12/21 Links Pt2: Black America’s Anti-Semitism Problem; 2022 the Deadliest Year for Palestinians? What the Media Didn't Tell You; Chanukah bus incident victims to mark a year since attack

From Ian:

JPost Editorial: Contemporary antisemitism should be taught in schools

While Mann commended the “great strides” made in promoting greater awareness of genocide, he said antisemitism “can take many forms” and “it is not enough to teach about the Holocaust.”

As Klein pointed out, Mann’s latest recommendations follow significant progress that has been said to have been made in recent years in combating antisemitism in the UK and worldwide, resulting from two landmark reports published by the UK All-Party Parliamentary Group against Antisemitism in 2006 and 2015.

One reason for the new report, supported by valued input from stakeholders across the country, was to identify what more needs to be done.

“If this scale of incidence among young people is not tackled, then we are storing up potentially serious problems for the future as well as for the present,” Mann wrote.

Among the recommendations made by Mann is that school leadership teams should be offered guidance from the government on how to deal with incidents of antisemitic hate. This should include how to report incidents that did not happen at school but involved either the targeting of students or students as perpetrators.

A British government spokesperson said in response to the report: “Antisemitism, as with all forms of bullying and hatred, is abhorrent and has no place in our education system. The atrocities of the Holocaust are a compulsory part of national curriculum for history at key stage 3, and we support schools to construct a curriculum that enables the discussion of important issues such as antisemitism.”

We believe Mann’s findings and recommendations should be taken seriously, not just by the British government but by other governments in Europe and around the world.

It is one thing to teach about the Holocaust in schools; it’s quite another to educate students against hatred of all forms, including antisemitism.

As Mann so elegantly put it, the UK government and others should “act on my new calls for action before this form of racism poisons the minds of many more young people.”

Black America’s Anti-Semitism Problem

The effect was most pronounced among young blacks and Hispanics. Both groups were 16 percentage points more likely to agree than whites in their age group. Anti-Semitism was particularly common among young blacks and Hispanics who called themselves "conservative." But that was a small group, and anti-Semitism was more common even among liberal blacks compared with liberal whites. Black and Hispanic young adults, in fact, were about as likely to agree with at least one of the statements as were white "alt-right" identifiers in the same age group.

Hispanics are often lumped with whites in hate crime data, so it is difficult to trace precisely the implications of this prejudice among Hispanics, which is an under-discussed and undercovered aspect of the story.

Hersh and Royden's survey also allowed them to examine several theories of the causes of anti-Semitism. One was "minority group competition": the idea that fighting over scarce resources like housing provokes anti-Semitism. Another was the idea that anti-Semitism is a manifestation of anti-whiteness: As James Baldwin put it, "Negroes are anti-Semitic because they're anti-white." A third, opposite possibility was the idea that people disliked Jews because they dislike Israel and because they supported the Palestinians. And fourth is that demographic or behavioral differences—for example, that minority groups are less well-educated or more likely to go to church—explains the variation.

None of these explanations stood up to scrutiny.

Take group differences. Hersh and Royden statistically controlled for both church and college attendance. While each mattered for whether or not someone held anti-Semitic beliefs, holding them constant blacks are still much more likely than whites to have anti-Semitic views. The authors also compare respondents in states with and without a lot of Jewish people (doable because most Jews live in just a few states). Again, race still predicts anti-Semitic views, meaning that proximity to Jews—"minority group competition"—doesn't explain the difference.

Similarly, Hersh and Royden argue that black anti-Semitism is more than just anti-white bias. That's because they measure views, like whether Jews are more loyal to Israel than America, that only apply to Jews, not whites. They also rule out the idea that anti-Semitism is just a function of pro-Palestinian views: Remarkably, blacks and Hispanics were more favorable toward Israel than whites across three separate measures.

To supplement this, Hersh and Royden asked respondents who said they believed Jews had too much power in which domains they had such power. Very few respondents—7 percent of blacks/Hispanics and 9 percent of whites—selected only Israel and Palestine. Instead, these respondents said Jews had too much power in areas like news media, finance, and entertainment. This suggests that anti-Semitic bias is not driven by anti-Israel views.

Having ruled out these popular explanations, Hersh and Royden are left only to speculate on the causes of black anti-Semitism. They point to the rising salience of victimhood in American culture, arguing that it may either make people more prone to embracing conspiracy theories or provoke competition over "victim" status. It is also possible, of course, that anti-Semitic views are just a product of prejudice—no need for further explanation.

What is apparent is that the views propounded by individuals like West and Irving are not unusual, particularly among black Americans. Unlike other forms of prejudice, Hersh and Royden observe, anti-Semitism is not fading among younger Americans: At least among minorities, the oldest hatred isn't going away any time soon.

Jonathan Tobin: Jews don’t need another left-wing advocacy group

The federations, whose purpose is to represent and raise funds from the entire Jewish community, were used to the JCPA acting like a Democratic Party auxiliary operation. But the latter’s behavior could be justified as the product of a consensus among the majority of Jews who are politically liberal and vote for the Democrats.

But its endorsement in 2020 of BLM was a bridge too far for many in the mainstream Jewish world. For Jewish federations—led for the most part by liberal professionals and donors—to be tied to a group linked to radical anti-Israel and antisemitic advocacy was intolerable, although in the midst of the moral panic set off by the death of George Floyd, many acquiesced. But it created a rift that caused JCPA activists to want to liberate themselves from even the minimal restraints that the connection to the federations brought.

Were this merely a matter of a tiff between Jewish Democrats and Republicans or generic liberals and conservatives, it wouldn’t warrant much attention. But the road that the new JCPA and a lot of its competition are taking—by adopting the catechisms of BLM and DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion)—is particularly noteworthy and dangerous.

Indeed, the JCPA is siding with forces that are driving left-wing antisemitism and Jew-hatred in the African-American community—highlighted by recent incidents involving celebrities like Kanye West and the epidemic of black attacks on Orthodox Jews in New York City.

Rather than an invigorated Jewish leadership, the new JCPA is additional evidence of the catastrophic and disgraceful failure of the existing liberal establishment. It’s not only a waste of scarce Jewish resources; it also reveals the intellectual bankruptcy of liberals who claim to speak for Jews but are actually working against Jewish interests and security. Redundancy and waste are bad enough. But the current situation is a moral calamity.

Why the ADL abandoned Antisemitism and went woke

The ADL’s education curriculum had started out teaching tolerance, but now teaches intolerance, and advocates partisan politics. Despite the organization’s origins, its handbook is notable for mentioning Jewish people only three times, once in the ADL’s background and twice in its definition of antisemitism.

But the ADL is not a Jewish organization anymore. It’s a generically lucrative leftist group which provides bias insurance to schools while joining in leftist attacks on conservatives.

A few years after Greenblatt came on board, the ADL announced a new program together with eBay billionaire Pierre Omidyar: one of the leading funders of the anti-Israel Left. ADL Senior VP Eileen Hershenov was the former general counsel for Soros’ Open Society octopus.

“Kudos to my former boss, George Soros,” she gushed.

Hershenov oversees the ADL’s partnership with the Aspen Institute, funded by Soros. The joint ADL-Aspen program’s civil society fellows included the founding Co-Director of the Open Society Foundation’s Economic Justice Program.

Small wonder that Greenblatt attacks any critics of Soros and the ADL, formerly critical of the Nazi collaborating billionaire, now has a page dedicated to defending the antisemitic leftist.

The ADL’s funders and partners list increasingly resembles those of most leftist activist groups with $1 million from Craigslist’s Craig Newmark, the Rockefellers, the Ford Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation and the Walton Family Foundation. There’s nothing Jewish here.

As an organization, the ADL doesn’t belong in Jewish circles, and its educational curriculum doesn’t belong in any schools.

Are Jews equal under Islam?

Filmed by @el_soco pic.twitter.com/zLzOlbX0sC

— Israel Advocacy Movement (@israel_advocacy) December 20, 2022

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10/14 Links Pt2: Phillips: Hysteria greets British PM's embassy move proposal; Amnesty UK refuses to sack official who likened Israel’s Gaza policies to the Shoah

From Ian:

Melanie Phillips: Hysteria greets British PM's embassy move proposal

Few expect that the British embassy will actually be moved. Indeed, given the chaos that has engulfed Truss since she became prime minister, with the financial crisis and collapse in electoral support sparked by her scorched-earth economic policies currently threatening to bring her down before she has her feet properly under the Downing Street table, moving the embassy would hardly seem to be a priority.

If it were to happen, however, it would not only be an enormous boost to Israel. It would also represent a dramatic change in British policy.

Unlike the US, where despite various presidents' relative coolness towards Israel the Christian heartlands remain solidly supportive, Britain's attitude towards the Jewish state has always been at best ambiguous and at worst – as in Mandatory Palestine – actively hostile.

Moving the embassy would not only start to reset Britain's shameful attitude towards Israel. It would also advance the cause of peace.

The only reason this century-old conflict continues is that the Palestinian Arabs have repudiated the two-state solution. They have refused repeated offers of a state of their own, because their goal is not a Palestinian state but the eradication of the Israeli one.

Towards this infernal goal, their principal weapon has been the refusal by Britain and other western countries to recognize the Palestinians' real agenda, providing them instead with funding, training and diplomatic recognition.

In other words, Britain and the rest of the west have incentivized, rewarded and perpetuated the war against Israel by going along with the morally bankrupt proposition that the Palestinian Arabs are entitled to a state of their own, even though their actual purpose is to use that state as a means to destroy Israel.

By moving the embassy, Truss – who describes herself as a "huge Zionist" – would be signaling an end to the shameful British capitulation to the Palestinians' lies and blackmail.

That is precisely why there's been such a reaction. While the average British citizen doesn't have an opinion about Israel one way or the other, Britain's elites loathe Israel on a scale that just doesn't exist in America.

The proposal to move the British embassy has lifted a stone, and we can all see what has crawled out from underneath.

Amnesty UK refuses to sack official who likened Israel’s Gaza policies to the Shoah

Amnesty International UK is defying calls to sack a senior official who shared a post comparing Israel to Nazi Germany and likened the Jewish state’s treatment of Palestinians to the Holocaust.

Garry Ettle, who represents the human rights charity as “country coordinator for Israel and Occupied Palestinian territories”, retweeted a message asking how video footage showing Israeli youths shouting at a Palestinian woman was “any different from Nazi Germany”.

The activist called Israel’s policies towards Gaza a “slow holocaust” in a Facebook message posted on 27 January 2020.

He also condemned US band Black Eyed Peas for playing a gig in “apartheid Israel” in another social media post last year.

Mr Ettle’s hardline views, which were revealed by online investigations group GnasherJew, have led to calls for Amnesty International UK to sack him.

Tory peer Lord Leigh of Hurley, an executive board member of the Conservative Friends of Israel, told the JC he thought Mr Ettle should be dismissed, adding: “Amnesty International UK has a very worrying record and this is the moment for decisive action to be taken by them.”

And a spokesperson for advocacy group Campaign Against Antisemitism said: “Only at Amnesty and like-minded organisations could someone who allegedly compares Israel to Nazis describe himself as a ‘human-rights activist’.

“Such comparisons are a breach of the universally accepted International Definition of Antisemitism. We would call on Amnesty to investigate and dissociate itself from this individual, but the organisation’s record on antisemitism gives little reason to think that it holds the views of the Jewish community in anything but contempt.”

Both the left and the right have turned on the Jews

Conservatives claim to abhor anti-Semitism, and yet foolishly believe they can ride the coattails of non-conservative loose cannons like Kanye West and greedily feed off the cultural scraps that fall to the ground; all while trampling on the supposed principles that were their “hills to die on” in their battles with the opposing side.

Kanye West, who in a matter of days argued that Jared Kushner sought peace in the Middle East to make money, repeatedly promoted the radical Black Hebrew Israelite conspiracy theory that American blacks are the “real Jews,” implied that Jews created cancel culture and announced that he would be going “death con 3” on “Jewish people,” has shown no signs of apologizing.

And yet, days later, conservatives celebrated Kanye West—an open and unapologetic anti-Semite—on the red carpet, labeling his very presence iconic.

A line has been crossed.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez spoke with Jeremy Corbyn and said veiled anti-Semitic things in the past, and conservative media—myself included—never let it go. And quite rightly so.

Kanye West, who has far more cultural influence than Ocasio-Cortez, pushed multiple explicit anti-Semitic tropes, and what was the result?

Many high-profile conservatives shrugged and moved on that same day. Some didn’t even shrug at all.

Now, many have responded to my vocal criticism of this appalling conduct with “whataboutism,” declaring that the leftist media ignores anti-Semitism all the time.

Yes, they do. So what?

I was under the impression that we were meant to be the principled ones. If that is true, where on earth are our principles?

I do understand the attitude of wanting to bring culturally-powerful people into our tent based on their supposedly aligned views on single-issue topics. (Let’s leave aside for now the fact that Kanye West’s “pro-life” views are based on an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory.) However, if there are no entry requirements to the ideological tent, if admission numbers are the only metric of value, what does that tent even represent?

Until our movement is willing to look in the mirror and stick to their supposed principles, the Jewish people cast out from this tent will wonder whether any of this is worth fighting for.

Yet again, Jews are alone.

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