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JCRC Column

Don’t let Whoopi Goldberg pigeonhole Jews

BY BOB HORENSTEIN Hitler sought to erase the Jewish people,
When American actress and
television personality Whoopi whom he considered to be an inferior
Goldberg proclaimed that “the
Holocaust isn’t about race” “race,” by committing genocide. Now, our
during the Jan. 31 airing of
ABC’s The View, she exposed distinctive identity and history are being
a blind spot many Americans
have when it comes to under- erased by those who insist on pigeon-
standing antisemitism. Gold-
berg demonstrated the same holing the Jews into a black-and-white
blind spot later that day on
The Late Show with Stephen paradigm in which we don’t properly fit.
Colbert, when she argued that
Jews are white and that no one one in six said they had never at the alarming increase in
– not even Nazis or Ku Klux heard of the term. We shouldn’t hate crimes against Jews over
Klansmen – can tell whether be surprised by these findings. the last several years to real- Bob Horenstein is the
someone is Jewish from their After all, Whoopi Goldberg ize that whatever privilege we Director of Community
physical appearance. isn’t alone among Americans have doesn’t provide immunity Relations and Public Affairs
Although Goldberg apol- who hold a rather narrow view against antisemitism. for the Jewish Federation of
ogized for her ill-informed of Jews as a “white” religious People who think like Gold- Greater Portland. This article
comments, ABC acted appro- community (although, ironical- berg have recast Jews into an was first published in the
priately in suspending her for ly, if you ask a white suprema- amorphous grouping that’s Feb. 21 issue of the Jerusalem
two weeks. We can only hope cist, we don’t qualify as white entirely devoid of our identity, Report Magazine.
that during her time off, she ed- at all). peoplehood, culture and long
ucated herself on the Holocaust The problem runs deeper history of persecution. Because these are people whose skin
and came to the realization that than merely discounting the we are dismissed as just anoth- color is manifestly not white.
the Final Solution wasn’t about 10-15% of American Jews er part of the white power struc- Their existence flies in the face
“white people doing it to white who are, in fact, people of ture – a view which, arguably, of the insidious Boycott, Di-
people.” So, case closed, right? color. Americans, particularly is antisemitic itself – not only vestment and Sanctions (BDS)
Hardly. progressives, tend to see struc- are we not considered a histor- movement, which would have
It would be a mistake to sim- tural oppression only through ically oppressed community, Americans believe that Isra-
ply write off this episode as a the lens of race. Based on this we also don’t merit the level of el is a white European settler
gaffe born not of hatred but of worldview, how can it be that support that other marginalized colonialist enterprise that dis-
ignorance and just forget it and Jews, who are lumped togeth- minorities do. possessed the indigenous (Pal-
move on. That’s because the er with the white majority, This explains how an FBI estinian) people of color and
opinions expressed by Gold- experience oppression? How spokesperson reporting on the therefore has no right to exist.
berg reflect the reason why can they be vulnerable when mid-January hostage-taking During the Holocaust, Hit-
antisemitism is widely misun- attributes such as privilege, af- at a synagogue in Colleyville, ler sought to erase the Jewish
derstood among Americans and fluence and implicit bias (if not Texas, could make the absurd people, whom he considered to
often ignored or dismissed even outright racism) are associated claim that it “was not specifi- be an inferior “race,” by com-
by professionals engaged in with being white? How can an- cally related to the Jewish com- mitting genocide. Now, our
diversity, equity and inclusion tisemitism be a pressing issue munity” – in other words, that distinctive identity and history
(DEI) work. if its victims are positioned at it wasn’t an antisemitic hate are being erased by those who
According to the American the top of the oppressive pow- crime. It explains why so many insist on pigeonholing the Jews
Jewish Committee’s survey on er structure? Jews feel abandoned by those into a black-and-white para-
the “State of Antisemitism in To be sure, we Jews who whom we would have expected digm in which we don’t proper-
America 2021,” 34% of Amer- are white-presenting must ac- to be allies in the face of rising ly fit and by which our concerns
ican adults don’t know what knowledge a degree of priv- antisemitism, especially from about the threat of antisemitism
antisemitism is, and nearly ilege. Yet, one need only look the far left. And it explains the are largely disregarded.
frequent omission of Jews and We need to make clear that we
antisemitism from ethnic stud- don’t accept an erroneous defi-
Jewish Federation of Greater Portland online ies curricula. nition of who Jews are based on
Website: jewishportland.org The fallacy that Jews are skin color. If we expect Ameri-
white also erases the identity can society to take antisemitism
Instagram: instagram.com/jewishfederationpdx/ of millions of Israeli Jews who seriously, we can’t allow the
trace their roots to Arab coun- Whoopi Goldbergs of the world
Facebook: facebook.com/JewishPDX
tries, Iran, Turkey and Ethiopia. to deny the complexity of our
Jewish Review: jewishportland.org/jewishreview Representing more than half identity or negate the reality of
the Israeli Jewish population, our historical experience.
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