When Jews Are Forced to Make Impossible Choices

During the Columbia University pro-Hamas encampment protests, which started in April 2024, Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D-MN) tried to split up Jewish students at the university into “pro-genocide” or “anti-genocide” camps, saying, “We should not have to tolerate antisemitism or bigotry for all Jewish students, whether they are pro-genocide or anti-genocide.”

Her inflammatory comments imply that if a Jew supports Israel’s right to exist, then they also must necessarily support the alleged “genocide” in Gaza.

Omar’s polarizing rhetoric represents a popular strategy in “progressive” American discourse that attempts to artificially corral Jews into one of two camps. Should a Jew support Israel, he or she is then automatically forced into the “enemy” camp.

This tactic pushed many Jews out of the left and into the right or into political homelessness.

Much like the attempted polarization of American Jewry today by antisemitic politicians like Omar, Jews throughout history were similarly attacked. The aggressors used the pretense of offering Jews a “choice”; more often than not, it was an impossible one.

Attacks on Jewish Communities: From Stalin to Antiochus IV

The tsunami of antisemitism sweeping through the world is not a new phenomenon. Jews have been the target of hatred for millennia. Over thousands of years, attacks on Jews took on different shapes, using multiple modus operandi. A society’s penchant for scapegoating and targeting Jews at times indicated the beginning of the end for that civilization.

In other instances, increased antisemitism was symptomatic of a turning point, indicating a society’s downward spiral away from liberal values and personal freedom. Encroaching ideas of fundamentalist Islam and radical Marxism into segments of Western society points to this phenomenon today.

In the age of social media and AI-generated propaganda, those who lack an understanding of Jewish and world history are ripe for absorbing antisemitic rhetoric and susceptible to believing and proliferating lies. Education is critical to combat the misinformation permeating the screens of impressionable youth. As Winston Churchill famously said, “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”

CHART: IMPOSSIBLE CHOICES FOR JEWS THROUGHOUT HISTORY

Jewish Life in the Soviet Union under Stalin (1924-1953)

Under Joseph Stalin’s harsh communist rule, Jews were forced to choose between giving up their religious practices or continuing to follow their religion in secret and risk arrest and deportation to forced labor camps in Siberia. For over a thousand years, Jews lived in what eventually became the Soviet Union, occasionally in peace but more frequently under severe repression and persecution. Overall, Jews suffered greatly under Stalin’s dictatorship.

He enforced a ban on all religions based on the communist teachings of Karl Marx. Stalin’s rule is known as a time of repressing opposition and forced communism. Overall, he was responsible for the death of around 40 million people.

Stalin had a complex relationship with Judaism. On one hand, during his rule, Stalin allowed many (assimilated) Jews to hold positions of power in the Russian government. Two of Stalin’s children even married Jews. On the other hand, he was against Jewish nationalism and forced Jews to give up their religion.

Jews were often persecuted for practicing and spreading religion and sent to forced labor camps in Siberia, referred to as the Gulag. Historians estimate the total number of Gulag prisoners at 20 million, of which 2 million did not survive their incarceration.After World War II, Stalin created a campaign against “rootless cosmopolitans,” a phrase viewed by many as a euphemism for Jews. Some historians contend that he planned to commit genocide by killing all of the Jews in the Soviet Union, but his scheme was cut short by his sudden death in 1953.
Jews in the Soviet Union continued to experience repression of their religion until the regime’s demise in 1991.

Jews in Pre-WWI and WWII Germany (1871-1943)

In the period leading up to World War II, German Jews had to make a choice: stay in Germany despite the rising antisemitism or leave the country where they had made their home.

On January 18, 1871, the German Empire was founded and Jews became equal citizens by law. By the early 1900s, most Jews had assimilated into German society. German Jews participated in areas of life such as journalism, retail, law, culture and medicine.

At least 100,000 Jewish soldiers fought for Germany in World War I between 1914 and 1918. When Germany was defeated Jews were scapegoated as “internal enemies” and unjustly held responsible for their country’s defeat.

The following years leading up to the Nazi Holocaust were ominous for German Jews and Jews across Europe. Many Jews understood that Germany was not safe for them. During the first six years of the Nazi rule, 304,000 German Jews managed to emigrate, which constituted more than half of the community in 1933.

The Jews that remained were not given any choices by the Nazis. Their rights were stripped from them and they were sent to forced labor or concentration camps. Overall, the Germans and their collaborators killed between 160,000 and 180,000 German Jews in the Holocaust.

The Dreyfus Affair (1894-1906)

In 1789, French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte offered the Jews of France full citizenship, becoming the first European country to grant Jews this right. However, citizenship and its ensuing rights were contingent upon a declaration that they were French first and Jewish second. As such, Napoleon hoped to completely assimilate the Jews into French society.

Roughly 100 years later, in 1894, a Jewish military captain named Alfred Dreyfus was falsely accused of treason and initially sentenced to life in prison. The “Dreyfus Affair,” which lasted from 1894 to 1906, brought to the surface the latent antisemitism that French Jews thought was negated under the banner of “Liberty, Equality and Fraternity.”

In 1895, as Dreyfus was falsely judged guilty of treason and paraded through the streets, the crowd chanted, “Death to Judas! Death to the Jews!” This event was a tipping point for some Jews, proving that they had never been accepted into French society despite their attempts at assimilation and declarations of fidelity.

So great was the shock of the Dreyfus Affair that Austrian Jew Theodor Herzl, who moved to France with the belief that the assimilation of Jews into European gentile society would be the cure for antisemitism, decided the Jews must leave Europe and establish their own state. Assimilation had not inoculated French Jews from antisemitism.

Allahdad Incident: Forced Conversion of Iranian Jews (1839)

In the Persian city of Mashhad, in 1839, Jews were persecuted and then given a grievous choice: convert to Islam or die.

During the Achaemenid Empire (550–330 BC), the Jewish community flourished in Persia. Some historians argue that as much as 20 percent of the population was Jewish, with prominent Jewish figures including Queen Esther from the Purim story.

When Arabian Islam conquered Persia, the rights of the Jewish community were downgraded to those of dhimmis (non-Muslims, second-class citizens living in an Islamic state). In the 16th century, Shi’ism became the official state religion and Jews became objects of hatred to their Muslim neighbors.

Mashhad was considered a holy place in Shi’ite Islam, and non-believers were not allowed to live there. Nevertheless, Nader Shah, a Persian ruler and Sunni Muslim, brought Jews to Mashhad to guard the spoils of wars that he had conducted throughout India in the mid-1700s.

The Jews lived in a separate quarter and despite their inferior status, the community prospered and became a source of resentment to its Muslim neighbors.

In 1747, Nadir Shah was assassinated, and Iranian Jews became targets of persecution. In 1839, an excuse was used to perpetrate a pogrom. Local Muslims attacked Jews, burning a synagogue, looting homes and kidnapping children. Following the attack, in which between 30 and 40 Jews were killed, the 2,400 Jews who survived were forced to convert to Islam or be killed.

Around 300 Jewish families formally converted but continued to practice Judaism in hiding, while others managed to flee.

The pogrom is known as Allahdad (“God’s Justice”).

Acceptance of Jews in Iranian society fluctuated over the years until the Iranian Revolution in 1979, when close to 100,000 Jews fled Iran, mainly to the UK, the United States and Israel. According to the Jewish Agency, an estimated 9,100 Jews remain in Iran today.

The Spanish Inquisition and the Jews (1390-1492)

Arguably, the most infamous time when Jews were forced to choose occurred in 1492, when the Jews of Spain were told to convert to Christianity or leave Spain forever.

During the Middle Ages, Spain had a thriving, prosperous Jewish community. Created in the 12th century by the Catholic Church to root out “heresy,” the Inquisition was a European movement that lasted hundreds of years and targeted various faiths and religions.

The Inquisition was mainly concerned with the heretical behavior of Catholics and converts. However, in 1390, the Jews and Jewish converts in Spain became central targets. The Inquisitor courts killed many Jews and Jewish converts that they doubted and pressured others to convert to Christianity. Some Spanish Jews accepted the Christian faith, while many continued practicing Judaism in secret.

After 100 years of persecution, in 1492, the remaining Jews in Spain were given a choice: convert or face exile. As a result of this ultimatum, more than 160,000 Jews were expelled from Spain. The Spanish Inquisition officially ended in 1834. Spain remained a significant player in world politics until the end of the century.

Hellenistic Antisemitism and the Fall of the Greek Empire (214-146 BCE)

Under Hellenistic rule, Jews were given a choice by their Greek colonizers: abandon Judaism and take on Greek traditions and religious practices or face persecution.

At this time in history, Jews mostly lived in Judea (today’s Israel). Following the first exile, some Jews were scattered throughout the Middle East, and others voluntarily left Judea to live in the Greek Empire.

Jews experienced moderate peace under the rule of the Seleucid kingdom for around 120 years. However, around 214 BCE, the Greek kingdom began to falter due to a combination of internal strife, weakening political structures and external pressures.

In 167 BCE, Emperor Antiochus IV came to power during this tumultuous time for the Greek Empire. He reasoned that forcing the Jews to Hellenize would help correct the empire’s ills by creating socio-economic stability in the region. He forbade certain Jewish practices like ritual circumcision and worshiping in the Jewish Temple, located in Jerusalem.

Eventually, Antiochus IV told Jews that they could Hellenize or face death. Some Jews went along and accepted the Hellenistic ideology, while others refused to cower to foreign influence.

The Jews who clung to their Judaism rebelled against the empire in the Maccabean Revolt (167-160 BCE) and won, leading to the empire’s further decline. Jews commemorate the rebellion’s success until today by celebrating the eight-day Jewish holiday of Hannukah.