Editor vs. Op-Ed Writer

I have no problem with Donna Brazile’s op-ed in the Wall Street Journal against anti-semitism. In fact I like it. Here’s a snippet:

The latest eruption of anti-Semitism has been sparked by fighting between Israel and Hamas, the terrorist group that controls the Gaza Strip. But the perpetrators of these vile anti-Semitic attacks, in the U.S. and elsewhere, use the actions of Israel as an excuse to mount assaults against Jews.

There is nothing anti-Semitic about policy disagreements with the government of Israel. Jews themselves, including Israelis, are sharply divided in their opinions of the government, just as Americans are sharply divided in our views of the U.S. government. But attacking people because they’re Jewish isn’t about a policy dispute—it is about simple hatred.

but I have a bone to pick with the editors. The slug of the piece:

Jew-hatred is wrong whether it comes from neo-Nazis or left-wing activists.

conveys a distorted view of the piece itself. Here’s the sole passage calling out “left-wing activists”:

Those on the left who profess to champion Palestinian rights are sorely misguided if they believe praising Adolf Hitler, beating up Jews in New York and elsewhere, and defacing synagogues in the U.S. and Europe with swastikas will aid Palestinians.

which is not representative of the piece itself.

My only quibble with the op-ed is that it doesn’t really provide a realistic assessment of anti-semitism in the United States. According to the Anti-Defamation League anti-semitic views are held by a smaller proportion of people in North and South America (19%) than in Western Europe (22%), Eastern Europe (34%), Asia (22%), sub-Saharan Africa (24%), or the Middle East and North Africa (a whopping 74%) but even that is an inadequate picture. The reason it’s that low in the Americas is that only 10% of Americans and 8% of Canadians hold anti-semitic views. Everywhere else in the Americas, a higher percentage hold anti-semitic views. Among the countries from which we receive the most immigrants 1 of 4 Mexicans holds such views, 1 of 3 Guatemalans, and 1 of 5 Chinese or Indians hold them.

In other words if we want to preserve the highly tolerant society we already have, condemning the U. S. as intolerant while welcoming less tolerant people is not a success-oriented strategy.