The Trojan Horse of Antisemitism
A blockbuster revives an ancient warning. It’s one we still haven’t learned.
Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster film The Odyssey has catapulted one of Western civilization’s most enduring images back into the public imagination: the Trojan horse. It was a ruse that accomplished in a single terrible night what ten years of siege could not. Troy did not fall because its walls were breached by force. It fell because it welcomed its own destroyer.
The horse was received by the Trojans as a gift. A gift from the gods, some believed. The lone dissenter, the priest Laocoön, warned them not to trust it. “Beware of Greeks bearing gifts,” he cried. But the weary Trojans were in no mood for such a gloomy warning. Laocoön was dismissed as a madman, and when serpents rose from the sea and killed him, the people interpreted his death as proof that the gods had condemned his skepticism.
The wooden horse was not smuggled secretly into the city. It was welcomed in full public view. The Trojans themselves hauled it from the shore, widened their own gates to admit it, and placed it in a position of honor within the city walls. They saw it as a tribute, a memorial, an acknowledgment by the defeated Greeks that the long war was finally over.
That belief was the real weapon: it provided the delivery mechanism for their destruction.
The horse did not need to be made of gold. It did not need to be indestructible. It simply needed to be welcomed. The city was exhausted after ten years of war. The people celebrated. They feasted. They went to sleep convinced that peace had arrived.
But, as they slept, the horse opened. Greek soldiers emerged from its hollow interior, opened the gates to the waiting army, and destroyed the city from within. Troy’s massive walls had not failed. Its judgment had.
The Trojan horse remains one of history’s most powerful metaphors because it illustrates a timeless truth: the greatest threats to a civilization are often those it willingly invites inside.
The Container
Antisemitism works in much the same way. It is the container concealing a destructive cargo.
It rarely presents itself as naked hatred. Instead, it arrives as an explanation for everything that has gone wrong. It promises clarity where reality is complicated, offering a single, satisfying answer to political turmoil, economic anxiety, and international conflict. It relieves people of the exhausting work of examining history, politics, economics, and culture. There is no need, for example, to master the tangled history of the Middle East over the past century.
“The Jews are responsible” becomes the explanation. Shun them. Boycott them. Attack their businesses. Deface their synagogues. Drive them out. Kill them. Individually and collectively, “the Jews” become the convenient answer to society’s failures.
The container carries a deadly cargo. Like the soldiers concealed within the Trojan horse, its hidden contents spread rapidly once the gates are opened. Opposition to the decisions of a particular Israeli government can become the gateway to a far more sweeping conclusion: that the State of Israel itself has no right to exist. From there, the contagion spreads further still. Jews everywhere are treated as collectively responsible for the actions of Israel, regardless of their nationality or personal views.
This pattern is striking. With Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, no one is demanding that Russia cease to exist. Nor are Russians worldwide held personally responsible for the actions of the Kremlin. China’s persecution of the Uyghurs has not become a condemnation of Chinese people everywhere. Likewise, atrocities committed by Islamist militants in Sudan or Nigeria have not produced calls for the destruction of Islam or for violence against Muslims worldwide. Only in the case of Israel has criticism moved from a critique of Israeli policy to a condemnation of Jews worldwide.
Like the Trojan horse, antisemitism enters civilization not by force but by invitation. In today’s West, that invitation has often come from an unlikely coalition: segments of the political left, clergy in some mainline and progressive churches, campus activists, human-rights organizations, and social justice movements. Many embrace anti-Zionist or antisemitic narratives believing they are expressing solidarity with the oppressed, opposing colonialism, or advancing the cause of justice. They respond to the gift’s beautifully crafted exterior—the cloak of liberation, decolonization, and resistance. To be sure, many support Palestinian statehood or criticize Israeli policies without being antisemitic. For others, however, the hostility reaches much further.
That is the container. But what is hidden inside?
The Cargo
Antisemitism is often presented as though it were merely hostility toward Jews. Consequently, many non-Jews dismiss attacks on Jews, Jewish institutions, or Israel as a fringe prejudice of little relevance to their own lives. But antisemitism can also function as a vehicle for broader ideological projects. Hatred of Jews becomes the language that attracts supporters who might otherwise reject the movement’s broader objectives. The hostility is visible; the larger agenda, less so.
For some Islamist organizations, hostility toward Israel forms part of a wider program that includes the elimination of Israel, government based on a radical interpretation of Islamic law, the reshaping of society according to those principles, and the rejection of Western liberal values. Hamas, for instance, presents hostility toward Israel as one element of a broader ideological project. Its 1988 founding charter refers to Jewish world domination and Muslims killing Jews. It advocates the elimination of Israel and the establishment of a government based on a radical interpretation of Islamic law. Other movements use hostility to Israel to advance critiques of liberal democracy, capitalism, religion, or Western institutions more generally.
Whatever the motive, the cargo carried by antisemitism is directed toward the elimination of the State of Israel and, for some, Jews worldwide.
Exposing the Cargo
The way to confront antisemitism is not only to challenge its outward expressions. Defending Israel as the Jewish homeland, documenting the continuous Jewish presence in the land over three millennia, rebutting claims that Israel is a colonial or apartheid state, or highlighting Israel’s achievements and the contributions of Jews to Western civilization all have their place. But such arguments address primarily the surface.
The deeper task is to expose what the container is built to conceal. In that regard, questions often accomplish more than declarations.
For those on the left, whose activism leverages hostility toward the State of Israel:
- If Israel ceased to exist, how would that advance your broader political goals?
- Should Jews be excluded from progressive groups for supporting the right of Jews to a homeland?
- Do you apply the same principles to all nations, or only to Israel? And, if only to Israel, why?
For Islamist movements that advocate replacing Israel with an Islamic state, different questions become relevant:
- If the existing population between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea were displaced, what would happen to its Jewish inhabitants?
- What legal status would Christians, Jews, Hindus, and other religious minorities have in such a state?
- Under sharia law, what would be the legal status of women, religious minorities, homosexuals, and those who leave Islam?
The purpose of such questions is not merely to win an argument. It is to discover whether antisemitism is the destination or the vehicle. The Trojan horse was never the real danger. What it concealed was. In the same way, antisemitism should be understood not only as an ancient prejudice but also, at times, as a means by which broader political, religious, or ideological ambitions gain a foothold in society.
The task, therefore, is to recognize that the attractive exterior which persuaded the Trojans to wheel the horse through their own gates was never the real issue. Civilizations rarely invite their destroyers inside knowingly. They do so when they accept the container oblivious to the cargo it carries. That was the lesson of the Trojan people. It remains the lesson of antisemitism today.
