What Is Anti-Semitic?

U.S. adults do not agree on what behaviors are anti-Semitic, according to a December poll by YouGov. The most common things Americans said were anti-Semitic were denying the Holocaust, denying Jewish people the right to self-determination and boycotting Israeli products in protest of the existence of Israel.

Anxiety in the Orthodox Jewish community has risen following an increase in anti-Semitic attacks. Chief executive of the Anti-Defamation League Jonathan Greenblatt said the incidents were becoming the “new normal” during a December interview with the Wall Street Journal. There have been multiple attacks in the New York area over the past several weeks, including five people being stabbed during a Hanukkah celebration at a Hasidic rabbi’s home and a mass shooting at a kosher supermarket in New Jersey, which resulted in the death of two Hasidic Jews.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has called the attacks “domestic terrorism.”

“This is a national phenomenon that we are seeing and it’s frightening and it’s disturbing,” Cuomo said at a news conference. “If anyone thinks that something poisonous is not going on in this country, then they’re in denial.”