By: Aaron Gluck
On the morning of October 7th in Israel, during the Jewish Sabbath and a major holiday, Hamas began a surprise attack from the Gaza Strip firing thousands of rockets, murdering innocent civilians, capturing hostages, and causing the escalation of an already dire situation in Gaza.[1] This led to the condemnation of the Hamas terrorists from the international community and universal support for Israel to defend itself.[2]
From a narrower standpoint, in the United States, 70% of adults are at least somewhat concerned with the situation and 8% have family in the region so this topic is on the minds of most Americans.[3] While Americans tend to side with Israel in the conflict, there is a significant minority that side with Palestine.[4] Americans have sympathy for both the Palestinian and Israeli people individually when they are questioned about them separately.[5] Though Israel enjoys support amongst the majority of Americans, young people had begun to be more favorable to the Palestinians before this conflict occurred.[6]
The conflict has led to protests on both sides of the conflict. While many of those protesting the State of Israel may claim they are anti-Zionist not antisemitic, many of the messages shared by those same individuals are in fact antisemitic and have existed for hundreds of years.[7] These messages include ideas that the media and government are controlled by Zionists or that Zionists are more loyal to Israel than the US.[8] Overall since October 7th antisemitic incidents have increased 388% over the same period last year.[9] According to Jonathan Greenblatt the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, whose mission is to “stop the defamation of the Jewish People and to secure justice and fair treatment to all”,[10] “[w]hen conflicts erupt in Israel antisemitic incidents soon follow in the US and globally.”[11] Protestors have called for an Intifada (uprising) as the one solution to the conflict eerily similar to an earlier idea from Nazi Germany “the final solution.”[12] Antisemitic signs and graffiti present at Palestinian protests have included “please keep the world clean” with an image of a Jewish Star crossed out and “Death to Zionism kill a settler”.[13] Additional acts of vandalism and messages have included messages such as “Free Palestine…Kill Jews” and “Kill the Jews”[14] These are not statements in support of Palestine, but blatant act of antisemitism. Protestors and those in support of Palestine can peacefully support their cause in this country without attacking another ethnic group.
Coupled with the rise of antisemitism has been the rise of Islamophobia following the Hamas invasion. The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) has reported that since October 7th, they have received over 774 complaints ten times the amount they received for the entire month of August.[15] The ADL has found Islamophobic content on platforms such as Instagram and TikTok directed as Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims.[16] The language has been dehumanizing and new terms have emerged such as Total Palestinian Death (TBD).[17] On reddit posts have been made that said “all of Islam should be brutally wiped from the face of the earth just for that poor dog.”[18] These statements can easily be made on social media by anonymous users and can be shared over and over to increase the reach of the harmful content.[19] In the comment sections of many posts hateful comments can be found such as “lets finish them once and for all” in a post about the Gaza invasion.[20] These statements perpetuate negative stereotypes that have been prominent since 9/11 and do not serve a positive purpose other than to attack one of the most targeted ethnic groups in the US.[21]
While in many cases, these actions have been limited to rhetoric, there have been multiple cases where people have committed violent hate crimes in support of their respective beliefs. Violence against Jewish people has included an attack in New York City where a woman was punched because the man believed she was Jewish, Jewish students at Berkely being assaulted, and countless other violent events in Europe and around the world.[22] A Palestinian mother was stabbed 12 times, and her 6-year-old son was stabbed 26 times and killed in their home by their landlord because they were Muslim, and the Department of Justice is currently investigating it as a hate crime.[23] Other actions against Palestinians have included assaults in Brooklyn and someone pointing a gun at Palestinian protestors in Philadelphia.[24] These violent acts are horrific and do not aid either side in promoting their positions on the Israel-Palestinian Conflict.
The conflict has caused many in the US to take a stand, and in the United States the First Amendment protects the people’s right to speech and assembly.[25] However, those rights are not unlimited, and free speech cannot incite violence.[26] American Jews and Palestinians are not the government of Israel or Hamas and should not be equated to them. President Biden understands this and the fears of Jewish and Muslim Americans worried about the effects of the crisis in Israel and has vowed to combat Antisemitism and Islamophobia.[27] In the US we should all be free to peacefully express our views without putting down another group and being discriminatory. Unfortunately, the situation overseas is dire, but the effects are wide-reaching and have led to negative consequences in the US, thousands of miles away.
[1] Josef Federman & Issam Adwan, Hamas Surprise Attack out of Gaza Stuns Israel and Leaves Hundreds Dead in Fighting, Retaliation, AP (Oct. 7, 2023, 11:32 PM EDT), https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinians-gaza-hamas-rockets-airstrikes-tel-aviv-11fb98655c256d54ecb5329284fc37d2.
[2] Joint Statement by President Biden, President Emmanuel Macron of France, Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of Italy, and Prime Minister Sunak of the United Kingdom on the Situation in Israel, 2023 Daily Comp. Pres. Doc. 887 (Oct. 9, 2023)
[3] Nathaniel Rakich, What Americans Think about the War in Israel- Gaza, abc NEWS (Oct. 24, 2023, 1:24 PM), https://abcnews.go.com/538/americans-war-israel/story?id=104150059#:~:text=Seventy%2Done%20percent%20of%20Americans,in%20the%20U.S.%20national%20interest.
[4] Id.
[5] Id.
[6] Becka A. Alper, Modest Warming in U.S. Views on Israel and Palestinians, Pew Research Center (May 26, 2022), https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2022/05/26/modest-warming-in-u-s-views-on-israel-and-palestinians/.
[7] Ctr. on Extremism, Anti-Zionism as Antisemitism: How Anti-Zionist Language from the Left and Right Vilifies Jews, ADL (Apr. 4, 2023), https://www.adl.org/resources/blog/anti-zionism-antisemitism-how-anti-zionist-language-left-and-right-vilifies-jews
[8] Id.
[9] ADL Records Dramatic Increase in U.S. Antisemitic Incidents Following Oct. 7 Hamas Massacre, ADL (Oct. 24, 2023), https://www.adl.org/resources/press-release/adl-records-dramatic-increase-us-antisemitic-incidents-following-oct-7
[10] ADL’s Mission & History, ADL, https://www.adl.org/about/mission-and-history (last visited Oct. 26, 2023)
[11] ADL Records Dramatic Increase in U.S. Antisemitic Incidents Following Oct. 7 Hamas Massacre, supra note 8
[12] See Pro-Hamas Demonstrators Attack Jewish Student at New Orleans Rally, Combat Antisemitism Movement (Oct. 26, 2023), https://combatantisemitism.org/studies-reports/database-of-antisemitic-incidents-worldwide-since-hamas-terror-assault-on-israel/.
[13] Id.
[14] Id.
[15] Ismail Allison, CAIR Reports Sharp Increase in Complaints, Reported Bias Incidents Since 10/7, CAIR (Oct. 25, 2023), https://www.cair.com/press_releases/cair-reports-sharp-increase-in-complaints-reported-bias-incidents-since-107/.
[16] Center for Technology and Society, Platforms Struggling to Curb Online Hate Amidst War in Israel and Gaza, ADL (Oct. 26, 2023), https://www.adl.org/resources/blog/platforms-struggling-curb-online-hate-amidst-war-israel-and-gaza.
[17] Id.
[18] Id.
[19] See Id.
[20] Peter.paltchikk, Comment to @StandWithUs, Instagram (Oct. 27, 2023), https://www.instagram.com/p/Cy6ctADP3aS/
[21] See Kiara Alfonseca, 20 years after 9/11, Islamophobia continues to haunt Muslims, abc NEWS (Sept. 11, 2021 12:52 PM), https://abcnews.go.com/US/20-years-911-islamophobia-continues-haunt-muslims/story?id=79732049.
[22] Pro-Hamas Demonstrators Attack Jewish Student at New Orleans Rally, supra note 11.
[23] Holly Yan, Brad Parks, Lauren Mascarenhas, & Virginia Langmaid, A 6-year-old Palestinian-American was stabbed 26 times for being Muslim, police say. His mom couldn’t go to his funeral because she was stabbed, too, CNN (Oct. 16, 2023, 8:16 PM EDT), https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/16/us/chicago-muslim-boy-stabbing-investigation/index.html.
[24] Simmone Shah, The Israel-Hamas War Is Leading to an Uptick in Hate Crimes, TIME (Oct. 18, 2023, 8:00 AM EDT), https://time.com/6324995/muslim-jewish-hate-crimes-israel-hamas-war/.
[25] See U.S. Const. amend I.
[26] See Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444, 447 (1969).
[27] Statement on the Federal Bureau of Investigation Report on Hate Crime Statistics for 2022, 2023 Daily Comp. Pres. Doc. 908 (Oct. 16, 2023).
