KINSELLA: Young progressives persuaded to embrace Jew hatred based on lies

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The Left is antisemitic.

It was not always thus. The manifestations of Jew hatred – both hardcore (Aryan Nations, Ku Klux Klan, Heritage Front et al.) and fringe (Jim Keegstra, Malcolm Ross, et al.) – were almost always on the Right. Not so long ago, either.

Something changed. For sixty years, the Anti-Defamation League did polling in North America about antisemitism and its malevolent variants. Year after year, the polls showed that young people considered themselves progressive. They passionately opposed racism and antisemitism.

Five years or so ago, there was a shift. Progressive young people still considered themselves anti-racist, but they started to associate Israel with racism.

Israel, young progressives eventually told ADL and other opinion-seekers, was a fascistic, colonial, apartheid state. The reality was otherwise: a quarter of Israel is Arab, and about 45% of the Jewish population is from Africa or Asia. Non-white, in other words.

It didn’t matter, because hate is always disinterested in reality and facts. To oppose Israel was to oppose racism, young progressives told themselves. Every Israel-hating protestor you now see in our streets – every bit of “anti-Zionist” libel you see on social media – can be traced back to that lie: Israel is white supremacist empire, subjugating and oppressing the impoverished, brown-skinned people who were there first.

Yossi Klein Halevi, a renowned Israeli author, shakes his head when asked about the antisemitism that has now infected the Left and young people in the West, like a virus that defies any vaccine.

“There’s been a progression of accusations against Israel,” he says. “Beginning with colonialism, moving to ethnic cleansing, accelerating to apartheid – and now culminating in genocide. And there’s nowhere else to go after genocide.”

“That is their ultimate goal,” Klein Halevi says of those who have persuaded young progressives to embrace a lie. “Because if Israel is a genocidal state, like Nazi Germany was, then Israel becomes incapable of waging a legitimate war of self-defence. Because a genocidal state has no right to self-defence.”

It is not just young people who have been seized with this hateful virus, of course. It is seen everywhere in this country – even with those who have power. Those who, without exception, are on the ideological Left.

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Everywhere that a Left-leaning mayor holds power – Toronto’s Olivia Chow, Montreal’s Valerie Plante, Victoria’s Marianne Alto – there has been spasm of antisemitism and antisemitic crime, accompanied by a total failure of policing. Municipal police services theoretically being in the sway of mayors.

Nationally, those who (for now) rule this country have been unwilling to do anything beyond tweets and posts of the thoughts and prayers variety. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his true deputy, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, have done precisely nothing to stem the tide of Jew-hatred that is seen everywhere.

It is “conservative” to ally oneself with Israel, you see.

Meanwhile, those who ostensibly represent us to the world – like our witless Global Affairs Minister Melanie Joly – have said the terrorist group Hamas deserves a seat at the negotiating table (right after the horrors of Oct. 7), and falsely accused Israel of killing hundreds at a Gaza hospital (her post is still up).

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Elsewhere, in academia and public service unions, it is much of the same. Institutions on the Left have become willing captives of base Jew-hatred, spewing ahistorical, fraudulent conspiracy theories. Because of “racism.” It is depressing and relentless.

In May 2024, I was in Israel, outside Tel Aviv, and we stopped for some shawarma at a roadside stand. Lined up ahead of us were Israel Defence Forces soldiers in uniform – lots of women, many black and brown-skinned. Some were speaking Arabic, Israel’s second language.

I looked at the soldiers and shook my head.

“If this is an apartheid state, it sure doesn’t look like one,” I said to Larry Maher, our Canadian guide on the mission. “I wish so-called progressives and Lefties back home could see this.”

Larry gave a grim smile.

“They still wouldn’t see it,” he replied.