Exploring My Jewish Identity with the Anti Defamation League

Today I had the opportunity to attend an event organized by the Anti Defamation League called, “Words To Action”.   For those of you who are unfamiliar with this organization, the ADL is a human rights agency that "fights anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry, and defends democratic ideals and civil rights".

This afternoon's forum, which was my first with the ADL, was comprised of both Jewish and non-Jewish high school seniors from around the city. We met at Pizzeria Serio on Belmont where we were greeted warmly with pies and salads, and given time to “schmooze” before jumping in to the heavier political discourse.  

The topic of today’s discussion was “Empowering Jewish Students to Address Bias on Campus”. The young man who led began by having us briefly explain why we decided to join the group. Answers varied little, ranging mostly from, “I came to learn how to defend my beliefs on a college campus,” to, “I just want to learn more about the Jewish experience.” He then had us play a game of “stand up if this applies to you”.  Specifically, he read us five questions, all in regards to our experiences with anti-Semitism, and asked us to stand if we had experienced what he was describing. Interestingly, almost every single person stood up for everything – an occurrence the group-leader promised he had hardly ever seen before.  Yet the questions never got personal; it was always, “have you read about anti-Semitism in the papers”, or “have you heard about anti-Zionism on campuses”.  What he never asked was, “have you yourself ever felt personally attacked our isolated because of your religious identity?” Had he asked that question, my guess is that hardly anyone would have stood up. 

Speaking for myself, I recognize that my experience in Chicago has not been exactly representative of what it is like to be Jewish in America and especially not the world. My experience over the past 18 years has been one of hardly any exposure to anti-Semitism.  In a way, I guess, I was kind of hoping the meeting today would act as a reality-check.   My feeling was that some of my peers in the room, including myself, have no idea what we are going to encounter in the future.  I do not say this because I want to feel more prepared to cope with being unreasonably hated; I’m actually not particularly afraid of people hating me because of my religion. I’ve determined that anyone who wants to be belligerently discriminatory or offensive because of my religion is not worth my time or worries. Rather, what concerns me most is not having a logical rebuttal to anti-Israel sentiments. 

I know I love Israel, and for basic reasons I can argue why I believe Israel has a right to exist and why I stand by its policy of remaining a majority Jewish state. Yet I get lost when it comes to the mistreatment of Palestinians.  When words like “apartheid state” get thrown around, I become very uncomfortable.  I don’t feel like I know enough about Israeli domestic policy to reasonably argue on behalf of the country, but I also feel compelled to defend Israel because of my Jewish identity.  I know the ADL conducts groups geared more towards how to approach these situations, but I’m also not sure I want to be told how to respond. Is it authentic if I’ve just reciting facts and figures relayed to me through a Jewish organization? I feel like I should be developing my own position on these topics. The only problem is, aside from living in Israel, I’m not quite sure where to start.

For my independent research, I read through a Huffington Post Article titled, "Anti-Semitism Is a Big Problem At American College Campuses, According To New Report." What I found most interesting in this piece was a comment that the author made about how at times anti-Israel sentiments "crossed the line into anti-Semitism." This line is curious to me because one of my lingering questions through today's discussion was whether anti-Israel sentiment is actually mostly anti-Semitism manifesting itself in a political discussion.  It seemed to me that our forum leader seemed to believe that way. This is a question I struggle to answer now becasue I have not yet experienced anti-Israel rallies on college campuses, but it is something I reasonably see myself having to think about in the near future.