It does not matter how nuanced or clear information is given to people who wish to keep their heads in the sand together. Their heads stay down. In previous columns, I have addressed self-determination and rights for Palestinians alongside the facts about Israel. Those heads only come out of the sand to accuse me of the hatred they themselves are espousing through willful ignorance and the charade of “social justice.” Make no mistake. They are propelling astronomical rates of antisemitic behavior whether or not they intend to do so.
According to the watchdog group, Combat Antisemitism Movement, the global number of reported antisemitic violence increased from August 2024 to August of 2025 by nearly 16 percent. The U.S. had the highest number of reported incidents of any country in August — with 162 incidents reported to police.
If you believe criticism of Israel is distinct from antisemitism, think again. People do not use the fact of a despotic leader in an African country as an excuse to lob emotional and physical racism at Black people everywhere. No, antisemitism is in its own category. It is the itch that gets scratched at the drop of dime. Israel is the only place on earth where its indigenous people are deemed colonizers and invaders. Israel’s athletes, musicians, writers and filmmakers are routinely demonized wherever they go outside of Israel. When the U.S. has created wars offensively, its athletes and others are not shunned everywhere they go.
I recommend reading Benny Gantz’ recent NY Times op/ed entitled, “What the World Gets Wrong about Israel” Opinion | What the World Gets Wrong About Israel – The New York Times. He lays out how western leaders do not understand how both the cabinet and opposition operate in Israel’s war against Hamas and others whose sole mission is to destroy Israel. Why does the world believe Hamas-generated propaganda? Lie after lie as they starve their own people and use them as props. They do not let them leave areas warned by the IDF because they want them to suffer and die to continue their world stage status as victims. It is total madness. The war in Gaza is tragic, yes, and it is caused and perpetuated by Hamas. The soldier to civilian casualties is actually lower than any urban warfare fought anywhere in the world in modern history. If this was genocide rather than war, that number would be much higher.
Bringing this to the local level, I am deeply disappointed by groupthink from people who have the capacity to do better while not having the will. On Sept. 9, I received an email newsletter from Grow Food Northampton (GFN) that blatantly called out Israel as the force creating starvation in Gaza and committing genocide and ecocide. There was no mention of the numerous attacks on Israeli agriculture, the decimation of all it created in the Gaza Strip, or the Israeli innovations that have helped countless countries avoid starvation. The newsletter inferred that the Palestinians were the indigenous people because it compared Israelis to the Europeans who colonized the U.S. This is so factually wrong that I am at a loss for words. An Israeli-American friend told me she does not feel safe going to the GFN community gardens and that the signage there does great harm by perpetuating dangerous anti-Israel propaganda.
Just nine days later, the Northampton City Council held a meeting where they discussed yet another anti-Israel resolution. Council Chambers was filled with zealous participants who uttered distortions and outright lies about Israel. I offered a short statement spur of the moment because I could not be complicit. I suggested they read Bernard-Henri Levy’s “Israel Alone.” It is short book filled with facts — something heads in the sand people do not want. Levy is a well-respected philosopher and progressive activist. I conveyed that the testifiers are propping up Hamas — the nihilistic group that relies on oppressing their own people. As Gantz points out, Westerners have chosen to be ignorant about Israel. They have it wrong.
The fever pitch about “justice” does not include empathy or real work to lift up the lives of others. It is a groupthink-perpetuating virus. One of the handful of testifiers who spoke against the council resolution is an Israeli-American. She spoke about surviving sexual abuse and how the rapes and torture of women on Oct. 7 felt to her. As she was expressing grief with vulnerability, the pro-Hamas gallery tried to speak over her by declaring the rapes were not proven. This callousness could be from denial yet its result is malicious. It is unconscionable to disregard the horrors suffered by Israeli women or the specific misogyny normative to Hamas.
On Oct. 7, some of us will commune in quiet grief or prayer. Others will continue the moral inversion. New year, same madness.
J.M. Sorrell is a monthly columnist. She recommends Sarah Hurwitz’ new book, “As a Jew: Reclaiming our Story from those who Blame, Shame, and Try to Erase Us.”