Where do you live, Meira Sohlberg?
After a group of ultra-Orthodox “rioters” vandalized the home of High Court Justice Noam Sohlberg and his wife Meira in the Alon Shvut settlement in Gush Etzion on Wednesday night, Meira spoke to reporters about her shock.
“How can Jews hurt one another?” she asked, calling the attack a “pogrom.” Leaders from across the political spectrum issued condemnations, including President Isaac Herzog, who called the violence “crossing a red line.” Notably absent from denunciations were the heads of leading ultra-Orthodox parties, which have turned a blind eye to violence by Haredim against military and police figures – including breaking into a police station in Beit Shemesh last week – and even justified them as an inevitable response to the criminalization of Haredi draft dodging.
Earlier on Wednesday, Israel’s Civil Administration approved the construction of over 2,000 new settlement housing units, around half of which were set to be built in Gush Etzion as part of the Gvaot settlement, itself an extension of Alon Shvut. According to Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, the move aims to “establish clear facts” to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state – what he called an “Arab terrorist state” – in the territory. Last month, IDF troops stationed in the West Bank reported that over 80% of violence reported in the territory was committed by Jewish settlers against Palestinians, and that the phenomenon is rampant and impossible to combat: the Jewish instigators go unpunished, and the Israeli army usually spends its time arresting the Palestinian victims. Condemnations from IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir do little to help.
Effectively, every day, gangs of settlers descend on Palestinian homes, property or villages in the West Bank, and steal, vandalize, harm, and even kill. They do not discriminate between Palestinians and Jews who come to serve as a protective presence. Even IDF soldiers in uniform are sometimes harmed or harassed by settlers, though they generally either do nothing to protect the Palestinians or actively participate in violence. There is no “Arab terrorist state” in the West Bank. There is, however, a Jewish terror apparatus, which Smotrich finances and supports.
The Sohlbergs got a small taste of what Palestinians suffer daily in the West Bank from Jewish terrorists. The violence against them was hypocritically condemned by the same coalition that ensures the continuation and escalation of Jewish terror. And Meira Sohlberg, instead of calling for respect for the rule of law, for common decency or universal humanity, called on the principle of Jewish supremacy, saying that “a Jew who takes a stone and throws it at another Jew’s house is intolerable and unacceptable.”
This same principle was invoked after the assassination of former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin by religious nationalist Yigal Amir. After his murder, Israelis did not ask: how could Amir commit such violence against a human being, much less a Prime Minister? Instead, they asked: how could a Jew kill another Jew?
Jewish supremacy – framed as Jewish solidarity – killed Rabin. By making peace with the Palestinians, the Labor Prime Minister was seen as a traitor to Jewish nationalism and the Jewish settlement project. He became a legitimate target. Anti-peace protests before his assassination even featured a photoshopped image of Rabin in a Nazi SS uniform – the ultimate enemy.
The attack on Sohlberg’s house followed a similar script. A neighbor who came to the scene reported that the Haredim called her a “shiksa” and even yelled “Hitler,” leaving behind a paper Israeli flag where the Star of David was replaced by a swastika. In the eyes of the ultra-Orthodox, the Sohlbergs and their settler neighbors are not really Jewish – even though, as ideological settlers, they likely believe that their existence is tied to reclaiming the Jewish homeland. For Haredim, by being an agent of a state that demands they conscript in the army, Sohlberg is betraying Judaism. He became a legitimate target.
If humanity is conditioned by religion – if only violence against Jews is “intolerable” – then you have discovered, Meira Sohlberg, how quickly you and others can be stripped of your Judaism. And what is truly intolerable is life as a non-Jew in the West Bank.
