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my name is christopher scalia. i'm a senior fellow here at aei. and it's my my pleasure to oment of the american dream lecture series, a component of aei american dream initiative. this series seeks to revitalize our nation's core institutions and inviting prominent writers, academics and thinkers to address some of the most significant political, cultural and social issues facing the united states. as we approac's founding, these lectures are an opportunity to ask how healthy are our national institutions and foundational principles? what threats do they face and what prospects for reform are available? last september, ember, we invited tonight's speaker to discuss anti-semitism in the united states. that was nearly a month before hamas's attack o israel and the ensuing pro-hamas anti-israel protests on campuses around the

united states. i wish our invitation had not become so much more relevant. in january, the anti-defamation league reported more than 3000 anti-semitic incidents between october 7th and january 7th, an 361%. compared to the same period the as we've seen, campus protests explode over the past month into encampments and building takeovers with the overt hatred expressed toward -- and the jewish state of isr it's more important than ever to understand the history and nature ofcism. this evening's guest is an invaluable guide for these times. someone who can bring both light and whenestions about antisemitism as a phenomenon about the connection between anti-semitic ism and anti liberalism more generally about how anti-semitic isms roots in 19th century germany as

well as its eventual adoption by the soviet union, can help us we see going on around us today and whether anti-semitism awareness act that recently passed the problem. rudruniversity's martin peretz, professor of yiddish literature and comparative literature emerita. born in romania in 1936, she was four years old when her family emeal. she earned her b.a. from mcgill from columbia, and then back to mcgill for her phd. there she helped found the department of jewish studies before venturing to harvard where she taught until 2014. she's the author of several books, including if i am not for myself the liberal betrayal of --, -- and power and free as a --. a personal memoir of national self liberation. apology. e'online but we have free copies of that memoir for all of youattending

in person today or for many of you attending in person today, probably not all of you. she has also co-edited or edited llections of yiddish fiction and poetry and has contributed essays t including national affairs commentary in the wall street journal. the national humanities medal and an honorary degree from university. dr. weiss will speak about -semitism for about 30 minutes, after which she'll be joined on continetti. mr. continetti is the director of domestic policy studies and the inaugural patrick and shirley neal, chair in american prosperity here at aei where his work focuses on american political thought and history. he was opinion standard, as well as the founding editor and editor in free beacon. he's a contributing editor at columnist for commentary and has been published in the atlantic. the new york times, the wall street journal and the washington post. you may have seen him on tv, fox

news channel's special report with brett bair, nbc's meet the press, and you'll hear his dulcet tones in the commentary podcast a few times every week. including most recently the right the 100 year war for american conservatives. and he, like dr. weiss, has a degree from, of l places, columbia. dr. weiss and mr. continetti will converse for about 20 minutes. then we'll turn to audiencece questions. afterwards, i hope you'll join us for light rconversation in the adjoining gallery. but now, ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming dr. ruth weiss. to the u.s. thank you. shall i put this down bit. thank you very very much. this is the place to and among people i read and and and just i.

i'm just overwhelmed by what you tell, what you say because, in fact, i've been thinking about and writing about these ideas for years and one does not want to have them come to life in the way that they have done recently. so t warm up an audience with a joke. so why don't i try one? this one from the first world war. the mayor of a french town. directs his round up all the -- and all the bicyclists says, why the bicyclists. you're not but if it didn't. if it didn't bring down the house, i'm sure that it's not just my telling, although i'm not a comedian by nature. but you're not yet in the spirit of our subject antisemitism,

which is the most improbably successful ideology and political strategy of modern times. can you think of anything that is weirder than american students in the land of the free d the home of brave of supporting hamas islam lists israel. in 1945, americans the decisive force defeating hitlerism discovered the remnant of the six-day million -- whom the germans and their willing executioners in daniel gold, hagen's felicitous phrase had managed to cleanse from the continent. but anti-sem no less to destroy germany. fact that we sometimes overlook and that should be emphasized, i would say more than the fact that it destroyed the -- once the general, the center of european culture. go to schiller park. beethoven, brahms. archeology philosophy. psychology modernism and whatnot. its reputation was now forever ruined.

scrubbin macbeth. in that same decade of the 1940s, the -- reestablished their national sovereignty in the land of israel that had been under foreign occupation for two millennia, and that is the difference between a civilization of builders and a and ti semitism is not about the --, but about those who organized polity against them andideology is doomed. yet here we are with a growing part of the student population and not just the student populace of america, advocating the same politics of destruction that america went to war to defeat. it is certainly the stuff of black humor, but i feel compelled to take it seriously as of course you do here. so our subject is antisemitism america. but the only way i can understand it, as chris said, is to say how we got here and in

order to do that, one has to understand what anti-semitism is, how it works, why it succeeds. realize how hard committees have worked to craft the international holocaust remembrance alliance definitionof antisemitism, and i do hope that its adoption will make some difference. but i view antisemitism rather as the organization of politics against the -- and as aninstrument of modern politics died at represent. to begin to underst who are its sponsors? it benefit? what do they gain by it? they advocated? who is susceptible? what are its functions? how does it succeed? now, there are always good reasons for targeting the -- rather than any other group. but these follow from the anti-semites need for them as target. so the obvious point of departure, as was said, and some

of this i have written about in so thank you to its editor. the obvious point of departure for understanding anti-semite ism is the movement. by that name established by wilhelm meyer in 1879 in germany semitic legal or the antisemitism league. ma was a disappointed man of the left who had come to feaeconsequences of emancipation that were taking hold of europe. he identifiedost obvious beneficiaries of liberalization athe cause its problems. warning the -- were conquered in germany from within. warning against the tombs. if it does gather mom germans were being overtaken, heso rather than actually address the serious difficulties and they were serious that germany

ting to its many political economic culture ral challenges his movement explained them as the the -- and called for political action against them. and i would say that here are some of its functions. so first, thehe pointing finger. it offeredsolution as explanation. the rothschilds have taken your money. the -- have taken your jobs. -- have taken over. journalism. literature. art. high net corrupts. art. et use. some christians blame church. the rising middle class competition, the visible prominence of -- made them a credible explanation. while the political dependency of the -- made them an ideal target. this explanation came with a simple solution. it was profitable to remove or to destroy the --

no political price to be paid for their next, scapegoating a in this connection. it deflected attention from the real causes of the problem, and it masked the accusers. anti liberal attempt to gain power. a negative campaign needs no positive program beyond the promise of lebanese scum. more of everything. once the -- are away and if i may demonstrate what a pointing finger does, if you follow theyou see what you don't see in prestidigitation. it is the hand of the person who's actually performing the deed. so it takes attention away doing what they are, what they stand that makes it very effective. third, and i would say that this is one of its most important functions. antisemitism is the great

coalition builder, although maher differentiated his movement from christian opposition to judaism, which is why he chose that name, not anti judaism or anything like that. he drew on the negative stereotype of the -- and he was well as secular ionalists. other movements forced and still choices between internationalism and nationalism, secul and religious, liberal and conservative, left and right. a small people with a hugely inflated variable image. -- were the ultimate unifying target. coalition building remains one of the main functions of organized housing politics against the --. and if you think ahead, we'll come to that to the u.n. and of ality on the campuses. so explanation, solution deflection, coalition builder, anti-semitism s also unilateral or negative campaign. now, negate campaigning may be

vulgar dishonest, cruel. tr is a criminal demagogue. sleepy joe can't fi his tongue and so on. but all democracies engage in it. not so against the --. a minority by choice that needs coexist. instance, it needs reciprocal tolerance from the surrounding society, and it precisely the people who are most against it. so -- lack any incentive for attacking the surrounding majorities. they have every disincentive to attack those who are doing them harm. now, i'm not speaking here about the moral basis of jewish civilization, but about its politicalsequence. inss -- are an anti imperial people except putting the torah at sinai create a contractual self-limiting relationship with the divine. the authority that granted them a small land with no guarantees of keeping it and no claim to

any other. this unique arrangement created not just disparity, but a radical political contrast between -- and other nations. that makes them uniquely susceptible to attack. there is much more to be said about the jewish side of this complementarity. but for the moment, our focus stays on those who exploit this unique political opportune duty that the -- represent. now, this is to say that antisemitism had a winning political strategy by the end of the 19th century. the mayor of vienna was elected on a platform of anti semitism. hitler rose to power in german liberal and communist opposition to become the chancellor of germany in 1933, waging that same anti jewish war comes to which nazi ism had added the accusation of polluting the aryan race. by 1945, -- had been eliminated

not just from germany, but for most of europe. so what we haveas you hear it all the time, the longest hatred, the dislike of the unlike discriminate nation or any of the ways that social scientists have tried to theorize this as one example of something larger. anti-semitism is the larger idea or ideology that takes over societies by seeming to be only against th inconsequential --. but before getting to the here and now, we have to go back to see how anti-israel scientism althou yet by that name, emerged in tandem with anti-semitism, the enlightenment wreaked past religion in terms, and unlike christianity, to caesar from what is owing to god. judaism is aational religion. or as mordechai kaplan put it, a religious civilization.

jewish religion is indivisible from nationality. so the french national assembly's accorded equal rights to -- as individuals, but granted them nothing as a nation. captaind become the ideal french citizen, yet as a --. bruno bauerver the status of -- as citizens in a postwar and post-national world. confirmed. first, the -- were now to be considered inolitical, not religious terms. but this de the jewish question or the jewish problem as isticking point of internationalism. marx claimed to be speaking in socio economic political terms. yet he drew from christianity the notion that the existence of the -- prevented universal salvation in order for his conception of historical

progress to work. the -- would have to dissolve themselves as a people. now, marx was explicit in defining the -- as huckster. hence the need for his elimination. and i would say that rereading marx on the jewish question is a good way to fathom what is being taught in our universities. and here i'll quote an organization of society which would abolish the preconditions for and therefore the possibility of huckster ing would make the -- impossible. his religious consciousness would be dissipated like the thin hazethe real vital air of society. on the other hand, if the -- recognize that this practical nature of his is futile and works to abolish it, he extricated himself from his previous development and works for human immense passion. as such and turns against the supreme practical expression of human self we recognize this is still

marx. we recognize in judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time an element which, through historical development, to which in this harmful respect the -- have zealously contributed, has been brought to its present high must necessarily begin to dintegrate. in the final analysis, the emancipation of the -- is the emancipation of mankind from judaism. now the political functions of thistionist anti jewishness were the same as wilhelm marr's pointing as explanation and solution scapegoating. coalit building, negative campaigning. and so on. but this, i would argue, proved much more lethal because it spoke in the name of and progress on the way to universal salvation. why more lethal? well let me suggest some ways. whereas opposition to

enemy alien is required only their physical which led moses hand. excuse me. moses hertzel. and many zionists tojewish condition by recovering the national sovereignty in the land of israel. and they did. ationalist ideals, magical versions of socialism and commuired the removal of jewish civilization from the -- was the precondition for the international and in the process. secondly, whereas, opposition to the -- as enemy aliens excludes them by definition and to zionism demanded the -- participate in the higher cause ofelf dissolution. like -- for jesus, but without the need for conversion. communism, insisted the -- transcend their jewishness and that they eliminate fellow --

who wouldn't and to jewish -- in the process of, you know, being more progressive, could feel themselves to be idealistic while aggressing against their fellow -- as they would never dare to do against gentiles. so just parenthetically, the marxist intellectual, of writing very engagingly --. that's the kind of paradoxical formulation that intellectuals adore. but many marxists were actually anti-jewish-. not paradoxical at all, but committed to the evolutionary disappearance of the jewish people. and thirdly, whereas americandemocracy could accommodate the idea of a jewish people by allowing its citizens freedom of religion and association. communism termed zion ism reactionary. the national movement that

prevented human progress. union hailed the muslim brotherhood's in palestine as the start of the arab revolution andcommunists include the thousands in america. do likewise it disseminate it all the current slogans against zionism as colonialist imperialist and racist. moscow's patrice lumumba university educated third wod students like muhammad abbas in orted it to countries that had never known --. the an-jewish political strategy of nazis. sts and islamists were aligneddespite their hostility to one another, you see building jewish -- were not inactive through a of course. their main response to a emancipation not unlike the poles and italians and others, was to reclaim national sovereign ity without awaiting divine intervention. main

impulse for its founding, the zionismo expected that by removing the -- from where they wand normalizing their political status, they would end antisemitism. in this alone, zionism was greatly mistaken. although the recovery of israel gave the --d self-defense once they mastered it. organizing politics against the -- in their homeland proved to be even moreal effective than it had been against them in dispersion. the arab league was founded in 1945 as an anti zionist league with all the familiar functing finger console of dating, the arab muslim unity against a common target, and of course from the daunting- of modernization, that all these regimes and their leaders faced.

conquest is to islam, as coexistence is to judaism creating the familiar for political complementarity between the desi

yet the arabs refused partition outright insist, noting that the palestinian arabs remain refugees as permanent jewish state, vowing to drive -- into th by the way, i think people here know that that is the mediterranean right? because these countries launched against israel a war. so asymmetrical that it could only be ended by the belligerence. to all the existing functions and strategies of organizing poli these leaders added a perpetually di population to be maintained as the alleged victims of jewish occupation and to be used nent excuse for continued aggression. now, christianity, which has come a long way, i think i know, had once used the imagery of christ's stigmata to incite violence against the --, but to be settled refugees were to be living victims while also active

terrorist proxies whose usefulness to their fellow arabs and muslims would be defined by the damage they could do to israel. now, on november 10th, 1975, the soviet and arab muslim voting blocs passed the un resio zionism is a form of racism and racial discrimination through an inversion that was bolder than that of wilhelm ma. arabg coexistence blamed israel for its racism. the us representative to the united nations daniel patrick moynihan infamy. aware the democraticunited states and its democratic allie rather than wage war against this infamy, the western democracies allowed the un and its agencies to promote anti-zionism in countries that had rarely seen a --. it's that u.n.

resolution cemented that route, that very resolution which. no one seemed ayattention to. it cemented the red green ance against israel. and what it did wassly shifted antisemitism of the arab right to left from. we will drive you into the sea to defining palestinians as the victims of colonialist discriminatory israel. anti-zionism penetrated the liberal left and how it became the poster child of the grievancetions. of course, politics is not a schematic tous. i am putting it here. and there are many stages of of them describing. and nor, by the way, is this intended to deny the suffering of refugees which many of us have personally turns the pointing finger back twhere it belongs.

that to those who do the pointing. arab and muslim leaders freed their colonial overseers. but at a great competitive disadvantage found in anti-israel politics. opportunities as fascism and communism, but on a much larger scale. anti-zionism. nay anti-semitism. why don't i just call it anti ism? penetrated the united states both from the outside and the inside. the arab lobby used its economic and political advantages to further anti isms. belligerent aims funding universities was only the most obvious of its methods. many of those professors students imams from arab and muslim lands were imbued with anti ism. and some were professionalengaged, urged by their host countries to spread it. others went into politics and formed political constituent ses. no one doubts the sincerity of ilhan omar and fellow members squad. in jewish terms we call this sb

from from birth and they were raised on anti ism and this being a free country, they insist that they have a right to promote the destruction of israel as part of their culture. her and that just as americagerman americans rallied openly against the. yet here is something interesting. no one told the immigrants from lands where israel iswhere martyrdom promised to its destroyers that to promote arab war against the -- in this country. they obviously realized that some of their beliefs were taboo. they do not promote the prosecution of homosexuals and lesbians or the practice of female circumcision, which are also practiced in some of their home countries. yet they may have grown ever more confident in spreading the infamy of anti zionism. why is that now?

barack obama, who was raised on muslim anti-semitic m, schooled in the anti zionism of his radical left colleagues in chicago, exposed to the anti-colonialist atma sphere of edward saeed's. columbia university topped off in the antisemitic church of reverend jeremiah wright may i say that i don't think the -- and other men on the planet any individual on the planet that was formed by the four major kinds of anti ism but you see he knew that he could not run for the presidency on a plaorm antisemitism, and indeed he knew order to win election. although the oy branch of antisemitism that he repudiated was thon wright's, not the others. but that is no longer true for the young hamas and louisiana e run for

office. as you can see from their bullhorns, what is changed? and whom does that benefit? so the activist assault from inside america has bee from. the outside powered by the old and new leftists and a professoriate, part of which wants to transform america. the anti-war movement of the 1960s that traced its lineage back to the anti-capitalist movement of the 1930s, found its home in the universities. it joined forces with the radical feminist against patriarchy, with black nationalists, against white tional coalition of grievance and blame. so intersect rationality needed something, however, to coalesce against. it found its uniform in the kca, its anti-colonial cause, and anti-zionism, its outlook for anger in taunting -- and so on. the grievance movemen many.

but until h advantage of anti ism. the war against the -- galvanized aggression against the jewisharget and its effect cannot be denied. i don't think enormity of the palestinian hamas attacks on yet fully sunk in. but thes that more than a 30 harvardrievance groups were ready to accuse israel of the following day after 21 years at harvard, having called attention to the expansion of anti ism. i was nonetheless stunnedw well-organized highly motivated, full throated incels confidence and passionately focused this al grown. you are all here experts onamerican politics. yet i surprised. raised by the revealedand not be blind tohave always seen as being so

important to this. exquisite fun of thatst the -- and israel. it is more obvious see trun to put them on the expense. it is great fun party and make and help to make it ensure a mass victory over israel which it seems to me that parts of the democrat party are now intent on doing. the war against the --. cannot end well for america or middle east unless all of this is repudiated and crushed as decisively as one hopes that israel will be able to dismantle hamas. this cannot end well unless the united states and, its willing allies the islamist version of the anti-assad coalition. so we are here to fight for our preciouste of israel. in the war of has helped somewhat

to try to explain the nature and the danger of organizing politics against the --. the object fitting of its appeal. and what happens when liberals don't confront it in thank you. ruth, for that amazing lecture. as i was listening, i recalled it s that our colleague howard hughes talked reminded me of the other day, which is comment by prime minister netanyahu that you are of value to the state of israel as a division of the this, he said, you know, it could be apocryphal, but i told him that back in my journalism days we had something called too good to check if it's going to state the record. that lecture was so rich, it's

begin. i have so many questions and we will have time for audience questions as well. i thought we might approach by focusing just on a few dates and then i have some more general conceptual questions for you too. and i want to focusmpus first. a lot of parallels have been drawn between what is happening on campuses now and what happened in 1968 with campus protests over the civil and vietnam war. i'm wondering, though, that rather than parallels isms, we can also view what's happening as a consequence of 1968. and i think of two things that happened as a result of those press protests. most 60 years ago. one was the establishment of studies departments, ethnic studies, african-americanast studies and the other particularlycampuses, was the banishment of the reserve officer training corps from elite schools. and you've written about both subjects in the past.

could you trace for usse decisions 60 years ago created the culture that we see festering today? well, i particularly grateful to you for that because if one is connecting the dots, the dot that i w started with on how this penetrated the united states from within is actually the second of those. and thatrosie from campus. i came to had always looked to the united states. i'm a i'm blessed with dual citizenship. and canada is a great country and proud to be a canadian as well. ked to the united states and as freer country actually spirit. and real greatest disappointment i had, it remained, by the way, the greatest disappoint from the beginning to the end of my 21 years. there was the banishment of rothesay from campus, and i spoke out against it as often as

it came up. i could not believe it because you seeage of those students is precisely when people go into the army. and here is one of your best universi and of course, this is not just about harvard, but it's a lot of the elite schools banished lots of that time presumably against the war in war and so on. but what did that mean? what it really was this country is not worth defending. i mean, that's what it clearly says. because if you're taking the best young they're supposed to train for the military, and you're telling them, no, the military is not allowed on this campus under any circumstances.ay this kept coming up every couple of years and thin kep to it. now you don't do it because of then don't ask, don't tell. now you don't do it because of this. you see, there is always a new and it was only a small small of people on the cs, persuade the rest of the of

the their fellow faculty members and the administration went along with it and the army pulled back. i mean, th r 40 yearsmilitary was taboo on campuses. and the kids who wanted to be who were there on right on the rotc scholarships had to go to m.i.t. at 5:00 in the morning because that was where this was available. i mean, it was such a shame and and that's i think where it started. this isb] this is not just anti-american. this is really determining the collapse of the co contrast it with israel, you see you can see the difference. i mean, israel is a much smaller country, much more vulnerabl every way. but my goodness, i mean what it is to be young, there to be a high school student at the end of high school is you're preparing to protect this

country. and people vie be in units that protect the best and most. so, by the way, i would say that if one is going to reverse anything and this is what we all dream of, is any of this ever ack? my first point of pushback wouldbe 10% of the students at these university should be there on scholarships. if you do admissions on the basis of who is in rotc or who is in another branch of training for the military now, because, of course, you have now a military which needs much more than people with rifles and and on tanks. right. you need an intelligence service. but i would say 10%, at least of these colleges should now really and they shouldist that these kids go around in their uniforms, that this is this is really what and it's, you know you know small changes making big changes. right. and i think that that would be a great start.

so you mentionedow you noticed this absence of raazi when you set foot on the harvard camp you came there. i want to also talk about some events at harvanlawrence summers, the president of harvard was forced to resign after a speech he had delivered across the street at mit on reasons why there were. there was no peen males and females in math and sciences. you had a fron seat that and you wrote what i think was just an amazing essay in commentary recently, pointing out how in some ways the summers episode was the beginning of a cycle that would culminate with clouding gay's resignation last year. what didn't you take away from what happened to larry summers? well, one thing when i take away is happily now is that lawrence summers, who exists today, is the pers ward at that time. he has become a very feisty

defender of everything that he feels is important and true at the time. and i don't disagree with that. he he was to my mind. well, i'm sorry, but he was a naive. the first thing that happened was not the women's thing that came drsh lbuur >d

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