As we begin to reflect on the new reality for the American Jewish community now that the living hostages have been returned, we will have several choices to make. As we make these choices, one thing we must embrace is that what will happen in Israel is not in our control. We will all have opinions and we will try to have impact in the way that makes the most sense for us – but we can not control what the Israeli government will do in response to their security concerns any more than we can control what Palestinian leaders or Hamas will do.
But what we do have full control over are the individual and organizational approaches we take to improving life for the Jewish community in America. We make choices with our time, with our dollars, and with our words – and all those will contribute to the ways in which we feel safe, connected to the wider community, and confident as Jews living in St. Louis.
This includes our focus on living a vibrant Jewish life based in observance, tradition, and values – the three pillars that have always defined our community. We have always been a people who has rooted ourselves in our faith, our practice, and living our values in our Jewish and non-Jewish communities. How we will approach our commitments to all of those spheres – and to our advocacy for the very right to do it safely and as a respected group – this will determine how well we succeed in creating that vibrant Jewish life.
In recent years – more like decades – our community priorities have taken what can only be described as a defensive position. As conflicts in Israel have increased, and understandings of our historical connection to the land have been questioned, antisemitism in the form of demonization and power conspiracies have taken hold. Rightly, we have focused on combating this serious threat. The question has been, have we done so at the expense of other focus areas, and have we done so in a way that makes sense?
To answer those questions, we may have to look at the problem a bit closer. On the one hand we have tried to pin this problem on one side of the political spectrum. If one thing has been made clear in the past year – it is that no one party is fully “safe” for Jews. Just this month, we have seen that fundamentalism and extremism in both progressive and conservative spaces have reared their ugly heads to a very troubling point. Whether presented as a “replacement theory” or a “owning the government" conspiracy theory, we need to own that anti-Jewish sentiments are grounded in cultures all over the globe. So, claiming any one party is worse than the other is an academic exercise we should not be a part of. Antisemitism is not about a party. It just is. And likely always will be.
So again, what is to be done? Do we double down on combating antisemitism wherever we see it – in a way that the fight has traditionally been understood in recent years? Do we state our facts, tell everyone how they are wrong, and make those statements loudly and proudly whenever we can, wherever we can? Well, maybe. But maybe not.
I would ask us to think long and hard about best practices in persuasion, community relations, and leadership. When has anyone been convinced by “facts” to think differently about an issue as emotional as the Arab Israeli conflict or even one’s religious positions on anything? I say this because the playing field has never been the pages of newspapers, posts on social media, or the local news. The playing field is the heart and the minds of individuals who, as data has shown, respond much better to conversations and dialogue when there is a relationship in place and common ground established. This has been the bedrock of community relations and combating antisemitism for decades. And rather than ramp up those efforts in the face of increasing need – many in our national and international Jewish communal landscape want to take a different approach. One that puts more focus on a defiant, reactionary, and particularistic approach to what antisemitism is and what should be done to combat it. Yet, study after study has shown that these approaches may actually do more harm than good.
A group called Fuente Latina, for example, has as its sole purpose - to show the Jewish community that what we think works in terms of speaking to the Latina community about Israel – may not actually work. In a recent E-Jewish Philanthropy article, called In the fight against antisemitism, passion isn’t enough, Andres Spokoiny explores what decisions have been made in this expanding field and expresses serious concerns about a small group of dedicated, well-meaning people with little to no grounding in this work or the data – setting the direction for the entire community. This also has led to an increasing rift between parts of the Jewish community who, though they do not have the capacity of others, do have a great deal to say about their lived experience addressing anti-Jewish attitudes and building bridges of understanding.
Many who are working in this field now say they have a plan. But when it comes to a plan to reach out to the people we are most trying to reach – we really don’t. Recently, the Kraft foundation revealed that they are changing their name from the Foundation to Combat Antisemitism to Blue Square Alliance Against Hate. And while I respect all that the Kraft’s have given to this work – the voices who want us to focus on the term hate, may be misguided.
Most people do not hate us. They have very serious questions about what we mean when we say we love and support Israel and frankly - what it means to be a Jew in the United States today. When you expose hatred against most minorities – like when we ask to “Stop Asian Hate,” that bigotry is most often rooted in a vile bigotry of the people themselves - uncomplicated by the wars Israel has had in the Middle East or the way the country was founded.
And even in our own strategy assessments, we say that there are fringes that we will not be able to move – those who truly hate us. Aren’t those the people we really do not want to spend all of our time on? And if the people we really want to reach are lumped together with the people who we say hate us – won’t that make them even more angry when we do want to have a conversation?
The challenges that the Jewish community faces in 2025 are a much more subtle and complex collection of biases and misunderstandings than ever. And so, to use terminology like hate when we are trying to change wider public opinion about the Jewish community, Israel, and our connection to it seems like a contradiction in terms.
There is a long road ahead of us to address these competing goals and what we need is a combination of community relations and public relations. If looked at purely as a public relations/marketing effort that is mainly aimed at proclaiming things, creating monologues and trying to convince people based on facts - we will not change any minds at all. Especially the ones who may have been receptive to our outreach.
This does not mean that we would not still be steadfast in our positions on demonization, and any mischaracterization of Jews, Israel, and Israelis. It is just that we would carry that unapologetic confidence into conversations and not just place them in proclamations. What we need publicly is strength and confidence rooted in empathy and understanding, not a strength and confidence devoid of the universalism of hate, bias and bigotry.
We must set out with a conviction that regardless of your criticism of what the Israeli government does – that demonizing them and demonizing Israel as a whole goes too far. Are there people in the Israeli government one might call a fascist? Of course, and that is no different than what you might say about the US government or many others across the globe. Does that make Israel a fascist state, a police state or a state full of war mongering demons? Absolutely not. Just like it doesn’t mean that about America either. And these are the kinds of things we need to say loudly and proudly to all our friends’ partners and colleagues – in conversation and dialogue.
In those conversations, we will have a better opportunity to share that we are not just caring about our concerns but theirs too. We will be able to ask questions and find common ground on several issues of common cause. We will also be able to dig into what they are hearing and reading about our community and Israel and really listen and show that we understand even if we disagree. This is the confidence that allows concern for the other - and we need that now more than ever.
We say often that we believe in holding multiple truths. But if we do – those multiple truths need to be spoken in those meetings. If all we are speaking about are the risks to our own community or our security needs, we will not be able to share our genuine caring for the many people across this country who are struggling and hurting in so many other ways.
As a community we used to be able to focus on our own needs and the needs of others. Somewhere along the way we may have lost that ability. The risks in our community, our trauma, and Israel's trauma are real and significant. But that suffering should not be communicated in isolation – but as a connecting point with the suffering of others.
For example, I will not stop wearing my blue ribbon - the one that reminds people of the worst massacre of Jews since the holocaust. That understanding is non-negotiable in my conversations. But I will not forget to connect my pain with the pain of the residents of north St. Louis who have been struggling for decades and got hit with a perfect storm this past May - literally, when the community was devastated by a tornado and then faced the prospects of our government ending support for so many in need. These connections and the support for the suffering of others have shown to be the best way to address misperceptions about a person and what you care about. And there is data to support that.
Across the country, our immigrant population is being rounded up like nothing we have seen in our lifetime. Women’s reproductive rights have been stripped away, the LGBTQ+ community is under attack like no other time in recent years, and the very democratic principles that have kept the Jewish community safe for decades are being torn asunder.
Those are all things that we have in common with people across races, backgrounds, religions, and nationalities. To not focus on those issues of common cause would be a terrible mistake. It is those very those connecting points that have always helped us build a greater understanding of who we are and to not make those connections would ignore the very values and commitments that brought Kivi Kaplan to be the first head of the NAACP, that brought Heschel to march with King, and that were the very foundations of the modern civil rights and progressive movements.
The path to what we are trying to accomplish as a community was laid in front of us well before October 7th. And what we have seen and heard recently is that both organizationally and individually, working in coalition with committed partners that exist in all our communities will work to change hearts and minds. A plan to re-engage, show up, and let the wider community know we are still here will show the very people we are trying to reach that there is still much more we have in common than what might divide us.
And while none of this happens overnight – getting a chance to have someone get to know you, to hear about your organization in a positive way, or just hear you out for a second - we might be able to help them understand why our love for Israel does not get checked at the door and what we think both about the perplexing double standards Israel faces daily and the demonization it creates here in St. Louis for the Jewish community. And if all goes well, we may also be able to relate to a similar demonization they may have faced in their lives.
Shared goals. Shared values. Bridges of understanding. Those have always been the keys to how we speak about the Jewish community and Israel. Now we must speak about them in conversation, in coalition, and in partnership. Now more than ever. That must be integral to our plan going forward because as we know, events in the middle east will not stop happening in a way that will impact us. Those events, however, should not make us turn away from how we have always built bridge and shared who we really are as a community.
