US Jews weigh threats and internal rifts over Israel’s Gaza war

For many U.S. Jews, the past year has brought two parallel strains: rising anger over attacks on Jewish communities and a deepening internal debate over how to relate to Israeli policies and actions as the Gaza war continues. The Associated Press spoke with rabbis, Jewish community leaders and commentators who said both dynamics are showing up in everyday life, including how congregations think about safety and how they weigh public displays of support for Israel.

In one example cited in the reporting, a man drove a pickup truck into a Detroit-area synagogue where more than 100 children were attending a preschool program. The driver, who had lost family members during an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon, exchanged gunfire with a guard before killing himself, according to the FBI. Rabbi Rick Jacobs, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, said that blaming American Jews—especially children in a preschool—for a foreign government’s actions reflects a “dangerous double standard” and warned against equating violence against Jewish institutions with political protest.

Jacobs also said, in direct comments quoted by the AP, that “To hold American Jews — let alone children in a preschool — accountable for the actions of a foreign government is a dangerous double standard that we don’t apply today to any other group,” adding that targeting synagogues or other Jewish institutions with violence “is antisemitism, plain and simple.” He said it remains possible to be “deeply critical” of Israel’s policies while recognizing that violence aimed at Jewish institutions is not legitimate protest.

Jewish author and commentator Peter Beinart similarly denounced the synagogue attack while reiterating his criticism of Israel’s conduct in Gaza and other places. Beinart said on his podcast that “No matter what Israel does, no matter how immoral or brutal or horrifying, it doesn’t justify attacking a synagogue or justifying attacking American Jews in any way,” describing the principle that Americans are not responsible for foreign governments’ actions merely because they share a religion or ancestry.

But Beinart’s remarks also fed a specific debate inside U.S. Jewish communities about public symbols. In the AP reporting, Beinart said synagogues that display “We stand with Israel” signs should take them down, arguing that the signs make congregants less safe and that the signs are immoral. Amy Spitalnick, CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, said she has numerous policy differences with Israel’s government, but argued she would not ask that those signs be taken down, saying Jews live in a country where people are entitled to their beliefs and “No one should have to risk violence because they’re expressing them.”

Spitalnick said the interconnected issues are nuanced, and she described her own position as supporting a Jewish homeland while having “fundamental disagreements” with the government and with the “humanitarian crisis it created in Gaza.” Beth Kissileff, a journalist whose husband survived the 2018 Pittsburgh synagogue attack that killed 11 people, told the AP that the issues feel complicated on a personal level: she said she feels Jews’ fates worldwide are connected, but she also does not feel it is “fair” for Jews worldwide to serve as “proxies” for the actions of Israel’s government.

Kissileff said she and many others strongly disagree with actions by Israel’s current government, including what she described as a failure to curb Israeli settlers who are attacking West Bank Palestinians and policies she said favor Orthodox over non-Orthodox forms of Judaism. Even so, she said scapegoating Jews because of Israel is unacceptable, adding that it is “outrageous to take anything out on anyone” and saying she is “outraged when any innocent life is taken,” including in the AP account of an apparent U.S. missile strike that killed many children after faulty intelligence.

Other religious leaders described the security environment as pushing congregations to respond. At a Conservative synagogue in Los Angeles, Nicole Guzik—who serves jointly as senior rabbi with her husband, Erez Sherman—said her community tries to avoid broaching politics from the pulpit while convening events intended to expose congregants to diverse views. The AP reported that rabbis at the Conservative synagogue have cited the high cost of security, saying it exceeds $1 million a year, as criticism of Israel and anti-Israel protests tied to the war in Gaza have sometimes spilled over into violence.

Guzik said the goal is to remain religiously present despite the pressures, telling the AP that “we are going to live as Jews as proudly as possible,” and adding, “There’s no reason Jews should not be able to express their love for their homeland,” with the AP quoting her view that “A love for Israel is intrinsic to Jewish belief.” Motti Seligson, director of public relations for Chabad-Lubavitch, also described security concerns while welcoming what he said is another trend after Hamas’ deadly Oct. 7, 2023, attack—an increase in people seeking to connect with their faith and with other Jews.

The AP also reported that some leaders fear that anti-Zionism and antisemitism are being treated as interchangeable. Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove of Park Avenue Synagogue, a large Conservative congregation in New York, told the AP that Jews have “grown uncomfortably accustomed to this new reality,” and he cited attacks in other countries, including Michigan and Australia. He said the “blurred line between anti-Zionism and antisemitism” is dangerous, warning that violent rhetoric can become violent action and that “enabling” occurs when people in authority refuse to draw clear moral lines.

Cosgrove, who is the author of “For Such a Time as This: On Being Jewish Today,” said Jews have an ancient connection to the land of Israel while many people remain critical of actions by Israel’s leaders. He said that “Love of Israel … is different from love of the Israeli government” and warned that the “problem of this moment is that it’s all being conflated into one.” He also described a visit to his congregation by New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, saying the governor advocated for proposed legislation that would create a buffer zone where demonstrations would be prohibited near houses of worship after recent anti-Israel protests outside New York synagogues.

As the debate continues, historians and Jewish-advocacy groups are also weighing how antisemitism is understood in relation to Israel. The AP noted that Mark Mazower, a history professor at Columbia University, traced changes in the meaning of “antisemitism” and said that after Israel’s founding in 1948, hostility to Israel increasingly became part of how the term was used. Mazower told the AP that it is “obviously wrong to blame all Jews everywhere for what Israel does,” while he said large American Jewish organizations have sometimes aligned themselves closely with Israel and argued that U.S. Jews have a duty to stand with Israel.

The AP also cited reporting by the Anti-Defamation League that incidents related to Israel were, for the first time, more than half of antisemitic incidents in its annual tally. In the AP account, Jonathan Greenblatt, the ADL’s CEO, told the organization’s national conference that “We will not apologize for our love and support for the Jewish state of Israel. Not now, not ever,” as the group seeks to address both violence targeting Jews and the complex internal rifts about Israel’s policies.