Do You Have Any Examples of Jewish Self-Hatred Working to the Detriment of the Self-Hating Jews?
Indeed, the phenomenon of Jewish self-hatred has soured our lives. Contrary to what would bring us tranquility as Jewish people, when our relations invert, with unfounded hatred replacing love, then we do not treat each other like other nations treat each other. We reject one another and are ready to give, sell, dispose of, and disconnect from one another. This results in ongoing self-destruction, and it is the state we are in today.
Sometimes, even if Jewish antisemitic activism has consequences for its promoters, self-hating Jews are willing to pay a heavy personal price to advance their agenda of harming Israel. One example of Jews who have shot themselves in the foot is the bitter commercial pressure of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream against Israel that the company’s founders Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield instigated. It seems they find a sweet taste in supporting progressive causes intended to boycott, divest, sanction, and asphyxiate Israel even if the brand they built “ended up at war with itself,” as quoted by financial analysts.
Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield influenced the multinational company Unilever, the owner of Ben & Jerry’s, to announce in July 2021 that it would no longer sell ice cream in Judea and Samaria, and East Jerusalem as “it is inconsistent with values for Ben & Jerry’s ice cream to be sold in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” The move had economic repercussions when The Simon Wiesenthal Center called for a consumer boycott of Ben & Jerry’s “antisemitic ice cream,” and several U.S. states, such as New York and Illinois, announced they would divest from Unilever.
To avoid further backlash, in June 2022, the consumer goods conglomerate Unilever sold its Ben & Jerry’s ice cream business in Israel to its local licensee. However, Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield do not succumb to the pressure when the end goal is to freeze any link to the State of Israel. In September 2022, in a show of unparalleled perseverance and determination to maintain a fierce stand to boycott Israel, both activists filed a lawsuit against its parent company Unilever to oppose the sale, seek damages, and demand the trademarks be returned.
In another example of Jewish self-hatred working to the detriment of the self-hating Jew, following the outbreak of yet another round of violence between Hamas-controlled Gaza and Israel in May 2021, a group of more than 250 Jewish employees of Google signed a letter urging its CEO to cut business ties with the Israeli Defense Forces and recognize “the harm done to Palestinians by the Israeli military and gang violence.”
Moreover, the signatories demanded, among other things, “the review of all Alphabet [Google’s parent company] business contracts and corporate donations and the termination of contracts with institutions that support Israeli violations of Palestinian rights, such as the Israel Defense Forces.” The most notable point about this letter is the fact that the signatories identified themselves as Jews and submitted the letter as such. Similar statements were also issued by Jewish employees at Amazon and Apple.
The request responded to a breakpoint between two groups of Jewish Google employees who fight against each other for influence at the company. On one side are the “Jewglers,” the prevailing Jewish voice at Google, a group of employees who identify with pro-Israel causes and with the fight against antisemitism, and on the other side is a contingent of anti-Zionist “Jewglers” who formed the breakaway group named Jewish Diaspora Solidarity.
When the anti-Zionist group was created, it described itself as “anti-nationalist, anti-colonialist, anti-Zionist Jews and allies.” That introduction was later changed to “We are Jews and allies who honor our Jewish anti-colonialist traditions.” The Jewish Diaspora Solidarity group at Google specifically protested their company’s involvement in a business deal with Israel known as Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion cloud-computing and artificial intelligence services contract.
But what starts with anti-Israeli sentiments does not end there; self-hatred runs much deeper. The rejection of business deals with Israel was also extended to a blatant opposition to Jewish causes. After Google announced a small donation to four nonprofits fighting antisemitism, the anti-Zionist Jewish group within the company was up in arms and rejected the charity.
Ariel Koren, one of the co-founders of the anti-Israeli activist group at Google and a major promoter of the #NoTechForApartheid campaign to isolate what they deem an oppressive State of Israel, quit her marketing position at the company after she was offered to relocate from California to Sao Paulo, Brazil. Instead, she resigned, claiming that the intended relocation was Google’s retaliation against her activism, which the company denied. Among those who praised her decision to resign and fully supported her anti-Israel stance were BDS activists and members of the Hamas terrorist organization.
But if self-hating Jews think that taking a self-righteous stance against Israel will win them the affection and the embrace of the world, they are wrong. It will win them its contempt and hatred. The only thing that will help Jews worldwide is to rise above the loathing that clearly pervades our relationships.
A considerable number of Jewish spiritual leaders and sacred texts throughout the generations stress the importance of our unity above all else. Masechet Derech Eretz Zuta, written at approximately the same time as the Talmud, is one of the numerous statements in that spirit: “Even when Israel worship idols and there is peace among them, the Lord says, ‘I have no wish to harm them.’ …But if they are disputed, what is it that is said about them? ‘Their heart is divided; now they will bear their guilt.’” (Masechet Derech Eretz Zuta, chap. 9.)
Similarly, the Talmud states, “Although Beit Shamai and Beit Hillel were disputed, they treated each other with fondness and friendship, to keep what was said, ‘Love, truth and peace”’ (Babylonian Talmud, Yevamot, 14b).
Currently, we are nurturing the opposite of this ideal of cohesion. Each community cares for its own interests in the narrowest, most self-centered manner. We are completely indifferent to the fate of Jews in other communities. In fact, we often prefer to dissociate ourselves from any kind of Jewish link so that the world’s attention will turn elsewhere from the Jews.
Avoiding our Jewish identity will not help us. We are in the spotlight because we are held responsible for everything that happens in the world, meaning everything that is wrong with it. It does not matter that we can prove that we are not responsible for any of the problems because, in the eyes of the world, we are, and reason does not change people’s views.
What can change the world’s view on Jews is our own unity. If we unite, the world will change how it feels about us. As Rav Kook, the first Chief Rabbi of the Jewish settlement in Israel, wrote, “The construction of the world, which is currently crumpled by the dreadful storms of a blood-filled sword, requires the construction of the Israeli nation. The construction of the nation and the revealing of its spirit are one and the same, and it is one with the construction of the world, which is crumpling in anticipation for a force full of unity and sublimity, and all that is in the soul of the Assembly of Israel.” (Rav Yitzhak HaCohen Kook [the Raiah], Orot [Lights], 16)
Yet, we have lost our unity and have fallen into abysmal hatred for one another. In such a state, we do not serve our purpose; we are not a model of mutual responsibility or unity., and because of that, we condemn the world to perpetual combativeness.
“The matter of social unity, which can be the source of every joy and success, applies particularly among bodies and bodily matters in people, and the separation between them is the source of every calamity and misfortune,” explains Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam) in his article “The Freedom.”
Based on the book “Jewish Self-Hatred: The Enemy Within — An Overview of Jewish Antisemitism” by Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.