Now they're targeting Jewish politicians.
“This is a democracy. You fight dangerous ideas at the ballot box, not with bans from foreign nations.”
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First, they tore down posters of kidnapped Jews.
Then they marched to bully and intimidate us outside of our synagogues.
Then they accused Israel of genocide and called us Nazis.
Then Jewish students were barricaded in libraries, Jews were murdered in Western streets, and Molotov cocktails were hurled at Jews peacefully demonstrating.
And now?
Now they’re targeting elected Jewish politicians — while we’re still in the dark, heavy shadows of the worst massacre against Jews since the Holocaust.
This week, five Western democracies (Canada, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, and Norway) announced that they would freeze the assets and bar the entry of two Israeli government ministers, Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, accusing them of “inciting extremist violence” against Palestinians in Judea and Samaria (also known as the West Bank).
Former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir once said, “The world hates us when we bleed, and hates us when we fight back.” These sanctions prove her right once again.
To state the obvious, sanctions are supposed to be tools for punishing clear violations of international law, not for disapproval of speech. If inflammatory rhetoric were grounds for international bans, half the United Nations General Assembly would be persona non grata.
Let’s be clear about something: You don’t have to like Ben Gvir or Smotrich. You may disagree with their rhetoric, their ideology, or their policies. You might find them abrasive or even appalling.
But they weren’t installed by a military junta. They weren’t handed power by a dictator’s decree. They were democratically elected by Israeli citizens, in one of the most fiercely pluralistic and transparent electoral systems in the world.
You can believe that Ben Gvir and Smotrich hold views you abhor, and still believe in the sanctity of democracy. That’s what pluralism requires. The test of democratic tolerance isn’t how you treat politicians you agree with; it’s how you treat the ones you don’t.
Renowned Israeli journalist Nadav Eyal, no fan of Smotrich or Ben Gvir, said it best: “This is a democracy. You fight dangerous ideas at the ballot box, not with bans from foreign nations.” No one is defending these men’s ideologies, but we are absolutely defending Israel’s right to choose.
And that’s the inconvenient truth their critics would rather ignore: These are not rogue actors, but representatives of Israeli voters, people who live under the constant threat of terror, who bury their children after bus bombings, stabbings, and rocket attacks that purposely target civilians, and thus civilians who cast ballots accordingly.
Sanctioning these politicians is not about justice. It’s not even about policy. It’s about punishing Israel for surviving. And it’s a dangerous step toward something the world has seen before.
In 1930s Europe, it didn’t start with gas chambers. It started with the isolation of Jews from polite society. Nazi Germany marked certain Jews as too radical, too dangerous, too unclean to be allowed in public life. They weren’t banned all at once. First they were excluded from universities. Then from government posts. Then from everyday life.
Today, we see a new version of that same instinct. More subtle, more sophisticated, but cut from the same cloth: Exclude the Jews who don’t make us comfortable. Sanitize public space from the kind of Jews who fight back. The kind who govern instead of grovel. The kind who defend themselves instead of disappearing.
Let’s not pretend that this is a neutral, legalistic act. While the West bans Jewish ministers from Israel, it welcomes with open arms officials from regimes that stone women, execute gay people, and fund global terror. Has any Western country sanctioned Mahmoud Abbas, who literally pays salaries to terrorists’ families?
Of course not. Apparently, it’s only a problem when the “wrong kind” of Jew is in office. It’s the latest iteration of an age-old Western prejudice, the idea that Jews are tolerable as long as they stay in their place.
In elite Western circles, the “good Jew” is soft-spoken, “progressive,” and self-effacing. The “bad Jew” is nationalist, unapologetic, and dares to wield power. The message is clear: Jews can be professors, poets, even politicians — as long as they act like guests. But Jews who govern themselves, in their own land, on their own terms? That’s when the world gets uncomfortable.
And here’s the other hypocrisy: Politicians in these same Western nations regularly incite hatred and violence — against Jews. Some do it indirectly, hiding behind “concern” for “Palestinian children,” as if to imply the blood libel that Israel purposely targets and kills children. Others do it explicitly, calling Israel’s actions “disproportionate,” “genocidal,” and “criminal.”
Jeremy Corbyn once called Hamas and Hezbollah “friends.” Rashida Tlaib regularly chants the genocidal slogan, “From the River to the Sea.” Canadian politicians show up to government sessions proudly wearing the Palestinian keffiyeh, made popular by mega-terrorist Yasser Arafat. Members of the Irish parliament have publicly called for Zionism to be dismantled.
What do they think happens when they speak like that?
We know what happens: Jews are harassed, intimidated, and even murdered. Jewish businesses are vandalized. Jewish neighborhoods are flooded with hate-filled mobs shouting for intifada and blood.
But none of those politicians are sanctioned. None are banned. Because, when antisemitism is framed as “criticism of Israel,” the world applauds.
This is a grotesque double standard. And more than that, it’s a betrayal. These five countries claim to champion democracy, tolerance, and civil rights. But when it comes to Jewish self-determination, suddenly they become selective. Suddenly democracy doesn’t count.
Make no mistake, this is not just about Ben Gvir or Smotrich. This is about whether Jews — any Jews — are allowed to have power that isn’t contingent on the world’s approval. It sets a horrifying precedent: one where a democracy can have its elected leaders canceled by foreign powers for holding controversial views. Not criminal views. Not calls for violence. Just opinions that clash with elite Western sensibilities.
What message does this send to Israelis? That their democracy is only valid if it votes “correctly”? That Jewish sovereignty is acceptable only if it comes with a Western permission slip?
And let’s not forget the geographic double standard: According to these five governments, it’s not just which Jews are acceptable, it’s where they’re allowed to live. If you’re a Jew living in Tel Aviv or Haifa, you’re tolerable. But if you live in Judea and Samaria (indigenous Jewish lands), you are treated as a provocation, as a problem, as a threat to global stability.
It’s as if Jewish rights only matter within certain pre-approved neighborhoods. The world pretends to support Israel’s right to exist, but only behind borders that make its existence indefensible. Think about that: You can be Jewish, but not too Jewish. You can be Israeli, but not too Israeli. You can live in Israel, but only in the parts acceptable to foreign diplomats.
Imagine telling a Canadian you support their sovereignty, but only if they stay out of British Columbia. Or a Brit that they’re fine, as long as they don’t live in Scotland. It’s absurd on its face. But for Jews, this territorial conditionality is normalized.
Western diplomats who sanction Jewish leaders for defending Jews in Judea and Samaria are not promoting peace. They’re signaling that some Jews deserve protection and others deserve punishment, depending on where they sleep at night.
And what message does it send to Jews in the Diaspora? That the world is growing tired of “difficult” Jews, the kind who assert themselves, who defend their people, who refuse to be perpetual guests?
To Diaspora Jews watching Western democracies freeze out Israeli officials, the subtext is loud and clear: If you vote the “wrong way,” you will be punished. If you act too Jewish, too assertive, too Zionist — you will be excluded. It’s not just Israeli Jews being told to stay in their place; it’s all of us.
If countries can now blacklist elected officials of another democracy because they dislike their politics, then no democracy is safe. What’s to stop China from sanctioning Canadian members of parliament for supporting Taiwan? Or Turkey from banning Australian lawmakers for supporting Kurdish autonomy? What we’re seeing is the slow erosion of democratic legitimacy — starting, of course, with the Jewish state.
When the world says “never again,” it must also mean: Never again will we accept Jews being punished for defending themselves, never again will Jewish leadership be conditional, never again will we be shamed for surviving.
History doesn’t repeat itself, but it rhymes. We’ve seen this rhyme before. When Jewish self-defense becomes unacceptable, Jewish life becomes unlivable. Today they’re banning Jewish ministers. Tomorrow, perhaps, they’ll be banning Jewish mayors, rabbis, writers, students.
We should all be paying attention — because the road from isolating Jews to harming Jews is not as long as we like to think.
If you care about democracy, this is your moment to speak up. If you care about Jews, this is your moment to draw the line. Not because you support these two ministers, but because you support the right of the Jewish People to govern themselves without foreign approval.
And Thomas Friedman just wrote an article for the NYT blaming the Israeli government for violence against Jews worldwide which further amplifies these types of misguided hatreds.
Smotrich and Ben Gvir emphasize correctly that it is more important in the dangerous neighborhood of the Middle East to be feared than to be loved