Understanding Antisemitism as a Foundation of White Supremacy

What progressive movements who care about anti-Palestinian violence should understand about antisemitism

Black scholars such as Eric Ward have long detailed the many ways in which antisemitism animates white nationalism.[1] The eight antisemitic tropes identified in this article illustrate how white nationalist movements today use antisemitism as the foundation for white supremacist ideology. Dismantling antisemitism is central to developing the broad coalitions necessary to support the liberation of all people, including Palestinians.

I often hear progressive activists say they don’t see antisemitism. I see it all the time. When my children were in school, Jewish kids on the bus were called “Jew boy” and bullied relentlessly. In gym class, they were called “Jew niggers.” For some of the Jewish kids, this bullying drove them to the point of self-harm. For my Jewish husband, antisemitism looked like bosses who did not trust him with handling money and leaders in my church asking for him not to be employed at a Mennonite university. Our neighbors hung a confederate flag in their side window facing our house. And after the Charlottesville 2017 Unite the Right march where neo-Nazis shouted “Jews will not replace us,” local rightwing militias drove by our house with their trucks with gun racks loaded flying the Confederate flag. Neighborhoods and businesses around Eastern Mennonite University used to ban Jews and Blacks. I never heard a sermon about antisemitism in my church growing up. When I visit my extended family’s synagogues, there are always armed guards as these religious spaces receive countless death threats. I wonder whether most Christians are aware of these threats and the constant fear for many Jews in the US. For conservative white Christians, racism and antisemitism are deeply intertwined. Antisemitism exists, and it continues to hurt and threaten Jewish people. But it is often sidelined because progressives wrongly assume all Jews are white, wealthy, and safe; and that no one else in society is affected by antisemitism.

White supremacy relies on the antisemitic myth of “Jewish control,” which deflects blame for societal problems away from the structures of white supremacy, such as capitalism, and onto a fabricated Jewish cabal. By scapegoating Jewish people, white supremacists divert attention from the systemic inequalities and injustices that they perpetuate. This scapegoating undermines solidarity among marginalized groups and reinforces the hierarchical frameworks and divisions among marginalized groups central to white supremacy. When progressive movements ignore and belittle antisemitism, they unwittingly aid white supremacist narratives.

In “Antisemitism and the Left: Confronting an Invisible Racism,” Sina Arnold and Blair Taylor argue that antisemitism is often overlooked or downplayed on the left, despite its persistence and connection to white nationalism. They define antisemitism as a distinct form of racism characterized by the belief that Jews are a powerful and malevolent force controlling society.[2] While antisemitism can take the form of simple prejudice, it often manifests as a broader critique of modernity, capitalism, and cosmopolitanism. The authors argue that this tendency to critique power structures makes progressive movements particularly susceptible to antisemitism, as it can be disguised as anti-capitalism.

Jewish allies for Palestinian Liberation Ben Lorber and Shane Burley’s book Safety through Solidarity describe several ways in which antisemitism disrupts the solidarity necessary for developing strategic movements.[3] Lorber and Burley show how antisemitism connects to anti-Blackness, xenophobia, anti-LGBTQ bigotry, and other forms of oppression and then lay out how to build the coalitions and movements we need to fight it all together. Minimizing antisemitism undermines the progressive movement’s commitment to combating all forms of oppression, and erodes trust in Jewish communities.

The weaponization or instrumentalization of antisemitism conflates all support for Palestinians or critique of Israeli policies as antisemitic. Antisemitism acts as a foil for anti-Palestinianism by deflecting attention from the systemic injustices faced by Palestinians. Accusations of antisemitism are sometimes used to dismiss or delegitimize critiques of Israeli government policies such as occupation, settlement expansion, or military actions in Palestine. Claims of antisemitism are sometimes used to frame Palestinian resistance as a threat to Jewish safety, justifying harsh security measures, military actions, and systemic repression under the guise of protecting against antisemitic violence.

Because of this instrumentalization of antisemitism, some social justice activists dismiss or downplay antisemitism, viewing it as a distraction from the struggle against white supremacy and Palestinian Liberation. Activists often link antisemitism to far-right ideologies, such as fascism and white nationalism, neglecting its presence in leftist or progressive spaces. This can render antisemitism seemingly irrelevant to progressive social movements even when it appears in their rhetoric. Activists frequently prioritize systemic issues, such as racism, colonialism, and economic inequality, sometimes viewing antisemitism as less urgent. They may perceive Jewish people, especially Ashkenazi Jews in Western contexts, as relatively privileged or assimilated, overlooking the diversity of skin colors and economic status among Jews.

Over the last eight years, I have taken a two-week course on antisemitism with progressive Jewish leaders in Jerusalem and have engaged in long conversations with my Palestinian friends about the instrumentalization of antisemitism to justify anti-Palestinian violence and repression. Since 2017, I have been providing training to Mennonite churches and institutions on Mennonite contributions to antisemitism and the Holocaust and showing how addressing antisemitism can support rather than distract Palestinian liberation. I’ve been writing about the need to disentangle antisemitism from anti-Palestinianism and Christian Zionism that justifies Israeli violence against Palestinians.

Progressive activists are largely untrained and unaware of how antisemitism manifests in progressive movements and how they inadvertently contribute to white supremacist narratives by ignoring antisemitism. This binary approach delinking Jewish and Palestinian safety fractures coalitions that could unite against both antisemitism and anti-Palestinian oppression, making it harder to address intersecting injustices.

Addressing antisemitism helps create an environment in which Jewish allies who support Palestinian rights and want equity and safety for Palestinians feel safe and respected, enabling stronger coalitions. Addressing antisemitism is not a distraction from Palestinian advocacy; it is integral to ensuring that the fight for justice is inclusive, ethical, and effective coalitions with a wide range of Jewish groups. Acknowledging and combating antisemitism fosters trust and collaboration, which is essential for any successful justice movement.

Recognizing antisemitism’s unique dynamics and foundational role in white supremacy is vital for creating inclusive and effective justice movements. Antisemitism is not a distraction; dismantling white supremacy requires an understanding of how elites and militant rightwing movements use antisemitism to scapegoat and divide marginalized groups. By understanding how systems of injustice intersect and reinforce one another, we can build broader and more effective intersectional movements for change.

Antisemitism is complex and multifaceted, rooted in a combination of religious, biological, cultural, economic, political, and colonial factors that have evolved over centuries. Understanding these origins helps contextualize the persistence of antisemitism and its adaptability to different historical and societal contexts.

Christian Antisemitism Deicide Tropes can be traced back to early Christian theology, which often portrayed Jews as “Christ-killers” responsible for the death of Jesus. This idea was used to justify centuries of persecution. The New Testament includes passages interpreted as collectively blaming Jews for Jesus’s crucifixion, which fueled hostility. Romans killed Jesus in a Roman form of capital punishment. The antisemitic trope that “Jews killed Jesus” remains widespread today. Today, Christians continue to accuse all Jews of being responsible for “deicide” or the killing of Jesus. Today, Palestinians legitimately view their struggle against Israeli occupation within a framework of liberation theology. Christians in Western contexts may use Palestinian symbols portraying Jesus as Palestinian suffering under Jewish Israeli violence without understanding the long history of antisemitic deicide tropes and how modern portrayals of Jews’ responsibility for the death of Jesus trigger trauma and disrupt the possibilities of solidarity.

Biological Antisemitism Tropes emerged during the Middle Ages, when the Catholic Church propagated myths such as the blood libel(the accusation that Jews used Christian children’s blood in rituals) and host desecration (allegations of Jews desecrating the Eucharist). Christians scapegoated Jews and blamed Jews for diseases, such as the Black Plague, accusing Jews of poisoning wells. More recently, the QAnon conspiracy has revived this trope, accusing Jews in Hollywood and Washington DC of pedophilia, drinking children’s blood, and spreading diseases like COVID-19. Today, white nationalists believe that Jews are a separate and dangerous race that threatens their existence. They view Jews as inherently different from and opposed to white people, regardless of their assimilation into white society.

This belief justifies the white nationalist goal of creating a white ethnostate free from Jewish influence. Christian Zionists support Israel as a Jewish state because they believe its existence and prosperity fulfill biblical prophecies and play a central role in the events leading to the second coming of Christ. Christian Zionists politically align with white nationalists who support the state of Israel because they see it as a way of removing Jews from their “white” societies.

Economic Antisemitism Tropes scapegoat Jews for financial instability, portraying Jews as outsiders controlling commerce or money.Medieval European political leaders barred Jews from land ownership and guild membership, compelling them into stigmatized yet crucial roles, such as moneylending and tax collection in feudal economies. This association fostered enduring stereotypes of Jews as greedy or exploitative. Antisemitic tropes falsely portray Jews as uniformly wealthy when many Jews are poor and middle-class. Antisemitism serves as a core belief that unites the disparate rich, middle-class, and poor factions of the white nationalist movement. Despite corporate elite exploitation of workers and fair wages, antisemitism drives poor white communities to vote with wealthy white elites, disrupting the more natural alliances between poor and middle-class workers against elite exploitation. In this way, antisemitism united white nationalists by sharing the deep-seated hatred of Jews. This makes antisemitism a powerful unifying force in the white supremacist movement.

Political Antisemitism Tropes emerged as European nation-states viewed Jews as outsiders or “foreign elements” incompatible with national identities. In the 19th century, nationalism further stigmatized Jews as disloyal or conspiratorial, fueling antisemitic political movements. The Dreyfus Affair (1894–1906) in France demonstrated that secular Jews still faced antisemitism. The false treason accusation against Jewish officer Alfred Dreyfus exposed entrenched antisemitism in modern societies. The “dual loyalty” trope falsely accuses Jews of being disloyal citizens, prioritizing allegiance to Jewish interests or the state of Israel. Antisemitism offers white supremacists an explanation for the perceived decline of white power in America. White nationalists view the successes of the Civil Rights movement and other progressive causes as evidence of a conspiracy against white people. They believe that Jews are behind this conspiracy, manipulating society and undermining white racial dominance.

Colonial Antisemitism Tropes exploited and marginalized Jews, complicating their relationships with other oppressed groups. European colonial administrators used antisemitic stereotypes to portray Jewish traders or financiers as distinctly exploitative, deflecting criticism from their own exploitative practices. Antisemitic narratives were used to stoke divisions among colonized populations, perpetuating the idea that Jews were part of a “parasitic” elite aligned with colonial rulers.

Racial Antisemitism Tropes began in the 19th and early 20th centuries as pseudoscientific theories categorized Jews as an inferior or dangerous race. This shift from religious to racial hatred made antisemitism more insidious, as conversion to Christianity could no longer “absolve” Jews of their supposed faults. The Nazis exploited racial antisemitism to justify the Holocaust, portraying Jews as an existential threat to the “Aryan race.” In the U.S., through much of the 20th century, many businesses had unofficial or explicit policies against hiring Jewish people, particularly in finance, academia, and law firms (e.g., “Gentlemen’s Agreements”). Restrictive covenants in real estate contracts often explicitly excluded Jewish people from purchasing or renting homes in certain neighborhoods. Although explicit legal mechanisms have diminished in many places, implicit biases and systemic barriers remain. Today, white nationalists see Jews as their ultimate enemy. Right-wing media outlets regularly incite racial hatred by blaming Jews for a conspiracy known as the Great Replacement.[4] This conspiracy sees movements like Black Lives Matter and the humanitarian efforts for sanctuary for immigrants as a Jewish plot for global domination. The person who assassinated Jews at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh justified his killing in part because the synagogue supported HIAS (Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, a progressive Jewish organization that supports immigrants. This belief allows white supremacists to target a wide range of marginalized groups under the umbrella of fighting against Jewish control.

World Control Tropes began with the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a fabricated antisemitic document purporting to reveal a Jewish plan for global domination, widely debunked but historically used to incite hatred and justify persecution of Jewish people. The “Jewish World Control Myth” falsely alleges that Jewish people exert clandestine control over global finance, media, and governments, greatly exaggerating Jewish influence on media, finance, and politics and ignoring the majority Christian influence on these spheres.

Christian Zionist Antisemitism is the belief that the state of Israel is necessary to a) bring about the return of Jesus and b) remove Jews from other countries.[5] Antisemitism in Europe and the Americas is found mainly among the Zionist right who support Israel as a way to remove Jews from Western societies. Christian Zionists offer financial support for Jewish annexation of Palestinian land and right-wing Israeli leaders. But Christian Zionists believe that all Jews must convert or die when Jesus returns, and thus are inherently antisemitic. Steven M. Cohen, a sociologist at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion notes, “Many people who dislike Jews like Israel and many people who are critical toward Israel are affectionate toward Jews.”[6]

Dismantling Antisemitism and White Supremacy is Possible

Antisemitism has persisted across cultures and eras by adapting to societal anxieties and prejudices, shifting from religious accusations to economic scapegoating to racial and political conspiracies but consistently involving dehumanization, “othering,” and scapegoating.

However viewing antisemitism as an immutable societal feature can lead to complacency and discourage efforts to combat it, reducing the urgency of addressing its impacts. Affirming that antisemitism and white supremacy are not eternal, emphasizes its human-made origins and highlights that it can be dismantled through deliberate and collective action. Framing antisemitism as eradicable motivates efforts toward justice and equality, shifting the focus from enduring harm to actively building a society free from hatred and prejudice. This perspective aligns with broader social justice movements that seek to dismantle systemic oppression, showing antisemitism as a part of the larger struggle for human rights.

[1] Eric Ward. “Skin in the Game: How Antisemitism Animates White Nationalism.” The Public Eye. 2017.

[2] Sina Arnold and Blair Taylor. “Antisemitism and the Left: Confronting an Invisible Racism.” Journal of Social Justice, Vol. 9, 2019 .

[3] Shane Burley and Ben Lorber. Safety through Solidarity: A Radical Guide to Fighting Antisemitism. Brooklyn, NY: Melville House, 2024.

[4] National Immigrant Forum. “The Great Replacement Theory, Explained.” 2021.

[5] See Wikipedia entry for Zionist Antisemitism.

[6] Naomi Zeveloff. “How Steve Bannon and Breitbart News Can Be Pro-Israel — and Anti-Semitic at the Same Time.” Forward Magazine. November 15, 2016.