antisemitism
What to know
Antisemitism is discrimination, prejudice, hatred, or violence targeting Jewish people or institutions based on stereotypes about their religious practices, identities, genetic makeup, and role in society. Rooted in centuries of religious thought and church teachings, the term was popularized in 1879 by Wilhelm Marr. He used pseudoscientific theories to scapegoat Jews and frame them as an enemy. In the late 19th century, antisemitism expanded from a religious to a racial form of hatred, which turned genocidal with the Holocaust.
Reports indicate a troubling resurgence of US antisemitism in the 2020s, in tandem with a rise in white supremacist propaganda. However, antisemitism is not confined to any one ideological group or demographic. It is a form of “out-group prejudice” that spans the political spectrum, often serving as an explanatory framework that blames Jews for social problems, including inequality. Attitudes can be direct and explicit (e.g., denying the Holocaust) or coded (e.g., using the term “globalists” to connote Jews). Modern forms recycle tropes that position Jews as, on the one hand, greedy opportunists with outsized power to manipulate world events and, on the other hand, inferior, evil, and loyal only to themselves.
Antisemitism in the US — which is the focus of this entry — is deeply connected to broader social, religious, and racial hierarchies that have historically denied marginalized groups their rights, dignity, and citizenship. Many antisemitic groups organize around white supremacy and Christian superiority. For example, the “great replacement” theory alleges that Jews drive immigrants of color into the US and encourage interracial marriage, with the goal of replacing white people.
Journalists reporting on antisemitism will often need to clarify its relationship to criticism of Israel and of Zionism, which asserts the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state. This relationship has been widely debated, within and outside of Jewish communities, since long before World War II. These debates have intensified with Hamas’s deadly attack and hostage-taking on October 7, 2023, and the horrors of Israel’s US-backed Gaza war. As with any language use, context is crucial. Criticism of Israel and of Zionism can, in itself, be blatantly antisemitic (e.g., “Jews don’t deserve a state because they are conniving filth”). These sentiments can derive from and reinforce antisemitism (e.g., blaming all Jews for Israel’s actions). And they can be something else — for example, an expression of opposition to Israel’s political structures and practices, or a critical perspective on the relationship between ethno-religious groups and nation states.
Like any claim of discrimination, accusations of antisemitism need to be taken seriously by journalists reporting on an incident or pattern of Jewish hatred. Exploring the positioning of sources — interview subjects, experts, and statistics — with respect to broader agendas, including their working definitions of antisemitism, is necessary for journalists to understand the assumptions informing analysis they cite as authoritative.
For accuracy, journalists must provide the context necessary for audiences to understand the speech or actions being reported, grounded in evidence and mindful of the issue’s scale, stakes, and impact. Instead of assigning labels, journalists can often contribute new insights to public understanding by thoughtfully analyzing the specific commitments and principles espoused by sources who disagree on what counts as antisemitism. Journalists play a key role in exposing threats to Jewish safety and civil rights, while also helping audiences understand when political actors are exploiting accusations of antisemitism to suppress freedom of expression, drive polarization among marginalized groups, or erode trust in institutions.
To avoid amplifying harmful stereotypes, journalists should familiarize themselves with common media portrayals and conspiracy theories about Jews. Accounting for the racial, ethnic, cultural, and ideological diversity within Jewish communities is important to disrupt the fallacy that all Jews are of European descent and agree on Israel or any other issue. When reporting about specific speech or actions, distinguishing between hate crimes versus incidents of bias is necessary for accuracy, and both can be worthy of coverage.
Stylewise, newsrooms and organizations, including the AP, increasingly favor the variant of the term without the hyphen or capitalization. The older option, “anti-Semitism,” references a made-up racial category that is seen to obscure the modern reality of antisemitism as targeting Jewish people and institutions.
Additional resources
Summary
Antisemitism is discrimination, prejudice, hatred, or violence targeting Jewish people and institutions based on stereotypes about their religious practices, identities, genetic makeup, and role in society. Modern forms of antisemitism often recycle tropes that position Jews as, on the one hand, greedy opportunists with outsized power to manipulate world events and, on the other hand, inferior, evil, and loyal only to themselves. Stylewise, newsrooms and organizations increasingly favor the variant of the term without the hyphen or capitalization.
people.