To Fight Anti-Semitism, Put Criminals in Jail

Yesterday, the Justice Department announced the formation of a multi-agency task force for combating anti-Semitism. Tal Fortgang has outlined in Mosaic some steps such a task force can take, especially when it comes to reducing anti-Semitic agitation at the universities. But there is much else that can and should be done by local governments, and that involves nothing more than enforcing the law:

[A]nti-Jewish crimes tend to consist of petty violence, such as assaults, harassment, thefts, and vandalism. They’re often perpetrated by individuals who know that Jews (especially easily identifiable haredi Jews) are unlikely to defend themselves. Petty thieves make off with money taken from Jews they likely see as enriching themselves by exploiting hardworking people. More often, these acts are driven by inchoate resentment against a people who look funny, behave differently, do not act tough, and yet, on the whole, seem to succeed.

The criminals rarely face consequences. Hardly any of the crimes in the anti-Jewish-violence repertoire get prosecuted, and those that do increasingly result in diversionary-justice measures rather than prison time. New York is under immense pressure from anti-incarceration groups to empty jails and prisons, especially of those held “only” for crimes like assault and battery.

We cannot drum the hatred out of anti-Semites, but we can put them in prison when they commit crimes.

Read more at City Journal

More about: Anti-Semitism, Crime, U.S. Politics

 

Donald Trump’s Plan for Gaza Is No Worse Than Anyone Else’s—and Could Be Better

Reacting to the White House’s proposal for Gaza, John Podhoretz asks the question on everyone’s mind:

Is this all a fantasy? Maybe. But are any of the other ludicrous and cockamamie ideas being floated for the future of the area any less fantastical?

A Palestinian state in the wake of October 7—and in the wake of the scenes of Gazans mobbing the Jewish hostages with bloodlust in their eyes as they were being led to the vehicles to take them back into the bosom of their people? Biden foreign-policy domos Jake Sullivan and Tony Blinken were still talking about this in the wake of their defeat in ludicrous lunchtime discussions with the Financial Times, thus reminding the world of what it means when fundamentally silly, unserious, and embarrassingly incompetent people are given the levers of power for a while. For they should know what I know and what I suspect you know too: there will be no Palestinian state if these residents of Gaza are the people who will form the political nucleus of such a state.

Some form of UN management/leadership in the wake of the hostilities? Well, that might sound good to people who have been paying no attention to the fact that United Nations officials have been, at the very best, complicit in hostage-taking and torture in facilities run by UNRWA, the agency responsible for administering Gaza.

And blubber not to me about the displacement of Gazans from their home. We’ve been told not that Gaza is their home but that it is a prison. Trump is offering Gazans a way out of prison; do they really want to stay in prison? Or does this mean it never really was a prison in the first place?

Read more at Commentary

More about: Donald Trump, Gaza Strip, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict