Reflecting on the British Labor party’s selection of Jeremy Corbyn—who praises Hamas and Hizballah, and peddles 9/11 conspiracy theories on Iranian state television—as its new leader, David Hirsh examines the rise of a form of anti-Jewish politics that is at once new and, often, very old:

The intense personal payoff of this variant of identity politics is a feeling of inner cleanliness. The world may be utterly compromised and there may be nothing I can do about it, but it isn’t going to be my fault, my own soul is clean. . . .

It is not accidental that . . . anti-Semitism has become pivotal to this process of defining who is inside and who is not. In the postwar period, in democratic discourse at least, everybody recognized anti-Semitism as being bad and they recognized opposition to anti-Semitism as an entry requirement into progressive politics. Now, just the action of initiating a discussion about what is anti-Semitic and what is not rings alarm bells for people schooled in progressive culture. To ask if something said or done is anti-Semitic, if it relates to Israel or Palestinians, is to risk placing one’s own membership of the community of the good under scrutiny. . . .

Moreover, there is a wider context: a deep reservoir of anti-Semitic discourse, images, emotions, and tropes within . . . Western culture. [This reservoir] has been deposited by the distinct waves of anti-Semitism that have washed over Europe since the original rise of Christianity out of Judaism. It would be surprising indeed if a campaign to make people think of Israelis as being outside of the community of the civilized did not draw, even unconsciously, on these ready-made ways of thinking, linked to intense affective triggers.

The campaign to treat Israelis and their “supporters” as pariahs tends to bring with it echoes of previous campaigns against Jews. Images and tropes from old anti-Semitic themes are unconsciously recycled, and Jews who oppose the boycott [of Israel] are framed as conspiratorial, powerful, rich, bloodthirsty (particularly for children’s blood), bourgeois, connected to dishonest bankers, warmongers, etc.

If Iran succeeds in obtaining nuclear weapons, the war in Gaza, let alone the protests on college campuses, will seem like a minor complication. Jonathan Schachter fears that this danger could be much more imminent than decisionmakers in Jerusalem and Washington believe. In his view, Israel seems to be repeating the mistake that allowed it to be taken by surprise on Simchat Torah of 2023 and Yom Kippur of 1973: putting too much faith in an intelligence concept that could be wrong.

Israel and the United States apparently believe that despite Iran’s well-documented progress in developing capabilities necessary for producing and delivering nuclear weapons, as well as its extensive and ongoing record of violating its international nuclear obligations, there is no acute crisis because building a bomb would take time, would be observable, and could be stopped by force. Taken together, these assumptions and their moderating impact on Israeli and American policy form a new Iran concept reminiscent of its 1973 namesake and of the systemic failures that preceded the October 7 massacre.

Meanwhile, most of the restrictions put in place by the 2015 nuclear deal will expire by the end of next year, rendering the question of Iran’s adherence moot. And the forces that could be taking action aren’t:

The European Union regularly issues boilerplate press releases asserting its members’ “grave concern.” American decisionmakers and spokespeople have created the unmistakable impression that their reservations about the use of force are stronger than their commitment to use force to prevent an Iranian atomic bomb. At the same time, the U.S. refuses to enforce its own sanctions comprehensively: Iranian oil exports (especially to China) and foreign-currency reserves have ballooned since January 2021, when the Biden administration took office.

Israel’s response has also been sluggish and ambiguous. Despite its oft-stated policy of never allowing a nuclear Iran, Israel’s words and deeds have sent mixed messages to allies and adversaries—perhaps inadvertently reinforcing the prevailing sense in Washington and elsewhere that Iran’s nuclear efforts do not present an exigent crisis.