Can America Be America When Jews Are Beaten in the Streets?
George Washington’s promise to American Jews helped define this nation. Breaking that promise would define us again.
It happened again. As war raged between Hamas and Israel over there in the Middle East, we watched in horror as American Jews were beaten right here in American streets. Thursday evening a gang of men beat a Jewish man in Midtown. On Tuesday, a gang attacked Jewish diners at a sushi restaurant in L.A. Synagogues were vandalized in Skokie, Tucson, and Salt Lake.
I say “again,” because we must not forget the wave of anti-Semitic violence before the pandemic. In late 2019 and early 2020, attackers beat Jewish Americans repeatedly. The violence culminated in a mass shooting at a Kosher Deli in Jersey City and a machete attack on a Hanukkah party in Monsey, New York. For the first time in their lives, friends of mine were afraid to be “publicly Jewish,” to walk outside wearing distinctive clothing that identified their faith.
I want to address why these attacks hurt our nation so much—reasons which echo beyond the simple evil of the assaults themselves. The reasons reach back to the beginning, to the battle over the fundamental character of the country the founders created.
Our public debate has been marked by sharp disagreement over two related questions. First, is the United States of America fundamentally a nation or an idea? And second, is the true character of our nation expressed more by the events of 1619—when the first slaves arrived on American shores—or 1776, when the Founding Fathers signed their name to a declaration that said “all men are created equal”?
The answer to those questions is nuanced. The United States of America is a nation whose greatness (and perhaps continued existence) depends on an idea. And the story of the nation is the story of the battle between the grim realities and systems of 1619 and the virtuous aspirations and emerging movements of 1776.
When the first European settlers arrived on the eastern seaboard, they arrived both as persecuted (think of the Pilgrims fleeing English religious intolerance) and persecutors (the slavers who trafficked in human lives). The advent of slavery on our shores—and the early brutal conflicts with Native Americans—signaled that the new world was very much like the old world. The same systems of oppression were imported to new lands.
Who should be surprised? As I’ve written before, tyranny was long the default form of human government. It was a violent and authoritarian expression of mankind’s fallen nature. G.K. Chesterton said it well. Original sin “is the only part of Christian theology which can really be proved.”
In many ways, however, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution represented an effort to fight back against man’s fallen nature—by creating a Constitution designed to protect human dignity and to block despots from dominating the land.
But we all know the history. The man who wrote the Declaration of Independence owned slaves. The first president elected under the new Constitution owned slaves. The cynic would look at this reality and declare the founding a farce. The ideals were a lie as soon as the words hit the page.
Yet those words were not a farce. They were not a lie. They were a hope, and—critically—they were a start.
And that brings us to American Jews. In many ways, the concrete expansion of American liberty beyond the ruling class of white (mainly) Protestant landowning men began with a touching exchange between our first president and the Congregation Yeshuat Israel in Newport, Rhode Island.
On August 17, 1790 the congregation wrote Washington a letter that was presented to Washington the next day, when he visited the town and when Christian clergy also delivered a message. It’s a marvelous artifact of 18th century communication. After a brief salutation, it begins with a statement of affection for the president:
With pleasure we reflect on those days—those days of difficulty, & danger when the God of Israel, who delivered David from the peril of the sword, shielded your head in the day of battle: and we rejoice to think, that the same Spirit who rested in the Bosom of the greatly beloved Daniel enabling him to preside over the Provinces of the Babylonish Empire, rests and ever will rest upon you, enabling you to discharge the arduous duties of Chief Magistrate in these States.
The rest of the letter is presented not as a plea for liberty, but rather a recognition of the founding values. “We now,” the congregation wrote, “behold a Government, erected by the Majesty of the People—a Government, which to bigotry gives no sanction, to persecution no assistance—but generously affording to All liberty of conscience, and immunities of Citizenship.”
That’s the text. The subtext, however, is plain. Members of this religious minority, hounded and persecuted across the globe, were seeking assurance. When they gave thanks “for all the Blessings of civil and religious liberty which we enjoy under an equal and benign administration,” they were both acknowledging their present liberty and expressing a hope for an enduring home.
Washington answered with one of the new nation’s first concrete expressions that American religious freedom extended explicitly beyond the bounds of the Christian faith. “All possess alike,” he wrote, “liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship.” His closing was powerful and important.
May the Children of the Stock of Abraham, who dwell in this land, continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other Inhabitants; while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and figtree, and there shall be none to make him afraid. May the father of all mercies scatter light and not darkness in our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in his own due time and way everlastingly happy.
The key words—“every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and figtree”—are taken from the book of Micah, chapter four. They’re a beautiful expression of peaceful flourishing in a pluralistic society. Washington referred to that verse almost 50 times in his correspondence. Lin Manuel-Miranda made them famous again by repeating them in the musical Hamilton.
It is no coincidence that the United States is home to the second-largest Jewish community in the world. The presence of a thriving Jewish community is evidence that American aspirations could become reality. Jewish safety and security is thus deeply rooted in the American founding. It’s part of our nation’s origin story.
But it’s hard to think of a greater contradiction of the principles of Micah 4:4 and of Washington’s hope that Jews would enjoy the “good will” of America’s inhabitants than brutal attacks in the street, inflicted solely on the basis of faith.
Indeed, street attacks represent a larger marker of exclusion and persecution. How many times have we seen that nightmare become a recent reality, and not just for Jews? It’s still hard to wrap one’s mind around the brutal murder of Ahmaud Arbery, a young black man who was chased through Georgia streets, cornered, and killed.
We’ve seen Asian American men and women assaulted, unprovoked, in broad daylight, including a notorious incident when a man beat an elderly Asian American woman as bystanders merely watched.
Compounding the pain and injustice is a partisan fact: All too many people care more about crimes and hurt more for victims when those crimes and those victims promote partisan interests and advance partisan narratives. One of the great tragedies of anti-Semitism is that it’s found in extremist movements from left to right. Hatred of Jews is so embedded in a variety of even opposing factions that you often can’t begin to presume the faction of the assailant when a Jewish man or woman is beaten in the street, shot in a deli, or knifed in a house.
This much we know, however: If the founding pledge of safety and freedom for Jewish citizens was a leading indicator that the American promise would be kept, then rising danger to Jewish citizens should be cause for profound alarm.
Our nation’s first president told believers in one of the world’s most persecuted religions that they would have a home in this land. That founding promise helped define this nation. Breaking that promise would define us again, but in an entirely different way. America cannot be America when Jews are beaten in the streets.
One last thing …
I sat across from Jonathan McReynolds at a dinner on Friday night, and after dinner he sang this song. It’s a great song for a time of rage, anger, and conspiracy. It’s honest and ultimately humbling. Give it a listen:
As a Jewish person, I have found it painful to read the coverage of the war between Israel and Gaza. Many of the journalists and reporters covering it would be outraged by the accusation that they are engaging in anti-Semitism, because many of them are not anti-Semites but have simply bought the propaganda. (Some are, and they can vent their hatred using this as a cover, but I think most are not.) Yet they bear at least some responsibility for fomenting the kind of hatred that inspires attacks of Jews on the streets.
What if the mainstream media covered the news like this, instead of leaving it up to right-wing media, which has lost its credibility in the wake of promoting the Big Lie?
1. Make the moral clarity stark by rejecting the notion of equal responsibility and show that in fact Israel never provokes violent attacks and only engages in defensive warfare.
2. Make the moral clarity stark by focusing on the war crimes of Hamas and stop falsely accusing Israel of war crimes (the double war crime of Hamas is embedding their military targets within civilian centers like schools, hospitals, and media buildings and lobbing rockets into civilian population centers).
3. Make the the moral clarity stark by ending the pretense that the greater number of casualties in Gaza shows that Israel is the aggressor and that therefore Gaza needs an Iron Dome for protection.
4. Make the moral clarity stark by reminding the world that Hamas need only lay down its weapons for peace to become a realistic goal and by reminding the world of its doctrine of genocide laid out in its charter.
5. Make the moral clarity stark by pointing out over and over again that in protests, the slogan "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" advocates genocide (if you look at a map of the region you will see that this poetic rendering of "the river to the sea" means wiping Israel right off of it).
6. Make the moral clarity stark by calling out the anti-Semitic reactions of the Squad.
In short if the media told the truth about the conflict, would we have as many anti-Semitic attacks? That's an experiment I'd like to see play out.
And here is another experiment I'd like to see all these people who call Israel an apartheid state take part in. I would love to see AOC and Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib and all the rest try this.
The experiment: Put on Muslim garb and stroll slowly through a Jewish neighborhood in Israel in broad daylight. Report on your experience. Then put on Orthodox Jewish garb and stroll slowly through a neighborhood in Gaza in broad daylight. Report on your experience if you live to tell the tale. You must do it in this order, obviously.
I dare them to just try it.
I see a lot more antisemitism incidents involving minorities, and the current wave are Palestinians attacking Jews in America and Europe for something done in the Middle East.
Which is ludicrous. Should blacks in America attack Muslims for the repeated pillaging of Northern Africa and the forces religious servitude by the sword over the centuries?
Should Buddhists in America attack Hindus that tried to push them out of India into other regions like a China hundred of years ago?
Should all other non Arab Americans attack Arab Americans in America because of 9-11 or the continual terror attacks, bombings, and knifing that have happened to people across America and Europe in the past twenty years?
Absolutely not. There is zero reason to assault a Hasidic Jew, Protestant Christian, Sunni Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, etc., because of something their ancestors did/didn’t do/believed to have done. And it is wrong to assault Jews that have nothing to do with what is going on in Gaza. Because if your only excuse is they must be part of the conspiratorial one world order nonsense, the problem is you and not the Hebrews. And people use the cover of Jew hatred, veiling it as “we’re just criticizing certain things”, to mask their loathing of one of the smallest minority religions that have had a huge impact on the world.
Religious Liberty transcends your bigotry. Jewish people are protected by the constitution regardless. And though this article is trying to be nuanced, in my minority community we have huge anti-semitism problems and it is fed upon by absolutely bonkers idiots that believe Jews control the weather, Jews control the banks, Jews start all the wars, or Nation of Islam insanity or whatever is the easiest cop out answer to the fact the Jews haven’t done barely anything to you, your life stinks for other reasons.
Much like Protestants once believed a Jesuit resides in every Protestant church, willing adherents to the Papacy that will flip on a dime like some Cold War trigger words etc. the major problem we have is there is a massive portion of the world that believes in absolutely ludicrous conspiracy theories about the Jews.
And they are fed, being blunt here, by parties and bad actors that use race, and religion, in this specific case against Hebrews, to further their own end game of power.
The unspoken truth, is in the many minority communities in particular in America and Europe Hebrew Hatred pops up far more than I would like to admit.
And the sooner we get off our partisan stepping stones and realize it’s just not one side that has conspiratorial nuts the better. But when it comes to the hatred against Jews, we need to look at the petrified dishes that gestate lies incarnate, and it has been disturbing for years as Jews have been the number community assailed by hate crimes for decades. Not gays, not blacks, but Jewish people.
And I have zero problems admitting this and wanting to protect Jewish people in America from persecution my Protestant ancestors faced (and sometimes sadly perpetuated which was wrong). Either the constitution is for all of us, or it will be for none of us as we pick each other apart.
Even if Christianity and Judaism have been sadly at each other’s throats in the past, this Protestant is happy to stand with our American Jewish brothers and sisters, or anyone that wants to live under and protect the tree of religious Liberty.
Because we either rise together in freedom, or we fall under the banner of hating the “other”.