Only Strong Leaders Will Preserve Future Jewish Generations

In the weeks since the October 7 massacre, questions involving lapses within Israel's intelligence establishment have appropriately been shelved as the Jewish nation battles Hamas terrorists.

With Israelis left to determine their investigational timeline, Jewish Americans can begin to face their own institutional reckoning. Across the nation, pro-Hamas demonstrations and antisemitic mobs have dominated the news.

Indeed, many of those tasked as stewards of Jewish interests have avoided heeding the warning signals emanating from progressive spaces. The escalation of anti-Jewish bias in academia began before last month's atrocities. For years, a prevalence of organized campaigns against Jewish students exposed the motives behind Israel's campus detractors.

Absent the organizational grit and inconvenienced by the ideological underpinnings tied to a modern strain of antisemitism rooted in a hatred of Israel, the politicization of numerous "mainstream" Jewish communal platforms satisfied liberal constituencies while undermining the security of Jewish youth.

The terror-linked organization Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), which the ADL's 2022 audit confirms is a significant player in fomenting antisemitic activity, managed to evade serious scrutiny from many Jewish institutions.

According to its website, between 2003 and 2014, SJP helped pass 25 campus initiatives supporting the antisemitic Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement. After 2014, SJP registered 67 victories in achieving its divestment objectives. Its string of success is representative of SJP's notable rise and popularity.

Since its founding in 1913, the ADL is considered the leading establishment dedicated to fighting antisemitism. Under the helm of former National Director Abe Foxman, who led the organization for nearly three decades, the group largely upheld its mission as a non-partisan institution committed to combating Jewish hate.

On the social media platform “X,” Foxman recently denounced former President Barack Obama for expressing a distorted equivocation between Hamas terrorists and Israel while appearing on a "Pod Save America" interview.

In a November 4 statement, Foxman characterized Obama’s rhetoric as "simplistic arrogance." Jonathan Greenblatt, a former Obama White House employee and the ADL's CEO since 2015, has yet to address the 44th president's comments.

Greenblatt's silence is consistent with the ADL's past pattern of downplaying concerning behavior when coming from liberal-leaning circles. Until recently, its fight against antisemitism has centered on highlighting unsavory actions on the right while reluctantly confessing to threats posed by the left, which manifests from the demonization of Israel.

In 2020, the ADL sought to blunt criticism of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement by stating that disinformation related to BLM is resulting in a "deliberate mischaracterization" of the organization's mission, despite BLM's original manifesto calling Israel an "apartheid" state and its leaders finding common cause with Palestinian protests.

Efforts to disassociate movements from anti-Zionist pedagogies are not confined to the ADL. In August 2020, over 600 Jewish organizations placed a full-page ad in The New York Times supporting BLM, referring to the cause as "the current day civil rights movement in this country."

That the signatories, showcasing different streams of American Jewry, would publicly bolster an activist group whose radical platform openly libeled Israel as a genocidal state reflects the lengths to which some establishments will reach to align with progressive projects. Their actions undermine the values for which they were hired to defend and place Jewish youth in the crosshairs of anti-Israel activists.

To its credit, the ADL has intensified its criticism of antisemitic Democrats in Congress. In partnership with supporting groups, The ADL's release this month of a free campus legal protection hotline for students experiencing antisemitism is also an encouraging indication, albeit belatedly, of the institution evolving to convey the needs of Jewish students.

Elon Musk, owner "X," was recently condemned for promoting antisemitism after endorsing a November 15 post that asserted Jewish "communities" are pushing a "hatred against whites" through encouraging open border policies. The broad brush under which the original message painted Jewish Americans, coupled with its rhetoric retaining roots among antisemitic conspiracists, led Musk to clarify his words.

In a later message, Musk leveled his criticism at the ADL for its attacks "against the majority of the West" while also acknowledging that such intersectional trappings "does not extend to all Jewish communities, but it is also not just limited to ADL."

That the X chairman and Greenblatt have reached a rapprochement does not discount that Musk sharpening his language to contain the ADL and those in its liberal orbit reflects the challenges tied to partnering with policies antithetical to Jewish ideals.

Creating conditions under which progressive antisemitism was able to slip under the institutional radar helped advance antisemitic activity across our nation's universities. The ideological synergy among left-wing politicians, professors and several prominent Jewish groups helped foster an unsettling academic landscape.

Preserving future Jewish generations requires leaders who uphold political discipline and embrace their duty to protect Jewish security.