To justify an unwillingness to take measures for reducing the spread of the coronavirus, some young people have argued that, because they are unlikely to suffer severely even if infected, they need not follow recommended precautions. To Shai Held, such an attitude bespeaks not just epidemiological ignorance but a callousness toward the elderly or otherwise infirm who might be put at risk—a callousness exemplified by the following sentiment, expressed over Twitter:

To be perfectly honest, and this is awful, but to the young, watching as the elderly over and over and over choose their own interests ahead of climate policy kind of feels like they’re wishing us to a death they won’t have to experience. It’s a sad bit of fair play.

Held responds:

It is bad enough if we remain indifferent to the plight of our elders; it is far worse to dress up our failings as moral indignation. As a rabbi and theologian, . . . I find myself thinking about the biblical mandate to “honor your father and mother.” The Hebrew word usually translated as “honor,” kabed, comes from a root meaning “weight.” At the deepest level, then, the biblical command is thus to treat the elderly as weighty. Conversely, the Bible prohibits “cursing” one’s parents. The Hebrew word usually translated as “curse,” k’lalah, derives from a root meaning “light.” At bottom, then, the biblical proscription is on treating the elderly lightly, as if they were inconsequential.

Why do I say “the elderly”? In its biblical context, the obligation to honor parents is a command given to grown children (as are the Ten Commandments more broadly—you don’t tell young children not to commit adultery or covet their neighbors’ fields). When you are an adult, the Bible instructs, you must not abandon the elderly. Giving voice to a pervasive human fear, the Psalmist prays, “Do not cast me off in old age; when my strength fails, do not forsake me!”

What does it say about our society that people think of the elderly so dismissively—and moreover, that they feel no shame about expressing such thoughts publicly?

Stephen Daisley writes about the slaying of Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim:

Yaron and Sarah were murdered in a climate of lies and vilification and hatred. . . . The more institutions participate in this collective madness, the more madness there will be. The more elected officials and NGOs misrepresent the predictable consequences of asymmetric warfare in densely populated territories, where much of the infrastructure of everyday life has a dual civilian/terrorist purpose, the more the citizenries of North America and Europe will come to regard Israelis and Jews as a people who lust unquenchably after blood.

The most intolerant anti-Zionism is becoming a mainstream view, indulged by liberal societies, more concerned with not conflating irrational hatred of Israel with irrational hatred of Jews—as though the distinction between the two is all that well defined anymore.

For years now, and especially after the October 7 massacre, the call has gone up from the pro-Palestinian movement to put Palestine at the heart of Western politics. To pursue the struggle against Zionism in every country, on every platform, and in every setting. To wage worldwide resistance to Israel, not only in Wadi al-Far’a but in Washington, DC. “Globalize the intifada,” they chanted. This is what it looks like.