A mob of masked anti-Israel “protesters” chanting antisemitic slogans tried to push past police barriers and break into the historic Park East Synagogue in Manhattan this week. The alleged reason for the riot was an Israeli real estate event being held inside.
What were rioters going to do if they got in? We don’t know. Not long ago, two young Israeli Embassy workers — who, unknown to the assassin, were Christians — were executed on the streets of Washington, D.C., by a man yelling “Free Palestine.” Only a few months ago, a Hezbollah supporter in Michigan rammed his car into a Jewish daycare, intending to massacre the children inside.
The Intifada has been globalized. In most American cities, synagogues and other Jewish community centers are forced to hire security teams to protect their members. Imagine going to church every week knowing that you’re putting your children at increased risk? This is the reality for many observant Jews.
In New York City, this insidious intimidation has been encouraged by the mayor.
After the Jewish preschool attached to Park East Synagogue had to be closed early because it would have been unsafe to dismiss children into a mob of terrorist sympathizers, New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani offered an obligatory statement about safety, before noting that he was “deeply opposed” to the event because property in West Bank was allegedly being sold, which was “illegal under international law.”
First off, Mamdani doesn’t know squat about “international law.” And even if he did, his job is keeping the city safe, not rationalizing the cause of Hamas cosplayers.
City lawmakers recently had to pass a law requiring New York police to create safety zones around religious institutions ahead of protests. It was necessitated by the fact that “anti-Israel” protesters targeting synagogues are often violently unhinged.
It should be noted that only a single table at the event was reportedly selling land in Gush Etzion in Judea, which isn’t a “settlement,” but a community of 70,000 Jews in the West Bank. Of course, even if every table at Park East Synagogue was selling land in Judea, rioting and threatening participants isn’t covered under free expression.
Moreover, the voluntarily buying and selling land isn’t illegal under any “international law.” And none of the West Bank, despite the endless shrieking of protesters, is “Palestinian land.” Certainly not the land in Gush Etzion.
A little history: On March 14, 1948, when Israel agreed to the United Nations partition plan that would have created both a Palestinian and Jewish state, Arabs rejected the deal. Local Jews in Gush Etzion, including several Holocaust survivors, living on land they had legally purchased, surrendered to an Arab militia. They were promptly massacred, their bodies mutilated, and their land stolen.
After the war, Jordan ended up controlling the territory. Then, in 1967, Jordan launched an attack on Israel (again) and lost it. Since then, the Jordanian government has relinquished claims on the West Bank, which isn’t occupied territory; it’s disputed. The children of the original inhabitants returned and rebuilt the community.
I’m not under the impression that Kafiya-wearing thugs who want Jerusalem and Tel Aviv swept into the sea and the Middle East ethnically cleansed of Jews are going to be swayed by a complicated history. But rational people should understand that the “Palestinian land” myth is merely a pretext to intimidate American Jewish communities. Nothing more.
OF COURSE WE SHOULD BE DEPORTING AMERICA-HATING NONCITIZENS
Terrorism isn’t merely about the violence; it’s about creating a climate of fear. Which is exactly what masked antisemites who surround synagogues do. It’s also exactly what Mamdani, who has said that opposing the Jewish state was “central to my identity,” is justifying.
Mamdani, regrettably, is the mayor of New York City, not the West Bank. He’s a Democrat, not the leader of Fatah or Hamas. Though, to be fair, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to tell the difference — especially for Jewish New Yorkers.