- Global surge in antisemitic incidents following the conflict between Hamas and Israel, affecting Jewish communities in various countries.
- Antisemitic acts range from verbal abuse to physical assaults, often justified by anger over the Gaza conflict.
- In areas like the U.S., Britain, France, Germany, and South Africa, antisemitic incidents have increased several hundred percent compared to the same period last year.
- Official responses vary, with Western authorities generally quick to support Jewish communities, while some countries like China have not taken steps to curtail antisemitic content online.
Media Bias Fact Check (Reuters):
Overall, we rate Reuters Least Biased based on objective reporting and Very High for factual reporting due to proper sourcing of information with minimal bias and a clean fact check record.
If you keep telling people that any criticism of Israel is antisemitism, and the IDF goes out and commits war crimes, don’t be surprised if people say “well if I’m gonna be called antisemitic for hating war crimes I might as well go all the way to actual antisemitism”. It seems kind of obvious.
Acting like a hate filled piece of shit because people call you one means you really were a piece of shit in the first place.
if you’re a bigot.
If the only thing keeping you from being a bigot is people patting you on the tummy then… you are a bigot.
The issue that has become increasingly apparent throughout this (and any other time people remember that the Palestinians exist) is that: Yes, you can be anti-Zionist (for a range of definitions of “zionist”) without being anti-Semitic. But it is REAL easy to not stop with the former when there is such a strong push to be incredibly careful how we refer to Hamas (the de facto government of Gaza) and Palestine with almost no care being given toward the IDF (and Mossad and Netanyahu) and Israel. Or why the Israelis are in the region to begin with or how much of their demographics are refugees from nearby Arab nations.
Which kind of gets back to the idea of: When your rant is indistinguishable from that of a bigot…
To make it clear: The IDF are horrifying monsters who are actively engaging in genocide. Hamas are terrorists. And this is more or less a war between two countries at this point. But when talking points are “Fuck Israel, they never deserved to be there in the first place. Kick them all out” without even an acknowledgement of WHY they are there (and why “The West” supported them going there in the 40s…)? Well, if it quacks like a duck…
Yeah, this is a great example of why I make an effort to specify the government when criticizing countries. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine? I call Putin and his government evil but never the Russian people at large. China’s genocide of the Uyghurs? I call Xi Jinping and the CCP evil but never the Chinese people at large. Israel’s apartheid state and ethno-religious cleansing? I call Netanyahu and his government evil but never the Israeli people at large (and certainly not Jews at large).
The allure of treating entire demographics or populaces as a monolith and blaming them for the crimes of their government is exactly why genocidal rhetoric is so dang pervasive, and I won’t abide by it.
(Yes, I will also criticize civilians who actively support these crimes, but I make sure to be clear in distinguishing between them and the rest of the civilian population.)
Yeah, it’s basically terrible people shooting at terrible people at the behest of terrible people with tons of civilians (on both sides) having to suffer because of it. And because of how the situation works it’s hard for anyone involved to not get sucked into this maelstrom of hatred.
And to think that there have been a number of times when this could’ve been avoided but hasn’t because the people with the power to do so either didn’t care or deliberately made things worse to further their own interests. (Or tried but were removed from power by more ruthless people.)
It’s a horrible, convoluted, heartbreaking, multicontinental multi-century mess that’s almost impossible to even talk about without wronging someone.
And some assholes take that as an excuse.
This is a war between two terrorist groups not countries
If this is war, then how IDF are monsters? If Hamas is using human shields, then how do you expect IDF can conduct this war? Should they give up because Hamas uses human shields? Should Israel not reacted at all on what Hamas did with Israel civilians, because Hamas uses human shields? Would it only embolden Hamas to repeat the same many times? Is it better to cut out the cancer, which Hamas undoubtedly is, despite of the pain it brings for the sake of the healthy future without Hamas?
These are not rhetorical questions. When I think through them I see no other way than what IDF is doing today - targeting Hamas despite of the use of human shields. It is a bad option, but all other options are either worse or just fantasy.
Their actions.
Special ops not carpet bombing.
Again they are carpet bombing the country. It’s not like hamas have civilians tied to all the buildings.
Israel could have stopped being cunts at any time in the last 60 years. They have intentionally escalated time and time again. They could have sought peace.
Their actions will undoubtedly create a whole new radicalised generation. Every innocent they kill just creates future terrorists. It has literally been going on for decades and will now likely continue on the same. The people won’t forget this.
The IDF have threatened to attack hospitals (and have in the past. Just probably not last week) unless they evacuate under unverifiable claims that Hamas are using those as bases. Which, if true, is the situation where you get troops in to secure the injured civillians.
Similarly, the IDF have made it clear that they watched too much Speed and will “shoot the hostage” regardless of how many human shields Hamas keeps.
And there is the ongoing trend of “Okay, all good Gazan Palestinians should evacuate along these routes. Oops, we bombed those too”
As for “how can a nation at war commit crimes”: Ignoring the concept of a “war crime”, it is well worth looking up what Imperial Japan did in the name of war. Nobody cares about asians so this tends to get forgotten but they really are the poster children for horrific atrocities under the guise of war.
War is inherently barbaric. But the IDF, like many nations, have used this war as an excuse to vent a LOT of pent up aggression.
Ahh, the “if you call me a Nazi I might as well act like one” defence.
It’s interesting how often people who oppose the existence of Israel (not to be confused with being rightfuly critical of its actions) are the first too make us feel unwelcome and tell Jew who facing antisemitism outside of Israel, that we just need to deal with it (and even expect it, acording to you), and if we don’t like it, we should just leave… But where is it we should be going…?
It’s almost as if what you really want is for Jews to just not exist.
And yet the israelis keep expanding into the west bank.
How about they just stay in Israel and quit expanding into other peoples countries?
That’s fine, so how about people say that, instead of shit like “from the river to the sea”?
People making the point you just did are clearly not the one’s I’m talking about, and pretending like no one thinks and says out loud that Jews have no place in the region is basically gaslighting.
It’s as if antizionism is like antisemitism 🤔
Oh wait, they’re literally the same. Most “antizionists” I’ve known and also seen online are covert antisemites.
I do think there can be legitimate criticism of Israel and zionism that is not antisemitic (like accepting that Jews deserve a safe place to live on our ancestral land, but also that ethno-states are a bad thing), but I do agree that, especially online almost all anti-zionism comes from an antisemitic place, or at least an ignorant one.
That person defined anti-semitism such that significant fraction of Jew are anti-semites by that definition.
Fascists commonly claim the entire nation equals “their brand of fascism” in order to imply that any who do not support their brand of fascism are traitors. Zionists went a step further and claim an entire religion equals “their brand of fascism” in order to imply that any who do not support their brand of fascism are racist against the whole religion.
Theirs is the playbook of Fascism, with a few situation-specific adjustment.
and, as a Jewish anti-zionist, I disagreed with them.
But that still doesn’t change the fact that actual antisemites hide behind the excuse of anti-zionism to continue to spread antisemitism. the thread we’re commenting on is a live example of this, and minimising this fact helps the antisemites.
True.
The conflating of Zionism with all of Israel and with the Jewish Religion as a whole has been very useful for the Israeli far right and the cost has been paid by Jews all over the World who have nothing to do with those fascists.
Similary, the accompanying strategy of throwing the accusation of anti-semitism left, right and center at any criticism of Israel or Zionism has had a “the boy who cried wolf” effect: people don’t really believe it anymore, so when real alerts for real anti-semitism are made, people just take them as the usual false slander for political purposes.
This was entirelly to be expected.
They are happy to no longer be any “covert” about it.
That’s the whole point of inventing the “antizionist” term, it makes them feel less bad about themselves because they can look in the mirror and lie to themselves by saying “I’m not a Nazi, I’m just against a state”. It’s like how anti-abortionists prefer to call themselves “pro-life”, it’s less negative.
So since I say the same shit about the American government, what does that make me?
Especially since I live in America.
Nope one is about a terroristic government who kills children and journalists all willy nilly, the other is a religion/race, I’ve really understood how Jewish is a race but that is neither here nor there.
I hate the Israeli government but I can’t think of a single jewish person i have met that i don’t like.
Good food and friendly people from what I can tell.
So you need reasons to not act on your anti semitism? You are just repressing it.
This is fucking ridiculous tbh.
I posted this in another comment, but srsly did you read the article? “In Los Angeles, a man screaming “kill Jews” attempts to break into a family’s home. In London, girls in a playground are told they are “stinking Jews” and should stay off the slide. In China, posts likening Jews to parasites, vampires or snakes proliferate on social media, attracting thousands of “likes”.”
That’s not criticism of IDF being taken badly, that’s random Jewish people being subject to severe antisemitic rhetoric simply for being Jewish.
Nah, it just shows that the masks have fallen down
It was dumb then, it’s dumb now.
Yes, the only reasonable responce to it is become actually antisemitic and start throwing Molotov cocktails to Jewish temples.