President-elect Donald Trump is not an anti-Semite. The people around him – so I assume, with good reason – are not anti-Semites. At least most of them aren’t. Or don’t intend to be. If some of them harbor certain prejudices, if some of them, including Trump himself, tend to generalize about Jews in ways that make us cringe – it is not with malicious intentions. Trump seems to think that Jews are good with money. He thinks it’s a compliment. We think it’s not. He probably doesn’t understand why anyone would be offended by being described as good with money. We need to keep it in mind that sometimes a compliment is meant as a compliment – not as an insult.
President-elect Donald Trump is also a thin-skinned novice in the political arena. His tongue is loose, his posture brash. He lashes out at his political rivals, and doesn’t slow down at stop signs. He kept calling Hillary Clinton “crooked Hillary” during the election season. It was nasty, but, having won, Trump no longer wants to be nasty with Clinton. He seeks no investigation or persecution – he thinks that Hillary Clinton has suffered enough. Does this make him a gracious man? Hardly. Does it justify his blunt manner during the campaign? It does not. But it does tell us something about the man: his barks don’t always turn into bites.
Anti-Semitism is serious business. It could potentially lead – as it has in the past – to horrendous consequences. Allegations of anti-Semitism are serious business. Using the AS tag on an American President, or his senior advisors, is something that ought to be done cautiously, reluctantly, sparingly. Especially so when it does not solve any problem, when it serves only to alienate people. Also – calling the US President and his advisors anti-Semites to score political points, to rally the troops for political purposes, to boost fund raising, to get the attention of the media, is dangerous and irresponsible. I did not like it when a certain congressman told me days before Election Day that Trump is anti-Semitic (“I don’t buy this stuff with his daughter – he can have a Jewish daughter and still harbor anti-Semitic sentiments”). I don’t think it’s wise to call Steven Bannon an anti-Semite based on an insensitive comment he made (assuming he did), according to his ex-wife, about “whiny Jews.”
I hear Jews all around me – American Jews – playing fast and loose with anti-anti-Semitic rhetoric in recent days. A woman asked me last week what Israel would do if Trump “makes us all wear the yellow star.” A man accused an Israeli diplomat with whom I spoke of “doing business with the devil” – because Israel deals with the new Trump administration. References to the 1930’s, to Germany, to the novel The Plot Against America, are written and heard throughout the Jewish community. ” target=”_blank”>Rob Eshman is right: it’s much too early to think that Trump’s victory is the apocalypse.
I find it curious that many of the people who are currently screaming about Trump’s supposed anti-Semitic tendencies are the same people who were quick to condemn Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu when he used the anti-Semitic card against Iran. They condemned him for comparing current-day Iran to 1938 Germany. They said this was fear mongering. They said this was bluster and puff. I find it curious that many of the people who are currently issuing warnings about Trump’s supposed sentiments were explaining to me not long ago that Israel ought to be more careful when it argues that being anti-Israel is no different from being anti-Semitic. The same people who were impatient with Israel’s tendency to see anti-Semites behind every corner now see them behind every tree. The same people who thought Iran does not justify the Nazi comparison – the holocaust denying, annihilation seeking, potential nuclear power Iran – are now playing with this comparison on their democratically elected president.
They should not be doing this. Anti-Semitism is serious business.
But they do have a reason to expect their president – your president, whether you like it or not – to lead the charge against fringe elements that see his victory as theirs – that interpret his victory as a license for anti-Semitic words and deeds. Trump, in ” target=”_blank”>spiked during the election season.
A president of the United States does not lead from behind. And when he does, he is subjected to much criticism – justified criticism. A president of the United States does not lead from behind in the broader world, and he certainly can’t lead from behind when there is trouble within his own country. So Trump’s unequivocal condemnation of supremacists, his disavowal of the so called alt-right, is timely and welcome – but it is hardly satisfying. We know that President-elect Trump has a sharp tongue. He has used it against his political rivals. Yet when speaking about the bigots he seems to be more subdued than his usual self. We know that President-elect Trump believes in being tough and aggressive about pursuing one’s goals, yet with the bigots all he wants to do is “look into the matter,” rather than crush them.
Trump built his campaign on the notion that he will not be a wimp, that he will be blunt in clarifying realities that his rivals skid around. He suggested that he will act while his rivals will just talk. Well – the battlefield against anti-Semites (and anti-Muslims, and anti-black people, and anti-immigrants) is no place for a wimpy president. It is the place where Trump could work his macho charm and bring forth one of the many possible benefits of having a macho president.
