How to Be Anti-Semitic and Get Away With It [View all]

[Mosby]

Out of 8 billion people on the planet, there are only 16 million Jews—but far, far more anti-Semites. I sometimes joke that if I had fewer scruples, I wouldn’t report on anti-Jewish prejudice; I’d contract myself out to the more numerous and better-resourced bigots, and help them get away with it. Because in more than a decade covering anti-Semitism, I have become a reluctant expert in all the ways that anti-Jewish activists obfuscate their hate.

People must learn to recognize and reject these tactics, because too many communities have developed ways to excuse or otherwise ignore anti-Semitism. Today, such prejudice is growing in high and low places because powerful people around the world are running the same playbook to launder their hate into the public sphere.

Here’s how they do it:

1. They become too big to fail.

(Elon Musk)

2. They don’t say the quiet part out loud.

(Tucker, Erdogan)

3. They replace Jew with Zionist

(Ali Khamenei)

4. They say they were just “supporting Palestine.

Earlier this month, the actor Susan Sarandon was dropped by her talent agency. It was a mostly symbolic gesture, because the celebrated performer continues to get work and others will be happy to represent her. But almost immediately, viral posts on social media viewed more than 50 million times claimed that she had been punished for her pro-Palestinian advocacy. This popular narrative had only one small flaw: It was false.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/12/anti-semitism-israel-gaza-celebrity-statements/676232/