The massacre in Israel on October 7, 2023, was followed by an immediate and sharp increase in antisemitic incidents in the United States. The incidents ranged from threats to Jewish students on college campuses to Nazi symbols and antisemitic screeds popular on social media to physical violence. Before the Israel/Hamas War began, antisemitism in the United States was already at the highest historical rate since hate crimes had been recorded. October 2023 resulted in four times as many anti-Jewish incidents as October 2022 and the threat environment for American Jews has only gotten worse since.

Although Jews represent approximately 2% of the American population hate crimes targeting Jews are consistently 60% of religiously based hate crimes in the US. Before the current surge, antisemitic acts had already been on the rise, including mass murder of Jews praying in a synagogue in Pittsburgh.  Antisemitism is in no way new to American culture, and the increase in antisemitic incidents highlights deep divisions in American society.

This class will attempt to put current American antisemitism into context and give participants a chance to discuss trends in and responses to this scourge on American liberty. The historical background of antisemitic beliefs and behavior will be briefly covered, but most of the course will deal with how antisemitic ideas and acts affect contemporary Americans.

Why are Jews targeted for hate and how do American Jews cope with the hatred? How does antisemitism relate to racism and other forms of bigotry? What political, religious, and social factors have led to an increase in antisemitic expressions and behaviors? What are the “code words” and other methods that antisemites use to signal to like-minded people while maintaining plausible deniability of antisemitic views? In what way do political figures exploit antisemitism for their own gain? Does that ever backfire? Is it possible to be an antisemite and a supporter of the State of Israel? Is it possible to have antisemitic views and have Jewish friends and relatives? We will explore these and other questions concerning this timely and difficult topic.

This class is being taught as a follow-up class to #310 Mira Kimmelman Holocaust Education Study Group. That class is not a requirement for this class.