Antisemitism in the United States
[16] Academic David Greenberg has written in Slate, "Extreme anti-communism always contained an antisemitic component: Radical, alien Jews, in their demonology, orchestrated the Communist conspiracy."
[21][22] The most persistent form of antisemitism has consisted of a series of widely circulating tropes and stereotypes in which Jews are portrayed as being socially, religiously, and economically unacceptable to American life, because of their inferiority to white Christian society or because of conspiratorial thinking in which Jews are accused of plotting to undermine the racial and economic hierarchies which make up the historical fabric of American society.
[23] Martin Marger wrote, "A set of distinct and consistent negative stereotypes, some of which can be traced as far back as the Middle Ages in Europe, has been applied to Jews.
functions in society, an irrational theory that deflects responsibility for social ills away from actual authorities and leaders and onto minority Jewish communities.
[31] "What concerns us is that many of the gains we had seen in building a more tolerant and accepting America seem not to have taken hold as firmly as we had hoped," said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director.
"While there are many factors at play, the findings suggest that antisemitic beliefs endure and resonate with a substantial segment of the population, nearly 35 million people."
[32] A 2009 study which was titled "Modern Anti-Semitism and Anti-Israeli Attitudes", published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology in 2009, tested a new theoretical model of antisemitism among Americans in the Greater New York area with three experiments.
Abraham H. Foxman, the organization's national director, argued, "It is disturbing that with all of the strides we have made in becoming a more tolerant society, antisemitic beliefs continue to hold a vice-grip on a small but not insubstantial segment of the American public."
[34] However, a 2019 survey by the Jewish Electorate Institute found that 73% of American Jews feel less secure since the election of Donald Trump to the presidency.
[40] According to earlier ADL research, dating back to 1964, the trend that African-Americans are significantly more likely to hold antisemitic beliefs across all education levels than white Americans has remained unchanged over the years.
In 1967, the New York Times Magazine published the article "Negroes Are Anti-Semitic Because They're Anti-White" in which the African-American author James Baldwin sought to explain the prevalence of black antisemitism.
[47] In December 2022, taking a joint stand against increasing instances of racism and antisemitism in the United States, African-American leaders New York City Mayor Eric Adams, Reverends Al Sharpton and Conrad Tillard, and Vista Equity Partners CEO and Carnegie Hall Chairman Robert F. Smith, joined Jewish leaders Rabbi Shmuley Boteach and Elisha Wiesel, and jointly hosted 15 Days of Light, celebrating Hanukkah and Kwanzaa in a unifying holiday ceremony at Carnegie Hall.
[51] Austin App, a German-American La Salle University professor of medieval English literature, is considered the first major American Holocaust denier.
App's work inspired the Institute for Historical Review, a California center which was founded in 1978 with the sole purpose of denying the Holocaust.
[54] The results of a survey which was conducted in 2020 revealed that close to two-thirds of Millennials and Gen Z adults were not aware that 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust.
They include Christian Identity Churches, White Aryan Resistance, the Ku Klux Klan, the American Nazi Party, and many other organizations.
Adopting the look and emblems of white power skinheads, many members of these antisemitic groups shave their heads and tattoo themselves with Nazi symbols such as swastikas, SS insignias, and "Heil Hitler".
Specifically, they claim that the Nation of Islam has engaged in revisionist and antisemitic interpretations of the Holocaust and exaggerates the role of Jews in the Atlantic slave trade.
[60][failed verification] In December 2012, the Simon Wiesenthal Center put the NOI's leader Louis Farrakhan on its list of the ten most prominent antisemites in the world.
There, they hoped to continue their academic careers, but barring a scant few, they found little acceptance in elite institutions in Depression-era America with its undercurrent of antisemitism.
[64][65] On April 3, 2006, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights announced its finding that incidents of antisemitism are a "serious problem" on college campuses throughout the United States.
A 2017 report by Brandeis University's Steinhardt Social Research Institute indicated that most Jewish students never experience anti-Jewish remarks or physical attacks.
[72] In September 2021, in collaboration with the Cohen Group, the Brandeis Center conducted a poll of American Jewish fraternity and sorority members.
Despite the focus on these geopolitical issues, antisemitic incidents unrelated to Israel also increased by 65% year-over-year, underscoring the widespread nature of the problem.
[80] The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) organizes Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) which are designed to collect and evaluate statistics of offenses which are committed in the U.S.
[89] During Hanukkah festivities in December 2019, a number of attacks committed in New York were possibly motivated by antisemitism, including a mass stabbing in Monsey.
[90] In 2018 and 2019, antisemitism in the United States was reported to have increased compared to previous years according to statistics collected by both the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Anti-Defamation League.
Armed with an AR-15–style rifle, the gunman, John Earnest, a White supremacist and Christian traditionalist, fatally shot one woman and injured three other persons, including the synagogue's rabbi.
[120] In June 2023, four Jewish homes were set on fire, one of which was destroyed completely, and fourteen others were sprayed with antisemitic graffiti including swastikas and other Neo‑Nazi and white supremacist symbols in Toms River, New Jersey.
The perpetrator of these attacks, Ronald "Ron" Carr, 35, from nearby Manchester, told the police that he acted to "save the neighborhood" from Jews, who "are ruining the world" and "should be a dying breed".
