I'm legitimately blown away by the antisemitism I've seen from both the left and some on the right since the October 7 attacks in Israel. Even among those who aren't fans of Israel, I thought they'd at least be silent, and they're not.
And there is anti-Jewish violence aplenty.
Much of it is low-level, thankfully, but there are exceptions, and in a free society, people have a right to keep and bear arms. Yes, that includes Jews.
Unfortunately, it's unhelpful when some try to argue that exercising that right doesn't make Jewish Americans safer.
As a Jewish woman, public health professional and advocate, New Yorker and mother, I feel the fear coursing through our community. Antisemitic violence is rising, and Jews across the country increasingly report feeling unsafe. A survey by the American Jewish Committee found that nearly half of American Jews feel less secure today than just a year ago.
At the same time, political violence is escalating. On Wednesday, conservative activist Charlie Kirk was assassinated while hosting a campus event — the latest killing in a troubling rise in shootings targeting people across the political spectrum. In May, two Jewish professionals were gunned down leaving an event at the Jewish Capitol Museum in Washington, D.C. And in August, the shooter in the Minneapolis school mass shooting had scrawled antisemitic writings across the assault weapon — a chilling reminder of how deeply intertwined gun violence and hate have become in America.
Regardless of motive, these tragedies reveal the same truth: when dangerous rhetoric collides with easy access to guns, violence follows. More guns will not make us safer — they will only perpetuate this cycle.
The author was spurred into anti-gun activism after Sandy Hook. This isn't an unbiased look at the facts on the ground. This is someone who has an anti-gun attitude and has for years now.
Let's be real here for a moment.
Charlie Kirk's assassination wasn't something he could have stopped with a gun on his own hip. From 200 yards away, he never knew his life was in danger. I saw the video. It's clear he didn't know there was a threat.
And the murder weapon is the type of firearm literally everyone swears they're not coming after, so don't sing me the gun control song here.
On the other two incidents, though, these were different. Someone with a gun on their person may have stopped these attacks. Someone armed might have put down the bad guy before he could really get going.
Something interesting I noted, though, is that the author, Rebecca Fischer, doesn't mention the Jewish woman set on fire during a "Run for Their Lives" walk in Boulder, Colorado, back in June. There's absolutely no way gun control could have stopped that incident, as a gun wasn't involved, but if someone had been armed, that 82-year-old woman who was firebombed might still be alive.
This idea that Jewish people should avoid guns doesn't make them safer. It makes them better targets for violent antisemites.
You can't put down the guns and expect those who wish you harm to do the same. Especially if there's no actual agreement to do so. I wouldn't even then, but without that, to do so is to hope the better angels of their nature will take hold. The problem is that most of these people don't have one. They see Jews as being responsible for every manner of ill they've ever experienced.
Giving up the means to defend yourself doesn't make you whatever the Jewish version of a saint is. It can just make you dead.
Then again, an anti-gun activist wouldn't recognize that fact. She's so up her own posterior with the whole "guns are bad" thing that she likely can't fathom anyone but the bad guy ever having a firearm. She likely can't comprehend that defensive gun uses outstrip so-called gun homicides by orders of magnitude and that can work in the favor of Jewish people.
Of course, she's also heard for years that studies say a gun in the home makes you more likely to be shot, but since those numbers include both criminal possession of a firearm and suicides, they're not remotely relevant to this particular discussion.
No one should have to carry a gun. We shouldn't need to carry one.
But we can and, if you're part of a group that's likely to be targeted because of who you are, then you probably should.
