Hate is destroying America’s promise — and half of – Latest News
More and more Americans really feel our national unity is growing fragile.
Conspiracy theories and misinformation are eroding trust, stoking hate and tearing on the very cloth of our society, usually with tragic penalties.
At the American Jewish Committee, we’re seeing these penalties up close — and our new report on “The State of Antisemitism in America,” out Tuesday, reveals how these divisions are affecting the Jewish group, and us all.
According to AJC’s report, 86% of US Jews say antisemitism has elevated because the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist assaults towards Israel. REUTERS
Every day, Jews throughout this nation should think about wrenching questions of personal security.
Should I put on my kippah immediately, or will that make me a goal?
Can I hold a mezuzah on my door, or am I affixing a bullseye?
Is immediately the day somebody throws a brick by the kosher grocery store’s window?
Will taking my children to synagogue put them in a shooter’s crosshairs?
Yet when American Jews categorical such fears, and even when antisemitic violence happens, the response from the broader public is usually muted — based mostly, it appears, in a sense of acceptance that anti-Jewish hatred is the norm.
Well-meaning leaders reply with elevated security measures: armed guards at synagogues, police cruisers outdoors Hebrew faculties, and SWAT groups on standby during the High Holy Days.
Yes, this safety is vital — however fortifying towards hate crimes can’t be confused with fortifying towards hate.
For this yr’s report, AJC commissioned two parallel polls from the unbiased analysis firm SSRS: one of a consultant pattern of 1,222 American Jews, the opposite of 1,033 US adults.
An overwhelming 91% of American Jews surveyed mentioned three violent antisemitic incidents in 2025 — the Passover arson assault on Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s home, the Washington, DC murders of Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky, and the firebombing of a pro-Israel march in Boulder, Colo., that killed 82-year-old Karen Diamond — had made them really feel much less protected.
The ballot was taken earlier than 15 people had been murdered at a Hanukkah celebration in Sydney; earlier than the one synagogue in Jackson, Miss., was firebombed.
According to AJC’s report, 86% of US Jews say antisemitism has elevated because the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist assaults towards Israel.
In the final 12 months, 73% of these surveyed had skilled antisemitism online, both by seeing or listening to it or by being personally focused.
More than half mentioned they’ve altered day by day behaviors out of worry of antisemitism over the past yr: college students conceal their stars of David; households skip synagogue.
Over the final 5 years, 17% of American Jews have thought-about leaving the nation attributable to antisemitism.
Yet there’s a clear hole between what American Jews are experiencing and how the remainder of the nation sees the problem — or doesn’t see it.
Less than half of the US adults surveyed, 45%, reported personally seeing or listening to any antisemitic incidents within the final 12 months.
The query was posed broadly, to incorporate damaging remarks or online content material, in addition to bodily assaults on Jews or their non secular services.
Among Americans who know a Jewish individual, solely 54% mentioned that they had personally seen or heard one or more antisemitic incidents within the final yr.
Among those that don’t know any Jews? 32%.
Little marvel Americans really feel such a sense of division.
I’m not advocating for particular therapy for my group.
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I’m calling for, relatively, the identical care, awareness and collective outrage we might rightly see if these day by day assaults had been being made towards members of another non secular or ethnic group within the United States.
No American ought to need a security perimeter to wish.
No American needs to be afraid to depart their home or go to a cultural heart of their selecting.
A risk this extreme towards any group destroys the bonds of trust that make the United States attainable, and leaves us all worse off.
That’s why the growing hatred towards the two% of America that is Jewish is a direct risk to our democracy.
When scapegoating and prejudice is tolerated or ignored, the guardrails defending all minorities crumble.
The fortress of metallic detectors and bulletproof glass we’ve constructed across the Jewish group is a bodily signal of the deep cracks undermining the muse of our society.
In a second when the voices of animosity and hatred appear to be the loudest within the room, American Jews are questioning if this nation can dwell up to the beliefs on which it was based 250 years in the past.
This is a second when collectively all of us should ask: Are we prepared to battle for our numerous and democratic America?
Ted Deutch is CEO at American Jewish Committee.
