It is a very troubling trend that good people support ideologies or causes that go against their interests and values, due to heavily financed deception and misinformation about historical and current events.
This misinformation and deception are also affecting the worrying rise in antisemitism that is affecting our society in multiple ways. We can see a surge in violence, an increase in economic challenges and a deterioration in the objectivity of reporting by individuals and organizations who are supposed to be objective.
A few recent examples are Amnesty International’s recent, totally distorted report on Israel, the US government considering removing Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), one of the most dangerous terror organizations, from the list of the internationally recognized terror organizations, and respectable American universities that are buckling to pressure by malicious BDS operatives and are implementing anti-Israel and anti-Jewish policies.
One of the most troubling outcomes of this antisemitic pressure and deception is the fact that some uninformed or misinformed Jews are turning away from their traditional support of Israel and their Jewish peers. These uninformed and misinformed individuals are falling prey to the relentless wave of deception which is promoted by the enemies of the Jewish people against the State of Israel and the free society that we cherish.
Unfortunately, recent statistical studies show that oblivious Jewish people are more likely to support the Palestinians than the only Jewish State. This is probably because they have no clue about the real destructive agenda of a well-financed deceptive effort by anti-Israel operatives who hide their real vicious anti-Jewish, anti-Israel, and anti-free world agenda.
When Iran claims that Israel is the “Little Satan” and that the USA is the “Big Satan,” they do not distinguish between Zionist Jews and anti-Zionist Jews. At the same time, they do not distinguish between pro-Israel Americans and other Americans. When the Iranian proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah, are following their agenda to exterminate all the Jews and non-Jews who live in the free and democratic State of Israel, and when they are launching rockets into Israeli civilian areas, they are not distinguishing between “good” and “bad” Israelis. In an identical way, when the Russians are shelling the civilian Ukrainian population, they do not distinguish between Russian-speaking and Ukrainian-speaking civilians. They are just trying to terrorize a country and follow their self-serving agenda.
In order to combat this scary trend, Jews need to stand together against antisemitic organizations like the BDS and discredit them, because just as they’d like to dismantle the only Jewish and democratic state in the Middle East, they also support terror organizations who not only want to destroy Israel and kill Jews, but also want to dismantle the free, democratic values of the Western world.
Even if Jews disagree with some of the policies of the Israeli government, they should not fall for anti-Israel operatives that tell them they want to “change Israeli policy” while not accepting Israel’s right to exist in the first place.
All responsible parents, adults, community leaders and educators must focus their attention on the younger Jewish generation, providing them with the tools to see the big picture and the facts about Israel as a haven for Jews around the world. Even if it’s not perfect, we must support it and work together to make it better. However, we should never abandon it or worse – try to hurt it.
As Ukrainian Jews are realizing now, a strong, thriving, democratic and Jewish state is the core interest of Jews around the world. Those who undermine it and try to lure young Jews to hate Israel should be challenged sooner rather than later.
Dr. Shmuel Katz is a Zionist-American leader, speaker and philanthropist.
This op-ed is published in partnership with a coalition of organizations that fight antisemitism across the world. Read the previous article by Eitan Fischberger.