned on the Jews in a heartbeat. We are safe nowhere except Israel where we can determine our own destiny.
The left in the USA is more interested in winning than they are in doing what is right. The left world over has assigned the Palestinians absolutely no agency and it completely infantilizes them. They have refused a fair peace and a two state solution multiple times. No one and I mean no one calls out Palestinian intransigence and requires of them the same sacrifices they do of Israel. The entire Palestinian national movement and the influence peddling of Qatari money is dependent on Jew hatred. It is evident everywhere from the MSM to university hierarchies!
The democrat party is set on a course for destruction not only of liberal views, but of itself and of America. It's been co-opted by the red green alliance of the DSA and I'm sorry but democratic Jews should have seen this coming.
It's been coming for over two decades but strongly in the past ten.
When the Women's March champions Linda Sarsour and when the Gay and Dyke Marches don't want Zionist Jews - the writing is on the wall. They chose to ignore it. Once again Jews are and will be the scapegoat but make no mistake: the fall of the United States and the West is in the offing. Everyone has been slow to move the narrative but Jews and Christians need to vote for anyone but the Democrats if they wish to save themselves and the nation. It is that drastic a situation.
Dems like Josh Shapiro are still a good option but probably have a low chance of winning.
No--he isn't. He'll sell out Israel if it's a choice between advancing in the Party and having moral clarity. I don't say this easily--I've listened to him.
He threw Israel under the bus and disavowed a college paper he wrote saying that the 2 state solution was dead because there was no Palestinian peace partner. He did so in an attempt to get the Dem VP nod. Instead, Kamala threw him under the bus, saying in her memoir that he was too Jewish for the electorate. His culture, his ethnicity and his religion is Democratic Party, not Judaism.
—"Because the bigger question may not only be whether liberalism can still protect the Jews. It may be whether liberalism can even protect itself."
While the second question is still open, the first one has been decisively answered, if we choose to see clearly. "Anti-Zionism" is now a mandatory belief of all Western liberals, as they've been baptized in the Social Justice faith, which molds their worldview and morality, and which has cast the Jewish state as an intolerable evil that must be destroyed. And this "Anti-Zionism" demands that Jews denounce and renounce Israel and Zionism if they want to maintain lives and careers in all spheres dominated by the Social Justice dispensation—meaning upscale academia, culture and media, the Dem Party and its affiliates, and just about all urban culture and society. And by 2030, this "Anti-Zionism" will be even more mainstream and accepted, as more young people processed by our Islamo-Leftist collegiate madrassas join the managerial class.
The pariah people have now become the pariah state, and the Jewish scapegoat has (again) been loaded with all the sins, crimes and anxieties of the (post) Christian West—racist capitalist imperialist colonialist apartheid genocidal ethnostate etc. Our progressive aristocracy hopes to buy itself another decade or so atop the social pyramid by feeding the Jews to the Muslims first, as a way to slake their rage and bloodthirst. There are many many more Muslims (more votes and dollars), all their leaders know exactly how to squeeze the liberal Achilles' Heel and cry Racism! and Islamophobia! when cornered, and they have another powerful weapon, the terrorist's veto. Also, the Islamo-Left alliance has spent decades molding the Palestinians into an eternal unsolvable grievance, they've been reconfigured into History's greatest most helpless (thus most sacred) victims, so abject that even their massacres are all Israel's fault.
Social Justice is turning out to be as much of a golem as Marxism was, a faith propagated by Jews in the name of universalism that gained power and immediately decided Jews needed to be eliminated for its utopia to appear. All the safe arrangements of the late 20th century are dead and buried and not coming back. Whatever people decide to do when they realize this is up to them, but the one thing they should never do is trust politicians. Heschel’s bet has long been lost and this will be confirmed by the Dem Party either just before the 2028 election or just after.
Agree 100%. Probably too late to save Western Europe and Canada. America still has a chance, but it's going to take a lot of people waking up to reality.
Western Europe and Canada have much more interest in euthanasia (long- and short-term and individual and collective) than they do in fighting to thrive and survive. Why would they fight for Jews when they won't even fight for their own peoples and countries?!
Like I said, any place ruled by the Social Justice dispensation will become increasingly "anti-Zionist" aka anti-Jewish (unless you're willing to publicly denounce those OTHER Jews who've committed the ultimate crime against the egalitarian future—they refuse to be exterminated!).
I'm guessing this means red states and other conservative locales will be the new Jewish sanctuaries.
From your lips, to God's ears.
For now. Unless the Candace Owenses and Nick Fuenteses gain more traction.
My feeling is that these freaks are more media creations and clickbait sewers than real-life phenomena. A million or 2 followers might be a lot online, but not in a giant country like ours. Also, they don't come with the full backing of upscale academia and culture like the Left "Anti-Zionists" do.
Hopefully their acts will soon grow stale.
From what I can see from these comments, I am in the minority in that I am on the right. While there has always been an isolationist, Buchananite wing of the Republican party, it is much smaller and weaker than the Nazi wing of the Democratic Party. And if you read up on the acceptance in the Democratic Party of a Senate candidate in Maine with an actual Nazi tattoo who spews antisemitic conspiracy theories and yet is expected to win the nomination, calling them a Nazi Party is not much of an exaggeration. Let’s not forget that despite the rewriting of history by leftist historians, the Nazis we’re leftists.
As a Jewish Democrat, all the pearl clutching over the party's turn to antisemitism is equal parts mystifying and amusing. Who among us spoke out when Obama derided half the country as bitterly clinging to guns and religion? Who spoke up when Clinton called half the country a basket of deplorables? When people supported the police and were called racist for doing so, who objected? When people objecting to biological males in female sports were called haters, who defended them? When people were canceled for questioning the safety of legitimately untested vaccines, or for questioning the necessity of shutting down society for COVID, or for suggesting that merit was more important than diversity, or for debating any of a variety of DNC orthodoxies, who spoke up to say that in a free society, disagreeing should be welcomed? Mostly, my Jewish Democratic friends followed the herd and ostracized the outsiders. Well, now we get to be the outsiders, the deplorables, the haters, bitterly clinging to our religion and nation. Congratulations.
And for all the lectures I have had to endure over the years about my white, cisgender, straight, male privilege, you would think that these same lecturers would consider that from the safety of America or Canada or Western Europe, they should check their privilege before dictating to Israelis what is the acceptable way to respond to a murderous, genocidal, existential threat.
Hi Rabbi. I don’t know your age , but as for me, . I was born 6 weeks before the state of Israel became a reality in 1948 . I was old enough to remember, the wars of 1956, 1967, , 1973 , the multiple in intifadas , and of course , 10/7. Your premise that liberalism has “protected “ American Jewry. I have read that in 1948the Truman administration refused to provide arms for infant , Israel. The pragmatic Jews of 1948 went to USSR for arms . With every war Israel was attacked and fought a defensive war.Regardless of whether the Israeli government was headed by Left wingers or right winger, the arabs and their allies were agnostic to their goal of killing all the Jews. Somehow , now, Bibi’s politics somehow are part of the rising tide of Jew hate. Anti Zionist Jews appeared in Exodus and for the next 3000years . As for me , I have never felt “ protected” by liberals like Your Gavin Newsom. I can feel your ambivalence in describing him . How he was so frank and standup with his Jewish donors . The fact he claimed it broke his heart to call out the Apartheid state state of Israel, and trash the government . But this is the same Newsom , who , infront of his African American donors claimed he was “ one of them”- he couldn’t read either !
I was fortunate enough to be admitted to Medical school.in 1969. My parents were high schools grades , My dad worked like dog. My grandparents were Russian and polish immigrants who became multilingual but never learned to read English We lived a in virtual Jewish ghetto in NE Philly . Of the 144 students in my Freshman Med School. Class I had 23 other Jewish classmates, and had 12 women, and 12 African American .They did not hide the quotas very well, huh ?
Please , Rabbi, do not delude yourself in believing that our people have been “ protected” by liberalism and liberals. We have been at best tolerated . In my career in practice or in my corporate second career , I heard more times than I can could count that I was “ a different kind of Jew“. The kind who are Gavin Newsom donors. I don’t trust politicians or even our allies. I am an independent . We must be proud of who we are. , and protect each other. I think it was Benjamin Franklin , in 1776, in my home town who opined: “ if we do not hang together, we will most certainly hang separately”
Thank you for the comment. I hear the experience behind it, and I do not dismiss it. You have lived through far more chapters of Jewish vulnerability than I have, and your distrust of political promises is hard-earned.
I also do not disagree with your core point: Jews survive not because politicians protect us, but because Jews protect one another, remain proud of who we are, and refuse to surrender our dignity to the good graces of others. On that, I think we are very much in agreement.
Where I would push back is here: I did not suggest that liberalism “saved” the Jews, or that liberals have ever offered something as solid as protection in any ultimate sense. Toleration is not covenant. Acceptance is not safety. And political friendship is often painfully conditional. I believe that now as much as you do.
My argument was narrower and more historical: for a period of American Jewish life, liberal democracy created conditions in which Jews could flourish more fully than they had in many other societies. That is not the same as saying those conditions were permanent, morally pure, or sufficient. Nor does it mean liberalism was free of hypocrisy, quotas, condescension, or antisemitism dressed up in respectable language. Your own life is evidence of that.
I also agree that Jew-hatred does not begin with Netanyahu, nor with this or that Israeli government. The hatred is older, deeper, and more enduring than the political categories people now use to explain it away. Too often, contemporary commentators speak as though antisemitism is merely a reaction to Israeli policy. It is not. Jewish history should have cured us of that illusion long ago.
At the same time, I do think it is fair to examine how certain political leaders and moral vocabularies in America have contributed to the present climate, whether intentionally or not. To say that is not to blame Jews, and it is not to exonerate antisemites. It is to ask how a society teaches itself whom to sympathize with, whom to suspect, and whom to cast as uniquely guilty.
So I take your correction seriously. If my phrasing suggested too much confidence in “protection” from liberals or liberalism, then that is worth refining. My own view is closer to yours than perhaps I made clear: Jews should never confuse access with security, applause with solidarity, or political usefulness with genuine friendship.
We must know who we are, stand with one another, and be prepared to defend Jewish life without illusions. On that, your Philadelphia wisdom and Benjamin Franklin’s line still hold.
Rabbi, thank you for your thoughtful response to my reply. . I wish you and yours a Joyous and holy Pesach. Look for ward to reading your future essays!
Context is completely essential in this debate. We in Israel face a Fanatical Martyrdom-driven Death Cult of a Religious War. This description of Hamas and West Bank Arabs is not fanciful. They are sworn to Destroy Israel. Compromise with that is simply impossible. Western Liberalism died YEARS AGO in the face of the Reality which is Islam. This Truth is known and accepted by President Trump and The Republican Party, because Demographic Islam now mortally threatens the Whole of The Western World. The Democratic Party and Liberalism is going to be out of power for many years now. So-called Liberal spaces of Conscience have collapsed under the reality of raw Nature and the reality of the Demographic Threat. Learn this lesson well, for the survival of the West as well as Israel depends on this. Demographics will be sorted Non-violently and with money to Repatriate all who are antithetical to The West. This is not Nazism or even Fascist. For, Done non-violently, the solutions are within the Judeo-Christian Western conscience too.
Rabbi Abraham raises an important question, but I think the deeper issue is that what we are now calling “liberalism” is no longer the liberalism that once protected Jews. Classical liberalism believed in pluralism, individual rights, and loyalty to democratic institutions. Much of what passes for liberalism today has absorbed a very different worldview — one shaped by Marxist ideas about power, oppression, and “colonialism.” In that framework, Israel and often Jews themselves are recast as symbols of power rather than as a vulnerable minority.
What many people also fail to see is that this has become a marriage of convenience between radical left ideologies and Islamist movements. Together they frame the conflict as Jews versus Palestinians, when in reality the deeper target is Western civilization itself. Jews may be the first target, but the same ideology ultimately undermines the very institutions that sustain free societies — national identity, democratic values, and cultural confidence. This isn’t just a Jewish issue. It affects everyone who believes in the survival of the West.
I was never as enamored by the Dem Party as so many Jews were. In truth--for years I considered myself a "Dem' as were my parents. But essentially --I was apolitical. That changed when I. noticed how the media covered Israel. I began to read--and examine the truth about the Party--and its history. What I found out basically made me decide to be an Independent--at first. I became Republican because in AZ you had to be one of 2 Parties to vote in the Primaries. I never regretted the decision--particularly when DJT ran.
The Dem Party is no longer "liberal" (in many ways Trump is liberal--as I am too). He is about common sense--period.
The Far Left is NOT "progressive" by any measure. A total misnomer! It is REGRESSIVE. America's youth--fresh from indoctrination--wants to relive the failure of Marxism/socialism. Riding on its back is Islam--the most worrisome part. The part that will not be easily deported--and has BIG plans for America as it had for Europe (and succeeded!).
It's no friend of Jews, Christians, or Gays For Palestine.
It is a way that the Muslim Brotherhood can thrive in the USA--while Iran is at war with us and Israel. Beware!
Jewish "Liberalism" has proven to be pure weakness... an Achilles Heel.. for centuries. It's embarrassing and reeks of sucking up so hard, it would make Eddie Haskell ("Leave it to Beaver") PUKE.
You write: “ Newsom is a lot of things, but reckless isn’t one of them.”
Oh really? During Covid he told Californians not to gather in groups. He then threw himself a birthday party at The French Laundry, a fancy and expensive restaurant in the wine area, with around 25 close associates in attendance.
Just as here, he apologized after.
I’m looking for a candidate who does the right thing first-not someone who does/says the obviously wrong thing, and then apologizes.
Rubio.
Josh Shapiro
Bad choice! He's no better a Jew--than Bernie!
Both sides include individuals that are behaving badly. The western press tends to emphasize one side's misdeeds and ignores the other's. But none of this is necessary. The Palestinians could have had a state on multiple occasions and turned it down each time because in doing so they'd have to accept Israel's existence.
Here’s a question, where in Torah does Hashem command Moses to lead his people? Not anywhere but Israel. Pack up and stop appeasing the gentiles.
We have every right to remain where we choose. Especially in the USA.
1939
Jews had a right to live in Germany, Poland, Ukraine. What is happening has happened before. Hard to admit. Hard to face facts, we want to be invited to stay.
Why is it that we are not?
Party on!
Gavin Newscum is just another empty vessel, unprincipled politician who has no core values or morals. He looks at the poll numbers of the Democrat party radical, Jew-hating base and thus shifts his position to conform.
To label Israel an "apartheid" state, where Arabs, muslims and Christians are fully integrated into its society, is an egregious lie and he knows it. Rather than pushing back against this phony charge, he amplifies it because Newscum is an ambitious lowlife politician who will take whatever position he must in order to get his party's nomination. And his party is currently in the grip of far-left radical antisemites.
Unfortunately, cowardice and conformity are rewarded in politics rather than courage and principles. So, he will likely get the nomination unless despite his pandering, the Democrat party's kook base still considers him not radical enough. After all, he hasn't yet said Israel should cease to exist.
Not only can't liberalism protect Jews, but it has become a clear and present danger to Jewish life in the west.
Liberalism of the kind practiced by Democrat Party never protected the Jews any more than it protected the Blacks or other minorities. It simply took advantage of any minority group that could be fooled to support it politically .