(Photo credit: Adobe Stock/lobro)
David J. Butler
That reflex is at the heart of an open letter Rabbi Arthur Green recently published on Substack, addressed to New York Times columnist Bret Stephens. Stephens had argued that Jews should devote less energy to the futile project of eradicating antisemitism and more to strengthening Jewish learning, identity and communal life. Green agreed — but added something far more unsettling: that Jews must “take a piece of responsibility for our situation.”
Green’s argument reaches deep into Jewish history and theology. Our language of chosenness, he suggests, our pride in moral distinctiveness, our record of achievement and success — all of it has, at times, hardened into a sense of superiority. In today’s Israel, he argues, that distortion has become political and visible in the policies of a right-wing government he calls a public disgrace. Without serious self-scrutiny, Green contends, Jews cannot fully understand the resentment that surrounds us.
Green is no marginal voice. He is a recognized scholar of Jewish mysticism, founding dean of the Hebrew College Rabbinical School and emeritus professor at Brandeis University. When he suggests that something intrinsic to Jewish self-understanding — amplified by Israeli power — helps explain the hostility we face, it deserves serious engagement.
It also demands a clear rebuttal.
Like Rabbi Green, I have serious concerns about Israel’s current government. I find some of its far-right leaders embarrassing. I believe certain policies have been reckless, morally corrosive and strategically shortsighted. Criticism is not betrayal; it is the obligation that comes with moral seriousness. Israelis themselves are waging that argument — loudly, fiercely and democratically.
But to suggest — even implicitly — that Jewish sovereignty or Jewish pride meaningfully explains antisemitism is to misread history and misdiagnose the present.
Antisemitism did not begin with Benjamin Netanyahu. It did not begin with the settler movement, with Zionism or with 1948. It did not begin with Jewish success in America or with biblical language about chosenness. It long predates Jewish sovereignty.
When Jews were barred from universities and professions, they were hated. When they entered those professions and excelled, they were hated. When they were stateless, they were despised as rootless cosmopolitans. Now that they have a state, they are denounced as colonialists. The explanation changes. The hostility does not.
Green is careful to say he is not blaming the victim. I take him at his word. But when we look for something intrinsic to Jewish identity or Jewish power to explain antisemitism, we risk granting it a moral logic it does not possess.
Antisemitism is not a reasoned response to Jewish conduct. It is hatred of Jews.
It does not require arrogance. It does not require triumphalism. It does not require sovereignty. It has flourished when Jews were weak and when Jews were strong. It has flourished when Jews were insular and when Jews were assimilated. It adapts to its moment, attaching itself to whatever story is available.
The Dreyfus affair was not about Israeli policy. Russian pogroms were not triggered by Jewish political power. The Shoah was not the product of Jewish success run amok. Antisemitism did not need Jewish misbehavior to justify itself then, and it does not need it now.
None of this absolves Israel’s government of moral scrutiny. Sovereignty brings risk. Power demands restraint. A Jewish state must be judged by Jewish values — justice, human dignity, the recognition that every person is created in God’s image. Israelis argue daily about whether their leaders are living up to those standards.
But antisemitism is not a referendum on Israeli policy.
Campus demonstrators chanting for intifada are not engaged in careful diplomatic critique. Synagogues requiring armed guards are not responding to theological error. The surge in antisemitic assaults in Western cities did not arise from a sober analysis of Israeli strategy. It arose because antisemitism does what it has always done: it seizes on events as justification for a hostility that already exists.
Antisemitism does not need a cause. It looks for excuses.
There is a temptation, especially among thoughtful Jews, to believe that if we perfect ourselves morally, the hatred will recede. Teshuvah — self-examination — is central to Jewish life. Green is right that we should ask how chosenness is taught. We should ensure that pride does not curdle into chauvinism. We should invest more in Jewish education and ethical seriousness than in slick public relations campaigns.
But self-examination must not slide into self-indictment.
We are responsible for our conduct. We are not responsible for the existence of antisemitism.
If Israel fails morally, it must be challenged — first by Israelis, and in solidarity by Diaspora Jews. If Jewish institutions have grown complacent, they must be renewed. If our children are alienated, we must engage them honestly.
What we must not do is accept the premise that antisemitism is the natural consequence of Jews exercising power.
Antisemitism does not retreat when Jews are weaker, quieter or more apologetic. It never has.
Israel may need reform. Jewish life may need rebuilding. But antisemitism is not the price Jews pay for existing too confidently in the world.
David J. Butler is an attorney. He is president of Dvash Consulting, LLC and a member of the ownership group of Mid-Atlantic Media, which owns and publishes Washington Jewish Week.