The mayoral primary victory of the most anti-Jewish, anti-Zionist, pro-terrorist candidate in history has been greeted by silence (and in some cases support) from leading Democratic political figures. This represents a growing form of antisemitism that has not been sufficiently exposed and condemned.
During the Iran war, Ayatollah Khamenei instructed his military to target civilian neighborhoods in Tel Aviv, Haifa and other Israeli cities. A hospital in Beersheba was bombed. These are war crimes but so-called human rights organizations that complain loudly whenever Israel kills a civilian being used by Hamas as a human shield, have remained relatively silent about Iranian war crimes against Jewish and Israeli civilians.
Where are Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Doctors Without Borders and other groups that claim to support universal rights, when Jews and Israelis are the victims of war crimes? This is symptomatic of a more pervasive bigotry.
Antisemitism has taken on a new mechanism: the deliberate failure to defend the rights of Jews by groups that properly speak out against attempts to suppress the rights — speech, academic freedom and assembly — of African-Americans, gays, transgender people and other minorities. But they have remained silent in the face of increasing discrimination against Jews and violations of their most fundamental rights.
When Jews assembled in Boulder, Colo. to exercise their First Amendment right to protest the release of hostages taken by Hamas, Mohamed Sabry Soliman burned and murdered one protester and injured others. The response from the ACLU and civil liberties organizations to this attempt to suppress their free speech has been, to say the least, disappointing. Imagine if the same violence had been directed at a protest by Blacks, gays, transgender people or other minority groups.
The murder of two young people attending a reception at a Jewish museum in Washington did not spark the kind of outrage from these groups as would be expected if these young people were attending a Black or gay event.
Similarly, though there was widespread public outrage at the attempt to burn down the residence of Pennsylvania’s Jewish governor on Passover, there was little comment by rights groups.
This double standard is itself a manifestation of antisemitism. It reflects an attitude by many in the so-called human rights community that Jews — as a group — are oppressors, and, as such, less entitled to have violations of their rights prioritized.
In some respects, this new manifestation of the world’s oldest prejudice is even more threatening than overt antisemitism, because it is silent, passive and difficult to detect and call out.
The FBI and Homeland Security have just issued an advisory regarding antisemitic threats against Jewish and Israeli targets. Jews today are subjected to more antisemitic acts and expressions than they have been since the Holocaust. Antisemitism is increasing more quickly than other prejudices.
Most importantly the trajectory is in the wrong direction: because anti-Jewish bigotry — often masking as anti-Zionism — tends to be greatest among university students and other young people, it is likely to persist and influence future politics, academia and media.
The silence of these groups is ironic because Jews have been instrumental in fostering civil liberties and human rights. Jews were instrumental in the civil rights movement in the South during the 1960s (I know because I was there). Jews have been at the forefront of the civil liberties movement, with many — including me — on the national board of the ACLU. Now these concepts have been turned on their head, and bigotry against Jews has been largely ignored by these groups.
More precisely, Jews have been subjected to an invidious double standard: attacks, verbal and physical, that would never be tolerated against Blacks, gays and other minorities are not only tolerated, but often justified when directed at Jews.
Even those who argue that this is anti-Zionism not antisemitism, and that the former is legitimate, must acknowledge the double standard against Israel and Zionism. When rights and liberties groups ignore the rights of Jews and Israelis, that too is a form of double standard bigotry.
So this is a call to all those who regard themselves as advocates of human and civil rights and liberties. Prioritize the rights of those who are the most discriminated against today, and are likely to be even more discriminated against tomorrow: Jews and Zionists. Only you — especially non-Jews — can reverse this dangerous and immoral trend. Good people of every background must unite to protect the rights of Jews with the same vigor that Jews have shown in defending the rights of others.
Dershowitz’s latest book is “The Preventive State: The Challenge of Preventing Serious Harms While Preserving Essential Liberties.”
