The Antisemites Who Swear They Aren’t Antisemites

Nowadays, some of the most dangerous Jew-haters are certain they’re anything but.

photo: Chris Hearn/Unsplash

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This is a guest essay by Vanessa Berg, who writes about Judaism and Israel.

You can also listen to the podcast version of this essay on Apple Podcasts, YouTube Music, YouTube, and Spotify.

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Within days of October 7th, my cousins’ step-siblings (who aren’t Jewish) began posting about Gaza on social media with more and more fervor.

Not about Hamas; not about the massacre; not about the women raped, the families burned alive, or the civilians kidnapped into terror tunnels. Just Gaza, suffering, “oppression,” “resistance,” “context.”

I called them out — gently at first, then more directly.

Their response was rehearsed, confident, and revealing.

They didn’t speak up for Israel, they said, because “Israel has an army and the Palestinians don’t.” And because “Israel doesn’t need our help, but Palestinians do.” Later, when pressed further, they added the moral punctuation mark they believed sealed the argument: “We just want peace.”

And yet their outrage flowed toward the one society (Palestinian) whose leaders have rejected every serious peace offer placed before them since the 1930s, while their exclusive condemnation was reserved for the one society (Israeli) that has spent decades pursuing peace in the shadow of repeated Arab wars, terrorism, massacres, and kidnappings. This inversion is not confusion; it is moral failure. And it is one of many ways antisemitism often reveals itself today: as an inability (or refusal) to distinguish between aggression and survival, between rejectionism and restraint.

What struck me wasn’t only the content of what they said. It was the certainty with which they believed it proved they weren’t biased. That they were, in fact, “principled,” “humane,” “above hatred.”

And yet, their desire for “peace” apparently applies to no other conflict on earth. Not Ukraine. Not Syria. Not Sudan. Not Nigeria. Not Yemen. I just checked their social media and found exactly zero posts about the thousands of civilians being murdered in Iran’s streets at the hands of the theocratic regime there. They only care, it seems, when the conflict involves Jews.

This is how antisemitism increasingly works now: not as explicit hatred, but as moral theater. Not as “I hate Jews,” but as “I’m just being empathetic.” Not as intention, but as outcome. And that divergence is noteworthy, because antisemitism has never depended on how its practitioners describe themselves. It has always been defined by patterns of behavior, language, and belief that place Jews outside the rules applied to everyone else.

Antisemitism is not just about how someone feels about Jews; it is about how Jews are treated. It manifests through double standards, collective blame, moral inversion, and the denial of Jewish self-determination. It does not necessarily require conscious hatred or, to put it more blatantly, for someone to say “I hate Jews” or “Jews have horns” or “Hitler was right.”

Instead, it requires only the belief (spoken or implied) that Jews are the exception: the exception to empathy, the exception to history, the exception to the right to defend themselves. That is why so many people can sincerely insist they are not antisemites while repeatedly participating in antisemitic narratives and behaviors.

This is textbook cognitive dissonance. People are deeply invested in seeing themselves as good, tolerant, enlightened individuals. When confronted with evidence that their words or actions harm Jews, the mind does not abandon that self-image; it protects it. And so antisemitism is redefined into something so narrow and cartoonish that only “extremists” qualify, while everyone else receives moral immunity.

“I don’t hate Jews” becomes a shield. It’s a sentence that allows people to say and do antisemitic things while exempting themselves from the label — as if antisemitism were determined solely by intention rather than consequence, as if impact were irrelevant. By that logic, no one is racist unless they mean to be, and no prejudice exists unless it announces itself with malice. History tells us otherwise.

This modern form of antisemitism is fueled by decades of pop culture, media (including social media), academic, and educational conditioning that have repackaged old ideas in new moral language. Jews are no longer portrayed as sinister because they are weak, but because they are strong. Israel is not framed as illegitimate because it is Jewish, but because it is labeled “colonial,” “white,” “Western,” “apartheid” — terms that conveniently erase Jewish indigeneity, Jewish exile, and Jewish history. These narratives are not discovered independently; they are taught, reinforced, and rewarded. Students are trained what to think long before they are trained how to think. Moral conclusions are preloaded, and complexity is treated as betrayal.

Critical thinking gives way to slogans. History gives way to Instagram swipes. Emotion replaces evidence. Content is shared not because it is true, but because it signals virtue. Outrage becomes a social currency, and Jews (small in number and historically convenient as scapegoats) once again become the acceptable target. The cost of being wrong feels abstract. The reward for being loud feels immediate.

What emerges from this environment is selective empathy. Infinite empathy for those who harm Jews, accompanied by endless context, explanation, and justification. Conditional or nonexistent empathy for Jewish victims. Violence against Jews is always explained. Violence by Jews requires no explanation at all. Blatant terrorism becomes “resistance.” Rape becomes “allegations.” Mass-murdering terrorists become “militants” and “fighters.” Massacre becomes “context.” Kidnapping civilians (including women, children, and elderly) becomes “complicated.” This is not universal compassion; it is empathy with conditions, and Jews rarely meet them.

Nowhere is this clearer than in the demand for Jewish moral perfection. Jews are permitted to exist only as victims. The moment they defend themselves, they become villains. Israel’s possession of an army is treated not as a necessity of survival in a hostile region, but as a moral indictment. Strength itself becomes proof of guilt. No other people on earth are told they forfeit moral legitimacy the moment they acquire the means to protect themselves. No other nation is expected to absorb violence indefinitely in order to remain worthy of sympathy.

For centuries, Jews were despised for being weak, stateless, and defenseless. Today, they are condemned for being strong, sovereign, and armed. The accusation changes. The target does not. Antisemitism has always adapted to the language of its time, shifting form while preserving function. What once spoke in the language of race now speaks in the language of “human rights.” What once justified exclusion now justifies erasure.

And still, many who participate in this moral inversion insist they “just want peace.” But what is a Jew supposed to say in response to someone who “just wants peace”? To challenge it is to be cast as a warmonger. To agree with it is to be forced into silence — because peace with whom, exactly? On what terms? At what cost, and paid by whom?

That is the trap. “Peace” is invoked not as a serious goal, but as a rhetorical weapon, one that forecloses discussion while assigning moral guilt in advance. It demands Jewish acquiescence without defining the conditions, the responsibilities, or the consequences. In this framing, peace is not something to be negotiated or built; it is something Jews are expected to concede to, regardless of whether the other side seeks it at all. This is plainly antisemitic.

Because, when “peace” is invoked only to pressure Jews to accept rockets as context, terrorism as grievance, and slaughter as understandable rage, “peace” ceases to be a moral aspiration and becomes a demand. A demand that Jews absorb violence so others can feel righteous. A demand that Jews disappear from the moral equation except as an obstacle to someone else’s conscience.

Peace without accountability is not peace. Peace without truth is not peace. And peace that requires Jews to surrender their right to self-defense, self-determination, or historical memory is not peace at all; it is the oldest expectation in a new disguise.

The problem is not simply that the word “peace” is abused, but what happens when that abuse is exposed. When the slogans are questioned and the assumptions challenged, the response tells you everything you need to know. Because there is a difference between misunderstanding and malice, between ignorance and antisemitism — and the difference reveals itself in how these “peaceniks” respond when they are challenged.

Ignorance is curious. It asks questions. It pauses when presented with new information. It is capable of saying, “I didn’t know that,” or “I need to think about this more.” An ignorant person may repeat a false or biased claim, but when confronted with evidence (history, context, or lived Jewish experience) they show signs of recalibration. Their goal is understanding, not vindication.

Antisemitism reacts differently. It does not engage with rebuttals in good faith; it searches for ways around them. When presented with facts that complicate a certain narrative, the response is not reflection; it’s resistance. The goal is not to learn, but to preserve a preconceived conclusion. New information is dismissed as propaganda. Jewish sources are treated as inherently untrustworthy. Jewish testimony is discounted because it is precisely that: Jewish.

This is where the mask often slips. The conversation stops being about evidence and becomes about suspicion. The Jew is no longer a participant in the discussion, but a suspect within it — too biased to be believed, too invested to be credible, too powerful to be honest. No amount of documentation is sufficient, because the problem was never a lack of information; it was a refusal to accept that Jews might be telling the truth about their own history and their own persecution.

An open-minded person is willing to have their worldview disrupted. An antisemite is only willing to consume information that confirms what they already believe. One is engaged in inquiry; the other in justification. One treats disagreement as an opportunity to learn; the other treats it as proof of conspiracy.

That distinction matters, because ignorance can be corrected. Antisemitism cannot — at least not until it stops disguising itself as skepticism or “critical thinking.” Genuine critical thinking applies the same standards to all sources and all claims. Antisemitism applies a unique burden of proof to Jews, then declares that burden unmet by definition.

When someone listens, adjusts, and wrestles with uncomfortable facts, there is hope. When someone reflexively dismisses Jewish voices, questions Jewish motives, and doubles down in the face of contradiction, the issue is no longer ignorance; it is something older, deeper, and far more dangerous, whether they are willing to admit it or not.

To function, antisemitism does not always require self-awareness. It does not always wait for admission, nor does it always depend on how someone labels themselves. A person can sincerely believe they are decent, kind, fair, and anti-racist — and still participate in antisemitism through the standards they apply, the narratives they excuse, and the voices they instinctively trust and distrust.

This is why intent is a poor defense. Antisemitism is not measured by how someone feels about Jews, but by whether Jews are denied the same credibility, empathy, and moral standing afforded to everyone else. When Jewish testimony is treated as suspect by default, when Jewish self-defense is framed as aggression, and when Jewish suffering requires justification while others’ does not, the outcome is antisemitic regardless of the speaker’s self-image.

The uncomfortable truth is that antisemitism often survives not just in people who openly hate Jews, but in people who insist they cannot possibly be part of the problem. It persists in the gap between who someone believes they are and what their beliefs actually produce.

And until that gap is confronted honestly, antisemitism will continue to wear the disguise of reason, morality, peace, and good intentions — long after those who practice it have convinced themselves they stand against it.

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