In May 2024, Time Magazine ran a story decrying “How Weaponizing Antisemitism Puts Jews at Risk.” This idea has become fashionable among progressives, Islamists, and campus radicals. According to this twisted narrative, the real threat isn’t antisemitism—it’s the accusation of antisemitism, supposedly being used to “silence” criticism of Israel. They cite the House Education Committee’s task force on antisemitism as proof, calling it a vehicle to crack down on “pro-Palestinian” protests rather than protect Jewish students. They lobby to prevent the IHRA definition of antisemitism to be accepted in government cases, because Jews shouldn’t be allowed to decide for themselves what defines antisemitism.
Who gave them such privilege?
The charge against Jews is explicit and comes from Jews and non-Jews. UC Berkeley associate professor of history and Jewish studies Ethan Katz was part of the Nexus Project which put words like “Intifada” into various buckets and grades of antisemitism, in an attempt to jettison IHRA’s widely adopted definition. Katz took aim at the House Education Task Force and said “the overarching motivation for many of these people [Republicans on the committee] is to use this as a way of attacking higher education. This means that they are using Jews as a kind of pawn to play a political game.” It’s as though antisemitism doesn’t exist or politicians (read THOSE politicians) couldn’t possibly care about Jews.
We are being reeducated: Jews aren’t victims; they’re tools. Republicans don’t care; their racists using Jews to attack minorities and liberal institutions.
Worse, Jews are no longer victims in this reading but complicit in attacks on progressive causes. The expectation (read demand) from the socialist-jihadi alliance is therefore for Jews to accept the indignities, harassment, intimidation and discrimination lest they speak up, and victims of preference possibly be held responsible or pay a price.
This inversion of reality is extreme – and deadly.
The true weaponization of antisemitism is not rhetorical; it is literal. It is found in the chants of mobs in Western capitals calling to “Globalize the Intifada“—code for bringing the murder of Jews from Israel to the streets of New York, London, and Toronto. It is etched in graffiti that reads “Gas the Jews” in Paris and Melbourne. It is breathed into masked agitators who storm Jewish neighborhoods, businesses, and houses of worship.
Car in Australia with antisemitic graffiti
It is not new. For over a century, Arab leaders have worked to deny the Jewish people their rights. The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, incited riots in the 1920s and 1930s to prevent Jews from praying at their holiest site, the Temple Mount. In 1929, that incitement culminated in the massacre of 67 Jews in Hebron. His riots from 1936 to 1939 kept hundreds of thousands of Jews in Europe to die in the Holocaust.
Fast forward to 2023 to Hamas’s October 7 pogrom—an antisemitic massacre that was a direct descendant of that same ideology. Jews, in the Hamas worldview, are not simply an occupying force—they are an infestation. Hamas’s 1988 charter calls for Muslims to fight and kill Jews wherever they may be. The 2006 Palestinian elections, in which Hamas won a majority, validated and empowered that genocidal ethos.
A majority of Gazans have always supported killing Jewish civilians in Israel, according to every Palestinian poll taken since 2000
This hatred has never been about borders or policy. It is about Jewish existence. Jewish presence.
Palestinian Arabs are almost uniformly antisemitic according to Antidefamation League (ADL) polls. They have weaponized their antisemitism and come to ethnically cleanse the land of Jews.
For calling out Muslim antisemitism, the three million-member powerful National Education Association (NEA) teacher union voted on July 6 to cut ties with the ADL. In rejecting using any materials from the ADL, the NEA stated that “despite its reputation as a civil rights organization, the ADL is not the social justice educational partner it claims to be.” NEA delegate Stephen Siegel said “allowing the ADL to determine what constitutes antisemitism would be like allowing the fossil fuel industry to determine what constitutes climate change.”
Only comrades of the socialist-jihadi alliance should be allowed to define antisemitism.
So when House Republicans call a hearing to investigate antisemitism on college campuses after mobs trap Jewish students in libraries and bar entry to Hillel buildings, outlets like Time spin it as a crackdown on speech. When Jewish students file Title VI complaints because professors and deans dismiss their fears and excuse calls for a new Holocaust as “political expression,” activists call it censorship.
Jewish students hide from mob at Cooper Union in New York City
The charge that “antisemitism is being weaponized” is not a defense of speech—it’s a shield for Jew hatred. It inverts the aggressor and victim and gaslights the world into thinking that Jews are too powerful, too organized, and too vocal in defending themselves.
It is not only in the Jewish Diaspora. The Islamic Republic of Iran – sworn to the destruction of the Jewish State which it calls a “cancer” – has literally weaponized its nuclear program. Not willing to be exterminated, Israel preemptively took out the infrastructure of the weapons of mass destruction. And the world came after Israel as if it were the aggressor.
Because there is a corrupt belief that Jews must accept their fate silently.
UN claims that Israel cannot defend itself from the political-terrorist group Hamas which rules Gaza and has 58% of the seats in parliament
The world has been trained that Jews have too much – whether power, money, land, rights – even pride. People believe that Jews should be stripped of those items and absorb the abuse. To demand basic human rights, dignity or protection is not considered defense but an assault on the attackers.
Are Jews hunting Palestinians on Western campuses or are Palestinian flag-wavers cornering Jewish students? Did Israel issue a fatwa against Arabs and Muslims, or was it Osama bin Laden who said that Jews will never be safe, Hamas that declared in its charter that it is an obligation for every Muslim to kill Jews, and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas who demanded a land ethnically cleansed of every Jew?
The world knows that antisemitism has been weaponized but not by Jewish students or congressional investigators. It has been weaponized by Hamas with bullets, knives, and fire. By “anti-Zionists” who shout genocidal slogans and assault Jews in the the streets of the Global North. By media figures who gaslight Jews to stay silent to protect the indefensible in the name of free expression.
Antisemitism has been weaponized and Jews are dying. Hamas’s willing executioners are telling you to move along.
Before Adolf Hitler ever raised his voice in Munich, he walked the streets of Vienna. The year was 1908. He was a failed artist, a nobody—but he was watching. And what he saw was a master class in antisemitism, taught by none other than the city’s powerful mayor, Karl Lueger.
Karl Lueger (1844-1910), mayor of Vienna, Austria 1897-1910
Lueger didn’t scream; he smiled. He didn’t wear jackboots; he wore a mayor’s sash. But his message was clear: Jews don’t belong. He didn’t have to say it outright—he just needed to point at “Jewish capital,” “Jewish influence,” “Jewish power.” Always with a wink, always in the name of the people.
Hitler later said Lueger was one of the greatest German politicians of all time. Not because he was a fascist but because he knew how to mainstream hate. He made antisemitism a component of civic reform.
Sound familiar?
Over a century later, in Queens, New York, Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani is walking the old path in new shoes. Like Lueger, he’s building a political brand on a foundation that isolates Jews—especially those who support the Jewish State—as outside the moral community.
Criticize the Israeli government? Fine. Hold them accountable? Of course. But Mamdani goes further. He doesn’t criticize Israeli policies. He calls for Israel’s erasure. He doesn’t debate Zionism. He demonizes it. And anyone who affirms the Jewish right to self-determination is labeled part of the problem. AMCHA Initiative has long shown how Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) on campuses – a group which Mamdani is proud to help found at his college – correlates to a steep rise in attacks against Jews.
We all see the impact on Jews today.
It’s Lueger’s method, just in post-colonial language.
Just like Lueger – and others like disgraced politician Jamaal Bowman – Mamdani claims he’s not against Jews; he’s just against the wrong kind of Jews—those who won’t denounce their homeland, who won’t apologize for their peoplehood. Like Lueger, Mamdani gets to decide who counts as a “good Jew.”
Zohran Mamdani (right) being endorsed by disgraced former Congressman Jamaal Bowman
And here’s the haunting echo: who’s watching today?
In 1908, Hitler was a quiet observer of Lueger. Who’s listening to Mamdani now?
Who’s the radical activist or ideologue soaking up the message that Jews are oppressors, that Zionists are the enemy, that the Jewish state is a crime? Who’s internalizing this polite, polished, progressive bile and dreaming of taking it further?
No, Mamdani isn’t directly inciting genocide. But Lueger didn’t either. History tells us you don’t need to pull the trigger to light the fuse. Lueger mentored Hitler without even knowing him.
We remember how it started last time. We worry who might be watching this time.
We have reviewed the terrible anti-Israel bias ingrained in public schools in Talking About Local School Boards in New York State, and socialists’ activist influence in public school unions and school boards in Anti-Israel Socialists Are Coming For School Boards. This article will discuss a particular school district – White Plains, NY – as a basis for you to get involved in your own district, and will compare it to New Rochelle, a similar district nearby.
Basic Statistics
Start by understanding some key statistics about the school district before wading into the school board itself.
Greatschools.org is a good place to familiarize yourself with your school district. White Plains has seven schools: 5 elementary, 1 middle school and 1 high school. In their assessmnet, compared to New York State, 57% are performing below average and 43% are average, a pretty terrible score.
Digging into the data deeper, provides some understanding of the poor scores.
The student body of 6,887 is 58% Hispanic, 21% White, 10% Black, 4% biracial and 3% Asian. Roughly 17% are learning English and 50% are from low income households. The demographics are similar to New Rochelle which is a bigger school, with a greater percentage of Blacks students. White Plains has more students learning English (17% to 12%), while New Rochelle has a slightly greater percentage of students from low income households (55% to 50%).
While all of the racial groups perform well on U.S. history tests, the Hispanic and Black students perform below New York State average in English (30% and 29%), and Black students grossly underform in science (16% with proficiency), even compared to those same ethnic groups around the state. Curiously, each group performs well on standardized regents exams, making one wonder whether teachers are simply teaching to pass the regents rather than basic skills.
The dynamics are not unusual for the state. According to the GreatSchools site, Black students typically only have 22% average proficiency in science around the state, and Hispanics are at 23%. White and Asian students are at 43% and 55%, respectively, considerably higher. However, in White Plains, only Black students trail the state average.
The scores for Black students in New Rochelle in English were significantly better, with 43% being proficient, significantly higher than White Plains Black student body at 29%.
The figures in Ballotopedia are different, but also show that White Plains’ Hispanic and Black students do not cross 45% proficiency in Math, while White and Asian students have 73% and 75% proficiency, respectively. New Rochelle Hispanic and Black students each have 57% proficiency in Math, considerably higher than White Plains.
White Plains (WP) far exceeded New Rochelle (NR) and state averages in other categories like graduation rates (91% versus 83% and 87%, respectively for NR and state averages) and those taking Advanced Placement courses (AP), with 29% compared to 18% and 21% for NR and the state, respectively. Overall, 79% of White Plains’ graduating students went on either to college or vocational school, compared to 75% and 68%, respectively for NR students and the state on average.
This WP performance came at a cost.
Enrollment in the WP schools was roughly 6,900 students and projected to be relatively flat for the next year, despite 8,000 apartment rental units coming online over the next few years. With a 2025-6 budget of $278 million, the average cost per student is roughly $40,000.
With 595 teachers, the WP student-to-teacher ratio was roughly 11.6:1, well below the stated goal of under 20-to-1. The overall WP district headcount including administrative positions was 1,196, or 5.7 students per school staff. This compares to NR with 767 teachers and 1,643 in total staff, or 12.6:1 student to teacher ratio and 5.9 students per staff.
On average, school districts in the state are funded 50% by local taxes, 46% by state subsidies and 4% from the federal government. White Plains is 78% locally funded (74% property tax and 4% other taxes).
The actual WP budget submitted for approval shows a breakdown for the budget as: 50% for instruction, 25% for employee benefits, 15% for general support, 5% for student transportation, and 4% for debt service. Why is only half of a school budget going to education?
New Rochelle’s school budget is $360 million serving 9,700 students ($37,100 per student) and property taxes account for 67% of the budget. New Rochelle has a budget line for the high school principal of over $1 million and the department chair and supervisor each with $700,000.
Data Assessment
The data is not consistent between sources but overall, it seems that White Plains spends more for students than New Rochelle. The reasons seem to be a relatively higher number of teachers as well as costs for more upgraded facilities. Despite spending more, the results for Hispanics and Blacks are worse on test scores but better on regents and high school graduation rates (92% to 83%).
Other Students
A total of 1,132 students in White Plains do not attend public schools, or over 14% of the total. These students do not receive funding for education, food, transportation or tutoring services.
There are no charter schools in either White Plains or New Rochelle, making the public schools the sole recipients of all funding, despite one in seven students being educated outside of the schools.
WP School Board
The White Plains school board is made up of seven people, each serving a three year term. In 2025, two of the most tenured board members have terms coming up.
Name
Assumed Office
Term Ends
Jessica Buck
2024
2027
Craig Mondschein
2024
2027
Cayne Letizia
2015
2027
Valerie Daniele
2023
2026
Rosemarie Eller
2005
2026
Sheryl Brady
2007
2025
Charlie Norris
2007
2025
As seen in the table above, there are three people on the board who have been serving for almost two decades, and three people serving in their first terms. Ideally, a board should have a mix of current parents together with people with historic knowledge.
There are four people running for the two seats. Sheryl Brady and Charlie Norris are both seeking reelection. Newcomers Julia Oliva and Dr. Mohammed S Chowdhury are also seeking the board positions. They all submitted responses to a questionnaire submitted by the League Of Women Voters of White Plains, which will be hosting a forum on May 13 at 7:00pm at the WP High School.
I spoke to the four candidates about their interest in the school board. Below is a snapshot.
Sheryl Brady:
She grew up in Westchester and is passionate about education and continues to keep up to date with seminars.
She had four kids go through the public school system and was very involved in the PTA. She is also very involved in Kol Ami in addition to the public schools.
She thinks the superintendent Dr. Joseph Ricca (Josephricca@wpcsd.k12.ny.us 914-422-2019) is fantastic and always available for questions. She believes he is also well known at the state level.
Brady believes the school board is about setting tone and policy which is focused on the intrinsic value of every person.
Her focus is on targeted, individualized instruction for the students.
She thinks the school facilities are amazing and acknowledged the community support for a $60 million bond issue to fund the improvements to the schools and athletics fields.
She is supportive of the cellphone bans in schools but likely would have been more permissive for high school students than the state mandate.
She thinks the governor’s mandate on teaching gender identity in all grades including lower grades should be age appropriate
She does not think antisemitism is a big issue in the district, and whenever there is an incident, to use it as an opportunity to bring the students together to learn empathy and Jewish history of persecution, and the Holocaust in particular.
In regards to teaching about the Arab/Muslim-Israeli conflict, she thinks teachers should not take sides and try to maintain respect.
Charlie Norris:
He grew up in Hartsdale and is passionate about education. His two children were fourth generation in WP public schools
He was the first male head of the PTA in 1993 and that got him involved in the school and ultimately the board in 2006. He has seen the schools change to be much more Hispanic and pivot according to their needs as well as special needs students which are much more numerous now than when he was a parent of a student.
He is very proud of where WP is now, while other schools in Mount Vernon and New Rochelle need to lay off teachers and cut programs.
He loves the state-of-the-art facilities already constructed the last few years as well as the new $35 million building going up to expand the high school. It is going up without an increase in taxes.
He is in favor of banning cellphones for kids in school.
He is in favor of teaching gender identity in schools and all types of family structures in an age appropriate manner.
He thinks antisemitism in schools is a function of general society and children pick it up (rather than it being introduced in schools). When there are incidents, they bring in rabbis to have meaningful discussions.
For the Arab/Muslim-Israel Conflict, he thinks it is important to be informative without taking sides. It is for educators to choose materials for the students and only sometimes does that come up to the board level.
Julia Oliva:
She moved to White Plains in 2007. She has one young child in the elementary school and a second one will enter in a year.
She has gotten involved in the school because she felt there were issues not being addressed. The open mic at the school board sessions allowed her to have a one way discussion but never heard back from anyone.
She is in favor of banning phones and wants teachers to be equipped with how to handle situation.
She wants to see more vocational instruction in high school as many students are probably not situated for college. She wants courses to prepare students for jobs in technology and cybersecurity, as well as healthcare with the number of expanded medical facilities opening in White Plains.
She thinks that too much money is being spent on non-essential capital projects rather than services. She thinks it’s a poor decision to drop some courses to have state of the art bleachers at the athletic fields.
Dr. Mohammed S Chowdhury:
He has been a White Plains resident since 2002. He is a physician.
He has not been involved in the school and was not knowledgeable about any of the metrics or issues mentioned above. His one son graduated from the school last year and he is seeking to volunteer now. He mentioned that he would tutor.
WP School Board Assessment
Sheryl Brady and Charlie Norris are pretty interchangeable. Both are liberals who have lots of institutional knowledge and having one of them is enough. Julia Oliva seemed very engaged but it is unclear how she would function in a committee setting. Dr. Chowdhury is ill-prepared to serve on the board with no involvement in education and no child at the school.
With 14% of the WP student body not attending public schools, I suggest someone with students in private school run for the school board next year. There are no monies going to compensate students at other schools for their transportation, tutoring or food which happens for the public schools. The 78% of the budget being borne by residents must get pushback from someone at the board and the two incumbents are unlikely to so.
The White Plains Teachers Association bargaining agreement ends in June 2026. It is important to have someone looking out for taxpayers on the school board.
Be involved in the budget process and get information at (914) 422-2071 or email budget@wpcsd.us. There is a Board of Education meeting on May 12 at 7:30 at the High School Auditorium and a League of Women Voters meet the candidates on May 13 at 7:00pm at the WP High School Library Media Center.
New Rochelle School Board
New Rochelle has a nine member board serving five year terms. Two spots are available in 2025 and five people are competing: Myriam Decime, Elana Jacob, Jessica Klein, Dr. Rosa Rivera-McCutchen, and Keith Singletary.
Jacob and Klein are both from the local Jewish community which is looking to continue to build on its grassroots activism which helped get rid of Congressman Jamaal Bowman in the 2024 Democratic primary. Rivera-McCutchen is closely aligned with Bowman and Decime is also part of the Black “progressive” movement. The school board election is a mini rematch of the heated NY16 congressional contest. Singletary is a CPA and focused on risk assessment and a much more reasonable choice than the other Black candidates as the NR public schools are in bad fiscal health.
The League of Women Voters will hold an in-person candidate forum on Monday, May 12, at 6 pm at City Hall and the New Rochelle Chapter of the NAACP will hold an online forum with the Board of Education candidates on Sunday, May 18, at 4 pm on Zoom (Meeting ID: 997 9688 1792, Passcode: 607622). To speak at a public hearing contact mbonilla@nredlearn.org, 914-576-4219.
Conclusion
White Plains: WP residents are paying an astronomical $40,000 per public school student, and are covering 78% of that cost – well in excess of the state average of 50% or New Rochelle’s 67%. The WP board budget presentation that “staff salaries are in line with collective bargaining agreements” and that the taxes are not as high as they could have been, is grossly misleading. The school board has been pouring money into professional quality facilities and an incredibly high number of teachers relative to the student population, while Black students are doing terribly in English, Hispanic students are doing poorly in science, and 14% of the students not in public school are getting nothing.
Reject the budget to lower the budget by $3.4 million.
Remove one of the long-serving board members with Julia Oliva to reorient the schools more to services than gold-plated facilities.
A parent from the private school community should run in the 2026 election – all that’s needed is 100 signatures from within the district.
New Rochelle: The vast majority of the nine member school board is from the Black community which makes up 19% of the student body and overall population. It would be a terrible outcome to see members of the far-left get seats on the school board.
Vote for Jacob and Klein to get proper representation and overall balance on the board.
The Passover Haggadah has a 15 line song called “Dayenu,” which means “enough” in Hebrew. The song reviews fifteen actions that God did for the Jewish people, any one of which would have been amazing on its own. The point of the song is to recount the many fantastic blessings God gave the Jewish people so that there is no way to show proper appreciation.
Jews around the world might ponder their various actions and contributions, and wonder why they not only don’t get appreciation but scorn.
Despite Jews being instrumental in the creation of Hollywood, they were deliberately omitted from the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.
Despite Jewish scientists creating many life-saving drugs, people accuse them of doing so only for profit.
Despite the Jewish State making tons of technological innovations that permeate everyday items and lives like smartphones, anti-Israel agitators try to promote a boycott of the country even as they use the country’s technology.
Despite Jewish philanthropists pouring billions of dollars into American universities, the school administrators allowed systemic antisemitism to take over the institutions.
Despite Jews being at the forefront of the civil rights movement, few Black leaders have come out and denounced antisemitism today.
Despite Jews allowing the Jordanian Islamic Waqf to administer the Jewish Temple Mount and continue Islamic prayer on the site, the Waqf denies Jews the basic human right to pray at their holiest site.
Despite Jews being the most targeted group of hate crimes in the US by a significant margin every year, they were never afforded protection because they are considered “white” and “privileged.”
Despite Jews having 3,700 years of history in the holy land and whose homeland is central to its religion, antisemites and university professors call them “colonizers.”
Despite Jews contributing a disproportionate amount to the entire world in regards to medicine, science, technology, and economic matters, antisemitic politicians call them “racists” and “profiteers.”
Despite the Islamic Arab armies’ invasion of Israel in 1948 and ethnically cleansing all Jews from the territories it illegally seized, Israel granted citizenship to all non-Jews including Islamic Arabs in the remaining land it ruled.
Despite Judaism not seeking to convert people around the world and believe that non-Jews go to heaven, antisemites say Jews suffer “Jewish Superiority.”
Despite Israel ceding land several times in an effort to make peace with its neighbors – which its neighbors never have – antisemites at the United Nations claim that the country is seeking to build a “Greater Israel.”
Despite Israel not wanting or starting wars, offering numerous ceasefires that were rejected, and would stop the current war immediately if terrorists surrendered themselves and the hostages, the international courts have deemed Israel’s actions a “genocide.”
Despite Jews thriving on debate and inquiry leading various intellectual and political movements across the spectrum, antisemites vilify Jews as a single shadow power attempting to control the world.
Despite Jerusalem being the center of Judaism, the United Nations passed a law making it illegal for Jews to live there.
Whereas Dayenu is a song to God that Jews appreciate every single item done on their behalf, Despite is a chilling reminder that nothing Jews do will satisfy the antisemites.
Watching the United Nations trip over itself to not call out Hamas and other Stateless Arabs from Palestine (SAPs) terrorist groups who should be brought to justice is a spectacle in rife antisemitism. Sometimes, watching the UN Security Council call out heinous attacks in other parts of the world serves as a reminder as well.
On March 21, 2025, terrorists from the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS), an ISIL offshoot, shot at worshippers in a mosque in Niger. At least 44 worshippers were reported killed and 20 injured. The UNSC issued a statement less than one week later. I include it below in its entirety with bold for emphasis:
The members of the Security Council condemned in the strongest terms the cowardly terrorist attack by Islamic State in the Greater Sahara in Kokorou, Niger, on 21 March, which resulted in the deaths of at least 44 civilians and 13 severely injured.
The members of the Security Council expressed their deepest sympathy and condolences to the families of the victims and to the authorities and the people of Niger, and they wished a speedy and full recovery to those who were injured.
The members of the Security Council reaffirmed that terrorism in all its forms and manifestations constitutes one of the most serious threats to international peace and security.
The members of the Security Council underlined the need to hold perpetrators, organizers, financiers and sponsors of these reprehensible acts of terrorism accountable and bring them to justice. They underscored the importance for all States, in accordance with their obligations under international law and relevant Security Council resolutions, to cooperate with the authorities of Niger as well as all other relevant authorities in this regard.
The members of the Security Council reiterated that any acts of terrorism are criminal and unjustifiable, regardless of their motivation, wherever, whenever and by whomsoever committed. They reaffirmed the need for all States to combat by all means, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and other obligations under international law, including international human rights law, international refugee law and international humanitarian law, threats to international peace and security caused by terrorist acts.
UN Security Council
It seems pretty straightforward to condemn the murder of 44 people. So why couldn’t the UN Security Council get it together after the October 7, 2023 murder of 1,200 people in Israel?
Eleven days after the attack, on October 18, the UNSC tried to get a resolution passed – and failed to do so. Why couldn’t the condemnation happen on October 8? 9? 12th? 15th?
Because there was no consensus.
The UNSC played with resolutions for days, including on October 16. Activity began to heat up after a hospital in Gaza was hit on October 17, and the world incorrectly jumped to the conclusion that Israel launched the missile. The United States vetoed the proposed resolution because “the draft did not mention Israel’s right to self-defence.”
There is no pathway for Israel to obtain basic rights and consideration through multilateral venues. It must pursue its interests on bilateral bases with countries around the world.
I have written in the past about the foolish views of liberal Nicholas Kristof about Israel. His idealized view of Palestinian Arabs are disconnected from reality and leads him to propose stupid plans for the Israeli-Muslim Arab Conflict.
It’s worse than that.
Kristof’s latest opinion pieces, “Our Beloved Gaza Is Gone”, showcases why his views are vulgar and promote antisemitic jihadists.
Rather than quote the popular Hamas leadership of Gaza which seeks the destruction of Israel or cite the polls of Gazans who want to kill Jewish Israeli civilians, Kristof quotes a “linguistic scholar” in Gaza who wants peace, as if this voice has any power or influence or represents Gaza in any way.
Yet Kristof started the first five paragraphs as well as the headline from this powerless, minority view. He ends with a quote “pray for us”, asking his readers to side with Gazans, to side with antisemitic genocidal jihadists.
When Kristof moved on from his angelic mask to the political-terrorist group Hamas, he whitewashed the entire episode. Lost was the brutal murder and raping of 1,200 people and Israel and seizure of 250 hostages, initiating a full scale war with Israel. Instead the pivot from “horrific atrocities in October 2023” – making the brutal war seem historic and momentary – turned immediately in the same sentence to “didn’t empower Palestinians but left them in misery.” Even though Palestinians initiated and supported the war, they were flipped to the victims.
And Kristof lies that Israel launched a war in response to the attack. The ruling authority of Gaza started the war, no one else. The “tens of thousands” of Palestinians killed is because of Palestinians, not Israel.
Kristof piled onto his fake telling of history that “Americans enabled this killing” by providing Israel the means to defend itself and bring the perpetrators of the attack to justice. He inverts morality and justice by claiming that it’s the people who want to slaughter civilians in their beds as needing protection.
When Kristof mentions Yahya Sinwar, he’s not described as a genocidal murderers who launched the October 7 massacre but only that he was “killed by Israel in October,” seemingly another victim of Israel’s war machine.
And amid all this distortion, Kristof places himself as the dove who bemoans “sustainable peace in the Middle East seems no closer,” as he simply refuses to acknowledge that Gazans want to see Israel destroyed.
Kristof then says that Israel and Hamas are much the same. Both engage in “dehumanization.” Both don’t care about children. For Kristof, the most liberal democracy in the entire Middle East is no different than genocidal jihadists who are intent on killing as many Jews as possible. The Israeli declaration of independence and system of laws calling for equality and peace are somehow no different than the Hamas Charter which calls for the annihilation of Jews.
With his jaundiced view, Kristof once again calls America to pressure Israel rather than the United Nations and the Arab world to coral the Palestinians. And he concludes that he didn’t really say everything he just did, and that Israel and Hamas aren’t really equivalent.
Doves pretend that Palestinian Arabs do not want to kill Jews and destroy Israel and demand that Israel accept whatever punishment and demands that the Arabs have. They do this while claiming they hold the moral high ground, even as they demand that Israel pay the full price of their largess.
Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) aged 66, questioned a young Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), aged 40, during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee vetting process for the United States Ambassador to the United Nations. It’s a short five-minute video and worth watching the entire exchange.
At 1:07, Van Hollen pointed his questions to adhering to UN Security Council resolutions and tied it to the Israeli-Arab conflict. Van Hollen said “long term peace must include security, self-determination and dignity for Israelis and Palestinian alike,” and added that “we should stand up and protect universal human rights and self-determination for all people, including both Israelis and Palestinians.”
He questioned Stefanik’s contention that Jews have a “Biblical right” to the land of Israel, and concluded his remarks at 4:59 by mansplaining that “when it comes to this very difficult issue [Jews living and praying in the West Bank and the Old City of Jerusalem], if the president is going to succeed at bringing peace and stability to the Middle East, we’re going to have to look at the UN Security Council resolutions – not just the ones on Lebanon, which we should enforce – but other UN Security Council resolutions [implying UNSC 2334], and it’s going to be very difficult to achieve that if you continue to hold the view that you just expressed [that Jews have a right to live and pray in Jerusalem and the West Bank], which is a view that was not held by the founders of the State of Israel who were secular Zionists, not religious Zionists.”
Some education is in order for this senator who airs his ignorance and Palestinian Arabs’ false propaganda so publicly:
David Ben Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister and secular Zionist said to the British authorities in January 1937 before the Peel Commission which discussed limiting Jews to certain areas of Palestine that “Our right to the Land of Israel does not stem from the Mandate and the Balfour Declaration. It precedes those. The Bible is our mandate… I can state in the name of the Jewish People: The Bible is our mandate, the Bible that was written by us in our Hebrew language, and in this land itself, is our mandate. Our historical right has existed since our beginnings as the Jewish People, and the Balfour Declaration and the Mandate recognize and confirm that right.” The secular Zionist Ben Gurion explicitly tied the right of Jews in the land to the Bible.
Ben Gurion referenced the original Hebrew language of the Bible, which became and remains the official language of the Jewish State, the only country which speaks in the biblical tongue.
When Ben Gurion read Israel’s Declaration of Independence on May 14, 1948 which he helped draft, the first lines were “ERETZ-ISRAEL [(Hebrew) – The Land of Israel] was the birthplace of the Jewish people. Here their spiritual, religious and political identity was shaped. Here they first attained to statehood, created cultural values of national and universal significance and gave to the world the eternal Book of Books.” The “land of Israel” encompasses the entire Jewish Promised Land, not new borders concocted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1947.
David Ben Gurion declaring the State of Israel on May 14, 1948
Further, Van Hollen fails to comprehend that his various statements do not complement each other but CONTRADICT each other. One cannot adhere to every UN Security Council resolution and simultaneously respect the dignity and human rights of Jews.
UNSC 2334, which passed in the waning days of the Obama administration, tramples on basic human rights and dignity of Jews by denying their right to live and pray in their holiest location in the Old City of Jerusalem.
If the basic parameters of Palestinian dignity is to deny Jewish dignity, then there is no scenario in which there is “dignity for Israelis and Palestinians alike” which Van Hollen ignores.
The United Nations is deeply broken and amoral, yet Senator Van Hollen seeks to prop it up as something holy, a pagan temple amongst the socialist-jihadi alliance. Rep. Elise Stefanik intends to act like the Jewish patriarch Abraham when she enters the United Nations, who shattered the false idols in his father’s store. She is poised to enter that dark chamber and shed light on its systemic depravity.
Representative Elise Stefanik at her Senate confirmation hearing. (Photo: Tom Brenner for The New York Times)
Abraham’s actions 3,700 years ago launched monotheism. Perhaps the end of the United Nations’ sacred cows will usher in a period when Jews and Judaism will be openly and widely recognized on the Temple Mount and throughout Jerusalem.
ACTION ITEM
Contact Sen. Van Hollen’s office and let him know what you think of his comments. Feel free to send this article. DC phone: (202) 224-4654. Contact your representatives as well.
WESPAC is a Westchester, New York-based “charity” that incites violence against Israel and its supporters. It is looking to recruit young Jews.
WESPAC helped fund the “People’s Conference For Palestine” in Detroit, MI on May 24-26, 2024. The event included full support for terrorism against Israel and the United States. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (supposedly sworn in to protect the US) was one of the featured speakers.
Lowlights of People’s Conference for Palestine May 24-26, 2024
Despite its claim that it is a peaceful movement, WESPAC solicited donations for the event. It funds Palestinian Youth Movement, which had several speakers calling for the destruction of Israel including Celine Qussiny, Mohammed Nabulsi, Hana Masri, Nadya Tannous, Lylla Younes and Yara Shoufani with chants “fight until victory”, “strike at the heart of Empire (the United States)” and “it is either victory or death.”
Nabulsi said (4:19) “I believe our fundamental goal is to generate political and social crisis within the American political class.” It seems that such sentiment includes within the Jewish community.
WESPAC is advertising for a new “Jewish school” which hopes “to reach as wide an audience as possible.” It says that the “program is very inclusive and accepting of everyone” and is generally marketed as free of affiliation of organized synagogues and “founded on social justice activism and awareness.”
It does not share how it intends to instill anti-Israel beliefs into young Jewish minds.
Pro-Nazi members of various singing and gymnastic societies salute a procession of flags at White Plains Conference Center in the 1930s (photo: AP)
The Nazis didn’t give Jews any way out of their genocidal aims but Hamas’s Willing Executioners are giving passes to Jews who reject the Jewish State and join their jihad.
Antisemitic pro-terror groups are seeking to drive a wedge within the Jewish community with a massive disinformation campaign to adults AND CHILDREN. Their game is a long one, hoping to destroy American support for Israel and Israel itself before Israel reaches its 100th birthday.
After Israel’s assassination of much of the political-terrorist group Hezbollah’s leadership, people worry whether the region will be engulfed in a wider war. Hamas has been neutered and Hezbollah is rudderless, making their sponsors in Iran furious. The fear is that the Islamic republic’s ire may get them to aggressively attack Israel and thereby bring the United States into the war.
It is just as likely that the leaderless Hezbollah terrorist group and its anti-Israel supporters around the world will begin to hit ‘soft targets’ globally, much as the U.S.-designated foreign terrorist group has done in the past.
The Henry Jackson Society published a Timeline of Terror in 2012 listing the various attacks committed by Hezbollah. The associate editor at that time was the now famous Douglas Murray. The attacks outside of the region included:
1984 bombing of a restaurant with U.S. servicemen in Spain, killing 18
1984 hijacking of a Kuwait airline, killing 4
1985 hijacking of a TWA flight from Greece, killing 1
1990 killing of Saudi businessman
1992 attack on Israeli embassy in Turkey, killing 1
1992 bombing Israeli embassy in Argentina, killing 29
1993 failed attack on Jewish community in Turkey
1994 bombing of Jewish community center in Argentina, killing 85
1996 bombing US air force residential tower in Saudi Arabia, killing 19
2012 failed bombing of tourist site in Thailand frequented by Israelis
2012 attack on Israeli ambassador in Azerbaijan
2012 attempted killings of Israeli embassy staff in India and Georgia
2012 suicide bomb of tourist bus with Israelis in Bulgaria, killing 7
2014 failed attack on Israeli tourists in Thailand
2015 failed attempt to stockpile bombs in the United Kingdom
2015 failed attempt to stockpile weapons in Cyprus
2023 failed attempt to attack the Jewish community in Brazil
People examine a damaged Israeli embassy car after an explosion in New Delhi, February 13, 2012.
REUTERS/Parivartan SharmaDestruction of the Jewish Community center in Buenos Aires, July 18, 1994Suicide bomber blows up bus with Israeli tourists in Bulgaria, July 18, 2012Explosion in Bangkok, February 14, 2012Hezbollah hijacks TWA plane from Greece, June 14, 1985
At this moment, as the Iranian proxies get decimated, it is just as likely that they and their supporters such as Within Our Lifetime will truly launch the “Global Intifada” in violent attacks against Jews and Israelis around the world.
Within Our Lifetime leader Nerdeen Kiswani calls for an “Intifada Revolution” wherever these are Israelis and Israel supportersWOL protest outside a New York City exhibit on the massacre at the Nova music festival in Israel, with signs “Zionists are not humans”Within Our Lifetime mourns death of Nasarallah by “zionist entity” in a tweet “The martyrdom of such a figure may generate feelings of despair, but resistance does not rest in one man’s hands — it is in the hearts of millions who refuse to abandon Palestine. Thousands will rise from his place in the earth to challenge this cruel world and carry on our people’s task. The weight of his martyrdom will crash down on the heads of the settler colony.“
Many Jews have found it difficult to be at work since October 7. Some have been alarmed by the lack of empathy for the Jewish community after the Hamas massacre. Others are distraught over comments that Israel is committing a genocide in Gaza. Sometimes the comments come from peers and other times from people who are senior or clients.
The workplace is not like other forums. A person’s livelihood is at stake, and the office is where people work together for long stretches of time. It is a very different dynamic than passing a masked protestor on the street.
How does a person handle anti-Israel vitriol from a colleague on social media like LinkedIn? Is it different if they post something on X or Facebook?
Here are some suggested guidelines:
It is always safe to stick with facts
Opinions are best shared in reaction to something at work; in personal settings, proactive is fine
Emotions are fine to share, as appropriate for that work environment, with an emphasis on humility
Do not troll people on social media. Use your own platform to make your feelings known
Use professional work media like LinkedIn for work related matters unless you are so senior that you believe your Israel advocacy can influence people
You can share your pro-Israel positions in a permanent passive manner by posting your role on Zionist groups like StandWithUs or post pictures of you in Israel
If you feel close enough to a colleague at work and their views are within the framework of honest disagreement, ask if they are open to discussing the topic
Should someone in your office cross the line into intimidation, harassment or discrimination, bring it up with human resources immediately, whether the person is junior or senior to you
If a client crosses the line, bring the matter up internally, asking the firm to terminate the engagement or reassign the client to a different colleague
Crossing the line into intimidation, harassment or discrimination should always be called out regardless of a person’s seniority, and whether internal or external to an organization. It must never be allowed to be normalized.
Honest ignorance is still ignorance. Consider whether the person stating lies is open to learning facts and try to engage respectfully. If the person is irate and will not be swayed, there is no point in engaging directly; you could talk to others who may have witnessed the spectacle.
If you are unfamiliar with facts as you hear arguments, admit as much that you need to do more research. It’s an opportunity to learn more from respected sources and not take someone’s emotional outburst as gospel.
People often react to difficult situations with a desire to either fight or flee. In a business environment, take a breath and be more tactical.
He [Rabbi Tarfon] used to say: It is not your duty to finish the work, but neither are you at liberty to neglect it; If you have studied much Torah, you shall be given much reward. Faithful is your employer to pay you the reward of your labor; And know that the grant of reward unto the righteous is in the age to come.
We have obligations at work, and we have obligations as Jews at work. It includes providing for our families and workers, as well as infusing the environment with Jewish values, but neither should fully supplant the other. Should that happen, it is not really a place of business where a Jew should be present.
First One Through 