On the occasion of Holocaust Remembrance Day earlier this week, Walter Reich offers some reflections on the dangers posed by anti-Semitism today, and especially in the West:
In Western Europe, anti-Semitism is found among right-wing forces; within political parties on the left, especially in Britain; and among elements of the Muslim community.
But for now, the democracies of Western Europe are strong enough to withstand the pressure. And in America, the episodes of anti-Semitic speech and violence, though they’ve greatly proliferated in the past few years, have begun to mobilize communities and governmental agencies to protect Jews. This won’t stop anti-Semitism’s continuing growth, but it will control it. Despite a long history of bias at many levels, from academia to boardrooms, Jews in America have established themselves during the past century in every sphere of American life, and the American tradition of tolerance will remain far more powerful than its manifestations of prejudice.
So although Jews face ongoing violence, it is not of a level that will, in the foreseeable future, result in massive death. In Europe and the United States, there might be limited outbursts. Should Iran develop nuclear weapons, it could, in a moment of irrationality, launch them to try to obliterate the Jewish state, which its leaders repeatedly have vowed to destroy and which is home to nearly half of the world’s Jews; but Iran’s fear that it could be devastated in return by a nuclear-armed Israel would almost surely keep such a cataclysmic possibility in check. In short, despite the rise in worldwide anti-Semitism, a repeat of the Holocaust—major mass murder—is, though possible, unlikely in the foreseeable future.
Read more on Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/01/seventy-five-years-after-auschwitz-anti-semitism-is-on-the-rise/605452/