What Nicholas Kristof Teaches Us About Antisemitism on the Political Left

The mainstream political left demonstrates a particular form of antisemitism. It is not overt hostility, but something harder to identify: motivated reasoning, a preconscious worldview that governs what a person finds credible, what requires proof, and onto whom the worst conclusions fall.

Here is how it works. When people evaluate a proposition they are primed to believe, they ask “can I believe this?” – a permissive standard requiring only confirmatory evidence. When they evaluate a proposition they are primed to reject, they ask “must I believe this?” – a far more demanding standard requiring that the claim survive a search for disconfirmation. Gilovich identified this asymmetry, and it has become a standard framework in the medical conflict-of-interest literature for explaining how physicians unconsciously favor conclusions they are primed to believe (1). Cain and Detsky put it plainly: everyone is biased, and the most dangerous bias is the kind its holder is certain they do not have (2). Tversky and Kahneman demonstrated that a random number can shift how people estimate facts (3). Given that empirical observation, consider how targeted, agenda-driven information can impact a person already primed to believe it.

That priming, applied to Jews, is what antisemitism on the political left often looks like. Not slurs, but a framework about what is believable and who has to prove it.

Nicholas Kristof’s recent column on sexual violence in Gaza illustrates this framework and does not depend on where one stands on Israel, on the conduct of its current government, or even on whether every allegation he reports ultimately proves correct. The question is not whether the claims are true, but what epistemic framework governed their acceptance. When a general cognitive bias reliably produces historically specific patterns about Jews, it is reasonable to understand that as antisemitic in structure, even if not consciously intended.

Kristof’s column illustrates three hallmarks of that framework in operation.

1. The double standard on credulity. Kristof acknowledges the October 7, 2023 rapes – he could hardly do otherwise, given the extensive documentation, forensic pathology, and survivor testimony – but treats them as a rhetorical framing device requiring no further scrutiny, then applies an entirely different evidentiary standard to Palestinian allegations with a credulous acceptance of claims so thin they include a dog trained to commit sexual assault. This is not a reporting judgment about competing evidentiary standards. It is a Bayesian prior: allegations by Jews require abundant proof; but allegations against Jews require only a plausible narrator. “Can I believe this” governed one set of claims. “Must I believe this” governed the other. The asymmetry is the tell.
2. A rhetorical structure that implies what it disclaims. Kristof announces that sexual violence was not official Israeli policy, then methodically constructs the case that it functionally was, leaving the reader with the very conclusion he formally disavows. The claim of a cover-up is not demonstrated directly; it is assembled through implication and inference, which becomes easier to accept if one already is primed to expect it, drawing on the durable stereotype that Jews conceal their true actions behind formal denials. The inference then feels like recognition rather than speculation.
3. Collective depravity. The column implicates soldiers, units, a culture without any individualizing context that might complicate the portrait, and with October 7, 2023 mentioned only as a rhetorical bookend rather than as the event that defines this war’s moral landscape. It is not a critique of military policy or command accountability. It is a statement about what “those people” are capable of and inclined toward, as a collective. The medieval blood libel did not require every Jew to have poisoned the well. It required only that “this is what Jews do.” The structure is the same.

These patterns could reflect ideology, political priors, or distrust of a particular government. I cannot rule those out, but what distinguishes antisemitic bias from generic political bias – or anti-Israel bias – is that the asymmetry tracks Jewishness specifically, reproducing patterns that are historically recognizable.

Some still will argue that my analysis conflates criticism of Israel with antisemitism. But the empirical record is clear: since October 7, 2023, Jews have been attacked not because their attackers assessed their views on Israeli policy, but because the hatred does not honor the distinction between Israeli and Jew. Collective moral framings do not stay neatly bounded by citizenship or political distinction.

Furthermore, this framework is not limited to non-Jews. The identity of the person holding it is irrelevant to how it operates. What matters is the asymmetry: what gets believed, what demands proof, what receives humanizing context, and onto whom the worst conclusions fall.

Legitimate criticism of Israel and its government is vital. It focuses on specific decisions, specific actors, and specific policies, argued with evidence proportionate to the claim and applied consistently across comparable contexts. What Kristof has written does not meet that standard. It reflects an older pattern: a framework of unconscious bias that presents itself as journalism.

He likely would reject that characterization. That is the point.

References:

1. Dana J. How psychological research can inform policies for dealing with conflicts of interest in medicine. In: Lo B, Field MJ, eds. Conflict of Interest in Medical Research, Education, and Practice. National Academies Press; 2009: Appendix D.
2. Cain DM, Detsky AS. JAMA 2008;299:2893-2895.
3. Tversky A, Kahneman D. Science 1974;185:1124-1131.