Joe Kent, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, resigned from the Trump administration on March 17, citing his opposition to the war in Iran. In his letter, he alleged that the United States entered this conflict \u201cdue to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.\u201d This hearkens back to an ancient, antisemitic conspiracy theory\u2014or \u201ctrope\u201d (a myth or false narrative about Jews)\u2014that claims \u201cJews run the world,\u201d but dressed up in the language of national security. The letter was immediately and broadly condemned as antisemitic by voices across the political spectrum, from Sen. Mitch McConnell to Rep. Don Bacon to Democratic Jewish leaders.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But here is what concerns me most: Joe Kent is not alone. Anti-Israel sentiment laced with antisemitic tropes is spreading\u2014not just on the fringes, but increasingly through the influencer class, the hard right, and the halls of power. Media figures like Tucker Carlson have increasingly used their platforms to amplify these false narratives, often framing US support for Israel as a product of \u201cdual loyalty\u201d or \u201cforeign interference\u201d that is harming American interests. Candace Owens and Nick Fuentes tow similar lines.<\/p>\n
And it\u2019s nothing new. Consider where these lies took root.<\/p>\n
Nazi Scapegoating<\/p>\n
Dr. Paul Joseph Goebbels was one of Adolf Hitler\u2019s closest followers and the chief propagandist for the Nazi Party. He often used his own state-controlled media to hammer home a single, deadly lie: \u201cDie Juden sind schuld!\u201d (The Jews are to blame!). This was a full decade before the Holocaust. Over time, Goebbels\u2019 lies slowly poisoned the public\u2019s view of the Jewish people. It was but one of countless others about the Jewish people that played a part in changing people\u2019s attitudes about them pre-Holocaust. Today, it stands as a stark reminder that genocide begins with the slow shifting of public perception.\u00a0<\/p>\n
While Goebbels controlled the official state narrative, other propagandists worked to radicalize the public at a more visceral level. A decade earlier, Julius Streicher started publishing the virulently antisemitic German tabloid Der St\u00fcrmer, which was published until the end of World War II. The newspaper often described how to identify Jewish people, included racist political cartoons and antisemitic caricatures, and focused on imaginary fears and exaggerations\u2014like medieval stereotypes accusing Jews of killing children, sacrificing their bodies, and drinking their blood. Over time, these articles and images subtly shifted people\u2019s perceptions of Jews, whom Streicher portrayed as an inferior race. By 1938 his publishing house was producing other antisemitic works, including the infamous German children\u2019s book Giftpilz (The Poisonous Mushroom). Articles became more malicious in Der St\u00fcrmer once the war began, many demanding the annihilation and extermination of the \u201cJewish race.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Nazis used such propaganda to rally the Germans to support the persecution of Jews, war, and ultimately, genocide. By the time of the Holocaust, these stereotypes and images were so familiar that people didn\u2019t realize they had adopted such inaccurate views as truth.<\/p>\n
Modern-Day Lies Blaming Jews<\/p>\n
Today, rhetoric being spewed from certain media influencers is disturbingly similar. This same \u201cblame\u201d is being modernized through what\u2019s called the \u201cGreat Replacement\u201d theory\u2014a conspiracy promoted by figures like Fuentes and amplified by Carlson. This theory falsely alleges that \u201celites\u201d (often a code for Jewish people) are engineering the demographic destruction of white Christians.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Disconcerting is that this \u201cGreat Replacement\u201d trope transitions into the equally dangerous \u201cdual loyalty\u201d myth. By framing Israel as the primary driver of all global problems, media influencers like Fuentes have explicitly promoted\u2014and Carlson and Owens have reinforced\u2014the lie that American Jews (and the politicians who support Israel) are more loyal to a foreign power than their own country.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Whether it is the \u201cinternal threat\u201d of the Great Replacement or the \u201cexternal threat\u201d of the Israeli lobby, the core lie remains the same\u2014that a secret, powerful group is working against the interests of the common man. It\u2019s an antisemitic trope that goes back to pre-Holocaust times, and its evil intent to purport global Jewry as the source of all ills in the world has not changed.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Antisemitism Is Surging<\/p>\n
One would think antisemitism no longer happens in twenty-first-century America, yet the opposite is true: it is skyrocketing. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) reported 9,354 antisemitic incidents in the United States in 2024\u2014the highest number ever recorded since the ADL began tracking them in 1979. For comparison, there were 8,873 in 2023 and 3,697 in 2022. (The numbers for 2025 are yet to be released.) In the 2023 ADL Antisemitic Attitudes in America report, 20 percent of Americans believe six or more antisemitic tropes that feed antisemitism, an increase from 11 percent in 2019. In 2024, the share of Americans holding \u201cextensive antisemitic views\u201d rose to 24 percent.<\/p>\n
One trope that surfaced during the 2021\u20132022 COVID-19 debacle is the phrase \u201cpoisoning the well, which blamed the Jews for spreading the virus\u2014a trope the ADL says, \u201cechoes the medieval trope that Jews were responsible for spreading the Bubonic Plague in Europe.\u201d This myth led to the use of the term \u201cHolocough\u201d across social media\u2014a call to infect and kill Jews with COVID.<\/p>\n
The \u201cdeadly exchange\u201d myth recently surfaced too. The ADL states this untruth \u201cclaimed that training exercises between the US and Israeli police forces fueled American police brutality against Black Americans by promulgating tactics allegedly used against Palestinians.\u201d A 2021 article by the American Jewish Committee (AJC) stated this gross analogy \u201cappeared in demonstrations \u2026 when protesters chanted \u2018Israel, we know you\u2014you murder children, too.\u2019\u201d Nick Fuentes has further fueled this narrative of \u201cglobal manipulation\u201d by the \u201cAmerican Zionist occupied government\u201d trope, claiming the US government is merely a puppet for Israeli interests.<\/p>\n
Why This Matters for Evangelical Christians<\/p>\n
Sadly, all four of these personalities\u2014Fuentes, Owens, Carlson, and Kent\u2014have publicly professed to be Christians, yet they fuel the fire of rhetoric that goes far beyond social lies. They are actively \u201cbearing false witness\u201d (Exodus 20:16), and the Bible does not sugarcoat the root of such deception: it is the work of the \u201cfather of lies\u201d (John 8:44).<\/p>\n
Now is not the time for Christians to be passive; we must take a stand vocally and in our actions. Fighting antisemitism is not about \u201cpolitical correctness\u201d but gospel integrity. We cannot claim to love a Jewish Messiah while disregarding the dehumanization of His brethren.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The increase in antisemitic incidents and the rise of repackaged lies and conspiracies is disturbing and verifies how critical it is for Christians to understand what antisemitic tropes are and speak out against them, so history does not repeat itself.<\/p>\n