In a recent exchange with some fellow retired US Foreign Service Officers, I pointed out that several of the demands made by the current administration, the media, and international organizations of Israel on its conduct of the war against Hamas constituted a form of ‘soft’ or subtle antisemitism. In the belief that others are open to hearing the truth about this form of antisemitism gaining traction in academia, the media, and the halls of political power, and to recall the need to live not just mouth the words “never Again” on this Holocaust Remembrance Day, I ask you to read on.
In America, in which tolerance and the ‘live-and-let-live’ attitude reigns, though not unchallenged by passionate ideologues of the supremacy of individualism now called personal autonomy, it takes obvious displays of antisemitism in the form of vandalism, speech inciting acts of violence, or violence against Jews for being Jews to get a response from the general American society. Because such acts of hatred are mercifully few relative to the number of criminals acts committed in a population of over 300 million souls, most Americans naively assume that antisemitism may be present in the hearts and minds of a small percentage of their fellow Americans, but not for most of us. But it’s not true.
While overt acts of antisemitism are immediately condemned, more subtle framing of Jews as not quite the same as the rest of us, which prepares the ground for sowing hatred of Jews as such, are either ignored willfully or simply unnoticed due to a lack of attention to subtle antisemitism in the general population.
At University decades ago, I heard many non-Jewish students refer to a particular fraternity, ZBT, as “zillions, billions, and trillions” vice Zeta Beta Tau. ZBT was also jokingly mocked as having the highest grade point average of all fraternities on campus, a subtle dig that its members could not hold their liquor and were not like other fraternities in being a place of refuge from the intense academic grind. In the former case, the slur on Jews as being money-grubbing was rather plain; in the latter, it was the subtle slur of “not being like us” that could be discerned. Of course, a good bit of admiration was mixed in, for many of the other fraternities envied ZBT’s ability to excel in their preparation for enriching careers in business and the professions while throwing some of the best and Saturday night parties on campus, though never during finals week as I recall.
But such slurs and subtle prejudices were not confined to College Fraternities. Who among us has not heard or heard about the slur that the fire that burned a faltering business’s building to the ground was caused by “Jewish Lightning”? Again, a slur that Jews care first and foremost for personal enrichment regardless of the ethics or legalities involved, a slur with deep Medieval roots that, like a pernicious weed, can be uprooted but never eradicated. While we decry the comparison made by overt antisemites to Jews as rats, or even weeds in our garden, we do little to counter the more subtle slights and prejudices. Always at the back of our mind is the thought that Jews just don’t fit in, and it’s their fault that they don’t. This expectation of conformity impinges on our tolerance for other religious groups “not quite like us” - Mormons, devout Catholics, religiously observant Muslims - but often reflects bewilderment with non-conforming social/dietary behavior. Only towards Jews is the disapproval based on their ethno-religious identity. Even the pernicious animus towards Black Americans seeks justification in the conduct of members of the Black community - the days of race-based discrimination based on pseudo-science about varying levels of intelligence, etc. across racial lines are over. The discrimination, nowadays most often subtle, against Jews continues.
In the political realm, another disquieting aspect of subtle antisemitism manifests itself - the double standard. In fact, it should be called a unique standard, that is, Jews, in particular the State of Israel, are held to a standard of conduct in matters of national security, international relations, and warfare unlike any other nation. The arguments for doing so are rich with echoes of the aforementioned examples of subtle antisemitism, in some cases laced with admiration. For example, because Israel has been exemplary in protecting civilians in the conduct of military operations, it must continue to exceed the expectations for avoiding civilian casualties (collateral damage) to which all other militaries are held. Likewise, the responsiveness of its domestic politics to the Common Good must not be judged in comparison to neighboring or regional countries’ internal governance, but compared to some lofty ideal that no nation-state has ever achieved.
This at times subtle, at other times not, antisemitism is the “prejudice of higher expectations”. It is the obverse of the prejudice of low expectations that said we should not tax the abilities of supposedly less-talented or developed groups. The prejudice of higher expectations sets Jews apart from the mainstream, placing on Jews a burden that no other people is expected to bear. Israel is expected to tolerate the presence on its doorstep of neighbors who have declared their intent to destroy Israel and murder or subjugate the Jews - we all know that that is the meaning of “from the River to the Sea”. Rather than being allowed to destroy that irredeemable and implacable foe, as the Union forces did to the Confederacy, as Allied Armies did to Nazi Power, as a ‘Coalition of the Willing’ did against ISIS, Israel must accept constraints on it just war against Hamas that would allow the weed of Jew hatred to survive in the tunnels of Gaza and certainly re-grow to strangle the State of Israel and all its Jewish citizens.
Justice is founded on two mutually supportive principles - all human persons are equal before the law, sharing in a common dignity; each person deserved to be treated fairly, held to the same standard of conduct of all others. Therefore, Justice demands that we end the subtle antisemitism of the prejudice of higher expectations, for it neither respects equality of treatment nor fairness in treatment of Jews.
Never again. Hamas Delenda Est
Excellent piece!