The time 11,000 people unfollowed me for being a Jew

And why I say good riddance

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“You don’t support genocide do you, right?”

I have been asked this question regularly since October 7th. This question, while to the naked eye may be a phrase to defend ‘Palestinian liberation,’ is a textbook villainous accusation Jews have faced for centuries, especially when society is in economic and social turmoil.

My Instagram audience pre-October 7th was 75,000 people. Now it’s dropped just below 65,000. What may have caused so many people to unfollow me, you ask? Perhaps it is my advocacy for peace in the Middle East, my pride in my Jewish identity, my unapologetic call-outs of public antisemitism, or a combination of it all. Maybe it’s the fact that I am not so easily swayed by public opinion, that I seek nuance, that I care about how history informs the present. Or maybe, it’s because I’m a Jew with an opinion.

When an average person speaks about a cause they care about, they are met with applause and support at best and are ignored at worst. When a Jewish person speaks out about antisemitism, we are hurled accusations of being ‘pro-genocide’ or a ‘colonizer.’ We are told we are self-victimizing, we do not face unique forms of oppression, and we have been self-victimizing since the Holocaust. We are told Palestinians in Gaza are dying (Really? We had no idea) so it’s not the time to care about the rapid increase of Jewish hate crimes in our own communities as if we are living in an oppression-olympics society where people can only care about one thing. Instead, we watch as the masses cheer for the death of Israelis, care about ‘saving' Palestinian children’ while advocating for another 75 years of bloody war and civilian casualties, ignore the plight of oppressed groups in their own backyard, and practise classic Western white saviorism of the Middle East.

One of many comments I’ve received from a white, queer Western person who believes that being pro Hamas ‘resistance’ will actually lead to better lives for Palestinian and Israeli civilians and that their stance is pro-peace when in reality they are advocating for continued violence and the demonization of Jewish Israelis.

Antisemitism is a unique form of hate, which often comes in the form of ‘punching up’ - or casting Jews as evil so it seems righteous to defend them. Today’s Keffiyeh-clad ivy league western world saviours are not Nazis or antisemites, they are noble and innocent ‘human rights defenders.’ Their mission, to eradicate Israel (Jews) from society, is not antisemitism but only anti-zionism.

Let’s look at some history where Jews (Zionists) have been cast as the ultimate evil in society, whose destruction would lead to happiness in society.

Some more examples:

• In Hitler’s autobiography Mein Kampf, he described the Jew as the “destroyer of culture,” “a parasite within the nation,” and “a menace.”

• Hitler made an effective emotional appeal to the lower middle class and the unemployed, based on the proclamation that Germany would awaken from its sufferings to reassert its natural greatness once the parasitic Jews were eliminated.

• In June of 1948 Congress passed a bill barring the immigration of the 90% of Jewish Holocaust survivors who, having spent the war years in the Soviet Union and/or the first months of the postwar period in Poland, were accused of being Communist sympathizers or operatives.

• According to modern-day far-right white supremacist figures, the ‘elite’ and Jews are orchestrating a change in the demographics of the United States by replacing all white people with immigrants, Muslims and other POC.

• In 2019, a shooting happened in a synagogue in California because the gunman believed Jews were planning a genocide of Europeans. He also set a mosque on fire.

• Centuries ago, Shakespeare’s Jewish character Shylock said “I did dream of money-bags tonight,” feeding a centuries-old trope that Jews want all of the money in the world.

• In the early 1880s to the early 1960s, it was not acceptable to have Jewish work colleagues, Jewish neighbours or, worst of all, Jewish members at private sports and social clubs in Canada.

Totally not an antisemitic comment on my video where I did not mention Israel or Palestine, but shared the traditional Jewish custom of Shabbat.

For centuries, Jewish people have been seen as the orchestrators of all evil. We are the world rulers, the capitalists, the communists, the menaces, the colonizers, the white people, the BIPOC people (see: the great replacement theory), the immigrants, the nationalists. We are all that is evil and wrong with the world. Today, we are violators of human rights, we are pro-genocide, we are colonizers and we are all white. Someone should tell that to the millions of Middle Eastern and North African Jews living in Israel.

So yes, I have lost over 10,000 Instagram followers (and counting) for being an unapologetic Jewish warrior battling antisemitism. No matter the reason, I say to these people, good riddance. My ancestors taught me to fight for my life, for peace, and for the truth. I will not be intimidated, silenced or eliminated by Harvard-graduate Nazis, celebrities and influencers who talk about issues to get clout, or 15-21-year-old loud, brainwashed children throwing a temper trantrum. Everyone who has ever tried to exterminate the Jews out of righteousness is no longer alive, yet here I am, a living miracle. So I say, You will not silence me.