The recent public clash between Rabbi Yehuda Kaploun, the US Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism, and Rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt, president of the Conference of European Rabbis, should trouble us deeply.
Neither rabbi is entirely wrong in their claims as to where antisemitism comes from, but the argument exemplifies a dangerous tendency: Jewish leaders are debating the “real” source of antisemitism while antisemites continue attacking us from every direction.
Antisemitism doesn’t have a single source. It never has.
For two thousand years, we’ve been the world’s preferred scapegoat. After the Holocaust, Europe gave us a brief reprieve from its ancient hatred.
But that reprieve ended a few decades ago, and lately there have been massive demographic shifts that have brought Middle Eastern antisemitism to European streets. Now, these phenomena are converging.
European antisemitism has deep historical roots. We were blamed for being too wealthy, like Shylock, and simultaneously for being too poor and spreading the Black Plague. This ancient hatred culminated in Nazi Germany and the Holocaust.
Meanwhile, Jewish communities historically faced less persecution in Muslim countries than in Christian ones. The intense antisemitism now prevalent in the Arab world emerged primarily after Zionism’s creation, fueled by opposition to Jewish sovereignty and the advent of the State of Israel.
Today, we are witnessing something unprecedented: the synthesis of ancient European Jew-hatred with modern anti-Zionism. Arabs invoking “Heil Hitler” to provoke Jews. American students on campuses chanting for intifada.
A convergence of hatreds
The age-old scapegoating merging with newer hatred of Jewish statehood and Jewish self-determination. This toxic combination creates a particularly horrific threat.
Jonathan Sacks captured this dynamic brilliantly: whatever issue dominates global discourse gets fitted to the Jews. We are simultaneously too rich and too poor, too powerful and too weak, too insular and too cosmopolitan.
Today’s preferred accusation is Zionism. Israel’s very existence becomes the problem, accompanied by fabricated statistics accusing us of genocide, despite the IDF being among the world’s most moral militaries.
This context makes the Kaploun-Goldschmidt dispute so frustrating. Rabbi Goldschmidt correctly identified that immigration anxieties have fueled right-wing extremism in Europe.
Rabbi Kaploun rightly pointed out that mass migration has imported significant antisemitic attitudes into previously safer communities. Both observations are valid. Both matter.
Even more disturbing is the public nature of their conflict. When the US antisemitism envoy publicly rebukes a prominent European rabbi at Davos for discussing antisemitism, something has gone terribly wrong.
The fact that Elon Musk amplified this dispute to millions means that we’ve handed our enemies a victory. Antisemites don’t care whether we’re threatened by the far Right or radical Islamists.
They don’t distinguish between old European hatred and newer anti-Zionist fury. They exploit every opening, attack from every angle, and capitalize on our divisions.
The reality is brutally simple: multiple forces are driving contemporary antisemitism. European far-right movements channel ancient prejudices into modern nationalism. Radical Islamist ideology, imported through immigration, brings violent anti-Jewish and anti-Israel sentiment.
Far-left activists weaponize anti-Zionism as acceptable antisemitism. These threats don’t cancel each other out. They compound each other with the same goal, making antisemitism mainstream and acceptable.
Jewish leadership throughout the world needs to acknowledge this complexity rather than competing to identify the “primary” threat.
The question shouldn’t be whether antisemitism comes more from immigration or from indigenous European extremism. It should be how we protect Jewish communities from all sources of hatred simultaneously.
This requires nuanced thinking that doesn’t fit neatly into partisan political frameworks. We can acknowledge that mass migration has introduced new security challenges for European Jews without embracing xenophobia.
We can recognize resurgent European nationalism as dangerous without ignoring radical Islamist antisemitism. We can oppose both simultaneously.
Jewish communities, specifically in Europe, are small and vulnerable, and are facing unprecedented threats from multiple directions.
We cannot afford public disputes between our leaders over which antisemitism counts more. We cannot afford to minimize any threat because acknowledging it might complicate our political alliances.
Rabbi Sacks taught that the Jewish people’s greatest strength has always been unity amid diversity. We’ve survived two millennia of persecution not by agreeing on everything, but by standing together when it mattered most.
Right now, it matters most.
Our leaders should debate strategy privately and present a united front publicly. They should acknowledge all threats honestly rather than ranking them ideologically.
Most importantly, they should remember that every public argument between Jewish leaders is a gift to those who wish us harm.
The antisemites aren’t arguing about ideology. They’re too busy attacking us. Perhaps we should learn something from their terrible clarity of purpose and match it with our own unity of response.
The writer is the international CEO of Aish, a global Jewish educational movement.