In certain circles—like her own circle, writes the journalist Taffy Brodesser-Akner—those who support Israel risk ostracism, and mentioning anti-Semitism invites lectures about “Jewish privilege”:
It is not OK to be openly pro-Israel anymore, and I know why. My direct-message boxes on Twitter and Facebook are filled with people like me—liberals, culture reporters, economics reporters—baffled and sad at the way the cause of Jews avoiding another attempt at our genocide has gone from a liberal one to a capital-c conservative one.
There was no room for our sadness and fear to be public during the Gaza war. There was no room for us to say, “Hey, hold on a second, these terrorists are firing rockets at civilians!” There was no room for us to say that it was not a national character flaw to defend one’s own citizens from attack. There was no room to remind people how they felt when planes flew into the Twin Towers. All this did was serve to remind us what our teachers had taught us all those years ago: that Israel exists because we are not welcome here, on this earth. They taught us that we are tolerated, at best, and that we are enjoyed most when we are victims. . . .
Meanwhile, quietly, we whispered to each other that it felt like the anti-Israel sentiment was actually a new way of being openly anti-Semitic, somehow wrapping it up in a Democratic cause.
Read more on Tablet: http://tabletmag.com/jewish-life-and-religion/190070/being-jewish-polite-society