Do Jewish lives matter?

The recent murder of two Israeli diplomats in Washington shows clear as day that anti-Zionism is antisemitism

On Wednesday night, a far-left activist fatally shot two young Israeli diplomats outside the Capitol Jewish Museum in Washington DC. The victims, Sarah Lynn Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky, were a couple about to get engaged the next week.

After carrying out the attack, the killer, Elias Rodriguez, shouted, “I did it for Gaza. Free, free Palestine,” as police took him away.

This appalling killing should be a wake-up call. Yet once again, much of the media appears indifferent, treating Jewish lives as an afterthought in the broader narrative. This horrific killing is not an isolated tragedy — it is part of a growing pattern of antisemitic violence in the West that receives far too little attention. More disturbingly, it shows how the line between anti-Zionism and antisemitism has all but disappeared.

Anti-Zionism is defined as opposition to Zionism, the movement for the self-determination and statehood of the Jewish people in their ancestral homeland, the land of Israel. Rooted in Soviet propaganda, anti-Zionism presents Zionism as a fascist, imperialistic, and racist ideology. According to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Zionism is “the enemy of socialism and the national liberation movements.” A common trope weaponised by anti-Zionists is that Israelis are Nazis.

Soon after the Washington DC shooting, the Bronx Anti-War Coalition, a radical New York-based anti-Israel group, wrote on X: “What Elias Rodriguez did is the highest expression of anti-Zionism.” In a similar post to its Telegram channel, the group added: “We need more Elias Rodriguez in the world.”

This is just one example of the vast swathes of anti-Zionist groups and individuals who attempted to justify the antisemitic attack online.

Many anti-Zionists will emphatically argue that they are not antisemites. Yet, if anti-Zionists believe that the Jews are the only people in the world who do not deserve a state, then I would say that they are indeed antisemitic. By singling out Israel as uniquely evil and undeserving of statehood, they are also singling out Jews as uniquely bad. Given the current hostile climate towards Israel, it is easy to see how hateful and extreme anti-Zionist ideas may have influenced Rodriguez and pushed him into a dark and murderous state of mind.

Despite being one of the most targeted minorities in the world, attacks on Jews receive less attention than attacks on other groups. The Woke Left, especially, is often selective in the way it chooses to confront racism. While racism against black people and Asians is rightly condemned and opposed, racism against Jews is often downplayed or outright ignored.

The American Left rightly marched in solidarity with African Americans following the murder of George Floyd by a police officer in 2020. Yet there were no large-scale protests or marches following the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting in 2018, when a far-right terrorist killed 11 Jewish worshippers in the deadliest antisemitic attack in US history. While many on the Left did condemn the attack, the lack of sustained or passionate focus demonstrates an inconsistency among the Left when challenging different types of racism.

A very similar lack of moral clarity was seen following the October 7^th massacre, when Palestinian terrorists killed 1,200 Israelis in the worst attack on Jews since 1945. Rather than marching in solidarity with Jews, the Left marched in support of the Palestinians. Even before Israel had mounted a response, crowds took to the streets — not in mourning for the Jewish victims, but in open celebration of their attackers.

For elements of the Left, there is a blind spot when it comes to antisemitism. This tendency is not confined to America — in Britain, too, the Left has struggled with antisemitism. Take the Labour Party, for example, which for four years allowed itself to be led by Jeremy Corbyn, a man who referred to Hamas and Hezbollah as his “friends”. Under Corbyn’s leadership, antisemitism thrived within the party. Even after he resigned as leader of the Labour Party, antisemitism remained. In 2023, Dianne Abbot, a Labour MP and former Shadow Home Secretary, wrote in The Observer that Jews do not experience racism and compared antisemitism to prejudice against redheads.

While the Left is often keen to talk about racism, it was muted in response to the huge spike in antisemitism following the October 7^th massacre. Left-wing magazines such as Novara Media have even played down antisemitism in the UK. They have also accused Jewish institutions of deliberately exaggerating antisemitism and suggested that diaspora Jews give moral cover to Israeli “apartheid”.

These examples demonstrate not only indifference towards antisemitism, but also hostility and distrust among parts of the Left towards Jews themselves. Rather than standing in solidarity with Jews, left-wing anti-Zionists express sympathy with the groups responsible for Jewish suffering – namely Hamas and Hezbollah, who are romanticised as anti-imperialists. Just two days after the October 7^th massacre, Socialist Worker published an article titled “Rejoice as Palestinian resistance humiliates racist Israel”.

This obscene glorification of Hamas, a deeply antisemitic terrorist organisation, demonstrates a complete moral blindness on the anti-Israel Left. That they went so far as to rejoice in the slaughter, rape, and kidnapping of Jews just goes to show the depravity and perversion of anti-Zionism.

Was this the distorted ideology of Elias Rodriguez? Were these the warped ideas that flowed through his head as he hung around the Capitol Jewish Museum looking for a Zionist (a Jew) to kill? It is impossible to know for sure. But given the available evidence, it seems likely that anti-Zionist ideas played a role in his radicalisation and eventually motivated him to kill.

If we ever want to fully confront racism, then we must also fully confront antisemitism. This has to start by challenging the anti-Zionist narratives that legitimise and glorify violence against Jews. It’s time to say it loud and clear that anti-Zionism is antisemitism.

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