MARCH 9 • 2023 | 11

between the continent of 
Africa, with its rich natural 
resources, and Israel, with its 
technological innovations. I 
appreciated the cultural tribal 
preservation aspects of their 
church. 
 In the coastal city of Cape 
Town, we started with a tour 
of Robben Island, where 
African National Congress 
member Nelson Mandela was 
sentenced to life and labor. 
After serving 18 of his 27-year 
sentence, he was released 
in 1990. He continued to 
fight against apartheid until 
liberation in 1994 and then 
became president. 
Finally, IBSI Ambassadors 
toured the South Africa Jewish 
Museum and dined with 
the South African Zionist 
Federation (Cape Town 
Council).
The opportunity to 
participate in an endeavor of 
this magnitude has been life-
shifting. Not since the civil 
rights era have we witnessed 
this type of partnership in the 
midst of division and outright 
hate. It is a privilege to be part 
of history in the making. 

Elizabeth C. Kincaid is an Oakland 

County resident. She attends Keter 

Torah Synagogue.

CORRECTIONS:
In “Meet the President of 
The Children’s Foundation” 
(March 2, page 36), it should 
have said that Delta Dental of 
Michigan (not the Delta Dental 
Foundation) provided funding 
for the outpatient Adolescent 
Addiction Recovery Center 
opened at the Children’s 
Hospital of Michigan Troy.
In the story on Monger’s 
Provisions (March 2, page 40) 
Zingerman’s Deli co-founder 
Ari Weinzweig was incorrectly 
identified as Ari Rosenzweig.

appeared above the fold of the 
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. That 
is inconceivable at most other 
times of Jewish oppression and 
persecution. It tells the story of 
when we are successful — when 
antisemitism is repudiated by 
the general public. It is the most 
likely indicator that we will be 
collectively safe in the long run. 
We were lucky that this 
move to partner with the 
establishment was successful. 
I felt this deeply on a recent 
trip to Montgomery, Alabama. 
Seeing the memorials to 
Black Americans persecuted 
and lynched by and under the 
very system that should have 
been protecting them from the 
worst elements of society is a 
reminder that not all minorities 
in America could then — or 
today — win over the elements 
of American society that control 
criminal justice. 

A STRATEGIC PLAN
A strategic plan to defeat 
antisemitism that must be 
collectively embraced by 
American Jews would build 
on this earlier success and 
invest in the infrastructure of 
American democracy as the 
framework for Jewish thriving 
and surviving and continue the 
historic relationship-building 
that changed the Jews’ position 
in America. It would stop the 
counterproductive internecine 
and partisan battle that is 
undermining the possibility of 
Jewish collective mobilization. 
It means more investment, 
across partisan divides, in 
relationships with local 
governments and law 
enforcement, using the 
imperfect “definitions of 
antisemitism” as they are 
intended — not for boundary 

policing, but to inform and help 
law enforcement to monitor 
and prevent violent extremism. 
It means supporting lawsuits 
and other creative legal 
strategies, like Integrity First for 
America’s groundbreaking 
efforts against the Unite the 
Right rally organizers, which 
stymie such movements in legal 
gridlock and can help bankrupt 
them. 
It means practicing the 
lost art of consensus Jewish 
collective politics which 
recognize that there must be 
some baseline agreement that 
antisemitism is a collective 
threat, even if any “unity” 
we imagine for the Jewish 
community is always going to 
be instrumental and short-lived. 
It means supporting 
institutions like the ADL, 
even as they remain imperfect, 
even as they sometimes 
get stuck in some of the 
failed strategies I decried 
above, because they have the 
relationships with powerful 
current and would-be allies 
in the American political and 
civic marketplace, and because 
they are fighting against 
antisemitism while trying to 
stay above the partisan fray. 
It means real education and 
relationship-building with other 
ethnic and faith communities 
that is neither purely 
instrumental nor performative 
— enough public relations visits 

to Holocaust museums! — so 
that we have the allies we need 
when we need them, and so 
that we can partner for our 
collective betterment. 
And most importantly, 
it means investing in the 
plodding, unsexy work of 
supporting vibrant American 
democracy — free and fair 
elections, voting rights, the 
rule of law, peaceful transitions 
of power — because stable 
liberal democracies have been 
the safest homes for minorities, 
Jews included. 
I doubt we will ever “end” 
individual antisemitic acts, 
much less eradicate antisemit-
ic hate. “Shver tzu zayn a Yid” 
(it’s hard to be a Jew). We join 
with our fellow Americans who 
live in fear of the lone wolves 
and the hatemongers who peri-
odically terrorize us. But we are 
much more capable than we are 
currently behaving to fight back 
against the collective threats 
against us. Instead, let’s be the 
smart Americans we once were. 
The real work right now is 
not baseball bats or billboards, 
it is not Jewish pride banalities 
or Twitter refereeing: It is quiet 
and powerful and, if done right, 
as American Jews demonstrated 
in the last century, it will serve 
us for the long term. 

Yehuda Kurtzer is the president of 

the Shalom Hartman Institute of North 

America and host of the Identity/Crisis 

podcast. 

JEFF SWENSEN/GETTY IMAGES

Visitors view items left by well-wishers along the fence at the Tree 
of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh on the first anniversary of the attack 
there, Oct. 27, 2019. 

BEYOND THE ‘DAY OF HATE’ 
continued from page 8

