Hey you know what? I think you probably mean well, but no, antisemitism is not about Israel, and saying that it is gives antisemites a lot of ammunition (“I don’t hate Jews; I just have a problem with the Israeli government!”).
The modern State of Israel was founded in 1948. That, as far as antisemitism is concerned, is so modern that it barely even registers on the timeline of brutal antisemitic violence and genocide.
Let me walk you through a timeline, focusing only on some of the largest, most violent antisemitic purges:
The Holocaust began in 1941, and left 6 million Jews dead.
Before that, there was Kristallnacht, which occurred in 1938.
That same year, Ecuador forcibly expelled all Jewish residents not working in agriculture.
Four years before that, in 1934, 2,000 Afghani Jews were expelled from their towns forced to live in the wilderness.
In 1929, the Jewish community of Hebron was massacred.
In 1922, the Hebrew language was banned in the Soviet union, and thousands were sent to the Gulag for so-called “Jewish cultural particularism”.
In 1921 all Jews living in Mongolia were forcibly expelled.
In 1919, Jews were mass executed by the Polish Army in the Pinsk massacre, and the the Kiev Pogroms killed 30,000-70,000 Jews, and left half a million more homeless.
The year before that, 3,000–10,000 Caucasus Jews were killed during The March Days.
Between 1917–1921, Russian Pogroms killed as many as 250,000 Jews.
In one 48-hour interval in May 1915, all 40,000 Jews living in Kaunas, Lithuania were forcibly expelled from the city.
In 1910, Shiraz blood libel pogrom swept through Shiraz, Iran, brutalizing thousands.
In 1891, 20,000 Jews were forcibly expelled from Moscow, Russia.
In 1881–1884, pogroms swept through all of Russia, forcing 2 million Jews to flee the country.
In 1864, at least 500 Moroccan Jews were massacred in Marrakech and Fez.
In 1862, during the American Civil War, General Grant issued an order expelling all Jews from his military district, before being directed by President Lincoln to rescind the order.
In 1815 Pope Pius VII reestablished the ghetto in Rome, and forcibly confined the Jewish population of the city there.
On June 29, 1805, 200-500 Algerian Jews were massacred.
In 1791 Catherine II of Russia confined Jews to the Pale of Settlement and doubled their taxes.
Between 1790–1792, most of the Jewish communities of Morocco were destroyed.
In 1786, Jews were forcibly expelled from Jeddah.
In 1776, the Jewish community of Basra was massacred.
In 1768, the Jews of the Jews of Uman, Ukraine were massacred.
In 1766, Jews were forcibly expelled from Toruń.
In 1753, the Jewish community of Kaunas was forcibly expelled.
In 1744, the Archduchess of Austria Maria Theresa forced the entire Bohemian Jewish community to pay for their readmission into the country every ten years, and introduced a law limiting each Jewish family to one son.
In 1743, the Jewish community of Riga was forcibly expelled.
In 1742 Elizabeth of Russia issues a decree of expulsion of all the Jews out of Russian Empire.
In 1727, Catherine I of Russia issued an edict forcibly expelling all Jews from Ukraine.
In 1718, the Jews of Carniola, Styria and Carinthia were forcibly expelled
In 1717, all Jews living in Gibraltar were forciblt expelled.
In 1715, Elector Max Emanuel ordered the deportation of all Jews living in Bavaria.
In 1712, a blood libel in Sandomierz led to the forcibly expulsion of the entire local Jewish population.
In 1691, 219 people were convicted of being Jewish in a court in Palma, Majorca, and 37 of them were publicly burned to death.
Only 500 Jews survived Austrian sieged the city of Buda in 1686. Half of them were then sold into slavery.
In 1679, a large percentage of the Jews of Yemen were forcibly expelled in the Exile of Mawza. Many died along the march to the Mawza, and more died once there due to the barren and inhospitable conditions there.
Between 1648–1655, the Ukrainian Cossacks massacred about 100,000 Jews and destroyed 300 Jewish communities.
In 1639, more than 60 people accused of being Jews in Lima, Peru were burned at the stake in a single Auto-da-fé.
In 1633, Jews were forcibly expelled from Radom.
In 1615 King Louis XIII of France decreed that all Jews must leave the country within one month on pain of death.
In 1593, at least 900 Jews were forcibly expelled from Bologna.
In 1593 Pope Clement VIII forcibly expelled Jews from all Papal states except the ghettos in Rome and Ancona.
In 1591, Philip II, King of Spain, banished and forcibly expelled all Jews from the duchy of Milan.
In 1571, the Mexican Inquisition began, leading to the trial and execution of those suspected of secretly practicing Judaism.
In 1569, Pope Pius V forcibly expelled all the Jews of Bologna, and encouraged the vandalization and destruction of all Jewish graveyards within the region.
In 1560, the Goa Inquisition began, and those in the region who were suspected of secretly practicing Judaism were tried and executed.
Between 1537-1546, Martin Luther whips up antisemitic sentiment throughout Germany, leading to multiple forcible expulsions of the Jewish communities living in the region.
In 1543, all Jews were exiled and forcibly expelled from Basel.
In 1540, all Jews were banished from Prague.
In 1539, all Jews were forcibly expelled from Nauheim.
In 1535, the Spanish sold all of the Jews of Tunis into slavery.
In 1526 Jews were expelled from Hungary, Croatia, and Slovakia following the Battle of Mohács.
In 1519, the Jewish community of Ratisbon was forcibly expelled, and it’s synagogues and graveyards were looted for building materials.
In 1511, most Apulian Jews were either expelled or tortured to death.
In 1510, the Jews of Naples were forcibly expelled.
In 1510, 40 Jews were executed in Brandenburg, Germany, and the remainder of the Jewish population was forcibly expelled.
That same year, 38 Jews publicly burned at the stake in Berlin.
In 1506, a massacre in Lisbon, Portugal killed over 2,000 Jews in the span of just three days.
In 1499, all Jews were forcibly expelled from both Nuremberg and Verona.
In 1498, Jews were forcibly expelled from most of France.
In 1496, the Jews of Portugal, including those who had fled the Spanish Inquisition just four years prior, were forcibly converted to Christianity and expelled.
In 1495, the Jews of Lecce were massacred and the Jewish quarter was burned to the ground.
In 1493 approximately 37,000 Jews were forcibly expelled from Sicily.
In 1492, the Jewish population of Tuat was massacred in a pogrom.
In 1481, the Spanish Inquisition began, leading to the murder, torture, forced conversion, and forcible expulsion of the Jewish population of Spain.
On Assumption Day, August 15, 1474, the Jews of Modica were massacred. During the evening, Christians are recorded to have run through the streets chanting: “Hurrah for Mary! Death to the Jews!”
In 1473, the Jews of Cordova, Spain were massacred.
In 1421 in Vienna, 270 Jews were burned at stake, and all remaining Viennese Jews were forcibly expelled.
In the single year of 1391, more than 400 Jews were massacred in Barcelona, another 250 Jews were massacred in Valencia, and all the Jewish inhabitants of Palma, Majorca were killed or forced to convert.
In March of 1389, approximately 3,000 Jews in Prague were killed in a single massacre.
In 1370, the entire Jewish population of Brussels was massacred, completely eliminating the Jewish community there. The event was commemorated by local Christians as “the Sacrament of Miracle”.
In 1354, approximately 12,000 Jews were massacred throughout Spain.
On August 4, 1349, 6,000 Jews were burned to death in Mainz as a part of the Black Death Jewish persecutions. Around 3,000 more Jews were massacred in Erfurt for the same reason, 600 were burned at the stake in Zurich, 600 more were burned at the stake in Basel, and the entire Jewish population of Speyer was destroyed.
In 1336, roughly 1500 Jews were killed in Franconia and Alsace.
In 1328, approximately 5,000 Jews were massacred following antisemitic preaching by a Franciscan friar.
In 1321 the Jews in central France were accused of ordering lepers to poison wells. After a massacre which killed an estimate 5,000 Jews, King Philip V admitted that the rumor was false and they were innocent.
In 1298, German knight Rintfleisch claimed to have received a mission from heaven to exterminate “the accursed race of the Jews”. Under his leadership, approximately 100,000 Jews were massacred, often by mass burning at stake.
In 1290, the Jews of Baghdad were massacred.
In 1290, the Edict of Expulsion forcibly expelled all Jews from England.
In 1285, a blood libel in Munich, Germany resulted in the massacre of 68 Jews. Following the massacre, 180 more Jews were burned alive inside synagogue which was lit on fire.
In 1275, King Edward I of England passed the Statute of the Jewry, forcing Jews over the age of seven to wear an identifying yellow badge, and seizing Jewish assets. Scores of English Jews were arrested, and 300 were publicly hanged.
In 1236, Crusaders attacked the Jewish communities of Anjou and Poitou and slaughtered an estimated 3,000 Jews.
In 1232, over 1,000 Moroccan Jews in Marrakesh were killed.
In 1203, the entire Jewish quarter of Constantinople was burned down by Crusaders.
In 1190, the Jews of York were massacred by departing Crusaders.
In 1171 the Jews of Bologna were forcibly expelled.
In 1146, an estimated 100,000 Jews were massacred by the Almohads in Fez and 120,000 more were massacred in Marrakesh.
In 1124, the Jewish Quarter of Kiev was burned to the ground by antisemitic arsonists.
During the First Crusade, more than 5,000 Jews were murdered in the Rhineland. Another 1,200 Jews committed suicide in Mainz to escape torture and forcible conversion.
In 1066, the Granada Massacre killed more than 4,000 Jews in a single day.
In 932, the Jewish quarter of Bari, Italy was destroyed.
In 694 King Ergica of Toledo ordered the kidnapping of all Jewish children over the age of seven, and the raising of those kidnapped children as Christians.
In 469, half of the Jewish population of Isfahan was put to death.
In 325, all Jews were forcibly expelled and banned from Jerusalem.
Between 132–135, the Bar Kokhba revolt was crushed, and 580,000 Jews were killed. Hadrian then ordered the forcible expulsion of all Jews from Judea, which was then merged with Galilee in order to form the province of Syria Palaestina, renamed in order to suppress the Jewish people’s connection to their historic homeland.
Sixty years?! Sixty years is nothing.
Antisemitism is one of the oldest forms of bigotry that still exists, and it exists in largely the same form that it always has. Non-Jews persecute Jews because we refuse to assimilate, because we emphasize literacy and education, and because we are an ethnic minority. These thousands of years of violent murder, torture, expulsion, exile, and degradation have nothing whatsoever to do with the modern State of Israel.
Antisemitism, much like the original post highlighted, transcends modern politics. It transcends most modern cultural divides.
Antisemitism is religious bigotry and racial hatred all rolled into one, and virtually no group on Earth has clean hands.
