How Can Someone Be Pro-Israel and Antisemitic?

By: Shyam K. Sriram, Contributor 

The current dialectic drama over the use and abuse of "antisemitism" has shown me repeatedly that there is a profound lack of knowledge among Americans not only regarding Judaism, but also the history and politics of Israel. Luckily, that was a formidable part of my undergraduate education between 1997 and 2002 when I completed a minor in Jewish Studies at Purdue University. Those faculty left a huge impact on me as a young student which shaped much of who I have become as an immigration scholar. In fact, my recent textbook on refugee resettlement references the Holocaust, fascism, Raphael Lemkin, the Armenian Genocide and diaspora, as well as so many other topics that I was immersed in as an open-minded and eager college student.

But over two decades later, I feel like my mind is unraveling every day as I hear what is now called "debate" over topics that are being discussed without any background knowledge. When anyone can be accused of antisemitism – even Jewish Americans – solely because they’ve spoken out against the illegal policies of a foreign government, we have fallen far as a society.

What makes this all worse is the insane level of gaslighting. The real antisemites, with their bigoted opinions of Jewish people, have the chutzpah to accuse Jews and their allies of being antisemitic because we publicly denounce the murderous actions of the Israeli apartheid state. How can that be possible? How can someone fear Jewish identity and Judaism while concurrently defending Israel? 

The answer lies in the performative activism of an ignorant population where ignorance is not just bliss – rather, it kills.

SHYAM K. SRIRAM is an assistant professor and program director in the Department of Political Science.