Comparisons are being made between the United States and Europe today and Germany in the 1920s during Adolf Hitler’s rise to power. The comparisons are born out of fear. Fear brought about by changes worldwide. Fear brought about by growing public expressions of hatred toward Jews and Israel.
And fear brought about because as Jews, we remember our history. We revere our history. We review our history over and over. Every Sabbath. Every Jewish holiday. While there are several important and certainly worrisome parallels that make the comparison between Hitler’s world and our world valid, as a whole, the parallel does not hold up.
Historically, when referring to Germany, the essential period for the parallel has to be Hitler’s rise to power in the 1920s until his second election in 1933. That is when post-World War I Germany was a democratic state, and it is where the Jewish community was front and center in all aspects of public life.
It is when the seeds of Hitler’s rise to power germinated and grew, ending in his democratic election. And the parallel must be examined, especially in light of economic anxiety and political polarization.
That’s where the parallel is strongest. It is instructional for our lives today because much of the post-October 7 anxiety among Jews throughout the West and in Israel is fomented from their being viewed as easy targets of hate and the cause of the problems.
Fear, targets, and the new normal
The rise and acceptance of hate speech directed at Jews is a significant similarity between then and now. For the past two years it has become acceptable to say terrible things about Jews with impunity. With no social price to pay, Jew haters publicly berate Jews without fear of blowback. This phenomenon is new.
Before October 7, their hateful speech would have been squelched. Before October 7, people who publicly pronounced evil and hateful ideas about Jews were shunned – or at least asked to speak in whispers and behind closed doors. It was socially unacceptable to publicly say hateful things about anyone, about any group, not just Jews. It is a new, very troubling reality.
A dystopian universe has emerged where the old rules and social norms no longer apply.
Guardrails have been removed, and people say things about Jews on the streets, in the subways, in public places, on campuses, and on popular podcasts and media outlets that they would never have thought to say, let alone, out loud and with conviction. Jewish-looking Jews have been targeted and berated.
And this leads to another similarity – the feeling of fear.
I do not know a single Jew who has not felt this fear. As a result, many have altered their own conversations in public, their dress and choice of jewelry, and their own choices of places to visit, people to associate with, and schools and universities to attend.
Miss Slovakia was thrown out of her Uber in Toronto after the hijab-wearing driver overheard her speaking about a recent trip to Israel. The beauty queen and holder of a PhD was told, “I don’t drive Jews.”
While a Scottish band was playing a concert in London, they threw up a picture of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US politician Hillary Clinton with swastikas. The band justified their action by saying that they wanted to stimulate discussion. On a tranquil beach in Sydney, terrorists launched a brutal massacre on innocent Jews gathered to celebrate the first light of Hanukkah.
And Zohran Mamdani was elected mayor of New York City in what has become the most widely covered, discussed, and dissected mayoral election in the world in modern times. In both Germany during Hitler’s rise to power and today there is a shaky economy. That brings uncertainty and scapegoating. And in certain communities Israel and the Jew are the easiest scapegoats.
An unstable economy – where people feel the pain of prices and insecurity about food, housing, and healthcare – makes average ordinary people lash out. With the help of pro-Hamas and anti-Israel leftists, they direct their anger and frustration toward Israel and Jews. They are targeting the Jew.
Social media is filled with unsubstantiated conspiracy theories about Jewish control. The myths about Jews quickly spread. They are Jew-hating screeds. Traditional media and social media have magnified this polarization. It is only getting worse as distrust of institutions, government, elected officials, and the police increases.
That is where the parallel with Weimar Germany in the 1920s and 2025 ends.
Anti-Jewish legislation will not be passed. Jews will not, cannot, be disenfranchised. Our rights will not be trampled upon as they were in Germany. After October 7, just as before October 7, the rights of Jews will be protected. University hotbeds are now – finally – creating new policies to preserve freedom of speech while, at the same time, protecting Jews.
As we light the candles on the menorah and retell our history, we must remember that while we have suffered too many tragedies, in the end we have triumphed. Our Jewish lights will continue to burn brightly. We will not let ourselves nor our tradition be dimmed.
Happy Hanukkah.
The writer is a columnist and a social and political commentator. Watch his TV show Thinking Out Loud on JBS.