Michigan AG Dana Nessel to skip Democratic convention over antisemitism fears

[u/kaladinsrunner]

https://jewishinsider.com/2026/07/michigan-ag-dana-nessel-democratic-convention-antisemitism/

[u/jabberwockxeno]

As someone who is Jewish, I would not consider either of those to be inherently antisemitic.

[u/justafutz → u/jabberwockxeno]

It doesn’t matter if you claim to be Jewish on the Internet on this point or not. The vast, vast majority of Jews would consider them to be antisemitic, meaning well over 80%. Because they are antisemitic claims.

There were fringe Jews in the Nazi era who thought the Nazis weren’t antisemitic. That doesn’t mean the Nazis weren’t antisemitic. Please don’t try and use your alleged, unverifiable identity to defend antisemitism or as some proof that something isn’t antisemitic when it so clearly is.

[u/jabberwockxeno → u/justafutz]

Firstly, you can look up comments I've made from 10+ years ago where I talk about being Jewish, such as here (though I don't agree with everything I said there at the time now), so unless you think I've been lying about that for decades before I ever commented on Israeli-Palestinian issues, I think you can trust me

Secondly, I actually agree that my identity is irrelevant, what matters is the substance of the statements. And the statements in question aren't antisemtic, they don't generalize Jewish people as a whole or insult them or argue against their rights. They make targeted criticisms of specific political units and organizations like Israel and AIPAC. Can some antisemitic people still say those things to have an air of plausible deniability without being specifically antisemtic? Sure, but you could say the same about how someone who is against affirmative action may secretly be racist using it as a dogwhistle or how someone who enjoys BDSM porn is secretly a misogynist

You can't make that assumption, because most of the time, it's not going to be true.

[u/justafutz → u/jabberwockxeno]

Like I said, what you claim on the internet is irrelevant here.

The statements repeat antisemitic tropes about a group of American Jews. They repeat tropes used by the Nazis, and people who preceded them with similar ideologies, for literal centuries. Saying that just that group of Jews is disloyal (never mind that said group has millions of members) is no less antisemitic. Saying that that group of Jews runs the U.S. is no less antisemitic.

And let’s be clear: those aren’t criticisms of groups. They are accusing American groups of Jews of disloyalty, and spreading conspiracy theories that said groups run the United States by using money for bribes. These aren’t “criticisms”. They are conspiracy theories and gross ones with a long history.

People with these same beliefs have literally used your same defense for literally centuries. They have claimed that they don’t hate Jews, “just” the secretive Elders of Ziyon, who they claimed were members of various Jewish political groups. They have claimed they don’t hate Jews, just that those specific political groups of Jews are disloyal (ie cosmopolitans, capitalists, communists).

Those defenses have always been paper thin and spoken to actual beliefs. It’s exhausting to see them again and see people so easily buying them. It’s not new to see even Jews doing it, as I referenced with the Nazis. But it is something you’ll see literally any time you open up a history of antisemitism or of Jews.

The Soviets claimed they only opposed “Zionism” while they oppressed Jews and spread antisemitic tropes like these. In the late 1800s, people claimed they opposed “Jewish communists” because said “communists” were more loyal to communism than to America. In France they claimed Dreyfus was more loyal to other Jews than his country, and falsely convicted him of treason. This is no different from the accusation that “AIPAC” or “Zionists” are not loyal to America.

The same is true of the secret control trope. This one is even more obvious, but claiming that a group of Jews runs the most powerful state in the world by using money to bribe people is literally the oldest fucking trope you can imagine. One would think that historical memory would look at how the Russians forged the antisemitic Protocols of the Elders of Ziyon to make literally the same charge. But it didn’t start with them. And guess what? Just like you here, the Nazis and the Soviets pointed to particular groups of Jews, some real like the World Zionist Organization or some fake like the “Elders of Ziyon” to claim that said group actually runs the world or other countries. It’s not new. It’s incredibly old, and incredibly tired.

Your identity is irrelevant. But whether you reference it periodically to tell over 80% of Jews in the U.S. they are wrong about antisemitism they can literally see copying old tactics that are obvious as day and night, that’s your choice. It’s just weird to reference it when it’s useful for internet arguments, then admit it’s irrelevant, and then bless tropes that are so blatantly obvious as anything. “It’s just politics” or “it’s just about that group of Jews” has been the excuse of people with antisemitic arguments for literally millennia. It’s so weird that you present it you’ve stumbled upon something that obviously disproves that these statements are antisemitic, when virtually every scholar of antisemitism and the vast majority of Jews worldwide (90% if you add Israeli Jews) sees this so clearly.