Surprised at the controversy over the executive order designating Jews as a protected "nationality" on college campuses. And wow am I seeing some incredibly uninformed takes on the idea of Jews as a nation. It's a critical idea when trying to address antisemitism.
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Many people are getting upset about the word “nationality.” To clarify, the “national origin” of Jews is ancient Judea. American Jews’ “nationality” is US. The Jewish “nation,” as in country, is Israel. And God refers to us as a “goy kadosh” (holy nation).
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The confusion likely comes from the fact that Jews have both a religion and are a distinct people based on our origin and history. You can be a Jew and an atheist simultaneously. Many people are proud Jews but don't believe in the Torah or practice any aspect of the religion.
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In Judaism, we refer to ourselves in the collective as an עם (“am”), which is often defined in English as “nation” but really means we are a people that is bound together by our history as well as our religion. You are born into it or accepted into it by conversion.
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Throughout history, our oppressors made no distinction between those who are religious Jews and those who are Jewish by ethnicity. The German Jews before the Holocaust were the most assimilated of any in Europe. Antisemites don’t care whether a Jew is religious or not.
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It’s the same today. Jews are not “white.” We’re not “POC.” These distinctions are meaningless when it comes to Jews. Come to Israel and you’ll see Jews of every skin tone. (“White-passing” has meaning in current US racial context, but that’s one tiny piece of our history.)
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So coming back to “national origin,” which is the wording of the Civil Rights Act…Jews are indigenous to Judea. That is our national origin, no matter where we were dispersed to over the millennia, including those of us whose family most recently lived in Europe.
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If you think that other groups that are protected based on their “race/national origin” belong in that legislation, shouldn’t Jews also be included? There is precedent to classifying Jews as a race/nationality for civil rights protection.
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The takes that I’ve been seeing comparing this redefinition to the Nuremberg Laws and as a prelude to stripping Jews of their American citizenship are simply ridiculous.
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If you want a far more learned take about Jewish nationhood vs religion, I recommend this video:
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And here's a good explanation of what the actual Executive Order says, and why the initial reporting was wrong:
yair.substack.com/p/trumps-redef…
yair.substack.com/p/trumps-redef…
