Self-Hating Jews: The Modern Day Kapos

I won’t be buying Levi’s jeans anymore, nor will I be booking a vacation at a Hyatt hotel. As to Ben & Jerry´s, they have been off my groceries list for some time now.

As a third generation descendant born after the Holocaust, it was disturbing to learn that there had been Jews — mostly known as kapos –– who collaborated with the Nazis at the expense of fellow Jewish inmates, in order to get preferential treatment at the camps. Growing up, our parents explained  that they were Holocaust victims and survivors as well; and us — as citizens of a free world — had no right to pass judgement on them.

At higher ranks of Nazi collaborators, we can also find the Jewish police at the ghettos and the members of the Jewish Councils known as the Judenrat. The case of Chaim Rumkowski comes to my mind: the infamous President of the Judenrat in the Łódź ghetto who thought that by serving the Nazis, he would be spared along with his family. He was beaten to death by other Jews who recognized him when he was ultimately sent to Auschwitz, after he was no longer useful to the murderers. His family died in the gas chambers.

Fast forward to October 7th 2023, we witnessed a pogrom in Israel, the one place Jews never thought it could happen. Unlike the Nazis who went to great lengths to try to hide their atrocities, Hamas genocidal terrorists openly glorify their sadism. Along with this vicious attack, we are seeing antisemitism rear its ugly head all over the Western world, including in elite colleges.

Anti-Israel encampments emerged at universities, with students joining in largely ignorant of facts, but eagerly wanting to be cool. The level of organization made it clear that this is not a grassroots movement, but a well financed initiative. According to the media, among the main supporters are the Levi Strauss family, famous for their iconic Levis jeans. The news also includes (be it directly or through umbrella groups), billionaire  George Soros (that himself has been involved in controversy over the years regarding if he helped Nazis confiscate property of fellow Jews in Hungary), and the Pritzker family of Jewish descent (owners of Hyatt hotels). Add to the list Ben & Jerry´s who endorse these protests as essential for democracy; and Bernie Sanders voicing support for peaceful protests, when these are clearly not such.

All these self-hating Jews are the modern day kapos. Their behavior fuels the type of antisemitism that at times makes it hard to differentiate between the US and Europe of today, and Germany of the 1930s. The Shoah did not begin in the crematoriums, that is where it ended, after the escalation of discriminatory laws and conducts. By funding these protests, self-hating Jews have helped in achieving one of the goals of the Nazi regime: Judenreid. The ”liberated encampments” at colleges, are nothing but areas cleansed of Jews; except if you oppose the “Zionist entity” (they can’t bring themselves to call it Israel), then you can enter -for now-.  If the day comes that even the great United States of America becomes the extermination camp to which all of this could lead, their lives would not be spared either. Nazis and the likes, don’t differentiate: they kill all Jews, self-loathing ones or not.

As a great granddaughter of someone that perished at the Warsaw Ghetto from typhus, I find it impossible to condone the betrayal of new kapos when they collaborate with the new nazis. They are not faced with “choiceless choices” nor acting under duress, they are just conducting themselves under a broken moral compass. They even feel superior to the rest -Aryan style- , because of acting this way regardless of the fact that they are Jewish.

Supporters of the hate that has spiked worldwide will argue it is solely anti-Zionism, not antisemitism. If this is the case, how come Jewish schools are shot at in Canada? A Jewish cemetery desecrated in Vienna? A Jewish woman stabbed in Lyon with a swastika graffitied on her door? Holocaust museums from Greece to Guatemala waking up to vandalism? Bomb threats at three synagogues in Utah as early as October 8th? How come Anne Frank had to go into hiding again, when her statute was covered in Amsterdam to prevent further vandalism? In the virtual world, antisemitic comments spiked in social platforms, immediately after October 7th when Israel had not even started its defense. All these incidents and so many more, show anti-Zionism is just another libel for the old-age hatred against Jews.

Today marks over 240 consecutive days of waking up to devastating news; of opening one’s eyes, only to want to close them again, to unsee the horror. Daily, more soldiers lose their lives defending the right for all Jews worldwide – even for the traitors and the ungrateful ones – to have a place where they can live if they want to, and to flee if they need to. It is infuriating that while prominent Jews in the US embolden the wanna-be activists that carelessly skip classes;  their Israeli peers, young heroes that are fighting against genocide because they pledged together with their grandparents “Never Again”, are being buried without ever experiencing college life.

To our modern day kapos: your true legacy is not of great jeans, luxury hotels, or of delicious ice cream. It is not of great ideas nor of open societies either. Your legacy is of collaborating with the enemy in Judenrein. When you ask yourselves how history will judge you, don’t forget Chaim Rumkowski and the likes.

For the Jews, you will always be traitors; and for the  antisemites, no matter how hard you try, you will always be filthy Jews.

Image courtesy of the author.

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Bibliograpy:

[1]https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/390759; https://www.ynetnews.com/article/rjpowzb40; https://www.i24news.tv/en/news/international/americas/artc-jewish-family-among-major-backers-of-anti-israel-campus-protests

[2] https://www.foxnews.com/politics/billionaire-family-bankrolling-anti-israel-groups-battleground-democrats

[3] https://www.reuters.com/business/ben-jerrys-board-says-pro-palestinian-campus-protests-are-essential-democracy-2024-05-13/

[4] https://www.vermontpublic.org/local-news/2024-05-02/sen-bernie-sanders-defends-pro-palestinian-student-protests

[5] Several of the antisemitic examples worldwide were taken from the publication from American Jewish Committee:  https://www.ajc.org/reports-and-emblematic-examples-of-antisemitic-hate-speech-and-violence-since-october-7

[6] https://www.isdglobal.org/digital_dispatches/rise-in-antisemitism-on-both-mainstream-and-fringe-social-media-platforms-following-hamas-terrorist-attack/