For generations, anti-Semitism was treated as one of civilization’s great moral disgraces — the ancient prejudice that culminated in ghettos, pogroms, and ultimately the Holocaust. Yet today, Jew-hatred has returned in forms both familiar and newly fashionable, often disguised as moral sophistication or political activism.
Since the October 7, 2023 Hamas atrocities against Israeli civilians, we have witnessed an eruption of hostility toward Jews across the Western world. On college campuses, mobs have harassed Jewish students, glorified terrorism, and treated Israel’s very existence as uniquely illegitimate. Synagogues have required increased security. Jewish businesses and neighborhoods have been vandalized. Chants once confined to extremist fringes now echo openly in supposedly enlightened institutions.
This hatred is not always expressed directly. Sometimes it appears in the form of grotesque accusations held to a standard no other nation on earth is expected to meet. A recent New York Times opinion essay by Nicholas Kristof illustrates the problem. In discussing allegations involving Israeli prison abuse, Kristof referenced claims that Israeli personnel used dogs in acts of sexual violence against Palestinian prisoners. Yes, it doesn’t get any more irresponsible than this – dogs being trained to rape human beings, which is an anatomical impossibility. Shame on Mr. Kristof for even passing along such filthy obscenities. Such inflammatory allegations demand the highest evidentiary threshold and the greatest journalistic caution. Instead, they were presented in a manner that many readers could easily interpret as credible, which they are not.
Responsible journalism requires more than merely repeating incendiary accusations. It requires judgment, skepticism, and an awareness of historical context. Jews have endured centuries of blood libels and monstrous fabrications portraying them as uniquely evil or sadistic. Journalists should recognize that history before amplifying sensational claims that will almost certainly inflame hatred and deepen division.
Why are Jews so routinely targeted? I have written about this in the past (See Uncommon Sense #294 which came out on October 31, 2023). Part of the answer is that anti-Semitism adapts itself to every age. Jews have been condemned as too weak and too strong, too isolated and too influential, too religious and too secular. Anti-Semitism survives because it functions less as a rational critique than as a social and political scapegoating mechanism. In times of unrest, people often seek a symbolic villain onto whom broader frustrations can be projected.
What should be done? First, moral clarity must return. Violence against Jews, intimidation of Jewish students, and the normalization of genocidal rhetoric must be condemned unequivocally, regardless of political affiliation. Second, institutions — especially universities and media organizations — must enforce standards consistently rather than selectively. Finally, we must remember that civilized societies are judged not by how they treat fashionable causes, but by whether they protect vulnerable minorities when doing so becomes unpopular.
Jew-hatred is not merely a Jewish problem. It is a warning sign of moral decay in any society that tolerates it.
And that, my friends, is the latest elephant in the room.
