In the last year there has been a wave of anti-Semitism in the United States and abroad coming from the left. How has this affected the traditional alignments of Jews with the left?
Brooks: There is no doubt that the most vicious and troubling anti-Semitism is coming from the left, especially the intellectual left of the University campuses. It is no small irony that the Jewish community, while embracing the left, has always feared anti-Semitism from the Evangelical right and now we are seeing our strongest support and solidarity coming from the Evangelicals and the most pernicious anti-Semitism coming from the left. This will no doubt give support to those who are beginning to feel that the Democratic party no longer represents them and can’t be trusted to stand by Israel when there is a crisis.
Weinstein: The ice is beginning to break. All the major Jewish organizations have shifted to the right on defense policy because of Israel. Some, like the American Jewish Committee, are even beginning rethink their longstanding commitment to mass immigration. Antipathy to the Christian right, once the bread and butter of groups like the ADL, has waned significantly because of the Christian Right’s love and devotion to Israel. But the ADL and other mainstream Jewish groups are not dropping their liberal social agenda any time soon. Others, though, are turning more clearly to the right. On college campuses throughout America, we are seeing the rise of a significant number of a new type of neo-conservative: formerly liberal Jewish college students rejecting the left-wing ideology of their anti-Israel professors. We’re seeing it in France among certain Jewish intellectuals, most notably Alain Finkielkraut, who have broken with the mainstream left over Israel.
Jacoby: I don’t think the tectonic plates have shifted, but again, American Jews are gradually noticing what is taking place. Currently, anti-Semitism in America can be found almost exclusively where the left holds sway, particularly on college campuses and in the black community. The anti-Jewish hostility at places like San Francisco State University, the new ”divestment” movement that likens Israel to South Africa under apartheid, the anti-Semitic poetry of Amiri Baraka — even for die-hard American Jewish liberals, it is getting hard not to notice that the most pronounced enmity is coming from the left.
Charen: Jews bristle every time some Baptist says they can’t get into Heaven, but when campuses are aflame with fashionable Israel-bashing and tolerance for Muslim anti-Semitism, they are strangely quiet. Jews are on auto-pilot most of the time, responding in Pavlovian fashion to perceived (and often misperceived) slights from the right, but hardly noticing the far more common and more dangerous anti-Semitism of the left.
Rauch: It appears that those Jews on the more moderate side of the left have had their eyes opened to the left’s anti-Semitic attitudes. This will certainly affect how some Jews vote in the future. However, the majority will probably still vote towards the left and hope that the racism is just a temporary aberration (which it’s not).
Bill Clinton made it clear that he preferred the Israeli Labor Party to the party of Netanyahu and Sharon; in fact, he threw his considerable weight behind defeating Netanyahu and the Likud Party so that Peres and Barak could give Arafat what he wanted. Bush by contrast seems close to Sharon and has called him a man of peace. How has that impacted Jews?
Brooks: There is no doubt that Bush and Sharon share a close personal relationship of mutual trust and purpose. Unlike the media portrayal of Sharon as a warmonger, the president knows Sharon as an old warrior who only wants peace and security for his people. However, unlike his predecessor, President Bush refuses to involve himself in Israeli domestic elections. All of these things demonstrate to the Jewish community how different President Bush is from other leaders and why he is such a committed friend.
