This tragedy was inevitable.
The massacre of Jewish people in Pittsburgh was not a matter of “if,” but rather a matter of “when.” Anti-Semitic acts of hatred have been on the rise since 2014, with the largest increase taking place from 2016 to 2017. In attempts to explain this particular massacre, some people in positions of power have sought to use the dead to mystify its true causes and justify their heinous political ideologies. The office of Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, for example, has tweeted a claim that can only be interpreted as saying that the massacre was, in part, caused by “the old and familiar anti-Semitism, and that of [so-called] radical Islam.” (The murderer, it should be said, is a white man and, as we shall see, would have likely despised Muslims as well as Jews.)
In January, Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, accused left-wing Jewish organizations and activists, such as IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace and their organizing bases, of contributing to “an equal and opposite reaction [to the right on anti-Semitism.]” These remarks, regardless of when they were made or who made them, should be met with nothing but our incredulity and our scorn. There is only one “side” claiming Jewish people are destroying our democracy through their vast coffers. There is only one “side” comfortable with associating with authoritarian and neo-fascist organizations worldwide that target Jews. There is only one “side” advocating our subjugation and our murder. And until we truly recognize our other enemy for what it is — white supremacists and their ideology — and take steps to quash them, these attacks will continue.
Take, for example, the motive of the perpetrator. In “justifying” his massacre, he referred to the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, which he claimed brought so-called “invaders in [this country] that kill our people,” probably incensed by the caravan of refugees crossing Central America to seek asylum from violence in their home countries caused in part by U.S. intervention in their governments, and rebuild the lives they left there. He has also said vile things like, “I have noticed a change in people saying ‘illegals’ that now say ‘invaders’. I like this.”
Not long after the massacre, the head of the conspiracy-peddling organization Judicial Watch argued that the caravan was getting money from the “Soros-occupied State Department,” referring to George Soros, a political donor toward various center-left candidates through an anti-Semitic dog whistle. We see from the dehumanization present in these comments — the reduction of people to lesser things, to so-called “invaders,” along with the anti-Semitic implication that there is a concentration of influential Jewish men pulling at the strings to create a new world order — that this massacre was not solely motivated by hatred of Jews, though that is undeniably a large part of it. It was also motivated by the ideology of white supremacy.
Now that we know our enemy, we must face it and defeat it: within others, yes, but also in ourselves. It is critical that we confront the reality that there are Jewish people working within the Trump administration right now — Jared Kushner and Stephen Miller, for example — to implement the ethno-nationalist policies we have seen before, such as family separation, and the ones possibly to come, such as the deployment of troops to the border. And we must confront the reality that Netanyahu has made friends with the most brutal authoritarians and fascists to be found, such as Prime Minister of Hungary Viktor Orban (who has also used George Soros as a slur!) and incoming President of Brazil Jair Bolsonaro (who has called for violence against Afro-Brazilians, whom he calls “animals”).
We must also confront our own privilege as white people to provide a safe community for people of color — especially people of color who are Jewish, who must confront both racism and anti-Semitism simultaneously — and remember that our suffering is not unique. The pain and terror that we have just experienced is generational for people of color. As Jewish Voice for Peace organizer Lesley Williams wrote: “For Jews, Nazi symbols evoke a terrifying, traumatic past. For African Americans, they evoke a terrifying, traumatic, unending present. […] Black people did not need to be reminded by hoods and swastikas that we live in a dangerously racist country.”
Three days before the massacre, a man shot and killed two black people in a Kroger supermarket in Kentucky; the reason the death toll wasn’t higher was because before the murders, he had tried and failed to enter a black church. Confronting white supremacy means that we must demonstrate as much care — more, even — for those affected by white supremacist violence, such as those affected by the Kentucky murders, as we have shown ourselves. It means being active in causes of decarceration and police demilitarization, listening to the lived experiences of people of color and calling out racism when we see it among strangers, among friends and among ourselves. Only a united front can stand against both white supremacy and anti-Semitism; we must work to create it. That way, we can prevent something like the massacre of Pittsburgh from happening again anytime soon.
Jacob Hanna is a junior majoring in economics.