In the Jewish calendar, the festival of Purim is celebrated tonight and tomorrow. Purim is a holiday that commemorates the saving of the Jewish people from the genocidal Haman’s plan to exterminate all the Jews living in the ancient Persian Empire in the 5th century B.C.. (How fittingly like Hamas Haman’s name sounds!) According to the Book of Esther, the ur-anti-Semite Haman persuaded King Ahasuerus (possibly to be identified with the Persian Emperor Xerxes I) to kill all the Jews in his empire. But his plans were foiled by Mordecai and his adopted daughter Esther, who had previously providentially risen to become Queen of Persia. The day destined for the genocide became instead a day of deliverance and since then a day of feasting and rejoicing – a fun holiday with a seriously relevant message and a reminder of the world’s perennially oldest hatred.
The Purim story highlights how hatred of Jews is even older than the Christianity that historically – and understandably so – has born the brunt of the blame for most of the anti-semitism that has poisoned western civilization for so many centuries. While remnants of that may still survive, anti-semitism is now widely in evidence especially on the secular post-religious left. (Of course, Marxism and its variants were themselves secularized versions of Christian eschatology. But very, very secularized!)
In the April Atlantic, Franklin Foer, in an article entitled « The Golden Age of American Jews Is Ending, » describes the growing experience of American Jews’ seemingly newfound recognition that the rising tide of anti-semitism in the U.S. is bringing to a close what he calls « an unprecedented period of safety and prosperity for Jewish Americans. » Certainly the escalation of anti-semitism in the U.S. since the October 7 terrorist attack on Israel appears to have come as something of a surprise to many.
Revealingly, one of those referenced in Foer’s article is quoted as having « moved her family from Chicago to Berkeley six years earlier, hoping to find a community that shared her progressive values. » Perhaps a little more mature reflection on some of those « progressive values » might have been in order, if not to avoid such a move then at least to accompany the move with an open-eyed perception of the persistence of the world’s oldest hatred. The author himself admits to having « consoled myself with the thought that once Trump disappeared from the scene, the explosion of Jew hatred would recede. America would revert to its essential self: the most comfortable homeland in the Jewish diaspora. »
« Among the brutal epiphanies of October 7, » however, has been the author’s recognition that « a disconcertingly large number of Israel’s critics on the left » do not « believe Jews had a right to a nation of their own. »
There is, I believe, a particular pathology to left-wing anti-zionist anti-semitism. At any moment, there are wars and ethnic and racial violence going on all around the world, oppressions of various sorts from Africa to Tibet. Yet seldom do any of these conflicts result in, for example, local government agencies like the Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board demanding a ceasefire! There seems to be something special about Jews defending themselves that somehow deeply offends certain « progressive » sensibilities.
In his article, Foer effectively depicts an important transformation which American culture has been experiencing:
« America’s ascendant political movements—MAGA on one side, the illiberal left on the other—would demolish the last pillars of the consensus that Jews helped establish. They regard concepts such as tolerance, fairness, meritocracy, and cosmopolitanism as pernicious shams. The Golden Age of American Jewry has given way to a golden age of conspiracy, reckless hyperbole, and political violence, all tendencies inimical to the democratic temperament. Extremist thought and mob behavior have never been good for Jews. And what’s bad for Jews, it can be argued, is bad for America. »
Even now, after all that has been said and done by the anti-semitic left since October 7, some still want to suggest that there can be legitimate « anti-zionism » which is not anti-semitism. Of course, insofar as Israel acts as a state in the international order, its particular leaders are obviously fallible and its policies subject to analysis and legitimate critique. Witness, for example, Senate Majority Leader’s laudable speech challenging Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s policies and indeed his long-term continuation in office, effectively calling for much needed regime change in Israel. But criticizing a particular politician and advocating a change in government is one thing. Rejecting the very concept of the Jewish state (in a way that few would reject the very concept of an American or British or French or German state) is a very different matter. As one correspondent quoted by NY Times columnist Michelle Goldberg on this issue expressed it, “Israel is the political entity through which the Jewish people exercises its natural right of self-determination and control over its own fate. How is singling out the Jewish people to deprive it of those rights not antisemitic?”
Photo: Esther Denouncing Haman (1888) by Ernest Normand (1857-1923)
