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[Make sure to read Daniel Greenfield’s contributions in Jamie Glazov’s new book: Barack Obama’s True Legacy: How He Transformed America.]
On a Tuesday in November, around a third of a million American Jews left their jobs, skipped class and headed to Washington D.C. Some didn’t make it. In Detroit, bus drivers deliberately stranded hundreds of Jews heading to D.C. Others ran into less widely reported problems.
Even among those who arrived, tens of thousands never made it through into the secured area. In the final count, 290,000 people passed through the metal detectors at the ‘March for Israel’.
This was not only the largest ever rally by American Jews, but the largest gathering against Islamic terror.
Having a third of a million people show up at the National Mall is not completely extraordinary. Farrakhan’s Million Man March did manage to turn out 400,000 black people from a total population of 34 million. The ‘March for Israel’ brought over 300,000 out of 4.2 million Jews.
There are an estimated 4.2 million American Jews by religion. 7% of them showed up.
Accounting for the very old and very young who could not have made the trip, that’s 1 in 10 American Jews traveling to be in D.C. on a random Tuesday on fairly short notice.
The demographic equivalent would be 3 million black people, 4.5 million Latinos, 1.2 million Asians and 14 million white people rallying on the National Mall.
While the Million Man March received widespread media coverage at the time and in succeeding anniversaries, and was immortalized in movies like Spike Lee’s ‘Get on the Bus’, the media offered less coverage of the ‘March for Israel’ than it did of far smaller anti-Israel events.
The March for Israel ruined the media’s narrative that American Jews are turning on Israel. And so the media did what it always does: it protected the narrative by spinning and suppressing..
The Washington Post. which recently censored an anti-Hamas cartoon, falsely claimed that only “thousands” had attended the rally even though its own photos clearly showed far more than that. The AP began its coverage with the false claims of “thousands” and later updated it to the still false claims of “tens of thousands”. It’s easy to see from aerial photos that this is not true.
While the Post put the Women’s March, which turned out 470,000 participants, on its front page, it buried the ‘March for Israel’ in its metro section.
But despite the predictable media bias and the flaws of the rally, organized by liberal groups, it was an important statement of where American Jews stand. After weeks of the media providing disproportionate coverage to pro-Hamas rallies of hundreds of people by hate groups like If Not Now, hundreds of thousands of Jews stood with Israel and its war against Islamic terrorism.
In contrast to the pro-Hamas rallies in D.C. where flags were burned and monuments vandalized, the pro-Israel rally was a sea of American flags and attendees sang the anthem. Police officers were assaulted at pro-Hamas rallies and thanked at the ‘March for Israel’.
It wasn’t just across the ocean that the difference between Israel and Hamas was made clear, but right here in America. Pro-Israel rallies don’t break down into violence, vandalism and orgies of hatred for America. It’s the pro-Hamas rallies that turn into riots over and over again.
The ‘March for Israel’ had plenty of flaws. Like most liberal Jewish establishment projects, it sacrificed meaningful commitments for simple truisms (Hamas is bad, Israel is good) even if these truisms are now being disputed by academia, the media and large parts of the Left. Rather than taking a direct position on the issues being debated in D.C., pauses in the fighting, trading a ceasefire for hostages, and whether the PLO will take over Gaza, the march sought the broadest possible unity platform which maximized turnout, but didn’t break new ground.
Some rally speakers pledged support for a two-state solution: meaning an Islamic terrorist state inside Israel, whose existence is the reason for thirty years of terrorism against Israelis. The only Israel they seemed to be willing to support was one willing to give its enemies every possible chance until they finally do something so horrific that fighting back becomes justified.
There was little concept of who the enemy was, apart from Hamas, and what the issue was, apart from antisemitism coming from undefined sources, including on college campuses. And so there was also little concept of what standing for Israel actually meant beyond opposing Hamas. Speakers at the rally expressed pain, grief and determination, but lacked any real focus.
Biden spurned the rally, refusing to send a high-profile official, instead dispatching Deborah Lipstadt, the administration’s antisemitism monitor, but offering no larger presence at the event as another sign that he is moving even further away from his support for the war on Hamas. Other elected officials however showed up as did a whole lot of other seemingly random people.
The emphasis on unity did bring together people you would otherwise have trouble imagining participating in the same event. Not just Speaker Mike Johnson alternating with Democrat House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, but Pastor John Hagee and former Will and Grace star Debra Messing, a baffling appearance by Van Jones who didn’t seem to know which rally he was at, and a musical performance by Ishay Ribo, a major Israeli Orthodox Jewish pop star probably unknown to much of the parts of the audience that binge watches Will and Grace.
While to outsiders, American Jews may seem like members of the same group and reflect familiar stereotypes, the reality is those few millions consist of a dizzying variety of different groups which have little in common with each other and inhabit echo chambers. The ‘March for Israel’ brought together devout and secular, Reform and Orthodox, Christian supporters of Israel and Hollywood celebrities: people whose worlds never really meet.
And it took a major crisis to get at least some Jews from suburban temples and urban synagogues, those who study the Talmud and those who believe in Tikkun Olam, to temporarily stand in the same place and realize that Islamic terrorists, like the Nazis, want to kill them all.
That brief community is not likely to last, just as the unity of unity that brought together New Yorkers after 9/11 fell apart into infighting and routine, but it still is a meaningful moment.
Although it may not last, it is a rehearsal for what needs to happen for all of us, Jews and Christians, people who believe in something and those who believe in nothing, in the face of an enemy that wants to destroy us all.
There is plenty to criticize about the ‘March for Israel’, but the content of the march mattered less than the statement that bringing so many people together to stand up to terror made.
The flaws of the rally were those of American Jews: many still addicted to the illusion of peace with terrorists, incapable of questioning their partisan political allegiances and trapped in their echo chambers, in pain, but failing to understand where the pain is coming from.
But for all its failures of imagination, the March for Israel was representative of American Jews. From the mother of a hostage to a standup comedian outraged at the hypocrisy of his industry hostage, from angry college students to the politicians they hope will save them, the rally was a snapshot of what is wrong with American Jews, but also a reminder that there is hope.
The Left has put out a narrative that American Jews are turning on Israel. Those who are still Jewish, rather than merely possessing Jewish last names, have not. American Jews suffer from a painful ignorance and some of their lost descendants, like Kamala’s stepdaughter, may rally for the enemy, but those who have not given up on being Jewish have not abandoned Israel.
In Washington D.C., representatives of the scattered strands of American Jewry briefly met and stood together in the shadow of enormous hate and evil. And briefly became one.
After the Passover Massacre by Hamas in 2002, one hundred thousand Jews had rallied in Washington D.C. That rally may have been smaller, but resembled this one in many ways.
Elie Wiesel, then still alive, told the crowd that, “this day will be remembered in the history of American Jewry.” It was not. But that failure of memory is a choice. Whether or not this one will be remembered is also a choice. The choice is a matter of commitment and priorities.
If American Jewry is to have a history, it will have to remember and more importantly act.
Nearly 1 in 10 American Jews showing up in D.C. on a random Tuesday is a historic moment. But whether it will change history is up to that third of a million and all the others who watched from home and attended rallies locally. History is made up of the choices that we make.
Will the March for Israel crystalize a wave of commitment in Jewish communities? Will it change how people vote, how they act and the cultural values that they pass on to their children?
Either we make history or we become history.
“ It’s the pro-Hamas rallies that turn into riots over and over again.”
That’s because the Palestinians have been portrayed as oppressed and the protesters are starting a revolution (but they don’t look into the history of revolutions)
The other alternative is the protesters are muslims who see themselves on the brink of islamic revolution and world domination.
Great writing Daniel, thank you.
“they don’t look into the history of revolutions”
Excellent point Mo.
The article seems to assume without evidence that all the marchers were Jewish. Many non-Jews, including me, support Israel defending herself. I think that many (not including me) also attended the march.
There are certainly many Christians who support Israel. Some attended the march. Anecdotally my sense is not that many relative to a turnout of hundreds of thousands. But it’s just anecdotal. It is a major commitment and it’s an area where there aren’t that many conservative Christians living there.
Nor that many conservative Jews, I suppose. My wild guess is 50/50. So, on any score, a great turnout. But who cares the religion of the fella in the foxhole with you.
American Jews will be fighting for their lives(with guns…..real fighting) on US soil.
Hopefully there will be enough armed Christians to add to the resistance to the DEM/Communist revolution destroying America.
It’s great they showed up (and as a Jew, I was there in spirit). The problem is American Jews in the main, sad to say, do not recognize the tyranny that has descended right here that among other things helped bring about what happened on 10/7 along with the depredations of Marxism that have laid us so low since the end of World War Two. And since American Jews have voted for the party that did this in overwhelming numbers, then some soul searching is required if this rally is to have any real positive effects going forward.
And when Trump tried to limit immigration of Muslims, how many Jews supported him and how many trashed him?
Well, there is a little light piercing the darkness: that jerk, Michael Rapaport, the Jewish actor who never stops shouting and cussing…he’s just come out and said he may vote for Trump!
The anti Semitism on college campuses , innAmericsn legacy media and in American streets that have followed the horrific events of 10/7 is leading to rethinking of views by many American Jews who previously were trying to balance support for Israel with identifying with the woke world Sometimes it takes the worst in human history to remind the Jewish community and its elements that they are all in the same foxhole fighting the same battle
I’ll add these observations to this article that, with pin point accuracy, breaks down this pro-Israel event and its participants into all its components:
1) Chuck Schumer gets the biggest liar award: Sure, he’s got our back- with a knife in it.
2) Any speaker who mixed in Palestinian rights with his/her words of support, supports Hamastine. It should be clear to all of average intelligence that, thanks to the clarity of the death chants of pro Hamasites, that Hamas is Palestine. Palestine is no more. Hamastine and Hamastinians now define all of the mythical land and people of Palestine. The Latinate ‘Palestine’ never fit the true description of the people and their cause. Palestine and Palestinians were propaganda used to appeal to the non Muslim west. But now, now the truth and method of the cause is finally revealed: Arabic acronym of Hamas replaces Latin Palestine.
3) Any speaker who praised the Biden Administration negated the purpose of this gathering. This duplicitous administration just abstained from the UN Security Council vote to adopt a resolution demanding a multi day ceasefire for Hamastine.
4) 290,000 good souls stood for Israel. They did not ‘march’ anywhere or ‘demonstrate with rage, aggression and war in their eyes.’. They literally stood, happy to be together, to not feel threatened and to bask in the sunshine of a perfect fall day. They sang, uplifted by life affirming music and proclaimed ‘The Nation of Israel Lives’ and then, were snapped back to sobriety by the raw reality of the agony of the hostages and their loved ones waiting for their rescue. Hoping. Hoping in a void. A void we cannot fill.
5) A common frame of mind for this diverse assemblage of participants, who have now dispersed to its various points of dispersion in the diaspora of Jews in America, should be one of connecting to the Israel Defense Forces. For every participant there are two IDF soldiers fighting for the survival of Israel and every Jew and God-fearing person around the world.
Support the IDF with your dollars. You cannot depend on this government to do it.
6) A sincere message to Christians in America: Don’t be righteous gentiles who hide Jews. Make America a righteous nation so that no one has to hide anyone.
Some proof, for whatever its worth at this late date, that some people are finally, finally, finally, efing getting it.
Or 3 letter friends are reviewing videos trying like hell right now to figure out the crimes these peaceful protesters committed.
God bless any of them that might have spit in the grass.
“Will the March for Israel crystalize a wave of commitment in Jewish communities? Will it change how people vote, how they act and the cultural values that they pass on to their children?”
Nothing will change. Not until the moral code of altruism and self-sacrifice for God and neighbor is rejected and Ayn Rand’s moral code for self-preservation and individual flourishing is discovered, understood, and proudly championed. Ayn Rand’s historical moral code of RATIONAL SELFISHNESS.
The secular Jew may not believe in God, he may not believe in serving God, or sacrificing for God, he may not believe in a utopian afterlife, but he is still deeply committed to the Judeo-Christian code of altruism and sacrifice for the neighbor, the stranger, the “common good”, society at large, and even the enemy.
Look at David Horowitz’s own childhood and upbringing, secular Jews still profoundly committed to the altruism-collectivism-socialism axis. Even now, it seems, that Mr. Horowitz hasn’t realized that altruism and Laissez-Faire Capitalism are incompatible.
Teaching Objectivism at the universities is the only way to maintain an industrial civilization based on self-preservation and rational selfishness. Based on Laissez-Faire Capitalism.
“Laissez-Faire” means “leave us alone”. Which means ultimately “leave the individual alone, free of violence, compulsion, coercion, the initiation of force and fraud, to pursue his personal happiness”. But this freedom and liberty to pursue personal happiness rests on a complex philosophical structure. Without that philosophy of reason, liberty, and the personal pursuit of happiness cannot survive.
Yeah man, you go right over to Israel and tell those Jews to reject the Torah and God and and their history. Then everyone will go Nice Jew, Good Jew. and then they will be laissez faired to death.
And when you come back, if you get out of Israel alive, do the same thing here in all of the Synagogues. How popular you will be.
What planet are you living on?
Somehow I don’t think Iran and Hamas will leave them alone. By adopting the weakness of Ayn Rand’s thinking they will become a bigger target.
>>Even now, it seems, that Mr. Horowitz hasn’t realized that altruism and Laissez-Faire Capitalism are incompatible.
Well, maybe, but you do know who his son is, right?
Is Ben Horowitz an Objectivist? Has he ever even heard of Objectivism or “rational selfishness”?
“As a group, businessmen have been withdrawing for decades from the ideological battlefield, disarmed by the deadly combination of altruism and Pragmatism. Their public policy has consisted in appeasing, compromising and apologizing: appeasing their crudest, loudest antagonists; compromising with any attack, any lie, any insult; apologizing for their own existence. Abandoning the field of ideas to their enemies, they have been relying on lobbying, i.e., on private manipulations, on pull, on seeking momentary favors from government officials. Today, the last group one can expect to fight for capitalism is the capitalists.” – Ayn Rand
Ben Horowitz is one of the keenest mother fuckers on this planet. He knows far more about everything than you do.
You have irrefutably proven that it is entirely possible to speak loudly about things you don’t understand without a shred of shame. Well done, Broadbrush!!
Please Laissez-Faire”.
Thanks True!
“abstention by governments from interfering in the workings of the free market”
Not many governments abstain from interfering in the workings of the free market. They are mostly trying to cheat each other.
I am leaving you alone, I’m not initiating force or compulsion against you. All you have to do is exercise your free will and not read or reply to my comments.
I’m certainly not forcing you to read or reply to my comments.
One of your favorite fallback positions. “Wha? L’il ole me? Ah ain’t-a doin’ nuthin.”
In truth they really aren’t your comments. They are really Rand and Peikoff’s comments with your nonsensical burblings thrown in.
The Jewish vision is the opposite of “Ayn Rand”‘s blindness:
https://www.etzion.org.il/en/halakha/orach-chaim/prayer-and-blessings/aleinu-concluding-prayer
The real problem of course is not Hamas.
Hamas is just practicing orthodox Islam. I would be surprised if 1 in 1000 people actually understood Islam.
Islam 101
http://media-quest.com/Islam101.pdf
Read 11 pages marked starting from the middle of page 4 thru 14.
You might also want to read the section on the Media-Quest page “A recent comment is as follows.”
No decent person can remain a follower of Islam. Islam commands that its followers must not take infidels as friends. And indeed what decent person can claim to be your friend yet remain a willing follower of a religion which has indoctrinated them since earliest childhood that they are commanded to either murder you or at very least subjugate you to the status of a dhimmi, to expect that their religion will become superior over all other religions, to practice taqqiya and kitman in claiming to be your friend all the while knowing it is the opposite that is true. Disgusting.
“Learn about Islam. That is the most important thing for people to do. Learn who it is that you are not.” – Samuel Lurie
And then what? Sit down and have a discussion with the Muj. Good luck with that.
Most people on this site already know what you are selling us.
The real problem is not Islam but the ongoing collapse of the West, America, and Israel into abject, suicidal, altruism.
They are collapsing into abject altruistic self-sacrifice for the needy and the morally evil.
Israel granted 21,000 work permits to the Palestinian Muslims in the name of altruism, mercy, and pity. Work permits that the Muslims used to do reconnaissance on the Israelis they would slaughter.
Hamas was enabled by the altruistic sacrifice of billions in American taxpayer money confiscated from the American taxpayer and handed over to Hamas and the Palestinians.
Without the altruism, self-sacrifice, mercy, pity, work permits, and billions of dollars feeding the evil monster of Hamas and the Palestinians, this massacre would not have happened.
Imagine if the Israelis, Americans, and Western Europe had done this with the Nazis. Actually, America did do this with its Lend-Lease policy to Soviet Russia. The altruism of Lend-Lease resulted in the Soviet takeover of Eastern Europe, without Lend-Lease Soviet Russia would have been destroyed by the Nazis. Read “American Betrayal” by Diana West.
The West, America, and Israel are giving Islam their “sanction of the victim”. They are pursuing suicidal altruism, self-sacrifice, and self-immolation for the barbarians of Islam.
“The “sanction of the victim” is the willingness of the good to suffer at the hands of the evil, to accept the role of sacrificial victim for the “sin” of creating values.” – Leonard Peikoff
And now a large percentage of Jews will be HIDING IN THE CLOSET DUE TO INTIMIDATION AND FEAR OF RETALIATION!
“Millions take Pride in those who are Coming out of the Closet while those same millions make others RUN INTO ONE!” SC
Try wearing a Jewish Hat or MAGA Hat on any campus, a workplace, or even out in public, these days!
THE DEMOCRATS always seem to rally protesters before an election. OWS, BLM, Abortion, now Hamas. They destroyed cities and yet, the Democrats were silently supporting Anarchy, and most were still elected. They recruit new voters. The leaders of the protests are Communists, and their signs prove it: ANSWER, The Party for Socialism and Liberation, the Revolutionary Communist Party, and the Communist Party USA which hides in the shadows but who are The Mother-of-all Communists. (CPUSA.ORG tell me the difference between them and the Democrats.)
THERE IS A DIFFERENCE NOW. The World is choosing sides and many Democrats are siding with Israel but is it real support or they do so thinking of a voting bloc who funds them and always votes for them anyway no matter what their position is. Many groups are protesting Biden and Democrats, “Muslims will not vote for you.” They will in the end and the Democrats know it, so they support Israel and Jews while winking their eye.
THE CORRUPT MEDIA promotes the most hatred of Israel and support for terrorists when they lead news with Israel bombings only. The barbarism of the Hamas attack is forgotten. The hostages are forgotten. Then they don’t broadcast bad news about Hamas, the weapon factories, tunnels, cache, below a hospital, a real war crime of using Human Shields.
WHERE ARE THE PALESTINIANS WHO WILL STAND UP TO HAMAS since it is they who have bringing destruction for decades, as well as other proxy terrorist groups who only enrich themselves while the people suffer? FIGHT AND DIE WITH HONOR! Hamas gone today, another different named group, tomorrow. CIVILIZED SOCIETY OR TERRORIST NATION! REMEMBER, ISRAEL HAD TO DEAL WITH SUICIDE BOMBERS TOO as they attacked buses, markets, gatherings, random areas, so what does Israel do? More laws, more checkpoints, more walls.
AMERICA’S SLEEPER CELLS ARE AWAITING THE ALARM TO AWAKEN and millions of Americans, including those who took The Oath, will aid and abet them!
Daniel concludes:
“Either we make history or we become history.”
Profoundly true. Amen.
Jews are slowly learning who they should quit voting for.
Hope you are right.
Most of us have known it since we began voting. My first presidential vote, not long after my 21st birthday, was for Richard Nixon because I admired his anti-Communist work in the 1950’s. He was openly antisemitic, but he came through in the 1973 war and aided Israel. (There is a story about that he did this only after Golda Meir told him that if he did not sell Israel the weapons they needed, they would have to use nukes. It might have been a bluff, but it worked, assuming that the story is true at all.) I have never understood Jews who reflexively vote for Democrats. They seem to me to be fools who do not know who their friends are.
What I can’t help but wonder is if any of the Jews gathered at the D.C.
mall would still vote for Biden. They obviously realize that Hamas and
its supporters make no distinction as to what type of Jews they are
and would be happy to slaughter all of them. In that sense, the Jews
in Israel are Jews like themselves.
Even if there is little concept on the part of the rally speakers as to who
the real enemy and real issues are regarding Israel – surely they at least
see through Biden. Who gives lip service to support of Israel but whose
actions sure as shooting are against them: continual financial disbursements
to Iran – demands for a ceasefire – releasing of needed weapons to Israel
contingent on their adhering to the American agenda – spurning the
colossal number of American Jews who turned out in support of Israel.
That Biden is a glaring two-face when it comes to Israel should be more
than obvious to American Jews now. That he is a treasonous two-face when
it comes to all Americans should be obvious now as well. As Daniel Greenfield
speculates whether the unity felt at the March for Israel will be enough to
change voting habits and history along with it – I pray the Jews realize that in
addition to all of them being ‘Jews to the slaughter’ that – when it comes to
being rescued by their Biden-led American allies – they are on their own.
Where did you get the 4.2 million number for our population ??? The official number hovers around 15 million in America. Yet that figure ignores the half our population that has intermarried. Regardless of one’s personal opinion about this , this amounts to another 5-10 million .
LOL! I guess you’ve even heard of the National Jewish Population Survey? THAT is the official source and there’s no other.
And the way you pose the question…arrogant and cocksure…you obviously pulled that number out of your own personnel…world cavern.
It is estimated that there are 15 million Jews on Planet Earth. Fewer than half of them live in the US. As to intermarried Jews, they do not stop being Jews when they intermarry; in fact they do not stop being Jews even if they convert to another religion. The children of intermarried Jewish men are not Jewish; the children of intermarried women are. And that’s all you need to know, assuming you don’t find it too difficult to fathom.
It would make me really happy if 1/10 American Jews would invest in making Jewish movies with Angel Studios. Hindus and anyone interested in Zoroastrianism too, and Jews kind of owe them for King Cyrus.
I wish I was a film director.
The movie that needs to be made is………. “Six Day War”.
An action thriller about the most improbable military victory of the 20th century.
You talk about waking up the echoes for Jew and Christian alike.
Now, THAT was a real nail-biter! Who would have imagined that Israel would win the hot war and then immediately lost the propaganda war that followed it?
Yes, this was a historically large rally in support of Israel, but it was not a rally against ISLAMIC terrorism. At best it was a rally against Hamas. There was not any serious consciousness that the religion of Islam had anything to do with Hamas. In fact, right near the end of the rally, there was a Moslem woman, Anila Ali, who is also an activist for the Democrat Party, who told the receptive audience all sorts of sweet but insidious lies about how Islam is a religion of peace and friendship with Jews. She lied about Islam; she lied about the Koran; she lied about sharia law. And the audience cheered.
All these cries for a “two-state solution” and a “ceasefire” are ludicrous. Was there not a “ceasefire” on 10/6? Was there not a “two-state solution” when Gaza was handed over lock, stock and barrel to the Fakestinians? IMO, the Biden admin was complicit in the failure of both these initiatives. Have they not seen the results of a de facto autonomous “state” created on Israel’s border? Are they oblivious to where all the billions of dollars in “aid” to Hamas has been spent? The US needs to back the hell out of a situation they helped create and leave Israel to deal with the cancer growing all around them. The world has already had one Neville Chamberlain. We don’t need to assume the role of another one.
The only “solution” these Islamofascists and their apologists want is the “Final Solution of the Jewish Question” enacted by the Nazis and their apologists such as the Mufti of Jerusalem did in the past. The Mufti who was then based in Hitler’s Berlin wanted to create gas chambers in the Negev to murder all the Jews then living in the Mandate.
You’re right on as usual Daniel! Theres millions more supporters for Israel that aren’t seen at the rallies too. This issue is about Freedom of Speech and Freedom to live in a world that is fair to all people. Communism destroys those freedoms.