Podcast: Antisemitism's tragic persistence

TRANSCRIPT: Antisemitism's tragic persistence

Noa Tishby:

Where it used to be let's just rid the world of the Jew and everything's going to be fine, right? Nobody says that in a polite society today, but what they do say is let's just rid the world of the Jew state and then everything will be fine.

Ian Bremmer:

Hello and welcome to the GZERO World Podcast. This is where you'll find extended versions of my interviews on public television. I'm Ian Bremmer, and today, we are looking at the startling rise of antisemitism, both in the United States and globally. So we know antisemitism is nothing new. An ancient Greek historian in the second century BCE railed against the, and I quote, "ridiculous practices of the Jews and the absurdity of their law." But lately, it feels like an ugly trend is back in fashion, and the numbers back that up. The Anti-Defamation League found 3,700 instances of anti-Semitic harassment, vandalism, or assault around the country last year. It's the highest number in 43 years.

And then there's the horrific attack. You remember at Pittsburgh's Tree of Life Synagogue in 2018 killed 11 worshipers remains the deadliest attack on the Jewish community in the United States. At what point do extremist politics, whether on the right or at left, become hate? To help me wade through these difficult questions is the Israeli actress, writer, and activist, Noa Tishby. She has served as Israel's special envoy for combating antisemitism before Prime Minister Netanyahu dismissed her for speaking out against his controversial judicial reform agenda, and she joins me now.

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Ian Bremmer:

Noa Tishby, great to see you.

Noa Tishby:

Great to see you as well.

Ian Bremmer:

So not an easy topic that we're talking about today. You're used to this, but I mean, obviously the Tree of Life Synagogue attack, most violent anti-Semitic attack in US history. And then Anti-Defamation League comes out and says more anti-Semitic attacks in last year than any point since they-

Noa Tishby:

Since they started measuring.

Ian Bremmer:

Okay, so I mean, you're very familiar with those stats. Why?

Noa Tishby:

Definitely.

Ian Bremmer:

What accounts for it?

Noa Tishby:

So first of all, the thing to remember is that antisemitism is the oldest form of hate and discrimination that is still being practiced today. And you and I were talking off camera for a second before, and you said that you've never got a chance to talk to anybody about antisemitism. And that's what's happening. What's happening is that it's so prevalent, it's so pervasive. It's everywhere in our society, but for some reason, people don't give it as much attention. Antisemitism is the number one form of hate-based crimes in America, religion-based crimes in America. And this is something that we don't actually give enough attention to.

It comes from three different areas. Antisemitism is on the far right, which is the one that we can identify very easily. It's the Charlottesville, it's the Jews lasers, using lasers to fire up California. It comes from the far left, which is a little bit more insidious and hard to decipher, which we'll talk about a little bit more, which is equating Israel to Hamas and to terrorist organizations. And it comes from radical Islam.

The answer as to why, I can't give you this answer, because it's been around for so long, it is so ingrained in our society. What I'm doing, in my position, in my life as a part of my life's work, is shedding a light on it so people can actually get present to what it is that they're doing. Because a lot of it comes from unconscious biases about the Jewish people. It really does.

Ian Bremmer:

But I was taught about the Holocaust when I was a kid. I was... I didn't have any Jewish friends, because-

Noa Tishby:

You did not have any Jewish friends?

Ian Bremmer:

I didn't know any. I didn't-

Noa Tishby:

Until what age?

Ian Bremmer:

Probably would've been in high school. I went to a Jewish summer camp of all things, Camp Menorah.

Noa Tishby:

Really?

Ian Bremmer:

I was the one non-Jewish kid at Camp Menorah.

Noa Tishby:

So no Jews and all the way to the Jewish camp.

Ian Bremmer:

So all of a sudden, [foreign language]. It was very weird. It was very weird. I learned all about, but no, the point was I was certainly aware that there was such a thing-

Noa Tishby:

As antisemitism?

Ian Bremmer:

... as antisemitism.

Noa Tishby:

Because of Holocaust studies.

Ian Bremmer:

Of course, yeah. But it wasn't something that was discussed particularly in the family. Not only are we becoming more aware of it because we're seeing the attacks, but we're also becoming more aware of it because it just seems more ever present in the discourse.

Noa Tishby:

Yes.

Ian Bremmer:

It's the attacks on Soros. It's the-

Noa Tishby:

Soros, code word for-

Ian Bremmer:

Code word for-

Noa Tishby:

... Jew, absolutely.

Ian Bremmer:

So wait, okay-

Noa Tishby:

Code word for-

Ian Bremmer:

Code word for-

Noa Tishby:

... Jew.

Ian Bremmer:

Right. So I want to know where you think it's clearly becoming a bigger problem today.

Noa Tishby:

Absolutely.

Ian Bremmer:

So why do you think that is?

Noa Tishby:

So first of all, the other thing to remember is that since Charlottesville, since those demonstrations, there's been a rise, 53% rise in antisemitism and online. What you were describing before, 69% to 84% of online antisemitism is actually anti-Israel rhetoric. So these two things are very different, but also super intertwined. Again, I'm not entirely sure where this is coming from, because every single person has a bias around the other, right? We've learned this throughout the George Floyd demonstrations. We walk around, you see somebody of a different ethnicity, and you're like, yeah, all right. You immediately have this kind relationship to that other.

And people have the same thing about the Jewish people. So if it's the Jews of all the power, the Jews of all the money, the Jews in Hollywood, they control this, all of that is affecting what people think about the Jews. And with everything that's happening online, I do believe that to some extent the Jews and Israel are kind of patient zero with this. It's coming from something that's very deep in our society. This is not something that I can be like, all right, it's coming from this particular person or that particular person.

So I wrote a book about Israel, which I'm sure we can discuss later, but as a part of the research, I get obsessed with various historical figures. One of them is Josephus Flavius, who was a historian that lived around the days of the first Jewish Roman war in 70 AD. And he moved to Rome after the fall of Jerusalem. And he wrote this book called The Antiquity of the Jews. It was an epic 10 volume book that he wrote as a historian in order to fight pagan antisemitism in 74 AD. And when I read that, I'm like, wait, pagan antisemitism was so bad and 74 AD that this Jew in Rome felt the need to write about it.

And this is what we're dealing with. It has been shape-shifting throughout the generations, and this is where we're at right now. It's the Soros, it's the Rothschild, it's the colonialism. It's all of this rhetoric that we hear and it's spreading out online like never before. And here's the other thing, antisemitism is not a simple form of racism. So antisemitism is anti-Jewish racism, but it's not as simple as any other racism. Because when you're racist about any other ethnicity, you think they're less than you, right? You're kind of like, well, they're not as great as me. I'm better than them, right? Antisemitism is a shape-shifting conspiracy theory. So it's not just punching down, it's also punching up.

Ian Bremmer:

Well, I mean, there's a fair amount of that. Why is the Supreme Court removing affirmative action quotas? In part, that's Harvard and other universities that aren't allowing in as many Asians-

Noa Tishby:

Asians.

Ian Bremmer:

... as there would be, right? So I mean, there's some of that.

Noa Tishby:

There is.

Ian Bremmer:

And I wouldn't say it's unique the way you just described it, only to Jews.

Noa Tishby:

That's true. And that's one of the bonds that we're finding between the Asian community. We're number one and number two in hate crimes in America. Because now there's a-

Ian Bremmer:

Not something you want to celebrate.

Noa Tishby:

Not something... Listen, let's celebrate it if it's here, may as well. But there's a sense in terms of the Jewish community, the complaint about the Jewish community is that they are overrepresented. And being overrepresented, which is something that you don't judge your achievements by merit smells of Marxism ever so slightly, because it's like, let's do the percentage of the population and based on the percentage of the population.

And this is something that's hurting minorities in America that have been struggling here and fighting and achieving based on merit. So my whole thing, and this is something that I've borrowed from my friend, Eric Weinstein, who's a brilliant man, and he said, the Jews are not overrepresented, they're over contributing. So yeah, all right, we're over contributing. But that doesn't mean anything... Doesn't have anything to do with control or with overpower. And I say all the time that everybody say we have a cabal, may as well start acting like we do. But sadly, we don't have one.

Ian Bremmer:

Do you think it's easier to be openly antisemitic in the United States today?

Noa Tishby:

Yes. Yeah, I do.

Ian Bremmer:

And what do you think the consequences for that need to be?

Noa Tishby:

It breaks my heart that it is easier to be openly antisemitic. It's easy to be antisemitic on the right, which is more of the good old classic antisemitism of Jews are the controlling, all of that. And it's also very easy to be antisemitic on the left. And this is something that not a lot of people feel comfortable discussing, especially from the liberal. And I consider myself on the liberal side of the political map, even though I'm a registered independent. When it comes to antisemitism on the left, the majority of it is coming from this disproportionate obsession about the state of Israel. Now, I am the first person to criticize the Israeli government when need be. Obviously I lost a position because of that.

Ian Bremmer:

In the Netanyahu government.

Noa Tishby:

In the Netanyahu government. This is totally fine to criticize Israeli politicians, Israeli policies, whatever. There's no problem there. But there's a strong sense in the political left right now in the fringe, and it's becoming more accepted than it used to be of denying Israel's right to exist. And this is something that where it used to be, let's just rid the world of the Jew and everything's going to be fine. Nobody says that in a polite society today. But what they do say is let's just rid the world of the Jewish state and then everything will be fine. So there's literally... In terms of polite societies in America, there's one bastion of colonialism that needs to be eradicated and everything would be okay. And it just happens to be the Jewish state.

There's a guy, his name is Colonel Richard Kemp. He is a retired British officer, was in the British military for decades. And he's a huge supporter of the state of Israel. And he actually said something which I found heartbreaking and extraordinary. He said that Israel is the target of one of the greatest slur campaigns in modern history. And it hurt my gut because this is not for nothing, that this is happening and this country just happens to be Jewish, and people are saying that it doesn't have the right to exist as other countries do.

Ian Bremmer:

I obviously see the rise. We've talked about the rise of antisemite in the United States. I also see Israel as getting more military support from the United States than any other country in the world. And by a long margin, Israel is being by far the most steadfast ally of the United States.

Noa Tishby:

It absolutely is, and should be, and will always continue to be.

Ian Bremmer:

Whether it's on the left or on the right, Democrats, Republicans. So I mean-

Noa Tishby:

People that actually work with Israel, they know the truth.

Ian Bremmer:

So I mean, I'm having a hard time. I mean, yeah, I see Marjorie Taylor Greene talk about space lasers, right?

Noa Tishby:

That's the Jewish, that's the right wing.

Ian Bremmer:

I know and I see Rashida Tlaib certainly supporting BDS movement, for example.

Noa Tishby:

Bless her heart, as we say.

Ian Bremmer:

But that's very different from people that are saying that Israel should not exist as a country. I have not seen much of that. Do you really see that? How's it expressed?

Noa Tishby:

Go to every college campus in America, every college campus in America, talk to college students and see their experience. This is something... Almost every college has apartheid week in which it's full on a week of slandering the state of Israel with rhetoric that sounds, if you just change the word Zionist to the word Jew, it sounds like 1936 Germany. So the Zionists are killing babies. The Jews are drinking Christian blood, and every college student in America is actually experiencing this. 50%, over 50% of college students in America feel the need to hide their Jewish identity. That's not coming from Marjorie Taylor Greene, that's coming from anti-Israel rhetoric.

Ian Bremmer:

50% of Jewish students-

Noa Tishby:

Over 50% of Jewish college-

Ian Bremmer:

... feel the need to hide their Jewish identity.

Noa Tishby:

To hide their Jewish identity. They will not walk around wearing a Star of David like I do. They just kind of go, we don't want to deal with that. I'm glad that it's nowhere near Congress yet, right? I'm glad that it's not-

Ian Bremmer:

It's nowhere.

Noa Tishby:

It is nowhere-

Ian Bremmer:

It's nowhere near Congress.

Noa Tishby:

... near Congress because again, once people get into positions of power, once they get educated, once they go to Israel, if you are in any kind of financial sector, any kind of tech sector, if you're a gay, LGBTQ+, member of the LGBTQ+ community all over the world, you know that Israel is not the big bad wolf. But if you're on college campus, you have a completely different experience.

Ian Bremmer:

So what do you consider to be legitimate expressions of distaste with the politics of the Israeli government? I mean, there have been-

Noa Tishby:

Many.

Ian Bremmer:

... millions of people demonstrating on the ground in Israel about concerns that they are losing their democracy. Those are mostly Jews.

Noa Tishby:

Yes.

Ian Bremmer:

There are Palestinians who feel like their rights have been taken away.

Noa Tishby:

Absolutely.

Ian Bremmer:

And they don't have a state of their own, and they don't have the ability to travel freely to their place of employ... All of these things. How do you parse that? Because I mean, clearly there is not just room, but I mean, there has to be-

Noa Tishby:

Have to be.

Ian Bremmer:

... an effort to allow, to promote, to tolerate all of those things.

Noa Tishby:

Not a question.

Ian Bremmer:

What's the line that needs to be drawn that isn't being drawn in your view?

Noa Tishby:

Right to exist. That's the line. So on college campus, when people talk about the Zionist entity and they talk... Which is usually the... I mean, it's literally the ayatollah of Iran's rhetoric. It's the same language. They talk about dismantling the Jewish state. So the conversation moved from policies, West Bank, BB yes or no, to yeah, but is Israel really a state or is it a colonialist endeavor that needs to be dismantled? And that is actually the reality of Jewish students on campus. This is where the line is drawn. If you have a problem with Israeli policies or politics, there's no problem there whatsoever. But if you actually look at the Jewish people and say they don't have the right for self-determination and self-governance in some parts of their ancestral land, that's where you've crossed the line.

Ian Bremmer:

And I mean, that clearly comes from, I suspect, a bunch of people that are saying, well, the Palestinians are not being allowed or provided that, then why should we support that for Jews in Israel?

Noa Tishby:

Right, but they usually say that Jews are not allowed and the Palestinians are allowed. That's number one. Number two, as a liberal, it's very challenging to ask... The question needs to be asked, what do the Palestinian want as a political movement? What is it that they're after? Because if they're after a state, then the question is why is there no state? And this has been put in the forefront and the doorstep of Israel only. And it also needs to be asked of the Palestinians, why is there no Palestine yet? That's number one. Number two, if they are willing to have a two-state solution, eventually, I'm sure there are going to be people on the Israeli side that are going to be willing to have that conversation again. However, if they're going to continue to chant like a lot of people on college campuses do, from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free, we're going to keep having this issue.

Ian Bremmer:

So get back to the United States politics for a second. You've talked a couple of times about the fact that we know where antisemitism on the far right comes from. At the same time, some of the strongest support for Israel comes from the far right.

Noa Tishby:

The right.

Ian Bremmer:

Comes from-

Noa Tishby:

The right.

Ian Bremmer:

... conservatives, comes from evangelical Christians. Explain to people watching the show why that is.

Noa Tishby:

Why the evangelical Christians are supporting Israel?

Ian Bremmer:

Are so strongly supporting Israel in many cases, and funding Israel in many cases, and all these things.

Noa Tishby:

Obviously, there's a prophecy in the New Testament then that the Jews need to go back to Israel and own it as a state and have self-governance and self-determination. By the way, so does the Quran. The Quran has the same thing. It also talks about the Jews going back to Israel and reestablishing their state. So religiously, we're good. I'm not sure why we're having this argument for the Muslim world. That's where it's coming from. On the evangelical side, they are steadfast supporters of the state of Israel. They obviously lean more to the right, but listen, the Israelis will take any help we can get.

Ian Bremmer:

And why do you think that there's so much obsession with George Soros in particular? I mean, the guy is in his late nineties. He's not doing an awful lot of-

Noa Tishby:

That's what I heard.

Ian Bremmer:

... anything right now.

Noa Tishby:

Again, everybody's looking for a villain.

Ian Bremmer:

I want to ask if you believe that Israel's status as a democracy is taking a real hit today.

Noa Tishby:

Not only is Israel's status not taken a real hit, Israel today and everything that's happening with the demonstrations and with the proposed judicial overhaul is the greatest example of a nonviolent social movement that we've seen in recent history. Let me explain why. So a few months ago, a new government was elected, democratically elected, democratically created. It's a parliamentary democracy, so it's fractured and-

Ian Bremmer:

Has a lot of parties.

Noa Tishby:

A lot of parties. You and I can start a party.

Ian Bremmer:

Barely has a majority.

Noa Tishby:

Barely majority, exactly. And I can be like, hey, let's start the party of the people that we are close. New government was elected. As it happens with new governments, they try to walk in and get into power and swing big. We saw this here with Obamacare, right? We saw it here with Trump get elected and try to overturn Obamacare. And if it wasn't for John McCain, it would've happened. That's what they did as well. They jumped in, they said, we're going to swing big and we're going to do a judicial overhaul. They call it a reform, but honestly, it was an overhaul. They took it way too far.

Ian Bremmer:

And we've seen, of course, Israel also today in better standing geopolitically in the region than they have been.

Noa Tishby:

In the region, of course.

Ian Bremmer:

There is an agreement.

Noa Tishby:

The Abraham Accords.

Ian Bremmer:

The Abraham Accords facilitated by the Trump administration. Increasingly looking likely the Saudi Arabia is going to join on board.

Noa Tishby:

I mean, the Abraham Accords wouldn't have happened without the approval of Saudi Arabia, allegedly. It wouldn't have happened without them actually saying yes to it.

Ian Bremmer:

And right move for the Israelis to facilitate those open diplomatic relationships?

Noa Tishby:

One of the most powerful and successful and extraordinary agreements in the region in recent history, and a warm piece as well. So as opposed to the piece with Jordan, which is still kind of chilly, or Egypt, the piece with the UAE became so hot so quickly. It really is between people and to a beautiful extent, Shimon Peres was Israel's prime minister and President, one of the greatest leaders of our generation. His vision for Israel was what was called the new Middle East. I'm getting goosebumps. His vision was to create collaboration and cooperation between the countries and the region that aren't only military and that are warm and open. And what we're seeing with the Abraham Accords is actually his vision coming to life. So if he was here, he'd be very pleased with that.

Ian Bremmer:

The one place that's hardest in the region to resolve for Israel is of course Iran. The Saudis now have a open diplomatic relationship with Iran. The Israelis certainly do not. In part, that's because the Iranian government continues to-

Noa Tishby:

They're just not that into us.

Ian Bremmer:

... say that Israel doesn't have a right to exist. The Iranian people don't feel that way.

Noa Tishby:

No, they don't. They really don't.

Ian Bremmer:

You kind of would think that if there was actual travel, if there was actual engagement between these two nations, that they'd have similar experiences. Do you hold any hope for that?

Noa Tishby:

I do. I get DMs from people from Iran a lot. I know what's happening there on the ground. I know how oppressed the people of Iran feeling. The people of Iran are kind of like the people in Gaza, under Hamas. They are oppressed by terrorists, by autocratic regimes that are horrific, that we can't even imagine. When I moved to America, which was a long time ago, so I'm a full on American now, but one of the things that was very difficult for me to wrap my head around was the fact that a lot of people in America don't understand that there is a different culture in that region.

That some of the leaders, some of the people, they don't want the same thing that we do. And this is what the Iranian regime is about. I do hold hopes definitely for Saudi Arabia, but for Iran as well. We're also dealing with real politics. So this might take a minute, but at the end of the day, Israel wants peace. There's no question there. And if Israel stops fighting, there would be no more Israel. If the Arab world would stop fighting, there'll be peace everywhere.

Ian Bremmer:

Noa Tishby, thanks for joining us.

Noa Tishby:

Thank you for having me.

Ian Bremmer:

That's it for today's edition of the GZERO World Podcast. Do you like what you heard? Of course you did. Well, why don't you check us out at gzeromedia.com and take a moment to sign up for our newsletter, it's called GZERO Daily.

Announcer:

The GZERO World Podcast is brought to you by our lead sponsor, Prologis. Prologis helps businesses across the globe scale their supply chains with an expansive portfolio of logistics real estate, and the only end-to-end solutions platform addressing the critical initiatives of global logistics today. Learn more at prologis.com.