Stop antisemitism
Unacceptable from the right or left
Ihave recently been mulling over a cryptic quote which has intrigued me over many years, stemming back to when I was taking a course on the Holocaust. The quote is as follows: “The only place where the extreme left and the extreme right join hands is around the neck of the Jew.”
What came to mind at that time was the obvious comparison between the right-wing antisemitism in fascist Germany and left-wing antisemitism prevalent in Communist Russia. But that was then and this is now.
Volumes and volumes have been written about the history and development of antisemitism, from biblical times to the present. What seems to be the single common thread winding its way through all of these manifestations is the notion that Jews and Judaism are to blame for all specific ailments in society, too many to name at present. We who represent a tiny fraction (less than one quarter of one percent) of the world’s population seem to have been placed at the center of nearly every controversy and calamity, even if they are taking place halfway around the world from where Jews may live.
Back to the quote. According to both the FBI and the Anti-Defamation League, the great majority of antisemitic incidents through 2022 had come from people on the extreme right. This was most vividly shown during the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Va.—replete with the chanting of “Jews will not replace us” and “Blood and soil.” Extreme right-wing antisemitism also reared its ugly head during the 2021 near-siege of the U.S. Capitol, as anyone watching that spectacle could see and read signs of Jew-hatred— consisting of Nazi (and Confederate) flags, shirts, and epithets.
Right-wing antisemitism most often focuses on such subtexts as racial inferiority, replacement theory, white nationalism, globalism, physiology, and financial control (Jews as both capitalists and communists, simultaneously); basically, whatever threatens and challenges a people’s way of life was most often laid upon Jews and the Jewish community. And—of course—there remains the ages-old canard of Jews as Christ-killers.
There is also now a very visible— and unfortunately growing—antisemitism on the extreme left, seen most vividly and recently during the outrageous Oct. 7 raid by Hamas, but reaching back in history— mostly focused since 1967 on “the occupation.”
Unlike the antisemitism found on the extreme right, that on the extreme left is almost entirely based on the existence and policies of the state of Israel. Many of the extreme left’s discourse and actions have marginalized all Jews by blaming them for Israel’s policies. The very existence of Israel is seen as the main cause of all the problems in the Middle East, and today’s growing sympathies toward the populace of Gaza have—in addition—morphed into slogans designed to bring down the state of Israel.
Thus the odd parallel—from the left, Israel should not exist, and from the right, Jews should not exist. What is even more dangerous than either of those two philosophies taken alone is occurring today, when both antisemitisms are operating at the same time.
To paraphrase a quote from the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, we want these sets of hands—from both the extreme left and the extreme right—off our neck!
Rabbi Eugene Levy retired from Congregation B’nai Israel in 2011. He lives in Little Rock with his wife Bobbye.