While civil rights litigation may be a tool, its uses are limited. First, civil litigation is expensive and protracted, and, as we have seen with recent suits against universities, often results in a settlement that promises “change” or “reform” that rarely come to pass, because the institution is rotten with antisemitism. Second, criminal litigation is dependent on the government’s willingness to prosecute. While the current administration has appointed US Attorneys who are willing to prosecute antisemitic organizations and individuals, would a President Harris or President Newsom or President AOC prosecute antisemitism flowing from the left or Islamists? Unlikely. Governments come and go, and, if history has taught Jews anything, it’s that governments are not reliable allies.
So it is time to elect the right people and defeat the wrong ones. Another strategy: Our former Police Chief went on a version of Birthright aimed at community leaders. He got to know Israel firsthand and it has made all the difference in Vancouver.
All good with few critical points imho missing. The focus on coexistence with obvious enemies brought on a disastrous results on the the border kibbutzim and on support of the Democratic Party in US. It is also important to remember that the legal system and enforcement of civil rights laws is also dependent on administrations that may change with every election. The Diaspora Jews must stay independent of political parties and focus on electing the supportive candidates and mot blind allegiance to parties. The support of Israel is just as important without interference in internal Israeli politics. As in anything in life, money rules and the Jewish money has to be carefully contributed.
I hate to say it but it is like a rerun of 1930s Germany where the German Reform and secular Jews boasted they were untouchable as they were more German than the Germans. The total lack of reality amongst Jews in the US, Canada, Australia and Britain that they can go on like usual with the usual incompetent unelected ghetto like leaders and including many of the rabbis who fear losing their money source and power if their flocks make aliyah to Israel, may be good at raising money, running JCCs, writing opinion pieces, debating, and telling Jews to shush and hide or they will hate us, even though we know they despise us already. The Jewish communities as a whole are blind to the fact that young Jews are now taking action, and not waiting for the inevitable by making aliyah or the opposite, by hiding their identities, becoming self-loathing as a result, and totally assimilating in order to live their lives like non-Jews, rejecting their identity for ever. The leaders have to stop pretending it is 1970 as we face a new, well funded and oiled enemy, and what used to work, is worthless, including Holocaust education which has been an abysmal failure. Jewish communities must stand up, fight back in every way possible. act like the Iranian diaspora who show up in the hundreds of thousands to demand the governments to act. Notice they are not grovelling on their knees begging for protection, nor are they acting as the permanent victims, helpless and needing non-Jews to protect them.
There is a lot to dissect in this article and much to agree with. The problem with attempting to rely on the litigation approach is that the vast sums of funds required are beyond the reach of most Jewish communities, and to be candid the Jewish leadership organizations that could coordinate and raise such funding don't seem to have any interest in doing so. As others have commented, our legal system now seems to be driven more and more by politics and while the current administration is willing to tackle antisemitism, what will it be like if progressives in the Democrat party gain total control? At that point even legal remedies will not be realistic. It also seems that our Jewish leadership (secular, religious and laity) in the western democracies are averse to actual self-defense. How many times have we seen the Jew hater approach three or four Jewish teens and attack them with no one fighting back. Why aren't our Jewish organizations offering self-defense training enable Jews of any age to make attacking us subject to a painful lesson.
This insightful work provides invaluable guidance on effectively combating antisemitism.
It offers practical strategies to counter acts of evil and criminal intent.
The advice presented in your post is both timely and essential for fostering a more inclusive society. Implementing these recommendations will contribute to a significant reduction in prejudice. I commend you for this crucial contribution to our vital cause.
Again, superb writing , first rate thinking. Mazel Tov on your ability to clarify these, for Jews, sometimes overwhelmingly complex, intertwined issues. But we are a complex people. As a writer myself, I compliment you on your use of brilliant quotations and your reliance on the Hagadah as a book of examples for us to contemplate.
I saw the Bret Stephens YouTube discussion. I took the main point to be that we should stop worrying about people liking us. But I agree with you that the confidence must come with consequences. That's why I think most Jewish philanthropy in the US should be targeted toward providing serious security for all those Jewish schools and camps and protests and gatherings and museums everywhere in the country. Contribute to Israel, yes. But also make American security a serious priority. And then stop worrying about being liked.
All of this discussion is well and good, BUT only in the US is there a durable andclear Bill of Rights upon which we Jews can hope and rely- but only if we are vigilant and are willing to protect these Rights, wich, by the definition of the Founding Fathers remind us, are not a gift from government but are G-D Given, immutable and personal. The Bill of Rights is an instruction list on how to be a free person in the type of free Nation the founders envisioned: free to speak your mind, free to adress injustice, free to worship and to exercise our faiths, free of unlarwful searcges, interrogations, self-incrimination, and so forth. At the core of the Bill of Rights, id the one Amendment that giuarantees all of the others: the 2d, which was put there in the realization that without the right to keep and bear arms, the free person in a free socitty can be a vicyim when things go "off the raills", we.g., when some nitwit hate-filled monster decides thst his llessons of his leftist teachers accusing the Jews of genocide in Gaza after Oct.7 were not only correct but provided a rationale to attack, say, a synagogue in Phiĺy or a couple leaving an event in DC. Sadly, we as Jews cannoy ignore that for us, the pogroms ate just around the corner and the cops ant always get to the scene in time to serve and protect. We have to learn to shed our fear of firearms, take a clsss, learn when and how to protect ourrelves, our children, , and our own survival. Ask a survivor, would he have preferred to have the means to effectively defend himself? Ask the heroic women and men of the Warsaw Ghetto resisyance. Learn that story and the other stories of resistance and survival against worse than anything we are now facing. Ask the victims of the IRGC and the mullahs of the Islanic "Republic" who have killed thousands who dared to speaj up and challenge their oppressors. Wouldn't things be different if they could exercisrest the G-D given right to keep and bear arms ? Time for us to wake up to the reality that could come our way, all too fast and sll too soon. Or. Not, if we are ready and the haters know our blood is not no longer cheaply spilled. Or is NEVER AGAIN!" just an empty slogan that without the personal power to effect it, becomes just 2 words ........
Yes, "pride won't save the Jews" but as the Romans said "Si vis pacem, para bellum." If Jews don't develop a strong defense whether in Israel or the Diaspora (and I don't mean weapons beyond concealed or open carry for Jews in the US where that is allowed or using pepper spray), then your enemies will prevail. As to personal weapons please get proper training. There are organized groups in this country, Antifa and its like, that are a great danger to you folks so like the Boy Scouts say "Be Prepared."
Great article. As Michel Foucault argued, knowledge is not a neutral collection of facts standing above politics. What a society recognises as legitimate knowledge is produced within its institutions, and those institutions reflect the power structures of their time. Power can censor ideas, but more importantly decides what is studied, how it is studied, what is funded, and what is treated as credible or pathological. When universities consistently frame one national movement as liberation and another as pathology, they are obviously not describing reality. They are participating in the construction of legitimacy and reality itself.
At the same time, when a community retreats behind heightened security for understandable reasons, it becomes less visible and that space is then flooded by organised pro-Palestinian activism on campuses and in academic departments, which frame Zionism as colonialism, racism, or pathology. When that framing is asserted with confidence and repetition, and without sufficient challenge, it starts to appear like an uncontested fact and over time, repeated assertions that Zionism is colonialism or pathology shift from being controversial and punishable claims to becoming embedded assumptions. Once that happens, Jewish national identity is pre-judged as a defect.
Legal intervention is necessary and definitely overdue and it would reinforce visibility within the institutions that generate legitimacy.
While civil rights litigation may be a tool, its uses are limited. First, civil litigation is expensive and protracted, and, as we have seen with recent suits against universities, often results in a settlement that promises “change” or “reform” that rarely come to pass, because the institution is rotten with antisemitism. Second, criminal litigation is dependent on the government’s willingness to prosecute. While the current administration has appointed US Attorneys who are willing to prosecute antisemitic organizations and individuals, would a President Harris or President Newsom or President AOC prosecute antisemitism flowing from the left or Islamists? Unlikely. Governments come and go, and, if history has taught Jews anything, it’s that governments are not reliable allies.
So it is time to elect the right people and defeat the wrong ones. Another strategy: Our former Police Chief went on a version of Birthright aimed at community leaders. He got to know Israel firsthand and it has made all the difference in Vancouver.
All good with few critical points imho missing. The focus on coexistence with obvious enemies brought on a disastrous results on the the border kibbutzim and on support of the Democratic Party in US. It is also important to remember that the legal system and enforcement of civil rights laws is also dependent on administrations that may change with every election. The Diaspora Jews must stay independent of political parties and focus on electing the supportive candidates and mot blind allegiance to parties. The support of Israel is just as important without interference in internal Israeli politics. As in anything in life, money rules and the Jewish money has to be carefully contributed.
Here is what we have in Canada:
https://cjpac.ca/
I hate to say it but it is like a rerun of 1930s Germany where the German Reform and secular Jews boasted they were untouchable as they were more German than the Germans. The total lack of reality amongst Jews in the US, Canada, Australia and Britain that they can go on like usual with the usual incompetent unelected ghetto like leaders and including many of the rabbis who fear losing their money source and power if their flocks make aliyah to Israel, may be good at raising money, running JCCs, writing opinion pieces, debating, and telling Jews to shush and hide or they will hate us, even though we know they despise us already. The Jewish communities as a whole are blind to the fact that young Jews are now taking action, and not waiting for the inevitable by making aliyah or the opposite, by hiding their identities, becoming self-loathing as a result, and totally assimilating in order to live their lives like non-Jews, rejecting their identity for ever. The leaders have to stop pretending it is 1970 as we face a new, well funded and oiled enemy, and what used to work, is worthless, including Holocaust education which has been an abysmal failure. Jewish communities must stand up, fight back in every way possible. act like the Iranian diaspora who show up in the hundreds of thousands to demand the governments to act. Notice they are not grovelling on their knees begging for protection, nor are they acting as the permanent victims, helpless and needing non-Jews to protect them.
There is a lot to dissect in this article and much to agree with. The problem with attempting to rely on the litigation approach is that the vast sums of funds required are beyond the reach of most Jewish communities, and to be candid the Jewish leadership organizations that could coordinate and raise such funding don't seem to have any interest in doing so. As others have commented, our legal system now seems to be driven more and more by politics and while the current administration is willing to tackle antisemitism, what will it be like if progressives in the Democrat party gain total control? At that point even legal remedies will not be realistic. It also seems that our Jewish leadership (secular, religious and laity) in the western democracies are averse to actual self-defense. How many times have we seen the Jew hater approach three or four Jewish teens and attack them with no one fighting back. Why aren't our Jewish organizations offering self-defense training enable Jews of any age to make attacking us subject to a painful lesson.
On a practical level, how can each of us individually get involved? Are there organizations that are now pursuing these practices?
Here is what we have in Canada:
https://cjpac.ca/
This is an essay for which I have been waiting for a long time. Thank you!
Outstanding.
Eric Rozenman
This insightful work provides invaluable guidance on effectively combating antisemitism.
It offers practical strategies to counter acts of evil and criminal intent.
The advice presented in your post is both timely and essential for fostering a more inclusive society. Implementing these recommendations will contribute to a significant reduction in prejudice. I commend you for this crucial contribution to our vital cause.
Again, superb writing , first rate thinking. Mazel Tov on your ability to clarify these, for Jews, sometimes overwhelmingly complex, intertwined issues. But we are a complex people. As a writer myself, I compliment you on your use of brilliant quotations and your reliance on the Hagadah as a book of examples for us to contemplate.
I saw the Bret Stephens YouTube discussion. I took the main point to be that we should stop worrying about people liking us. But I agree with you that the confidence must come with consequences. That's why I think most Jewish philanthropy in the US should be targeted toward providing serious security for all those Jewish schools and camps and protests and gatherings and museums everywhere in the country. Contribute to Israel, yes. But also make American security a serious priority. And then stop worrying about being liked.
All of this discussion is well and good, BUT only in the US is there a durable andclear Bill of Rights upon which we Jews can hope and rely- but only if we are vigilant and are willing to protect these Rights, wich, by the definition of the Founding Fathers remind us, are not a gift from government but are G-D Given, immutable and personal. The Bill of Rights is an instruction list on how to be a free person in the type of free Nation the founders envisioned: free to speak your mind, free to adress injustice, free to worship and to exercise our faiths, free of unlarwful searcges, interrogations, self-incrimination, and so forth. At the core of the Bill of Rights, id the one Amendment that giuarantees all of the others: the 2d, which was put there in the realization that without the right to keep and bear arms, the free person in a free socitty can be a vicyim when things go "off the raills", we.g., when some nitwit hate-filled monster decides thst his llessons of his leftist teachers accusing the Jews of genocide in Gaza after Oct.7 were not only correct but provided a rationale to attack, say, a synagogue in Phiĺy or a couple leaving an event in DC. Sadly, we as Jews cannoy ignore that for us, the pogroms ate just around the corner and the cops ant always get to the scene in time to serve and protect. We have to learn to shed our fear of firearms, take a clsss, learn when and how to protect ourrelves, our children, , and our own survival. Ask a survivor, would he have preferred to have the means to effectively defend himself? Ask the heroic women and men of the Warsaw Ghetto resisyance. Learn that story and the other stories of resistance and survival against worse than anything we are now facing. Ask the victims of the IRGC and the mullahs of the Islanic "Republic" who have killed thousands who dared to speaj up and challenge their oppressors. Wouldn't things be different if they could exercisrest the G-D given right to keep and bear arms ? Time for us to wake up to the reality that could come our way, all too fast and sll too soon. Or. Not, if we are ready and the haters know our blood is not no longer cheaply spilled. Or is NEVER AGAIN!" just an empty slogan that without the personal power to effect it, becomes just 2 words ........
Yes, "pride won't save the Jews" but as the Romans said "Si vis pacem, para bellum." If Jews don't develop a strong defense whether in Israel or the Diaspora (and I don't mean weapons beyond concealed or open carry for Jews in the US where that is allowed or using pepper spray), then your enemies will prevail. As to personal weapons please get proper training. There are organized groups in this country, Antifa and its like, that are a great danger to you folks so like the Boy Scouts say "Be Prepared."
No disagreement with anything you say Bob but you need an editor to severely crop your pieces...
Great article. As Michel Foucault argued, knowledge is not a neutral collection of facts standing above politics. What a society recognises as legitimate knowledge is produced within its institutions, and those institutions reflect the power structures of their time. Power can censor ideas, but more importantly decides what is studied, how it is studied, what is funded, and what is treated as credible or pathological. When universities consistently frame one national movement as liberation and another as pathology, they are obviously not describing reality. They are participating in the construction of legitimacy and reality itself.
At the same time, when a community retreats behind heightened security for understandable reasons, it becomes less visible and that space is then flooded by organised pro-Palestinian activism on campuses and in academic departments, which frame Zionism as colonialism, racism, or pathology. When that framing is asserted with confidence and repetition, and without sufficient challenge, it starts to appear like an uncontested fact and over time, repeated assertions that Zionism is colonialism or pathology shift from being controversial and punishable claims to becoming embedded assumptions. Once that happens, Jewish national identity is pre-judged as a defect.
Legal intervention is necessary and definitely overdue and it would reinforce visibility within the institutions that generate legitimacy.