U.S. Jews Seek Response to Confluence of Hatred

 Henry Srebrnik, [Halifax] Chronicle Herald

Today, according to the founders of a new organization, American Jews face assaults simultaneously from four major ideological camps. White nationalists attack Jews the name of white supremacy. Radical black nationalists attack Jews in the name of black liberation and “equity.”

Many progressives and segments of the Democratic Party promote the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel and anti-Jewish critical race theory, in the name of “social justice” and Palestinian nationalism. Finally, radical Islamists, many from anti-Semitic cultures, preach incitement against Jews.

Yet Jewish establishment organizations whose mission is the defence and well-being of the community -- the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), the American Jewish Committee (AJC), the Jewish Federations, and the networks of Jewish Community Relations Councils (JCRCs) -- are failing to protect American Jewry, they assert.

In response, therefore, in July Avi Goldwasser and Charles Jacobs, along with activists across the United States, launched a grassroots non-profit initiative, the Jewish Leadership Project (JLP), to demand that these major Jewish organizations cease subordinating the safety and welfare of the Jewish-American community to partisan ideology.

Much of the JLP’s analysis of failed Jewish leadership was recently featured in essays published in a 2022 issue of White Rose magazine, edited by Jacobs and Goldwasser, whose influential non-profit projects have ranged from highlighting the hostility faced by Jews on college campuses to exposing the threats Islamists pose in the United States.

For his work in helping to liberate thousands of Black slaves from jihadist raiders in Sudan, Coretta Scott King presented Charles Jacobs with Boston’s Freedom Award.

Jacobs and Goldwasser realize that efforts to combat external foes cannot prevail given the feckless leadership within Jewish organizations. “Jewish Americans are under siege,” stated Goldwasser. “Campuses are rife with Jew-hatred. Jews have been attacked on the streets of Boston, Brooklyn and Los Angeles, and murdered in Pittsburgh, San Diego, Monsey, and Jersey City. They have been defamed by media outlets such as the New York Times and CNN, and even maligned by members of Congress.”

Goldwasser asserted that “Many once-venerable Jewish organizations have primarily become front groups for progressive political interests. The significant danger
the Jewish community faces today is an indictment of these institutions and their leadership.”

“White supremacists are an immediate, lethal threat to the Jewish-American community, but the growing animus against Jews among black radicals, anti-Zionist leftists, and Islamic extremists constitutes the longer-term peril,” added Jacobs. “Unfortunately, establishment Jewish organizations are now led by individuals who refuse to recognize the nature of 21st-century Jew-hatred, let alone combat it, and so
have abdicated their responsibility to the people they are meant to serve. They have abandoned their missions, are losing credibility, and must radically change course or step aside before the Jewish-American suffers additional harm.”

Establishment Jewish leaders often seem more preoccupied by their social standing than demonstrating real concern for the Jewish community’s predicament. They also seem to have missed the dramatic shift in America’s cultural and political landscape, which has taken place over the last several decades.

Anti-Zionism in particular, has made Jew-hatred culturally and socially acceptable under the guise of human rights and free speech. Yet almost every major Jewish legacy organization failed to see the long-term consequences. This has especially been an issue on college and university campuses and has contributed to the fact that 50 per cent of American Jewish students now feel that “they must hide who they are out of fear,” according to an American Jewish Committee poll.

The survey was included in the Committee’s annual “State of Antisemitism in America” report, released on October 25, 2021.The report showed deep anxiety among Americans about its severity.

“We need strong, proud, and courageous leaders willing to confront those who would do us harm,” Jacobs asserted. “JLP is the first Jewish organization in America that not only recognizes the state of emergency, but also is mobilizing to carry out substantive change to counter the threats we face.”

As a vulnerable minority, Jews have usually made public criticism of their leaders a near taboo. But this must change. Jewish leaders need fresh ideas. The American Jewish community must engage in open discussions, by encouraging broad community participation about the crisis they face.

The JLP is already attracting supporters, having established over a dozen teams throughout the United States.