Opposition lawmakers slammed the Likud leadership on Tuesday for not stepping up to speak out about the anti-Semitic attacks and threats sweeping across the United States.
MK Nachman Shai (Zionist Union) slammed the Israeli government for showing apparent indifference to the waves of bomb threats and vandalism in the U.S. and Canada in recent weeks, in contrast to Israel’s history of standing up for Jewish communities under threat elsewhere around the world.
“We have seen dozens of terrible incidents recently, including vandalism, defacing at Jewish cemeteries, threats against Jewish Community Centers and more. But despite our long-standing practice of coming to the defense of threatened Jewish communities, when it comes to the United States, we are silent,” Shai said in an email statement to the Tazpit Press Service.
“Jews have always fought for the rights of minorities. I am urging the Israeli government to put the theory of being the leader of the Jewish people into practice by standing up for Jewish communities in the United States. We must defend them, as they have done for us so many times.”
Shai’s statement followed a stormy emergency session of the Knesset Committee for Immigration, Absorption and Diaspora Affairs about the most recent wave of anti-Semitic attacks in the United States.
Monday, a swastika was carved into the door of a synagogue in Ohio — an incident that followed five waves of bomb threats against Jewish Community Centers, Jewish Day Schools, several offices of the New York-based Anti-Defamation League and at least one Jewish museum, as well as three cases in which Jewish cemeteries in Brooklyn, Philadelphia and St. Louis were vandalized, with hundreds of headstones knocked over and broken.
On Tuesday, a sixth wave of bomb threats struck JCCs and ADL offices in the United States, with the FBI, state and local police in at least five states scrambling to sweep buildings in New York, Wisconsin, Florida, Maryland and Oregon.
“For many years there was a sense that the United States was the safest place for people of all religions and ethnic groups, a place with tolerance for any religion or race. Unfortunately, this has changed 180 degrees,” Knesset committee chairman MK Avraham Neguise (Likud).
Leftist pundits and politicians have blamed the attacks on the rhetoric of U.S. President Donald Trump. “I do not think you can ignore the connection between the inauguration of a president who ran a campaign of xenophobia and the slew of organizations convening anti-Semitic rallies that would be worthy of Nazi Germany,” far-left Meretz MK Tamar Zandberg said. “[Israel’s] political alliance with the American government has led the Israeli government to turn a blind eye to the hatred as long as it was directed toward Muslims the United States.”
But the spike in anti-Semitism did not begin in 2017, and in fact, the rise can be traced back to the years of the administration of former President Barack Obama. An ADL audit of 2016 reported that anti-Semitic assaults on American college campuses nearly doubled during 2015, an increase of about three percent over 2014.
President Reuven Rivlin thanked New York State Andrew Cuomo during his recent visit to the Jewish State for his unswerving support and commitment to fighting anti-Semitism, wherever it exists. “Your arrival to Israel at this time is an extremely important signal that the American people and government will not let anti-Semitism win,” Rivlin told the governor. “On behalf of the State of Israel, I would like to express our appreciation for your visit and for the clear and powerful message you have sent.
“The same appreciation goes to President [Donald] Trump, who condemned the recent attacks. And we are deeply touched by Vice President [Mike] Pence who went and gave a hand – and a voice – in fixing the broken gravestones. The fact that so many Christians and Muslims came to aid the Jewish communities sends the clearest message against racism and hatred. It is a sign of great hope and civil courage.
Ilana Messika and Andrew Friedman of TPS/Tazpit News Service contributed to this report.