Jews Don't Count

by David Baddiel

It is a progressive article of faith—much heightened during the Black Lives Matter protests following the murder of George Floyd in 2020—that those who do not experience racism need to listen, to learn, to accept and not challenge, when others speak about their experiences. Except, it seems, when Jews do. Non-Jews, including progressive non-Jews, are still very happy to tell Jews whether or not the utterance about them was in fact racist.

I think, by the way, that a lot of Jews on the left are ashamed of Israel, and so they go out of their way to say so. Fine. I’m not suggesting that the state of Israel hasn’t done many things to be ashamed of. But here’s the thing: I am not responsible for those actions and expecting that I should feel so is racist. If a non-Israeli Jew does feel responsible, it is internalized racism. To be perfectly honest, I think a fair amount of Jews on the left are just ashamed of being Jewish. I think Jews on the left have to some extent absorbed the myths about Jews being rich capitalist power mongers, and so therefore make a special point of how un-Jewish they are, the objective corollary of which is hating Israel. Me, I think, Israel? Meh.

oof ! not a fan of this statement - would love to hear from other Jews on their thoughts on this.

One of the things about being a non-Zionist is it puts you in an interesting position with left-wing antisemites. Most left-wing antisemites assume that you’re only using the cry “antisemitism!” because you’re a Zionist. Since I’m not a Zionist, this is confusing. Although it shouldn’t be, of course, if what I’m doing is crying “antisemitism!” because I’ve seen something antisemitic.