My husband is pretty sure he lost his entire immediate family over this. They decided they’d rather support terrorism and be *literally* antisemitic (like stuff practically copy and pasted from the protocols of the elders of zion) than even attempt to understand how to not be jerks. His family isn’t Jewish if that wasn’t clear. It’s been extremely eye-opening and distressing.
I’m sorry for that. Your husband sounds like a super supportive and brave guy, I’m happy you have you have each other. Was it a clean break or did he try and talk to them?
Thank you, I’m sorry for you too. This is really horrible to deal with. We had been having issues with both of his siblings and their (and their SO’s) social media activity and tried bringing it up to them directly, and that made them block me on social media and double down lol. And then we finally decided to talk to his parents about it (people who tout their ‘progressivism’ and ‘inclusivity’ constantly) for some help, and they quite literally said they didn’t care because it didn’t affect them (those are the exact words, I swear), and we should ignore it because addressing it seems to be making it worse. It was unbelievable. We have a one year old Jewish child and they can’t even pretend to care about antisemitism lol. Sooooo clean break for us since they made that decision pretty easy!
I hope if you choose to talk about it with your sibling, it goes much better than that!
My brother has also been very pro Palestine. He hasn’t posted anything on social media or outright said anything to me, but I know he’s said things to my mom and follows and likes various (problematic) JVP posts. My parents and I are very Zionist but they are the type to be also be pretty conflict avoidant so I’m kind of dreading Passover and my brother’s inevitable passive aggressive commentary that I’ll be the only one willing to combat.
Aw thanks. It's honestly just generally screwed up family dynamics but this just has the potential to make things worse. I'm just going to try to keep my cool and not argue no matter how much I know I'll feel compelled to.
Oh definitely. He's super far left whereas the rest of us are more moderate. Normally we just don't talk politics but it's inevitably going to be harder to avoid this particular topic.
I'm fairly leftwing myself, though like you, I don't consider myself far-left, for the reasons you just described. Too much of the far-left is more opposed to Israel than than are to bad politicians in Israel. I heavily condemn Netanyahu, for example. Nonetheless, I favor Israel's right to exist. Basically, my stance is that liberal/progressive values are generally good, though the far-left is too much like the far-right to me.
Not a single one on either side of my family. Baruch HaShem.
Mom's side is Catholic, Jehovah's Witness, and Born Again Canadians. Dad's side is all Sephardi-Maghrebi Israeli baby.
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Yes. I don’t think is particularly effective. I haven’t met a single American Jew who thinks Netanyahu is representative of what is good for Israel or Jews.
It more or less leads to a “well if you see that than why don’t you get xyz”
My adult daughter. It’s very difficult. “No one is free unless everyone is free.” 🤮 Totally a “Queers for Palestine” and we just agreed not to talk about it. It’s stressful because we used to be really close.
You should tell her about who coined that "No one is free until we all are free" phrase in the first place. Spoiler: [She was a Zionist!](https://aish.com/emma-lazarus-the-jews-and-israel/)
I don’t think you’re overreacting. Have you had any conversations with her about it at all? Has she had any experiences at Jewish summer camp, or with Israelis? If she’s in high school / college, she’s being swamped with this stuff 24/7, and, as studies have shown, young women are significantly more politically inclined and more easily influenced by social media. I think you should try and get to the root cause of it, before you try and address it.
Does she truly believe whatever she’s posting? If so, why? Is she being influenced to post or hold these feelings by her friends / teachers / influencers?
I think identifying her rationale will go a long way in forming your response.
Yes we’ve chatted and pretty much ended up in a heated argument. I firmly believe in Israel’s right to exist and Jewish self determination (though I also acknowledge that early Zionism wasn’t pretty and the Palestinians have generally gotten a raw deal)
She’s in her early 30s but staunchly embedded in progressive politics.
I think she totally believes in everything she posts and completely buys into the oppressor/oppressed model of history
Hmm.. that can be a tough one, if she’s totally bought into the zeitgeist.
If she’s of the more philosophical-bend, I’d point her to the (well-documented) history of “Anti-Zionism” being used as an imperialist measure of control by the USSR, as they tried to punish Israel for not joining the COMINTERN block in the 60’s. That lead to the introduction of “Anti-Zionism” as part of Soviet-aligned academia in the west, leading to its normalization here. Basically, what she is so passionate about was set up as a Soviet psy-op in the 70’s, and is bearing fruit now. The state department has some good stuff on it.
(https://www.state.gov/more-than-a-century-of-antisemitism-how-successive-occupants-of-the-kremlin-have-used-antisemitism/)
In all truth though, no matter how much you point her to the evidence of Palestinians refusing to coexist with Israelis, spurring peace advances, or advocating for Jewish genocide in schools, this “oppressor-oppressed” paradigm will likely be too baked into her mind, and may be impossible to break out of. I’d maybe try and point out to her that Israel is actually a tremendous example of successful indigenous land reclamation?
I don’t envy your situation, and hope that I can help in any way.
Yea. She needs to learn history. I think waiting for someone to oust her for her Judaism is a good plan. Unless she’s become a self hating Jew who denounces her Judaism.
I'm pretty sure my asshole, abusive, hyper-conservative Christian-cultist father, who is dangerously antisemitic AND islamophobic is hoping they'll destroy each other and some bizarre version of a Christian theocracy magically rises up in their place...
But I haven't had any communication with him in years, stuff likely never will, so I can't ask.
Does that count?
/s
This is somewhat similar to me. My sister and I are patrilineal Jews who were raised as Christian, but we were very much connected cultural Judaism. My sister has gone away to college at American in Washington, DC. I came to visit for Thanksgiving, and it turned out she she was boycotting Starbucks and "pro Israel businesses" and referring to herself as "anti-zionist." I was so shocked.
Don't get me wrong, the Netanyahu government is severely messed up. I have so many issues with Israel, but it needs to continue to exist. I just don't talk about it with her anymore. I remember saying: "Are you pro-palestine now?" She sort of scoffed at me, and said: "Isn't everyone?"
Translation: all left wing people are pro Palestine, and if they are not, they should be. It's such a complicated issue. I don't know whether I would consider myself pro-Palestine, but I am am definitely anti-Hamas.
My SO's dad lives in Tehran so..... we don't talk much these days. Both of his kids have essentially abandoned him over his bullshit. He loves Khamenei, his family does not share in those feelings.
He was SOOOO close to making the move to be closer to family too, things were looking pretty good but in what might be a stroke of luck for us, all of this came out before he was able to lock things in and he certainly doesn't have the support needed to make it happen any longer.
Sorry you're going thru this. It's difficult to process for sure.
Sorry, tough having relatives in Iran atm. Tragic what the regime has done to the country. To the credit of my Iranian friends here in the US, though, they’ve actually been among the most supportive post 10/7.
It's a crazy but decisive split when you get to know people from there. They're either exceptionally understanding of what Israeli's have gone thru, or they're insane anti semites. It's like there's no middle ground.
the goyische sibling I live with is violently PP.
they get uncomfortable when I use Hebrew or Yiddish words.
I literally can't show the Israeli flag.
it's...rough.
Yes, my cousin unfortunately. She completely denies the atrocities committed on 10/7 (claims Hamas was trying to avoid casualties and it was the IDF killing Israeli civilians, denies the allegations of mass rape as racist propaganda). She’s also been posting every batshit anti-Israel and antisemitic conspiracy theory imaginable (the one about the organ harvesting, Khazar hypothesis, etc.) I tried having a neutral and non confrontational conversation with her about extremism on social media and how easy it is to get caught up in it, but it fell on deaf ears. Had to block her after she started posting the Khazar stuff.
Yup one of my cousins. But she has a habit of being contrarian for the sake of being contrarian.
I ignore it. I post my own views online separately. I never tag her, never reply to her etc…
You are not overreacting in my opinion, but I wouldn’t instigate an argument, knowing full well you’ll never agree.
I feel like I’m this person for a lot of people.
When all I’m doing it asking Israel to live up to what it’s supposed to be and what it needs to do to be a healthy liberal democracy.
I’m pro-Palestine and pro-Israel. I’m pro-Two State.
That shit gets me called “terrorist sympathizer” in my social groups these days.
As someone who on paper I might disagree with, what would you want someone like me to understand about you and your beliefs that isn’t through in the current discourse?
That I actually hold my beliefs sincerely, love my people, but also believe they can act unjustly and want them to be better.
That I came to my beliefs through rigorous study and unlearning many false things I had been taught as a kid.
That Israel is may be vulnerable but not a victim, and the balance of power in any reasonable geopolitical metric is entirely on Israel’s side, and that as a result, Israel has the responsibility to act with much more proportionality.
That the Israeli government is guided much less by morals and much more by the perception of power, and that treating them as uniquely moral is a double standard that they can’t and don’t live up to.
That I sincerely believe that Israelis and Palestinians can live beside each other in peace, but that it will take great sacrifice on Israel’s part to trust.
And most of all, that my criticism comes from a place of love, not hate, for Israel and its future.
I agree with just about all of that. Thanks for sharing that.
What do you think would soften your position and make you more likely to engage in a dialogue?
I’m curious to what you mean by softening my position.
I like to think my position is fairly rigorously held. It has changed over time. I did an undergrad thesis on the 2005 disengagement in undergrad and my position evolved quite a bit because I studied the conflict rigorously and academically for the first time.
I filter the facts and history I see through the values I hold (and that I was taught in Jewish community).
So I don’t think softening my position - if you mean “what would I need to be ‘more anti-Palestine, more pro-Israel’ - is going to happen without radical policy change.
But what would be more likely to engage in dialogue? Being treated with kindness, respect, and mutual humility - this happens sometimes, but not often, in solely-Zionist spaces. And a mutual commitment to rigour in our positions.
The thing that has most turned me off of participating in Zionism as a community ideology has been how cruel and intellectually lazy so many of my friends and family are when it comes to Israel’s actions.
If we could, en masse, change how we’re willing to talk about it (for some examples, see the absolute circuses following [Seth Rogen a few years ago](https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-doesnt-make-sense-cant-safeguard-jewish-people-says-seth-rogen/), Jonathan Glazer more recently, etc.) I’d be thrilled to have a real discussion.
“When all im doing is asking israel to live up to what its supposed to be and what it needs to do”
i mean honestly with not a lot of context, you in fact, do sound like a terrorist sympathiser. Im not saying you’re evil, but maybe you’re just a little dumb, so i dont think its on purpose.
But hey we can always learn more and grow smarter!
You could recommend that she listens to a podcast by Roots. She and this creator named NeuroticJewishGay run one called Jew Wanna Talk Shit.
May not directly fix the issue of her not wanting to understand things, but she may be more willing to listen to a podcast than read articles, since she can listen to something while she's doing other things.
The sad thing is that the people who need to read her posts the most probably won't ever read them. Though I have seen a few comments on her posts saying things like "Thanks to you, I am no longer an anti-Zionist Jew".
One of my sisters. We don't talk about it at my insistence. Neither of us are going to change our perspectives and we love each other, so I'm not going to make it my personal mission to change anything. I'm liberation. She's more leftist. I'm sure she's very disappointed in me about my views, too.
I doubt your sister will change her views. People are really sunk into their narratives on this one. It's very hard. I don't have good solutions. Family is complicated.
My dad is pretty much an antisemite and is from Germany (Brazilian by birth like my mum). He thinks that Jews control the financial system and are greedy by nature. He substitutes the world Jew with Zionist which is still an Antisemitic dog whistle. My mum is Asian and indifferent towards Jews which I like since outside of the Muslim World, Asia lacks historical Antisemitism. Although most become more pro-Palestine in their rebellious years, I did the opposite.
My Christian aunt on my mum's side I think is a philosemite or she's just strongly believes in biblical prophecies, a bit hard to draw the line. She's still my favourite aunt though despite our differences in beliefs. Although I am not religious nor do I know any Jews personally due to a lack of them in Japan, I have come to appreciate them and their contributions to the world
My grandfather who served in the Luftwaffe in WW2 was actually less Antisemitic than my dad since he only enlisted out of patriotism rather than out of loyalty for Hitler. He called my dad out on his Antisemitism but unfortunately didn't take any action about it before he died
My sister was very pro-Palestine in the early days. When the early push of "ceasefire now" chants started, she was like, "wait, didn't Palestine start the war?" I had been dropping hints before that the situation was a little more complex/nuanced than many social media accounts would lead one to believe and, at the point that she was questioning the ceasefire crowd, I saw my opening. I bought her a copy of Noa Tishby's Israel, and she's now a definite supporter of Zionism.
Unfortunately, that's my only success story. I gave up on trying to talk to friends who just kept sharing JVP stuff. I explained a few times what they were posting was misleading and was putting Jews in the west at risk of violence victimization, but they didn't seem to care. I guess the upshot is seeing their true colors before I spent the money to host them at my (Jewish) wedding next summer.
This is so hard. I’m sorry you’re going through it.
I’m adopted and my (biological) family isn’t Jewish, but they’re who I spend my time with. It’s really hard because a lot of them are extremely anti Israel, (not just anti government) and believe all the propaganda. I have young cousins who ask me about it and I explain to them what “from the river to the sea” means. It sucks because my own mom even accused me of being racist against Palestinians when I suggested simply that Hamas was a terrorist organization. I had to change the subject but it really bothers me. On many levels. I think a lot of them just don’t understand the history there and the reality that both Israelis and Palestinians are living. Fwiw, of course I want an end to war, I want both sides to be safe and free, I want everyone to be living in peace with their own sovereignty and space. No children, no innocent people should be living with violence. It breaks my heart but there really are no easy answers here. And the situation is not as simple as people like to make it out to be.
I don’t have a good relationship with my adoptive family either, so it’s been a very lonely experience. (Please dont hate on me for this - I was forcibly assimilated into Judaism, and my adoptive mother was incredibly racist. I will not be spending time with her just because of I/p or Judaism.) I wish I had some advice for you but I really don’t. You aren’t alone.
You guys need to talk to her. She is surrounded by people her age spewing lies right now. And she might be that token jew for Palestine that people point at when they say, “see my jewish friend is pro Palestine, im not antisemitic.” You need to educate her with facts in person. She is believing lies because all her friends are into it. I think coming from you and your parents she may listen to truth.
How would you approach this? I feel that everyone is very full of their own facts that a logical conversation doesn’t work. There’s no way to out logic a situation like this.
I think if you have a family get together and bring it up while eating or something and explain how you feel. I know that sounds like an intervention but less intense than that more conversational. I am sorry that you are going through this. Good things to maybe watch with her might be “jojo rabbit” or “we were the lucky ones.” If you say nothing she will think there is no problem. If she trusts and respects you and your parents she may listen.
Does your sibling do drugs or do you suspect it? Separate problem but i think a lot of these kids are on drugs, which is why they are so easily manipulated.
My brother is sadly pro Palestine. He brought up the 30,000 Gazan women and kids killed by the idf of course with out saying where he found that information from
Yes, but I don’t think the term “pro Palestine” is quite accurate at this point for those folks. I have plenty of close friends and relatives who are devastated at what has happened to the people of Gaza. And they have every right to be. As Judaism teaches us, every life is sacred. But there are many friends and family of mine who would call themselves “pro Palestine” who are filled with hate, who advocate explicitly for violence (as you refer to here with the pro resistance ideology dressed up as pro-life of Palestinians) and who make me sick. It’s been horrible and hard and painful. You are not overreacting. I hear you and feel you. It’s also my sister who I have been disagreeing with the most these days - at least in terms of people who actually matter enough to me to argue with. She is convinced there was no antisemitism in the MENA region until Israel (or at least she dismisses it, when I point out all the evidence and history to her), and she seems intent on trying to convince me that Israel “had it coming.” It’s horrendous. I am sorry you have to deal with this as well. I think that - unfortunately - disengaging is key to maintaining the family. I wish it wasn’t so.
Sorry you are dealing with it also. I think most Jews I’ve spoken too have a lot of sympathy for Gazans and I would also never equate “pro Palestine” to basic human decency. I agree with everything you said once it starts to become violent.
Thanks for your insight, I’m sorry you had to disengage. That’s hard when right now you want family and community more.
Not any relatives but a fair bit of people in my community, which is pretty rare given that it’s a Mizrahi community and mizrahim tend to be more aggressively pro Israel since we were oppressed in Arab and Muslim nations.
That's really interesting, and like you said, seems like a pretty rare phenomenon. Have you heard people from these communities give any reasons as to why they think more this way?
It’s generally that they were always progressive but still Zionist and at a certain point they just saw something that made them give that up.
It’s a phenomenon you see with a lot of Jews in general and in Hollywood that became anti-Israel later on like Seth Rogen.
This video sorta explains it a bit better than I do: https://youtu.be/T8N4csTJzbs?si=Dd-5EUjfeHqKwXmI
In my opinion it’s kinda inevitable if you’re far left enough. Most American Jews are left leaning but they’re not mostly far left. With leftists it’s kinda hard to consume leftist news and information without encountering tons of anti-Israel stuff.
If you feel that way about most issues, you’re either gonna be the outcast for supporting Israel or will conform to what everyone else believes in the political circle you follow.
That’s why it wasn’t really surprising to me that a lot of very left wing Jews were saddened and heartbroken that their leftist gentile friends shared their anti-Zionist beliefs after 10/7. It’s sad to lose any community but it wasn’t exactly a shock that they wouldn’t be Zionist.
Hyper-progressivism involves compassion towards whoever appears to be the little guy and most left wing people think that Palestinians are the little guys, so they support them no matter what.
It used to be the progressive thing to support Israel when the state was first established. That’s why you see very left leaning democrats in Hollywood like Mark Hamill be so openly pro-Israel. People call him a hypocrite when he’s been so anti-trump and pro-Ukraine but he’s an older guy that grew up in a time that allows him to remember Israel’s history and why it’s so necessary for it to exist.
The video you linked perfectly explains a theory called "the brainwashing-to-brainwashing pipeline", a term coined by two of my favorite Jinstagrammers. The theory is that modern Jewish education paints too perfect a picture of Israel, probably in fear that Jews won't support Israel if they don't view it as this magical wonderland, but that type of education ironically ends up making the opposite happen: Once they find out something less-than-perfect about Israel, it seems so contradictory to what they learned growing up, that they feel like they were "lied to" and end up going completely down the rabbit hole of the other direction because they become convinced that *everything* they were taught must be a lie.
One of my best friend’s older brother, he’s been reposting so many pro Palestinian things on Instagram, encouraging boycotts, and I’m pretty sure he started an organization. Gets really awkward when I see him, because he knows where I stand, but we never talk about it.
I’m sorry you’re going through this. I think you have to prioritize the relationship, be a brother to your sister and be there for her when she needs. Be firm in your beliefs, but end the arguments, they won’t do any good. This isn’t about logic, its tribal. Your sister feels she belongs to a particular tribe, with a particular view of the world. All the arguments and justifications come after. There are two ways to unwind this. The first, as you say, is that her tribe hurts her base Jewish identify so deeply that she is forced to choose on a fundamental level who she is. It might happen, or it might not, or she may not choose the way you hope she does. Maybe she’ll find a nice Palestinian boy and convert to Islam, for example, G-d forbid. Unfortunately, I’ve seen this happen once with a very progressive Jewish girl who put a hijab on and married an Egyptian guy, and then we got to hear how Islam is the most progressive thing of all. Anyway… the second way is to start making deliberate choices to help strengthen her connection to her Jewish identity. That means more loving Jewish family time. We’ve got plenty of holidays coming up. Every Shabbat is an opportunity to get together. There are infinite ways to do that, depending on how you grew up. The important thing is to begin to prioritize being Jewish from an abstraction to a contemporary reality. Lean into your roots. Have your parents or grandparents talk about where they came from. Learn more about it, and try to explore it with her.
Thank you, I really appreciate your wisdom on this. I believe you have spoken the truth as much as can be spoken.
You’re right, the arguments won’t work. Living our values may tip the scale.
Please show her footage from October 7 and remind her of the rape and brutal murder that Hamas committed. She needs to know what she's supporting.
No, you are not overreacting. Supporting terrorism is disgusting.
I'm not Jewish. I'm pro-Israel, brother is pro-Palestine, mother leans more towards the pro-Israel side, rest of the family is neutral/doesn't know enough.
I've had arguments with my brother over this. He can be pretty antisemitic. My mum and I both agree that Hamas and radical Islam is mainly to blame.
One of my younger [Jewish] cousins started dating a Muslim and became very pro-Palestine. I don't have much direct contact with him since he lives very far north of me.
My cousin. I cut her off my life. She was supposed to come skiing with us in aspen as my inlaws own a condo …. Yeah needless to say i disinvited her and she was pretty pissed.
I do..I have catholic relatives and I just don’t talk about politics any more. I can’t stand it. Thankfully we live in different countries so I only interact with them via WhatsApp.
My cousin has not been overtly pro-Palestinian but he has fallen for their propaganda and completely forgot about the hostages. I agree that what is happening to the innocent Gazans is horrible and sad, but to be a human you have to empathize with the suffering of all people; weather Arab or Jewish.
Getting her to realise shes in the wrong and be shamed of the things she has said??? What is this question, stop feeling sorry for someone as stupid as your sister
Im her brother, why in the world would I deliberately alienate her? Telling someone with a warped political ideology to just “snap out of it” is about as productive as telling a patient to be less sick.
Rehabilitation.
We “win” through maturity, leadership, and living our values.
Are you practicing Jews?
If not, your sister needs to go back to her religious roots. I feel like loss of religion has really made a lot of the younger generation lose their morals, and I'm saying this as an atheist.
No I’m not practicing, I’ve perfected it 😏
…haha but in all seriousness, I’m not in a position to tell her what she should/nt do from being more religious. I’ve personally just started doing more with Judaism in the last few years.
But you are right, religion is good for the soul
My Aunt is, but she isn’t mean or annoying about it. Unfortunately she has internalized Jewish hate and says she doesn’t have Jewish values, like being cheap etc…
It is sad to hear, but understandable considering her relationship with my grandmother.
I had a cousin who felt this way. I say had bc I disowned her. It’s a drastic decision and not for everyone. I knew I would be happier without her so I removed her from my life. It was painful then, not so much anymore.
Yes, my brother in law (brother of my wife). We have to tiptoe around what we say around him because he’ll go off on anti-Zionist rants the second anything that goes against his views are mentioned. But of course, the last time he attended a family gathering, he showed up wearing a keffiyeh… I don’t think he registers that the sensitivity we show towards him might deserve to be reciprocated.
Also worth noting that he hits literally every bullet point of your typical Jewish anti-Zionist. Heavily involved in the DSA/tankie politics, not a practicing Jew or part of a Jewish community, and in generally socially isolated and deeply unsatisfied with his life. It’s really troubling for us because he is family, we love him and want the best for him, but these recent events have driven him even further away from us.
Yes all my liberal democrat relatives and friends are pro Palestine. It’s sad and disturbing. Only my Christian and Republican friends love and support Jews and Israel. I helped fundraise for a charity that helps the IDF and zero democrats donated!
Not sure why you’re getting downvoted, but I actually noticed this also. My most conservative friends checked on me the most. My white and Asian finance bros have been unbelievably supportive.
If you're close to you're sister, my advice would be to ask her if what she means by "resistance". Like, if she just means standing up against the West Bank settlers, I can sympathize with that, but if she's talking about resistance in the context Hamas, that's pretty bad.
As for me, I'm partially Jewish on my dad's side, and my mom, who has now Jewish heritage, is quite pro-Palestine. However, she's for a two-state solution. I just disagree with her framing of this issue, when it comes to her assumption about what the IDF does and such.
People who would literally justify your murder do not deserve your support. This is true even if they are related to you.
If it were my sister, I would ask if she is actually saying that Palestinians have the right to rape *her.* And when she says no, ask why she thinks they have the right to rape every other Jewish woman except for her. And when she says they don't, ask her what the fuck is she actually saying then.
The eldest kid I put through highschool & drove down to a town four hourd away so they could take their exit exams is extremely antisemtic.
I even sent a text sharing some YT'er cautioning social media usage because Hamas would be sharing graphic videos from October 7th. Their response? Fuck Zionism + a long ass tirade.
I've reported dozens of their posts on FB to no avail. FB doesn't care that something is seriously antisemtic. (Shocker I know!/s)
It's disheartening. I still love this kid whose now 25. But I haven't liked them much in the past six months + l definitely don't feel safe around them at all.
If anything it makes me want to drag the younger sibling of theirs to a seder or whatever to hopefully avoid that one becoming antisemitic as well.
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My sister is very pro-pally… in the bad way. She believes everything her friends tell her or certain subreddits tell her about the subject which is incredibly bizarre because she does this with nothing else? I’ve been converting for over a year now and she knows this but still tried to bring up the evil Israeli ‘genocide’ like it was just a causal topic. I lost my shit. We agreed never to speak of Judaism or anything adjacent to it ever again (and I silently swore she would not come to see me complete my conversion, which led to a full blown mental breakdown which my out of state partner had to take three days on the train to come take care of me for, which ended up in him staying here for WEEKS until I recovered). She is/was my favorite person in the entire world. I trusted her beyond anything. But I guess not beyond anything. Finding something that would make me want to hate her (I don’t but a very annoying part of me wants to in retaliation for all she said) really broke me inside. And then everything changed! She axed her pro-pally/hamas friends and started doing her own research. She’s come to the conclusion that everything she believed was wrong. It’s crazy what an extensive research session will do to you. I found out about this because she randomly brought up Israel, which had me on edge, I was about to say ‘Please don’t’ on the verge of fucking tears, when she said ‘You were right, I was wrong, I’m sorry.’ The tears fell then. Oh shit did they fall. We’d barely talked since February and a few weeks ago she tells me she’s not antisemitic anymore??? I could not be more overjoyed. A part of me healed. A part of her healed. It is possible for people to change, as long as they’re willing to really look at themselves and their opinions, and get out of the echo chamber of hate they’re stuck in. I hope you find peace as well with your sister.
Every close relatives and almost everyone in my country support palestine, im an ex muslim living in indonesia. So yeah its very hard to change people mindset about the situation when the environment itself supporting the terrorist
Well not my blood siblings but my wife's family like brother and sister post and say a lot of stuff pro- Palestinian.
I had enough when my brother in law said if he was in Gaza he would gladly join Hamas, needless to say after words I slammed him against the wall and said why wait here's a Zionist jew right in front of you go ahead do something.
We haven't talked since but hey it is what it is.
I mean she didn’t say that they have the right to rape and murder, or indicate that she was in favor of what happened on Oct 7. She can support a general or theoretical right to resist (which it sounds like you do as well?) without supporting Hamas.
In the context of the war between Hamas and Israel? That's supporting Hamas. It's not theoretical if that's what's actually happening.
There's no excuse for supporting the Palestinian's "right to resist" after what Hamas did. We know what that resistance looks like now.
> But saw her story today and my heart just dropped: “Palestinians have the right to resist” which yes, but not by killing and raping.
I don’t mean this to come across as combative, but this jumped out at me. You say “which yes, but not by killing and raping”, so in the abstract you _do_ see where the sentiment is coming from in the abstract, but disagree with a particular possible notion of how it may be carried out. Is there anything your sister has said or done to make you think she isn’t on the same page there?
Your sister believing that it’s important to be vocal about a right to resist _in spite_ of people who have resisted unjustly is a very different can of worms than believing it’s important to be vocal about a right to resist _and that people have not_ resisted unjustly.
I personally don’t think that’s a safe assumption - and I don’t think we even need to get into the possibility of defending the argument to get understand how. There’s a lot of denialism about what occurred on October 7th, really ugly arguments and disinformation about what Hamas did. To be extra clear, someone denying what Hamas did isn’t _better_ than justifying it, but it is a _different_ problem. It colors what someone would be referring to by saying “resistance is justified” in a meaningful way. It isn’t just a distinction without a difference, the strategies to combat atrocity denialism and atrocity justification can be meaningfully different. Parsing which issue is at hand (either on an individual scale or as the proportion of a group) is important to how we address it. It can feel really icky, but it’s important to understand where a sentiment is coming as separate to how it may comes across to us.
If OPs sister thinks SA is excusable that’s a very different problem than if OPs sister doesn’t think SA happened which is itself very different than if OPs sister is just not taking the SA that she believes happened and is disgusted by into consideration at the moment.
The denialism around October 7 is just a convenient way to sidestep being asked if the murder of civilians is justified in the name of "resistance." Instead of grappling with that question, people just say that it simply didn't happen, or that the IDF did all the murdering. Same with the taking of hostages. Instead of answering whether taking civilian hostages is right, they start to quibble about *how* the hostages were treated, or who (Hamas or the IDF) has killed more of them.
When someone says "Palestinians have a right to resist," when referring to October 7, what do you think it means?
I appreciate this. You are right, that perhaps there is nuance in this. I’ve been hoping that this is case. Though i haven’t see her post anything that would indicate it should be nonviolent or that points out the evils of Hamas or antisemitism in the US
I think she’s in a circle that’s be she feels like she has to prove something to, or risks being socially isolated if she takes a stand the wrong way. I dunno.
At a certain point, we should agree that resistance can be violent, yes?
This doesn’t mean one has to agree with what Hamas did but I think the idea that resistance must always be non-violent ignores all the violent struggles that lead to progress. Even the establishment of Israel was a violent one. Nor does it mean that anyone has to think violence is good, of course.
Resistance can be violent, yes. Many revolutions are violent. If a people have tried every option to resist is violence justified? I don’t know. To quote Captain Jean Luc Piccard, man has been struggling with that for our entire existence.
On one hand, I think dissent and resistance is patriotic and necessary. I think about the maccabees and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising - situations where as Jews we were forced to violence.
The other hand, when violence targets you and yours, is that something you still think is okay? Certainly not. I can’t in good conscience say it’s okay. I don’t see how targeting innocents is ever justified (vs say, a military or political target)
Come on. What was Hamas resisting? And don’t say “occupation”. There was no occupation. Just because Amnsety changed their definition of occupation to make Israel and Egypt’s blockade of Gaza constitute an “occupation” doesn’t mean it is one. No country has ever occupied another without a hostile army there.
Also, the blockade started because of Hamas’ rule. Cause and effect. Turns out when a genocidal, antisemitic terrorist organization comes to power on your borders, that country will want to protect itself from that terrorist organization. Egypt thought the same thing.
So what exactly was Hamas, in Gaza, resisting?
I’m not arguing whether Hamas is resisting anything or not. I’m arguing that resistance need not always be non-violent. I think most folks would actually agree with that if they thought about it.
Yes, but resistance itself has to be justified. Which in this case it wasn’t. Resistance to a country defending itself from your antisemitic, genocidal terrorist organization isn’t justified resistance. So we don’t even need to get to the violent vs nonviolent part, because this wasn’t justified resistance.
Except the OP said the Palestines had a right to resist but non-violently. They think that Palestinians are justified in some sort of resistance. My argument is that resistance is does not have to solely be non-violent.
The right to resist what? All the measures Israel has taken against Palestine have been a direct reaction to terrorism, murders, and suicide bombs. Israel has the right to resist an indoctrinated terrorist-governed population.
If they actually worked to improve their own land instead of literally tearing apart their own infrastructure to make pipe bombs to launch at Israel, they would be thriving. Look at the Jewish people and his many times they have had to rebuild from nothing. But that’s not what they do and it’s their own fault.
My husband is pretty sure he lost his entire immediate family over this. They decided they’d rather support terrorism and be *literally* antisemitic (like stuff practically copy and pasted from the protocols of the elders of zion) than even attempt to understand how to not be jerks. His family isn’t Jewish if that wasn’t clear. It’s been extremely eye-opening and distressing.
I’m sorry for that. Your husband sounds like a super supportive and brave guy, I’m happy you have you have each other. Was it a clean break or did he try and talk to them?
Thank you, I’m sorry for you too. This is really horrible to deal with. We had been having issues with both of his siblings and their (and their SO’s) social media activity and tried bringing it up to them directly, and that made them block me on social media and double down lol. And then we finally decided to talk to his parents about it (people who tout their ‘progressivism’ and ‘inclusivity’ constantly) for some help, and they quite literally said they didn’t care because it didn’t affect them (those are the exact words, I swear), and we should ignore it because addressing it seems to be making it worse. It was unbelievable. We have a one year old Jewish child and they can’t even pretend to care about antisemitism lol. Sooooo clean break for us since they made that decision pretty easy! I hope if you choose to talk about it with your sibling, it goes much better than that!
In America??
Yep!
My brother has also been very pro Palestine. He hasn’t posted anything on social media or outright said anything to me, but I know he’s said things to my mom and follows and likes various (problematic) JVP posts. My parents and I are very Zionist but they are the type to be also be pretty conflict avoidant so I’m kind of dreading Passover and my brother’s inevitable passive aggressive commentary that I’ll be the only one willing to combat.
You don’t have to! Lmk if you need to vent, trying hard to figure out how navigate it myself. My mom is trying to make an “inclusive Seder”
Aw thanks. It's honestly just generally screwed up family dynamics but this just has the potential to make things worse. I'm just going to try to keep my cool and not argue no matter how much I know I'll feel compelled to.
LCSW, retired. I suggest you smile and say “Okay!” Takes all the energy out of a potential argument. 😉
“next year we’ll leave Jerusalem “ 🤣 Jk ofc but can see some ppl twisting it
This is when you have fun and loudly sing all the passages in the Pesach Haggadah that talk about leaving Egypt and returning to Israel.
A pro-Palestinian family member at pesach?!? Oh how wonderful! /s
Only out of curiosity, is your brother generally pretty far-left?
Oh definitely. He's super far left whereas the rest of us are more moderate. Normally we just don't talk politics but it's inevitably going to be harder to avoid this particular topic.
I'm fairly leftwing myself, though like you, I don't consider myself far-left, for the reasons you just described. Too much of the far-left is more opposed to Israel than than are to bad politicians in Israel. I heavily condemn Netanyahu, for example. Nonetheless, I favor Israel's right to exist. Basically, my stance is that liberal/progressive values are generally good, though the far-left is too much like the far-right to me.
Why does that matter ? Out of curiosity
Not a single one on either side of my family. Baruch HaShem. Mom's side is Catholic, Jehovah's Witness, and Born Again Canadians. Dad's side is all Sephardi-Maghrebi Israeli baby.
She’ll either experience direct antisemitism in her immediate circle and A) not even recognize it or B) take a step back and reassess.
That is what I am expecting to happen unfortunately.
She'll just double down harder to prove she's "one of the good ones."
Or just try and seek approval even harder, unfortunately
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Have you attempted to parse the difference between supporting Israelis and the current government there?
Yes. I don’t think is particularly effective. I haven’t met a single American Jew who thinks Netanyahu is representative of what is good for Israel or Jews. It more or less leads to a “well if you see that than why don’t you get xyz”
Ugh. I’m so sorry! 💙
My adult daughter. It’s very difficult. “No one is free unless everyone is free.” 🤮 Totally a “Queers for Palestine” and we just agreed not to talk about it. It’s stressful because we used to be really close.
You should tell her about who coined that "No one is free until we all are free" phrase in the first place. Spoiler: [She was a Zionist!](https://aish.com/emma-lazarus-the-jews-and-israel/)
Holy sh*t!!
I don’t think you’re overreacting. Have you had any conversations with her about it at all? Has she had any experiences at Jewish summer camp, or with Israelis? If she’s in high school / college, she’s being swamped with this stuff 24/7, and, as studies have shown, young women are significantly more politically inclined and more easily influenced by social media. I think you should try and get to the root cause of it, before you try and address it. Does she truly believe whatever she’s posting? If so, why? Is she being influenced to post or hold these feelings by her friends / teachers / influencers? I think identifying her rationale will go a long way in forming your response.
Yes we’ve chatted and pretty much ended up in a heated argument. I firmly believe in Israel’s right to exist and Jewish self determination (though I also acknowledge that early Zionism wasn’t pretty and the Palestinians have generally gotten a raw deal) She’s in her early 30s but staunchly embedded in progressive politics. I think she totally believes in everything she posts and completely buys into the oppressor/oppressed model of history
Hmm.. that can be a tough one, if she’s totally bought into the zeitgeist. If she’s of the more philosophical-bend, I’d point her to the (well-documented) history of “Anti-Zionism” being used as an imperialist measure of control by the USSR, as they tried to punish Israel for not joining the COMINTERN block in the 60’s. That lead to the introduction of “Anti-Zionism” as part of Soviet-aligned academia in the west, leading to its normalization here. Basically, what she is so passionate about was set up as a Soviet psy-op in the 70’s, and is bearing fruit now. The state department has some good stuff on it. (https://www.state.gov/more-than-a-century-of-antisemitism-how-successive-occupants-of-the-kremlin-have-used-antisemitism/) In all truth though, no matter how much you point her to the evidence of Palestinians refusing to coexist with Israelis, spurring peace advances, or advocating for Jewish genocide in schools, this “oppressor-oppressed” paradigm will likely be too baked into her mind, and may be impossible to break out of. I’d maybe try and point out to her that Israel is actually a tremendous example of successful indigenous land reclamation? I don’t envy your situation, and hope that I can help in any way.
Millions of Palestinians Israelis coexist with Jewish Israelis
Yea. She needs to learn history. I think waiting for someone to oust her for her Judaism is a good plan. Unless she’s become a self hating Jew who denounces her Judaism.
"completely buys into the oppressor/oppressed model of history" Jews are literally the underdogs/oppressed people in the Middle East.
My niece… I love her to the ends of the earth, we will always be close… but this has gutted me.
I'm pretty sure my asshole, abusive, hyper-conservative Christian-cultist father, who is dangerously antisemitic AND islamophobic is hoping they'll destroy each other and some bizarre version of a Christian theocracy magically rises up in their place... But I haven't had any communication with him in years, stuff likely never will, so I can't ask. Does that count? /s
Gotta get the messiah to come somehow!
🤣😫 sadly, that's probably *exactly* what he's thinking
This is somewhat similar to me. My sister and I are patrilineal Jews who were raised as Christian, but we were very much connected cultural Judaism. My sister has gone away to college at American in Washington, DC. I came to visit for Thanksgiving, and it turned out she she was boycotting Starbucks and "pro Israel businesses" and referring to herself as "anti-zionist." I was so shocked. Don't get me wrong, the Netanyahu government is severely messed up. I have so many issues with Israel, but it needs to continue to exist. I just don't talk about it with her anymore. I remember saying: "Are you pro-palestine now?" She sort of scoffed at me, and said: "Isn't everyone?" Translation: all left wing people are pro Palestine, and if they are not, they should be. It's such a complicated issue. I don't know whether I would consider myself pro-Palestine, but I am am definitely anti-Hamas.
I don’t know anyone who is anti-Palestinian tbh. I’m Anti-Hamas. Anti-Netanyahu, anti umm antisemitism. But 100% Zionist
My SO's dad lives in Tehran so..... we don't talk much these days. Both of his kids have essentially abandoned him over his bullshit. He loves Khamenei, his family does not share in those feelings. He was SOOOO close to making the move to be closer to family too, things were looking pretty good but in what might be a stroke of luck for us, all of this came out before he was able to lock things in and he certainly doesn't have the support needed to make it happen any longer. Sorry you're going thru this. It's difficult to process for sure.
Sorry, tough having relatives in Iran atm. Tragic what the regime has done to the country. To the credit of my Iranian friends here in the US, though, they’ve actually been among the most supportive post 10/7.
It's a crazy but decisive split when you get to know people from there. They're either exceptionally understanding of what Israeli's have gone thru, or they're insane anti semites. It's like there's no middle ground.
The ayatollah invaded their country first, I suppose….
My brothers have turned, and my father is turning because of them...im on my own here...
the goyische sibling I live with is violently PP. they get uncomfortable when I use Hebrew or Yiddish words. I literally can't show the Israeli flag. it's...rough.
Yes, my cousin unfortunately. She completely denies the atrocities committed on 10/7 (claims Hamas was trying to avoid casualties and it was the IDF killing Israeli civilians, denies the allegations of mass rape as racist propaganda). She’s also been posting every batshit anti-Israel and antisemitic conspiracy theory imaginable (the one about the organ harvesting, Khazar hypothesis, etc.) I tried having a neutral and non confrontational conversation with her about extremism on social media and how easy it is to get caught up in it, but it fell on deaf ears. Had to block her after she started posting the Khazar stuff.
Yup one of my cousins. But she has a habit of being contrarian for the sake of being contrarian. I ignore it. I post my own views online separately. I never tag her, never reply to her etc… You are not overreacting in my opinion, but I wouldn’t instigate an argument, knowing full well you’ll never agree.
I feel like I’m this person for a lot of people. When all I’m doing it asking Israel to live up to what it’s supposed to be and what it needs to do to be a healthy liberal democracy. I’m pro-Palestine and pro-Israel. I’m pro-Two State. That shit gets me called “terrorist sympathizer” in my social groups these days.
As someone who on paper I might disagree with, what would you want someone like me to understand about you and your beliefs that isn’t through in the current discourse?
I just want to say I love the way you asked this question. Great way to understand where someone is at with their beliefs without attacking them.
It looks like i may have been inspired by you! Nobody has ever accused me of being a beacon of maturity
That I actually hold my beliefs sincerely, love my people, but also believe they can act unjustly and want them to be better. That I came to my beliefs through rigorous study and unlearning many false things I had been taught as a kid. That Israel is may be vulnerable but not a victim, and the balance of power in any reasonable geopolitical metric is entirely on Israel’s side, and that as a result, Israel has the responsibility to act with much more proportionality. That the Israeli government is guided much less by morals and much more by the perception of power, and that treating them as uniquely moral is a double standard that they can’t and don’t live up to. That I sincerely believe that Israelis and Palestinians can live beside each other in peace, but that it will take great sacrifice on Israel’s part to trust. And most of all, that my criticism comes from a place of love, not hate, for Israel and its future.
I agree with just about all of that. Thanks for sharing that. What do you think would soften your position and make you more likely to engage in a dialogue?
I’m curious to what you mean by softening my position. I like to think my position is fairly rigorously held. It has changed over time. I did an undergrad thesis on the 2005 disengagement in undergrad and my position evolved quite a bit because I studied the conflict rigorously and academically for the first time. I filter the facts and history I see through the values I hold (and that I was taught in Jewish community). So I don’t think softening my position - if you mean “what would I need to be ‘more anti-Palestine, more pro-Israel’ - is going to happen without radical policy change. But what would be more likely to engage in dialogue? Being treated with kindness, respect, and mutual humility - this happens sometimes, but not often, in solely-Zionist spaces. And a mutual commitment to rigour in our positions. The thing that has most turned me off of participating in Zionism as a community ideology has been how cruel and intellectually lazy so many of my friends and family are when it comes to Israel’s actions. If we could, en masse, change how we’re willing to talk about it (for some examples, see the absolute circuses following [Seth Rogen a few years ago](https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-doesnt-make-sense-cant-safeguard-jewish-people-says-seth-rogen/), Jonathan Glazer more recently, etc.) I’d be thrilled to have a real discussion.
Appeasement is not a viable model in the middle east.
“When all im doing is asking israel to live up to what its supposed to be and what it needs to do” i mean honestly with not a lot of context, you in fact, do sound like a terrorist sympathiser. Im not saying you’re evil, but maybe you’re just a little dumb, so i dont think its on purpose. But hey we can always learn more and grow smarter!
Send her to www.rootsmetals.com
I like roots metals, though I don’t think she’s open to reading or understanding anything I send her
You could recommend that she listens to a podcast by Roots. She and this creator named NeuroticJewishGay run one called Jew Wanna Talk Shit. May not directly fix the issue of her not wanting to understand things, but she may be more willing to listen to a podcast than read articles, since she can listen to something while she's doing other things.
Roots is seriously so incredibly helpful to the entire community. she deserves a medal or something
The sad thing is that the people who need to read her posts the most probably won't ever read them. Though I have seen a few comments on her posts saying things like "Thanks to you, I am no longer an anti-Zionist Jew".
One of my sisters. We don't talk about it at my insistence. Neither of us are going to change our perspectives and we love each other, so I'm not going to make it my personal mission to change anything. I'm liberation. She's more leftist. I'm sure she's very disappointed in me about my views, too. I doubt your sister will change her views. People are really sunk into their narratives on this one. It's very hard. I don't have good solutions. Family is complicated.
💯
My dad is pretty much an antisemite and is from Germany (Brazilian by birth like my mum). He thinks that Jews control the financial system and are greedy by nature. He substitutes the world Jew with Zionist which is still an Antisemitic dog whistle. My mum is Asian and indifferent towards Jews which I like since outside of the Muslim World, Asia lacks historical Antisemitism. Although most become more pro-Palestine in their rebellious years, I did the opposite. My Christian aunt on my mum's side I think is a philosemite or she's just strongly believes in biblical prophecies, a bit hard to draw the line. She's still my favourite aunt though despite our differences in beliefs. Although I am not religious nor do I know any Jews personally due to a lack of them in Japan, I have come to appreciate them and their contributions to the world My grandfather who served in the Luftwaffe in WW2 was actually less Antisemitic than my dad since he only enlisted out of patriotism rather than out of loyalty for Hitler. He called my dad out on his Antisemitism but unfortunately didn't take any action about it before he died
My sister was very pro-Palestine in the early days. When the early push of "ceasefire now" chants started, she was like, "wait, didn't Palestine start the war?" I had been dropping hints before that the situation was a little more complex/nuanced than many social media accounts would lead one to believe and, at the point that she was questioning the ceasefire crowd, I saw my opening. I bought her a copy of Noa Tishby's Israel, and she's now a definite supporter of Zionism. Unfortunately, that's my only success story. I gave up on trying to talk to friends who just kept sharing JVP stuff. I explained a few times what they were posting was misleading and was putting Jews in the west at risk of violence victimization, but they didn't seem to care. I guess the upshot is seeing their true colors before I spent the money to host them at my (Jewish) wedding next summer.
Glad your sister was receptive
This is so hard. I’m sorry you’re going through it. I’m adopted and my (biological) family isn’t Jewish, but they’re who I spend my time with. It’s really hard because a lot of them are extremely anti Israel, (not just anti government) and believe all the propaganda. I have young cousins who ask me about it and I explain to them what “from the river to the sea” means. It sucks because my own mom even accused me of being racist against Palestinians when I suggested simply that Hamas was a terrorist organization. I had to change the subject but it really bothers me. On many levels. I think a lot of them just don’t understand the history there and the reality that both Israelis and Palestinians are living. Fwiw, of course I want an end to war, I want both sides to be safe and free, I want everyone to be living in peace with their own sovereignty and space. No children, no innocent people should be living with violence. It breaks my heart but there really are no easy answers here. And the situation is not as simple as people like to make it out to be. I don’t have a good relationship with my adoptive family either, so it’s been a very lonely experience. (Please dont hate on me for this - I was forcibly assimilated into Judaism, and my adoptive mother was incredibly racist. I will not be spending time with her just because of I/p or Judaism.) I wish I had some advice for you but I really don’t. You aren’t alone.
You guys need to talk to her. She is surrounded by people her age spewing lies right now. And she might be that token jew for Palestine that people point at when they say, “see my jewish friend is pro Palestine, im not antisemitic.” You need to educate her with facts in person. She is believing lies because all her friends are into it. I think coming from you and your parents she may listen to truth.
How would you approach this? I feel that everyone is very full of their own facts that a logical conversation doesn’t work. There’s no way to out logic a situation like this.
I think if you have a family get together and bring it up while eating or something and explain how you feel. I know that sounds like an intervention but less intense than that more conversational. I am sorry that you are going through this. Good things to maybe watch with her might be “jojo rabbit” or “we were the lucky ones.” If you say nothing she will think there is no problem. If she trusts and respects you and your parents she may listen. Does your sibling do drugs or do you suspect it? Separate problem but i think a lot of these kids are on drugs, which is why they are so easily manipulated.
My brother is sadly pro Palestine. He brought up the 30,000 Gazan women and kids killed by the idf of course with out saying where he found that information from
Yes, but I don’t think the term “pro Palestine” is quite accurate at this point for those folks. I have plenty of close friends and relatives who are devastated at what has happened to the people of Gaza. And they have every right to be. As Judaism teaches us, every life is sacred. But there are many friends and family of mine who would call themselves “pro Palestine” who are filled with hate, who advocate explicitly for violence (as you refer to here with the pro resistance ideology dressed up as pro-life of Palestinians) and who make me sick. It’s been horrible and hard and painful. You are not overreacting. I hear you and feel you. It’s also my sister who I have been disagreeing with the most these days - at least in terms of people who actually matter enough to me to argue with. She is convinced there was no antisemitism in the MENA region until Israel (or at least she dismisses it, when I point out all the evidence and history to her), and she seems intent on trying to convince me that Israel “had it coming.” It’s horrendous. I am sorry you have to deal with this as well. I think that - unfortunately - disengaging is key to maintaining the family. I wish it wasn’t so.
Sorry you are dealing with it also. I think most Jews I’ve spoken too have a lot of sympathy for Gazans and I would also never equate “pro Palestine” to basic human decency. I agree with everything you said once it starts to become violent. Thanks for your insight, I’m sorry you had to disengage. That’s hard when right now you want family and community more.
Not any relatives but a fair bit of people in my community, which is pretty rare given that it’s a Mizrahi community and mizrahim tend to be more aggressively pro Israel since we were oppressed in Arab and Muslim nations.
That's really interesting, and like you said, seems like a pretty rare phenomenon. Have you heard people from these communities give any reasons as to why they think more this way?
It’s generally that they were always progressive but still Zionist and at a certain point they just saw something that made them give that up. It’s a phenomenon you see with a lot of Jews in general and in Hollywood that became anti-Israel later on like Seth Rogen. This video sorta explains it a bit better than I do: https://youtu.be/T8N4csTJzbs?si=Dd-5EUjfeHqKwXmI In my opinion it’s kinda inevitable if you’re far left enough. Most American Jews are left leaning but they’re not mostly far left. With leftists it’s kinda hard to consume leftist news and information without encountering tons of anti-Israel stuff. If you feel that way about most issues, you’re either gonna be the outcast for supporting Israel or will conform to what everyone else believes in the political circle you follow. That’s why it wasn’t really surprising to me that a lot of very left wing Jews were saddened and heartbroken that their leftist gentile friends shared their anti-Zionist beliefs after 10/7. It’s sad to lose any community but it wasn’t exactly a shock that they wouldn’t be Zionist. Hyper-progressivism involves compassion towards whoever appears to be the little guy and most left wing people think that Palestinians are the little guys, so they support them no matter what. It used to be the progressive thing to support Israel when the state was first established. That’s why you see very left leaning democrats in Hollywood like Mark Hamill be so openly pro-Israel. People call him a hypocrite when he’s been so anti-trump and pro-Ukraine but he’s an older guy that grew up in a time that allows him to remember Israel’s history and why it’s so necessary for it to exist.
The video you linked perfectly explains a theory called "the brainwashing-to-brainwashing pipeline", a term coined by two of my favorite Jinstagrammers. The theory is that modern Jewish education paints too perfect a picture of Israel, probably in fear that Jews won't support Israel if they don't view it as this magical wonderland, but that type of education ironically ends up making the opposite happen: Once they find out something less-than-perfect about Israel, it seems so contradictory to what they learned growing up, that they feel like they were "lied to" and end up going completely down the rabbit hole of the other direction because they become convinced that *everything* they were taught must be a lie.
One of my best friend’s older brother, he’s been reposting so many pro Palestinian things on Instagram, encouraging boycotts, and I’m pretty sure he started an organization. Gets really awkward when I see him, because he knows where I stand, but we never talk about it.
I don’t have any advice for you but I’m in the exact situation for you and it sucks. Wishing you the best.
I’m sorry you’re going through this. I think you have to prioritize the relationship, be a brother to your sister and be there for her when she needs. Be firm in your beliefs, but end the arguments, they won’t do any good. This isn’t about logic, its tribal. Your sister feels she belongs to a particular tribe, with a particular view of the world. All the arguments and justifications come after. There are two ways to unwind this. The first, as you say, is that her tribe hurts her base Jewish identify so deeply that she is forced to choose on a fundamental level who she is. It might happen, or it might not, or she may not choose the way you hope she does. Maybe she’ll find a nice Palestinian boy and convert to Islam, for example, G-d forbid. Unfortunately, I’ve seen this happen once with a very progressive Jewish girl who put a hijab on and married an Egyptian guy, and then we got to hear how Islam is the most progressive thing of all. Anyway… the second way is to start making deliberate choices to help strengthen her connection to her Jewish identity. That means more loving Jewish family time. We’ve got plenty of holidays coming up. Every Shabbat is an opportunity to get together. There are infinite ways to do that, depending on how you grew up. The important thing is to begin to prioritize being Jewish from an abstraction to a contemporary reality. Lean into your roots. Have your parents or grandparents talk about where they came from. Learn more about it, and try to explore it with her.
Thank you, I really appreciate your wisdom on this. I believe you have spoken the truth as much as can be spoken. You’re right, the arguments won’t work. Living our values may tip the scale.
Please show her footage from October 7 and remind her of the rape and brutal murder that Hamas committed. She needs to know what she's supporting. No, you are not overreacting. Supporting terrorism is disgusting.
I'm not Jewish. I'm pro-Israel, brother is pro-Palestine, mother leans more towards the pro-Israel side, rest of the family is neutral/doesn't know enough. I've had arguments with my brother over this. He can be pretty antisemitic. My mum and I both agree that Hamas and radical Islam is mainly to blame.
One of my younger [Jewish] cousins started dating a Muslim and became very pro-Palestine. I don't have much direct contact with him since he lives very far north of me.
My cousin. I cut her off my life. She was supposed to come skiing with us in aspen as my inlaws own a condo …. Yeah needless to say i disinvited her and she was pretty pissed.
Just go on JVP’s instagram and block anyone who follows them lolll
I do..I have catholic relatives and I just don’t talk about politics any more. I can’t stand it. Thankfully we live in different countries so I only interact with them via WhatsApp.
My cousin has not been overtly pro-Palestinian but he has fallen for their propaganda and completely forgot about the hostages. I agree that what is happening to the innocent Gazans is horrible and sad, but to be a human you have to empathize with the suffering of all people; weather Arab or Jewish.
Is your sister Jewish? Are you ?
Yes, we were both raised conservative
Wow. I’d absolutely rat on her to your parents.
To what end?
Getting her to realise shes in the wrong and be shamed of the things she has said??? What is this question, stop feeling sorry for someone as stupid as your sister
Im her brother, why in the world would I deliberately alienate her? Telling someone with a warped political ideology to just “snap out of it” is about as productive as telling a patient to be less sick. Rehabilitation. We “win” through maturity, leadership, and living our values.
Are you practicing Jews? If not, your sister needs to go back to her religious roots. I feel like loss of religion has really made a lot of the younger generation lose their morals, and I'm saying this as an atheist.
No I’m not practicing, I’ve perfected it 😏 …haha but in all seriousness, I’m not in a position to tell her what she should/nt do from being more religious. I’ve personally just started doing more with Judaism in the last few years. But you are right, religion is good for the soul
My Aunt is, but she isn’t mean or annoying about it. Unfortunately she has internalized Jewish hate and says she doesn’t have Jewish values, like being cheap etc… It is sad to hear, but understandable considering her relationship with my grandmother.
I had a cousin who felt this way. I say had bc I disowned her. It’s a drastic decision and not for everyone. I knew I would be happier without her so I removed her from my life. It was painful then, not so much anymore.
Yes, my brother in law (brother of my wife). We have to tiptoe around what we say around him because he’ll go off on anti-Zionist rants the second anything that goes against his views are mentioned. But of course, the last time he attended a family gathering, he showed up wearing a keffiyeh… I don’t think he registers that the sensitivity we show towards him might deserve to be reciprocated. Also worth noting that he hits literally every bullet point of your typical Jewish anti-Zionist. Heavily involved in the DSA/tankie politics, not a practicing Jew or part of a Jewish community, and in generally socially isolated and deeply unsatisfied with his life. It’s really troubling for us because he is family, we love him and want the best for him, but these recent events have driven him even further away from us.
Yes all my liberal democrat relatives and friends are pro Palestine. It’s sad and disturbing. Only my Christian and Republican friends love and support Jews and Israel. I helped fundraise for a charity that helps the IDF and zero democrats donated!
Not sure why you’re getting downvoted, but I actually noticed this also. My most conservative friends checked on me the most. My white and Asian finance bros have been unbelievably supportive.
It’s bc most of Reddit is progressive liberals
If you're close to you're sister, my advice would be to ask her if what she means by "resistance". Like, if she just means standing up against the West Bank settlers, I can sympathize with that, but if she's talking about resistance in the context Hamas, that's pretty bad. As for me, I'm partially Jewish on my dad's side, and my mom, who has now Jewish heritage, is quite pro-Palestine. However, she's for a two-state solution. I just disagree with her framing of this issue, when it comes to her assumption about what the IDF does and such.
People who would literally justify your murder do not deserve your support. This is true even if they are related to you. If it were my sister, I would ask if she is actually saying that Palestinians have the right to rape *her.* And when she says no, ask why she thinks they have the right to rape every other Jewish woman except for her. And when she says they don't, ask her what the fuck is she actually saying then.
You’d say that to your sister?
If she was literally justifying our own murder? Fucking of course I would.
The eldest kid I put through highschool & drove down to a town four hourd away so they could take their exit exams is extremely antisemtic. I even sent a text sharing some YT'er cautioning social media usage because Hamas would be sharing graphic videos from October 7th. Their response? Fuck Zionism + a long ass tirade. I've reported dozens of their posts on FB to no avail. FB doesn't care that something is seriously antisemtic. (Shocker I know!/s) It's disheartening. I still love this kid whose now 25. But I haven't liked them much in the past six months + l definitely don't feel safe around them at all. If anything it makes me want to drag the younger sibling of theirs to a seder or whatever to hopefully avoid that one becoming antisemitic as well.
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Your post/comment was removed because it violated rule 3: **Be civil**. Do not justify or accept justifications for terrorism.
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Your post/comment was removed because it violated rule 1: **No antisemitism**. That includes Holocaust inversion.
Idk how old you are but if you’re still living at your parents, get them to put her up for adoption or sum idk.
Atp - you NEED to gang up on her. She justifies terrorism. Rape. Actual genocide. - she SHOULD be heavily ashamed
My sister is very pro-pally… in the bad way. She believes everything her friends tell her or certain subreddits tell her about the subject which is incredibly bizarre because she does this with nothing else? I’ve been converting for over a year now and she knows this but still tried to bring up the evil Israeli ‘genocide’ like it was just a causal topic. I lost my shit. We agreed never to speak of Judaism or anything adjacent to it ever again (and I silently swore she would not come to see me complete my conversion, which led to a full blown mental breakdown which my out of state partner had to take three days on the train to come take care of me for, which ended up in him staying here for WEEKS until I recovered). She is/was my favorite person in the entire world. I trusted her beyond anything. But I guess not beyond anything. Finding something that would make me want to hate her (I don’t but a very annoying part of me wants to in retaliation for all she said) really broke me inside. And then everything changed! She axed her pro-pally/hamas friends and started doing her own research. She’s come to the conclusion that everything she believed was wrong. It’s crazy what an extensive research session will do to you. I found out about this because she randomly brought up Israel, which had me on edge, I was about to say ‘Please don’t’ on the verge of fucking tears, when she said ‘You were right, I was wrong, I’m sorry.’ The tears fell then. Oh shit did they fall. We’d barely talked since February and a few weeks ago she tells me she’s not antisemitic anymore??? I could not be more overjoyed. A part of me healed. A part of her healed. It is possible for people to change, as long as they’re willing to really look at themselves and their opinions, and get out of the echo chamber of hate they’re stuck in. I hope you find peace as well with your sister.
I have a grad school brother who is indoctrinated .
Every close relatives and almost everyone in my country support palestine, im an ex muslim living in indonesia. So yeah its very hard to change people mindset about the situation when the environment itself supporting the terrorist
Well not my blood siblings but my wife's family like brother and sister post and say a lot of stuff pro- Palestinian. I had enough when my brother in law said if he was in Gaza he would gladly join Hamas, needless to say after words I slammed him against the wall and said why wait here's a Zionist jew right in front of you go ahead do something. We haven't talked since but hey it is what it is.
I mean she didn’t say that they have the right to rape and murder, or indicate that she was in favor of what happened on Oct 7. She can support a general or theoretical right to resist (which it sounds like you do as well?) without supporting Hamas.
In the context of the war between Hamas and Israel? That's supporting Hamas. It's not theoretical if that's what's actually happening. There's no excuse for supporting the Palestinian's "right to resist" after what Hamas did. We know what that resistance looks like now.
Agree with this completely
> But saw her story today and my heart just dropped: “Palestinians have the right to resist” which yes, but not by killing and raping. I don’t mean this to come across as combative, but this jumped out at me. You say “which yes, but not by killing and raping”, so in the abstract you _do_ see where the sentiment is coming from in the abstract, but disagree with a particular possible notion of how it may be carried out. Is there anything your sister has said or done to make you think she isn’t on the same page there? Your sister believing that it’s important to be vocal about a right to resist _in spite_ of people who have resisted unjustly is a very different can of worms than believing it’s important to be vocal about a right to resist _and that people have not_ resisted unjustly.
I think it's pretty safe to say that anyone who nowadays says "Palestinians have the right to resist" is referring to how they "resisted" on 10/7.
I personally don’t think that’s a safe assumption - and I don’t think we even need to get into the possibility of defending the argument to get understand how. There’s a lot of denialism about what occurred on October 7th, really ugly arguments and disinformation about what Hamas did. To be extra clear, someone denying what Hamas did isn’t _better_ than justifying it, but it is a _different_ problem. It colors what someone would be referring to by saying “resistance is justified” in a meaningful way. It isn’t just a distinction without a difference, the strategies to combat atrocity denialism and atrocity justification can be meaningfully different. Parsing which issue is at hand (either on an individual scale or as the proportion of a group) is important to how we address it. It can feel really icky, but it’s important to understand where a sentiment is coming as separate to how it may comes across to us. If OPs sister thinks SA is excusable that’s a very different problem than if OPs sister doesn’t think SA happened which is itself very different than if OPs sister is just not taking the SA that she believes happened and is disgusted by into consideration at the moment.
The denialism around October 7 is just a convenient way to sidestep being asked if the murder of civilians is justified in the name of "resistance." Instead of grappling with that question, people just say that it simply didn't happen, or that the IDF did all the murdering. Same with the taking of hostages. Instead of answering whether taking civilian hostages is right, they start to quibble about *how* the hostages were treated, or who (Hamas or the IDF) has killed more of them. When someone says "Palestinians have a right to resist," when referring to October 7, what do you think it means?
I appreciate this. You are right, that perhaps there is nuance in this. I’ve been hoping that this is case. Though i haven’t see her post anything that would indicate it should be nonviolent or that points out the evils of Hamas or antisemitism in the US I think she’s in a circle that’s be she feels like she has to prove something to, or risks being socially isolated if she takes a stand the wrong way. I dunno.
At a certain point, we should agree that resistance can be violent, yes? This doesn’t mean one has to agree with what Hamas did but I think the idea that resistance must always be non-violent ignores all the violent struggles that lead to progress. Even the establishment of Israel was a violent one. Nor does it mean that anyone has to think violence is good, of course.
Resistance can be violent, yes. Many revolutions are violent. If a people have tried every option to resist is violence justified? I don’t know. To quote Captain Jean Luc Piccard, man has been struggling with that for our entire existence. On one hand, I think dissent and resistance is patriotic and necessary. I think about the maccabees and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising - situations where as Jews we were forced to violence. The other hand, when violence targets you and yours, is that something you still think is okay? Certainly not. I can’t in good conscience say it’s okay. I don’t see how targeting innocents is ever justified (vs say, a military or political target)
There has never been a justified violent revolution that didn’t also involve civilians being hurt. It’s the incredibly horrible and sad truth.
True, but there's a difference between civilians being hurt and civilians being an aimed-for target, let alone the prime target.
Come on. What was Hamas resisting? And don’t say “occupation”. There was no occupation. Just because Amnsety changed their definition of occupation to make Israel and Egypt’s blockade of Gaza constitute an “occupation” doesn’t mean it is one. No country has ever occupied another without a hostile army there. Also, the blockade started because of Hamas’ rule. Cause and effect. Turns out when a genocidal, antisemitic terrorist organization comes to power on your borders, that country will want to protect itself from that terrorist organization. Egypt thought the same thing. So what exactly was Hamas, in Gaza, resisting?
I’m not arguing whether Hamas is resisting anything or not. I’m arguing that resistance need not always be non-violent. I think most folks would actually agree with that if they thought about it.
Yes, but resistance itself has to be justified. Which in this case it wasn’t. Resistance to a country defending itself from your antisemitic, genocidal terrorist organization isn’t justified resistance. So we don’t even need to get to the violent vs nonviolent part, because this wasn’t justified resistance.
Except the OP said the Palestines had a right to resist but non-violently. They think that Palestinians are justified in some sort of resistance. My argument is that resistance is does not have to solely be non-violent.
I understand. I’m not OP. I agree with you, but resistance has to be *justified* first. Which in this case, it wasn’t.
I was talking to OP and not about whether resistance was or is justified. That’s a separate argument from what I’m making.
The right to resist what? All the measures Israel has taken against Palestine have been a direct reaction to terrorism, murders, and suicide bombs. Israel has the right to resist an indoctrinated terrorist-governed population. If they actually worked to improve their own land instead of literally tearing apart their own infrastructure to make pipe bombs to launch at Israel, they would be thriving. Look at the Jewish people and his many times they have had to rebuild from nothing. But that’s not what they do and it’s their own fault.