Cal Thomas: The history of anti-Semitism

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Thursday, February 22nd. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown. Up next: WORLD commentator Cal Thomas on a new book that suggests Jewish Americans ought to rethink their loyalty to Democratic politicians.

CAL THOMAS: In the aftermath of anti-Israel protests on many college campuses and in the streets, a new book by Benjamin Ginsberg is perfectly timed. It’s titled The New American Anti-Semitism: The Left, The Right, and the Jews.

Ginsberg is a professor of political science at Johns Hopkins University, and he’s especially hard on progressives and urges American Jews to move away from their longtime support of Democrats to form a new political alliance, especially with evangelical Christians.

While U.S. presidents have given lip service in support of Israel, some Republican and many Democratic presidents have pressured Israel to make concessions to her sworn enemies that threaten the existence of the Jewish state.

Politico reports this about Israel’s ongoing attempt to eliminate Hamas: “Biden administration officials have spent weeks quietly drafting a multiphase postwar game plan that envisions a revamped Palestinian Authority [or PA] ultimately taking over the Gaza Strip.”

It takes a leap of faith to ignore what Hamas and other terrorist groups have as their objective and to believe that a “revamped” PA would not be overtaken again by Hamas or another terror group.

Antisemitism extends back to ancient Egypt. Ginsberg gets to what I think is the real source of antisemitism. Because Jewish culture emphasizes education and achievement, Jews reach the very top of economic and political life. But that excellence tends to cause resentment and jealousy. Underachievers need someone to blame and for some this tiny minority is an easy target.

In view of this, Ginsberg wonders why a large majority of Jews still vote for Democrats. “Since 1932,” he writes, “Jews have unfailingly given a plurality of their votes to Democratic presidential candidates. … On seven occasions (they) received more than 80 percent of the Jewish vote.”

Jewish Americans were once open to voting Republican, but their allegiance shifted under Franklin Roosevelt. That shift is hard to fatham, given Roosevelt’s barring of thousands of Jewish refugees from entering the country. (His excuse was they might be Nazi spies.) Roosevelt also refused to bomb the rail lines leading to Auschwitz.

But Jews largely voted for and supported Roosevelt, in part because the president had so many Jews in high government positions. Ginsberg writes that support caused some concern:, “the president was leery of being identified too closely with Jews. FDR asked his Jewish advisors to keep a low profile.”

Modern antisemitism is egged-on by Democratic members of “The Squad” in Congress. Representative Ilhan Omar from Minnesota, has equated the United States and Israel with Hamas and the Taliban. That was too much for some of her Democratic colleagues, who denounced her comments.

Some college campuses appear to be breeding grounds for modern antisemitism. A survey by the Anti-Defamation League found “73% of Jewish college students surveyed have experienced or witnessed some form of antisemitism since the beginning of the 2023-2024 school year alone. … Of the non-Jewish students erroneously assumed to be Jewish, nearly half (46%) stated that they had been targeted based on their assumed Jewishness.”

Ginsberg’s book makes a strong case on the roots of antisemitism. It also shows how Jewish-hatred continues to poison the politics and culture of many countries, including our own.

I’m Cal Thomas.

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