What an Uber ride in New York City revealed about antisemitism today and what we can learn from Israel

Two weeks ago, I spent the week successful New York City, my hometown and the spot that inactive calls itself the planetary superior of tolerance and progress. Yet during a elemental Uber ride, I heard thing that shocked maine arsenic an American and arsenic a Jew.

My operator calmly explained that the devil has taken implicit the world, that lone a caliphate tin reconstruct bid and that women invitation rape by the mode they dress. He delivered these views with full confidence, arsenic if they were present portion of mainstream conversation. This was not whispered extremism. This was Midtown Manhattan connected a weekday morning.

MORNING GLORY: THE RETURN OF ANTISEMITISM SHOULD SHOCK AND APPALL AMERICANS

This clime did not look retired of nowhere. Political figures similar Zohran Mamdani, the incoming mayor, normalized antisemitism and excused extremist rhetoric that undermines Jewish safety. When elected officials erase the motivation boundaries that erstwhile protected number communities, mean radical instrumentality it arsenic support to spell adjacent further. New York is opening to tolerate ideas that contradict American values and spot Jews successful existent danger.

Then I arrived successful Jerusalem for the Sabbath.

The Israeli emblem flutters successful Jerusalem. (Photo by AHMAD GHARABLI/AFP via Getty Images)

Within hours, my children were playing freely with Arab children successful Liberty Bell Park. At the skate park, Israeli teens and Arab teens were sharing bikes and boards without hesitation. A young Arab lad named Ayub ran up to maine with his arms raised, and his parent smiled successful approval. There was nary tension. No division. Only families surviving their lives.

Later that play successful Tel Aviv, I met a cheery Arab-Israeli (yes, work that again) who was relaxing connected the beach, having a portion and enjoying a level of idiosyncratic state that would beryllium intolerable successful overmuch of the region. He spoke openly and comfortably. It was a elemental moment, yet a almighty one. Israel, contempt its challenges, is simply a spot wherever radical of antithetic identities and backgrounds tin unrecorded freely and authentically.

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This is world connected the ground, not the curated narrative, the lived truth.

Meanwhile, successful New York, the metropolis that prides itself connected motivation clarity, my operator was outlining a theocratic worldview and hinting that unit is justified erstwhile nine does not travel his spiritual rules. When governmental leaders legitimize antisemitism oregon minimize extremist ideas, radical who clasp those ideas nary longer consciousness constrained. They consciousness validated. They consciousness emboldened. And Jewish communities consciousness much vulnerable.

Israel continues to uphold values of coexistence, diverseness and idiosyncratic state that New York is drifting distant from. American Jews consciousness this shift. We spot antisemitism creeping into governmental code and spilling into nationalist behavior. It emboldens those who people oregon intimidate Jews. It weakens the foundations of information that erstwhile defined New York.

Left: New York City mayoral campaigner Zohran Mamdani speaks during the National Action Network National Convention successful New York City, U.S., April 3, 2025. Right: Israel supporters extracurricular of the Israeli Consulate successful New York City, New York, Oct. 9, 2023.  (Jeenah Moon/Reuters/Jennifer Mitchell for Fox News Digital)

Mayor-elect Mamdani’s antisemitism is not harmless rhetoric. It shapes the code of the city. It creates an situation wherever a Manhattan operator feels comfy describing a satellite ruled by Sharia and implying that an Oct. 7 benignant onslaught could beryllium justified due to the fact that nine does not conform to his spiritual standards. That is not normal. That is not acceptable. And that is not the New York that generations earlier america worked truthful hard to build.

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I garbage to enactment silent. I volition basal up for my children. I volition basal up for their friends. I volition basal up for each procreation that fought for state and against persecution. That is wherefore I enactment with NCSY and its Jewish Student Union programme arsenic they face antisemitism successful America’s schools. It is wherefore I enactment with the Yad Vashem USA Foundation to sphere representation and information astatine a clip erstwhile some are nether attack.

Anti-Israel activists protestation extracurricular the United Nations office successful New York, connected April 7, 2025. (Selcuk Acar/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Two weeks. Two cities. Two starkly antithetic realities. Only 1 is protecting the values the satellite claims to cherish.

New York indispensable determine whether it volition proceed down a way shaped by extremism and antisemitism oregon whether it volition reclaim the principles that erstwhile made it a beacon of freedom.

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Lady Liberty, I americium disquieted astir you.