is as Gunman takes Jewish worshipers hostage on one Texas Synagogue Saturday Morning, I was more than a thousand miles away, standing outside an isolated synagogue and serving as a volunteer security guard alongside an off-duty police officer. Across the country, the painful reality is that American Jews cannot gather to pray without taking safety precautions to guard against a growing epidemic of another kind: anti-Semitism.
Saturday’s attack is a reminder that anti-Semitism is a rare common thread that runs strongly across the far-right, far-left, and jihadist ideological spectrum.
Thanks to the security training that Texas rabbis and their congregations received due to the enormity of these threats, the four hostages safely escaped a standoff at the Beth Israel Congregation in Colleyville. The only casualty was the attacker himself, British national Malik Faisal Akram, who was shot by the FBI’s hostage rescue team when he raided after the captives had escaped.
The hostage crisis came in the wake of a string of white supremacist and neo-Nazi attacks that targeted Jews. pittsburgh, powe, California; And Kansas City, Kansas, to list a few. Not to mention 2017 was a white supremacist march in Charlottesville, Virginia, where a participant killed someone by driving his car into a crowd and neo-Nazis chanted, “Jews will not take our place.”
While far-right groups are responsible for a great deal of recent violence directed at Jews – and much of the media has focused on anti-Semitic incidents in America – Saturday’s attack is a reminder that anti-Semitism is that rare common thread that is strengthened far and wide – authority, far left and the jihadist ideological spectrum. Although the threat of jihadist extremism remains Domestic extremism has now emerged As an even bigger homeland terror threat.
I began my career as an FBI counter-terrorism analyst and headed one of the analytical teams at FBI Headquarters after the 9/11 attacks. It was then, 20 years ago, that synagogues in America first began setting up security committees. At the time, the most pressing threat – to the Jewish community and to the US more broadly – posed by international jihadist terrorism.
Why did top law enforcement officials determine last year – for all the progress the US has made in thwarting jihadist terror attacks? White supremacists present a big threat Akram showed that a dangerous contributor to jihadism remains anti-Semitism.
In 2020, Britain’s domestic intelligence service, MI5, called Akram “subject of interest“But at that time closed its investigation after concluding that there was no terrorist threat. In December, Akram visits New York And then, a few weeks later, four Jews were taken hostage in a synagogue in Texas.
Why did Akram target the congregation Beth Israel? It Wasn’t Just Because It Was Close To The Federal Facility Holding Afia Siddiqui, a Pakistani national serving a sentence of 86 years attempted assassination of American citizens In return for his release, he demanded the release of the hostages. For this he could target any institution near the jail.
No, Akram was convinced, as he told his captors, that Jews control society and hold immense power. As one of the hostages, Jeffrey Cohen recalled, Akram believed that they could “Call President Biden and he’ll do it. We can call President Trump and he will, because Jews control everything.” He thought these four Jewish men could secure Siddiqui’s release because “Jews control the world, Jews control the media.” Yes, the Jews control the banks.”
While Siddiqui, Akram’s cause of Celebre, is in prison because she shot an American military officer and expressed her desire to kill the Americans, she, too, is known to stop anti-Semitic conspiracies. In her January 2010 trial, she famously called for the entire jury pool to be subjected to genetic testing in order to exclude Jews. “If they have a Zionist or Israeli background … they are all mad at me,” Siddiqui said, “They should be put out.” She later said her guilty verdict was “coming from Israel, not America.”
Akram is not alone in defending Siddiqui: Al Qaeda, Taliban and Islamic State group has all demanded his releaseAs done by the Government of Pakistan. But here in the United States there are groups, such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Dallas-Fort Worth Chapter of CAIR described Siddiqui’s sentence as “one of the greatest examples of injustice in American history”.
CAIR immediately condemned this weekend’s Colville attack as anti-Semitic and “an unacceptable act of evil”. But CAIR officials themselves have promoted anti-Semitic tropes. In November, Zahra Billu, executive director of CAIR’s San Francisco chapter, gave a speech Condemnation Not only anti-Muslim bigotry and right-wing groups, but also “humble Zionists”—which include mainstream Jewish organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League, which fights anti-Semitism, and Hillel, an organization for Jewish college students— As well as the “Zionist” synagogue. ,
“When we talk about Islamophobia, we often think of raging fascists,” Billu Explained, “But I also want us to pay attention to the humble Zionists. Those who say, ‘Let’s just break bread together.'” Accused of being a part of, he warned, “They are not your friends.”
(Billu did not respond to requests for comment from media organizations when news of his remarks came to light. His comments were called anti-Semitic, in response to Hower, ADL’s leader, CAIR National Twitter Account Posted: “You use false anti-Semitism claims to defame Muslims.”)
If CAIR does not condemn this kind of anti-Semitic trope – these Jews cannot be trusted, they are part of an organized Islamofia network, don’t break bread with humble Zionists – it is indeed anti-Semitism and our core. Not opposing reasons. Watch outlining these acts of violence against Jews.
In fact, the lesson from this latest attack should be that words matter and all opposing tropes – whether it’s “Jews won’t replace us” or “Jews control the banks” or “don’t break bread with humble Zionists” – Should not be uncontrolled.
The consequences of not doing so could be disastrous. In 2019, an astonishing 60 percent of all victims of anti-religion hate crimes were specifically targeted because of the perpetrator’s anti-Semitic bias, according to the fbi, Compare this with 13.2 percent due to anti-Muslim bias and 3.8 percent due to anti-Catholic bias.
According to the FBI, in 2019, an astonishing 60 percent of all victims of anti-religious hate crimes were specifically targeted because of the perpetrator’s anti-Semitic bias.
Whereas a study by the University of Marlind’s National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Response to Terrorism showed that religion-based hate crimes in the United States are less violent (Many include vandalism targeting houses of worship) Compared to other types of hate crimes, Jewish targets were “much more represented as victims of mass casualty attacks than other types of violent crimes.” ” Antisemitic attackers comprised only 10.4 percent of the perpetrators in the data set, but they were 38.1 percent of those who planned or executed mass casualty attacks.
That’s why I found myself standing outside a synagogue on a cold Saturday morning and why synagogues across the country offer active shooter training to their circles. For Jews in America, being prepared to run, hide, or fight – a key aspect of such training – is not an academic exercise.
Jewish communities should continue to be supported with money to protect their synagogues, and all houses of worship should prioritize receiving the life-saving training that spared the hostages in Beth Israel. In the meantime, my neighbors and I will keep on guard.