Here Lies Your Backbone

We have all recently seen Ye’s most recent descent into madness in regards to the Jews. How the only item shopable on Yeezy.com right now is the shirt titled HH-01.

Yet, very few non-Jews are publicly speaking up against his recent tirade and antics. The same non-Jews who just weeks ago were having public heart attacks over Elon Musk’s salute at the second Trump inauguration.

This is for all those who called out Elon Musk, but not Ye, and vice versa. For all those who were appalled at Musk, Ye, or both, yet refused to publicly commentate on the hostages being held by Hamas in Gaza. For all those who could find the words to condemn the people on the opposite side of the political spectrum, but fell silent when images akin to 1945 were released of Eli, Or and Ohad this past Saturday. This is for you who must be lying in their grave from their spine vaporizing and growing repeatedly over the past year and a half. 

Here lies your backbone. 1945- 2025. 

***

Welcome to your own funeral. You even dug your own grave, how considerate. Oh you’re surprised that none of your Jewish friends are here? Why’s that? Because you spoke up against Elon Musk’s Nazi salute? Ah, our apologies for failing to catch your concern for our condition in the sea of rising hatred that you help perpetuated.

What hatred you ask?

Ah, you didn’t know? You didn’t know that you contributed to the over 360% spike in antisemitic incidents in the United States over the last year and a half. Well, we tried to tell you.

We tried to explain that calling for the globalization of the intifada would see Jews punched, stabbed, shot, and more, not just in Israel, but in New York and Chicago. We tried to explain that you defining our Jewishness for us would lead to a disconnect between your understanding and Jews lived experiences. We tried to tell you that we were worried by the fact that Ye’s tweets had more likes than Jews on the Earth, 80 years after the Holocaust. We tried to tell you that holding Jews hostage for the crime of being Jewish was wrong, but you insisted that it was justified. 

But your backbone suddenly reappeared as you cried out against Trump and his team, at the concerning actions such as pardoning the “Camp Auschwitz”  January 6 insurrectionist. When you called for Musk to apologize for neo-Nazi’s rallying around his actions. When you reassured yourself that you would have been on the “right side” of the Holocaust.

But as released hostages and their families pour out their thanks to the Trump administration for bringing them back from the edge of Hell, and when images of Israelis that, if put into black and white, would be near indistinguishable from images after the liberation of Auschwitz, when you applaud yourself on International Holocaust Remembrance Day yet fail to hear modern survivors of this same hatred, your spine crumbles again. 

***

The good news is that you do not need to remain a spineless human, staring at your early grave due to rising extremism. The solution is, thank G-d, incredibly simple. You take the time to learn, really learn, what antisemitism looks like, as uncomfortable as it may be for you to confront your own ignorance and bias. You elevate Jewish voices, not just ones you happen to politically align with, when they call out antisemitism, regardless of where the antisemitism originates from. You partner with Jewish organizations who have spent the last 80 years trying to be the substitute for your backbone, so that they may finally be able to shoulder the growing burden with you. You listen when Jews tell you something is antisemitic, just as you would if someone told you that something was racist. You learn about Jewish history, without having to universalize it.

Because if you refuse to do so, we will not be just having a funeral for your backbone, but also for the Jewish people. 

Sources:

https://www.cnn.com/2024/10/06/us/anti-jewish-threats-us-adl/index.html#:~:text=More%20than%2010%2C000%20antisemitic%20incidents,began%20tracking%20threats%20in%201979.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2025/01/22/camp-auschwitz-jan-6-rioter-trump-pardoned/77884230007/