Two things happened last week in New York that should tell you everything you need to know about the future awaiting American Jews.
The first was the launch of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s Strategy to Combat Antisemitism. Hailed by the mayor’s own peppy propagandists as historic, the plan takes bold moves like pledging $2 million for the Queens Holocaust Memorial Garden, under the theory that nothing fights Jew hatred quite as effectively as rhododendrons.
Not mentioned anywhere in the city’s 30-page report was a certain Jewish state, unhinged hatred for which is, by far, the single most prominent driver for antisemitism in the Big Apple. There’s a good reason, too, why Mamdani’s strategy had nothing to say about vilifying Israel as a trusted pathway to violence: just this June, the mayor stood on the Brooklyn Bridge and bellowed that members of AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobby, were “monsters” who poisoned the wells of American politics with their “dark money”.
You’d expect such a laughable strategy from such a prejudiced politician to send Jewish leaders into fits, and, to be fair, some said and did all the right things. Rabbi Amiel Hirsch, reviled by many in his own Reform movement for being too vocal about Jew-hatred on the left, accused the mayor of “evading the issue”. Moshe Davis, who served as the first executive director of New York’s Office to Combat Antisemitism under Mayor Eric Adams, penned a scathing piece in the Free Press, correctly pointing out the farce of Mamdani’s plan having nothing to say about the “Free Palestine” movement, which is committed more or less exclusively to making American Jews feel afraid.
Which leads us to the second noteworthy event of the week.
Just as Mamdani was busy announcing his laughable proposal, a gaggle of Jewish community bigwigs made an announcement of their own. They included Dr John Ruskay, the former longtime CEO of the UJA Federation of New York; Rabbi Eric Yoffie, the former longtime leader of the Reform movement; Rabbi Dr Ismar Schorsch, the former longtime chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary; and Nancy Kaufman, the former longtime head of the National Council of Jewish Women. These luminaries, all still very much active in American Jewish communal life, informed the world that they and a host of others were joining together to form the inaugural Jewish Communal Advisory Council of a group called J Street.
Founded in 2007 by former Howard Dean aide Jeremy Ben-Ami, and heavily funded by George Soros, J Street presents itself as the anti-AIPAC, a liberal lobbying outfit that supports both Israelis and Palestinians. In reality, however, the group has come under constant criticism for consistently and unfailingly supporting policies and politicians who put vital Israeli and Jewish interests at risk: during the Gaza War, for example, Ben-Ami made headlines for siding with Jerusalem’s worst detractors and saying Israel may be committing genocide.
Why, then, would so many ultimate Jewish establishment insiders rush to join J Street?
The answer is as simple as it is sad. Because the Jewish-organised Jewish community has long seen itself as merely one tile in the Democrat Party’s gorgeous mosaic of aggrieved minorities. Because these insiders understand that the Democrat Party is now governed by men like Mamdani. And because they know that the path forward for any Jew who wants to enjoy the protection of the Jew haters in charge is simple: denounce Israel and the Jews who support it. Call them bearded zealots. Argue that they don’t represent Judaism’s real values, which are all about welcoming the stranger and avoiding conflict at any cost. Take the knee. Hope for the best.
Mamdani’s plan is the clearest manifestation yet of this approach. If you’re a good Jew, the mayor effectively told us last week, and if you’re willing not to squawk about Israel or denounce the brutes marching down the street calling for its annihilation, there just might be a few shekels in it for you and your group. And J Street’s mass recruitment of non-Orthodox communal leader no longer in office is the clearest manifestation yet that the approach is working and that certain so-called Jewish communal leaders would gladly cower if only you offer them something that feels like a shred of relevance or a morsel of influence from the master’s table.
The luminaries in question, of course, will claim otherwise. They’ll say J Street is a necessary course corrective to an Israeli government grown to “extremist”. They’ll coo that political power is best used from the inside, and that remaining on the inside always comes at a price. American Jewish communal leaders have been making these same exact arguments for years. And yet, repeatedly and consistently, they’ve failed to make a single Jew safer, and watched with impotent befuddlement as their party embraced the more radical Jew haters in its midst.
Never mind. As the so-called communal leaders strain to convince us that their voices still matter, most American Jews have moved on, realising that their miserable leadership has failed them and abandoning the organisations their parents and grandparents once so avidly supported. To those muddle-minded self-appointed leaders, then, we say just this: it’s not the end of the world, friends; it’s just the end of you.
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