What Bret Stephens Gets Right—and Wrong—About the State of World Jewry
One of the most quoted lines in Jewish tradition is also one of the most ignored: If I am not for myself, who will be for me?
That question sat quietly beneath Bret Stephens’ recent State of World Jewry address at the 92nd Street Y. Stephens’ argument was less radical than some of the headlines suggested, and more unsettling than many wanted to admit. His core claim was simple: Jews have invested enormous energy in fighting antisemitism, and far too little in strengthening Jewish life itself.
It is a claim worth taking seriously.
Stephens did not deny the reality or danger of antisemitism. On the contrary, he argued that decades of well-intentioned effort have failed to slow its spread. Awareness campaigns, task forces, public condemnations, and institutional statements have multiplied, yet antisemitism continues to adapt, normalize, and embed itself in spaces that consider themselves enlightened and immune.
His diagnosis was unsentimental: antisemitism does not recede because Jews explain themselves better or behave more virtuously. It persists regardless. And while Jews have limited control over the prejudices of others, we have considerable control over the vitality of our own communal life.
On that point, Stephens is clearly right.
Jewish history offers little evidence that arguing with our enemies produces security or continuity. It offers abundant evidence that building schools, synagogues, community centers, cultural institutions, and social networks does. Jewish flourishing has always come from internal investment, not external approval.
Stephens’ most provocative suggestion—that the Anti-Defamation League should be dismantled—was almost certainly intended as rhetorical shock. Many Jews understandably recoiled. At a moment when antisemitism is at its highest level since the postwar era, calling for the dismantling of a long-standing communal defense organization feels less like reform and more like fracture.
But the provocation should not obscure the underlying point. Jewish resources are finite. Every dollar spent trying to persuade antisemites not to hate us is a dollar not spent on Jewish education, community, or continuity. Strengthening Jewish life is not avoidance. It is agency.
That reality is not theoretical. Across North America, Jewish institutions are struggling to survive. Recently, a Jewish school in Framingham, Massachusetts announced it would close due to declining enrollment. Framingham is a largely Reform Jewish community, making the loss particularly acute. When schools and community centers disappear, Jewish life does not simply relocate. It thins. And rebuilding what is lost is far harder than sustaining what already exists.
This is where Stephens’ argument is most compelling. A confident Jewish community does not need to plead for legitimacy. It demonstrates it. Investment in Jewish life is not withdrawal from the broader society. It is the foundation for engaging it with dignity.
Where Stephens’ address invites disagreement is not in its emphasis on institution-building, but in its choice of target and timing. His criticism of the ADL may resonate with certain audiences, but for many Jews it feels misaligned with the urgency of the moment. Stephens has spent many years at the New York Times, an institution that has often struggled to reckon honestly with antisemitism in its own coverage. That context makes his critique land less like tough love and more like a familiar distancing from communal defense at precisely the moment many Jews feel most exposed.
Jewish tradition offers a useful corrective here. Hillel’ famous formulation is not a slogan but a sequence: If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? The order matters. Moral responsibility toward others does not negate the obligation to protect oneself. It presumes it.
We do not have the luxury of choosing between Jewish confidence and Jewish conscience. Our history demands both. Building our own institutions does not require dismantling every mechanism of communal defense. Nor does it require apologizing for the fact that Jews, like every other people, have the right to invest in their own continuity.
Stephens’ address was valuable precisely because it forced these questions into the open. It reminded us that dignity is not something granted by others, and that Jewish life does not survive on statements alone. It survives when Jews choose themselves—clearly, unapologetically, and without forgetting who we are.
If we are serious about the future of world Jewry, we would do well to remember that Hillel’s first sentence still comes first.
