The Jews have a woefully weak position on antisemitism.

Jewish identity cannot be contingent on outside approval. It must be rooted in self-respect, strength, and knowing that our values are only meaningful when paired with the power to protect them.

photo: Levi Meir Clancy/Unsplash

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While I was reading about this week’s shooting at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., I couldn’t help but notice an interesting quote from Yoni Kalin, an eyewitness who was at the American Jewish Committee event inside the museum that evening.

“This event was about humanitarian aid,” said Kalin. “How can we actually help both the people in Gaza and the people in Israel? How can we bring together Muslims and Jews and Christians to work together to actually help innocent people? And then here he is just murdering two people in cold blood.”

And that, in a nutshell, unfortunately describes many Jews’ oblivious outlook to antisemitism: We are the only people on Earth who try to reason with the people trying to kill us. Or, in this case, organizing humanitarian aid for people who just slaughtered, raped, and kidnapped our own.

While antisemitism metastasizes into violence, many Jews are still stuck in dialogue panels, armed with talking points and donor-funded tote bags. We continue to believe that if we just explain ourselves better — if we’re kinder, more understanding, less “tribal” — the hate will subside. If we just hold more interfaith Seders, or post more infographics, or join hands with people who have never once condemned Jewish blood spilled in the streets, then maybe — maybe — they’ll stop hating us.

This strategy is not just naive. It is dangerous.

There is a glaring asymmetry in how Jews respond to antisemitism versus how other groups defend themselves. When other minorities are attacked, they’re allowed — encouraged, even — to fight back, assert their identity, and demand unapologetic protection.

But when Jews are targeted, we are told to “understand the context.” We ourselves often parrot this language, afraid to appear too “parochial” or “defensive.” We universalize our pain and bend over backwards to turn every anti-Jewish massacre into a teachable moment for someone else’s cause.

Jews are, by and large, conflict-averse. We value education, diplomacy, nuance. These are noble traits. But when we apply them to people who are not operating in good faith — who are ideologically committed to our erasure — we are not peacemakers. We are useful idiots.

After every synagogue shooting, campus riot, or murdered Jew in broad daylight, there’s a predictable script: vigils, speeches about “uniting against all hate,” and op-eds in major newspapers that manage to denounce antisemitism without ever naming its source. All of it feels like spiritual busywork: a performance to make ourselves feel in control of something we clearly are not.

Worse, this weak position is broadcast to the world. It tells antisemites that Jews will never organize meaningful resistance. That we’ll always seek “dialogue” before self-defense. That we will be more afraid of being seen as overreacting than we are of being attacked.

No other people are asked to apologize for their trauma the way Jews are. When we mourn, we’re told we’re being dramatic. When we defend ourselves, we’re accused of aggression. When we assert our right to live (not just exist, but live), we’re labeled as oppressors. This isn’t just double standards. It’s moral isolation, a form of exile as real as any ghetto or shtetl. And far too many Jews have internalized it.

This is why so many attacks on Jews go unpunished, and why so many university administrators, government officials, and cultural influencers feel comfortable ignoring our pain. They’ve seen the Jewish community’s Pavlovian instinct to forgive, contextualize, and intellectualize even the most visceral violence against us.

And many Jews wear this weakness like a badge of honor: “Look how tolerant we are. Even as we’re being murdered, we still show up to interfaith meetings.” But there is no moral high ground in suicide. Our unwillingness to call out antisemitism, especially when it comes from groups we’ve been conditioned to see as “oppressed,” is not enlightened. It’s suicidal.

We would rather preserve our “progressive” credibility than our safety. We would rather be liked by the world than respected. In our desperation to be seen as “just like everyone else,” we’ve erased the very particularism that makes Judaism worth preserving. We trade in Jewish identity for vague slogans about “humanity,” forgetting that universal values mean nothing without a rooted people to uphold them. A Judaism that forgets it is distinct will soon find it has nothing left to defend.

And that’s exactly why the world continues to kick us in the teeth and expect us to apologize for getting blood on their boots.

We need to change our posture; not our values, but our posture. Jewish safety must become non-negotiable. Jewish dignity cannot depend on how well we explain ourselves. We don’t need more allies who love us as long as we agree with them politically. We need courage: moral clarity backed by action.

This means naming antisemitism, even when it’s politically inconvenient. This means defending ourselves without guilt. This means drawing red lines and meaning it when we say: “Never again!”

Because if “never again” doesn’t come with teeth, it’s just another empty slogan.

The Jewish People are not weak. Our ancient and modern contributions to humanity — science, medicine, art, law, ethics — are vast. But our position on antisemitism is weak, and it is being exploited.

To add insult to injury, too many Jewish organizations are still stuck in a 1990s framework: press releases, interfaith luncheons, and polite requests for “understanding.” But this is not a polite moment. This is not a moment for op-eds and donor dinners. This is a moment for moral clarity, institutional backbone, and unapologetic defense of Jewish life — everywhere. And if our existing organizations can’t provide that, then we need new ones that can.

It’s time to retire the fantasy that if we just act good enough, the world will stop hating us. It won’t. But, if we act strong enough, it might think twice before hurting us again.

There is a lesson in modern Jewish history that too many Diaspora Jews seem determined to ignore — and it’s written in the sand and blood of the Middle East. When Israel was established in 1948, it was not welcomed with open arms. It was immediately invaded by five Arab armies that vastly outnumbered and outgunned the fledgling Jewish state. Their goal was not coexistence. It was annihilation.

The Jews didn’t hold a dialogue circle. They didn’t ask to be understood. They fought — and won. Over the next 75 years, Israel was attacked again and again: in 1956, 1967, 1973, and through countless terror campaigns. And each time, Israel did what Jews elsewhere often struggle to do: It responded with resolve. It didn’t seek permission. It acted in self-defense — swiftly, decisively, and unapologetically.

And guess what happened?

The Arab nations that once vowed to drive Israel into the sea eventually realized: This is a people that will not be broken.

Egypt, which launched wars against Israel in 1948, 1956, and 1973, became the first Arab nation to sign a peace treaty with the Jewish state in 1979. Jordan, once part of a pan-Arab effort to destroy Israel, followed in 1994. Why? Because Israel’s strength earned their respect. Not strength for its own sake, but strength rooted in legitimacy, clarity, and the unshakable will to survive.

Israel didn’t gain peace by being liked. It gained peace by being strong. The Jewish People in the Diaspora would do well to remember this. In the face of hatred, we must not beg to be liked. We must act in ways that compel respect — even from those who don’t love us. Being liked is fleeting. Being respected is protection.

Even then, we can go back even further in Jewish history. Spanish Jewry thought it had assimilated. It gave the world Maimonides, diplomats, poets, financiers — and then came 1492. German Jews thought they had made it. They were professors, soldiers, doctors, civil servants — and then came 1933. American Jews, until October 7th, thought they were immune. We built institutions, donated billions, marched for other people’s causes, and now American Jews are afraid to walk around with a Star of David.

The pattern is clear. Safety doesn’t come from acceptance. It comes from vigilance. And, when necessary, defiance.

Throughout history, Jews have been forced to adapt, to survive in exile, to navigate hostile societies with our heads down and our words carefully measured. But Israel was a return to something ancient, a Judaism of agency. A Judaism of sovereignty. A Judaism not afraid to say: “We are here, and we are not going anywhere.”

And that identity shift matters.

For too long, many Jews — especially in the West — have confused moral passivity with moral superiority. We’ve been conditioned to believe that weakness is virtue, that to be a “light unto the nations” means enduring abuse with infinite patience.

Not all Diaspora Jews are guilty of this, though. I remember reading last year about a group of Jews in Los Angeles who took matters into their own hands and went to UCLA to confront the so-called “pro-Palestinian” demonstrators who were intimidating Jewish students and physically blocking their access to campus.

I thought: “Finally!” Finally, a group of Jews who didn’t wait for permission to defend their dignity, who didn’t write another strongly worded letter to the administration, who didn’t beg to be treated fairly. They showed up. They stood tall. And they made it clear: If you come for us, we will come for you.

Let’s recall that Judaism has never been a religion of martyrdom. It’s a religion of covenant — of obligation, of purpose, and of life. “Choose life,” the Torah says. Not appeasement. Not surrender. Life. And life means strength.

To be clear, Jewish strength is not about vengeance. It’s about survival with integrity. It’s the strength of David facing Goliath. Of Masada’s last defenders. Of Soviet refuseniks. Of IDF soldiers who rescue hostages while under rocket fire. Of Jews at UCLA showing up for each other, unafraid.

Strength doesn’t mean abandoning Jewish values. It means finally living them with deep-seated courage, pride, and confidence.

Israel, for all its imperfections, has internalized this truth. Now it is time the Jewish Diaspora does too.

Jewish identity cannot be contingent on outside approval. It must be rooted in self-respect. In boundaries. In strength. In knowing that our values — justice, compassion, peace — are only meaningful when paired with the power to protect them.

Because, whether in Jerusalem or Washington, D.C., history has made one thing brutally clear: No one will protect the Jews if the Jews are unwilling to protect themselves.

And history is watching.

Just as the world now recoils in horror at the memory of the Nazis, it will one day speak the same way about Hamas. History will not be kind to Hamas, or to the regimes and individuals who fund, cheer, and justify its barbarism. Sooner or later, the sane, respectable world will look back on Hamas the way it looks back on the Nazis: as a death cult animated by genocidal hatred, willing to sacrifice its own people just to kill Jews.

And yet, what’s even more disturbing is how many Jews today are still trying to win over their sympathizers. Can you imagine Jews, 80 years ago, trying to garner the approval of actual Nazis? Holding teach-ins about Kristallnacht with the SS? Asking Joseph Goebbels to please understand their side of the story?

It’s insane — but, somehow, this is what’s happening now. We see Jews pleading with people who glorify Hamas, begging them to see our humanity, hoping that if we just show enough empathy, they’ll stop chanting “Globalize the intifada!” and start liking us.

It didn’t work in 1939. It won’t work in 2025.

We do not need the approval of those who want us gone. We need resolve. We need courage. And we need to remember that Jewish dignity has never come from being liked; it has always come from knowing who we are, standing firm in that identity, and refusing to bow.

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