Antisemitism

Though I grew up Jewish, I did not experience antisemitism as a child. This might have been the result of living in a newly established suburban community on Long Island that was at that moment being populated by Jewish military veterans and their families leaving New York City and seeking Eden. All I knew growing up were Jews and I was maintained very insulated. My father helped serv the developing conservative shul both as an active member and as the shul’s religious chairman. At thirteen everyone that I knew had celebrated a Bar Mitzvah, some less willingly than others, and at sixteen the girls celebrated their Sweet Sixteens. They were also Jewish. I did not have to identify as Jewish because, well, on the one hand I didn’t identify as anything but also because being Jewish was an unquestioned part of existence. There was no alternative. At home we did not talk about the Holocaust nor mention the threat of antisemitism. My father celebrated the existence of Israel as the realization of Biblical promise, and once, when I had not yet celebrated my Bar Mitzvah, sought to enroll me in a yeshiva where perhaps I might train as a rabbi. He worked hard in the development of the Jericho Jewish Center and during the interviewing of Rabbis for the shul the candidates stayed in our home. My father went to work most Saturdays.
            I first experienced antisemitism in my freshman year of college. Then, my roommate having learned that I was Jewish applied in my name for membership to the American Nazi Party. My roommate was a Southern racist bigot and the first antisemite I was to know. But I understood racism: I watched the television and read the news in horror. I listened to the songs of Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Phil Ochs, Judy Collins, Pete Seeger, Eric Andersen and many others. Dylan’s “With God On Our side,” was the first mention of the Holocaust that I remember. On the campus at Roanoke College there were fraternities that by charter and custom excluded Jews from membership, and for a brief moment as I sought some semblance of acceptance I even considered pledging my faith to Jesus and to join an antisemitic Greek organization. I was talked out of that decision by a Jewish brother of the only fraternity that welcomed Jews, physics majors, and other assorted social outliers.
            From that moment at Roanoke College I understood the meaning and effect of antisemitism, and that learning has never left me. I energetically supported Israel during the 1967 and 1973 wars. I studied the Holocaust: read books, fiction and history; viewed film, fiction and documentary. On the campus where I taught, I became the resident, visible Jew and was called upon rather often to sit on interfaith panels. On one memorable discussion I assailed the antisemitism of Martin Luther and the reference to the Jewish Bible as “Old Testament.” I remember my comments being not well received. When the few Jewish students enrolled sought a home for the holidays, they were directed to me and we took them in.  I was once questioned by a faculty member why it was that Jews became associated with Indian madras fabric. I was baffled and almost amused by the question. When I received tenure, I wore a kippah for a year. I became an identifiable public Jew. Over the years I have visited Israel, the last time while visiting my daughter who was studying abroad in residence there. During my fifties I became active in Jewish practice and attended weekly services on the Sabbath and holidays, taught enrichment classes to eighth graders, and learned to lead services and read Torah. I weekly transported Mr. and Mrs. Mastbaum, holocaust survivors, to shul every week. My two daughters celebrated their Bat Mitzvahs. I identified publicly and privately as a Jew.
            But this latest conflict in the region has unleashed what appears to me as blatant recognizable antisemitism. And here is how I know: during the 1980s and early 1990s I participated in the antiapartheid movement directed at South Africa where the white settlers had violently suppressed and oppressed the African native population. Eventually the movement succeeded and Nelson Mandela was finally released from prison and became the first African president of the country. But the antiapartheid movement never advocated for the elimination of South Africa. Rather, it called for the reform of its government and social and labor practices; the movement demanded justice. Ironically, the apartheid laws were established in 1948, the same year as the Nakhba, the expulsion of Palestinians from their homes following the Israeli war of independence. In the years following the wars in 1967 and 1973, the continued occupation of Gaza, the West Bank and the settler movement that followed, I have opposed the actions of the Israeli government as I did that of South Africa. I still do object to the policies of the Israeli government. But the recent calls for the elimination of Israel is more than a demand for justice: it is the demand for the elimination of an established nation that has been settled by Jews. To eliminate Israel is a call to eliminate Jews. This call is nothing but blatant and dangerous antisemitism.