Anti-Israel protesters have briefly blocked bridges and highways, interfered with access to airports and amusement parks, and disrupted legislative sessions. But their success in forcing a month-long shutdown of an entire museum in Seattle is a first—and a dangerous precedent.
Twenty-six staff members of Seattle’s Wing Luke museum recently walked out, to protest the wording of a panel in an exhibit concerning an anti-racism campaign by American Jews in the 1940s-1950s.
My new book is a history of that anti-racism initiative. Cartoonists Against Racism: The Secret Jewish War on Bigotry (coauthored with comics historian Craig Yoe) describes how the American Jewish Committee enlisted cartoonists and comic book artists in the fight against antisemitism and other forms of racism during the years following World War II.
The idea behind the campaign was to discredit all forms of bigotry, through the colorful and entertaining medium of cartoon illustration. They flooded schools and union halls with anti-racist posters. They arranged for newspapers to publish political cartoons mocking prejudice. They ran anti-racism public service announcements in comic books and magazines. Jewish groups even persuaded the writers of the popular “Superman” radio show to create a storyline in which the Man of Steel battled the Ku Klux Klan.
The Jewish anti-bigotry activists believed that by ridiculing both antisemitism and all other forms of racism, they could show the American public that discrimination against any minority group is bad for all Americans and
violates our nation’s most cherished principles.
Unfortunately, some narrow minded people in our own time have not yet accepted the idea of opposing all types of racism. They want to be free to hate Jews, disguising their bigotry as “anti-Zionism.” But when anti-Israel protesters talk about “Zionists controlling the media,” they obviously mean Jews. The same is true of phrases such as “dirty Zionists,” and “Zionists keep out,” and so many other ugly slurs that have been chanted or displayed at recent anti-Israel protests.
The staff members who are on strike against the Wing Luke Museum in Seattle object to a sentence in one panel of the anti-racism exhibit which states a simple fact: “Today, antisemitism is often disguised as anti-Zionism.”
Disguising their hate is a tactic common to all bigots. They talk about “cultural differences” or “neighborhood integrity” or “people preferring their own kind.” But those are all code words meant to hide their hateful intent.
At the heart of the Seattle walk-out is a sentiment that is becoming all too common these days: They want Jews to stop complaining about antisemitism. They want Jews to just shut up already, instead of protesting the slurs and the libels and the disruptions. They want Jews to stop pointing out that “anti-Zionism” is often a mask for antisemitism.
Ben Hecht, the famous playwright and Hollywood screenwriter, saw something similar happening during the Holocaust years. Political leaders and others were annoyed by calls for the rescue of Jewish refugees. So Hecht authored a jarring poem, “Ballad of the Doomed Jews in Europe,” which appeared as a full-page newspaper advertisement in the New York Times and elsewhere in September 1943. A line in the first stanza declared:
“Four million Jews waiting for death / Oh hang and burn
but—quiet, Jews! / Don’t be bothersome…”
Obviously, we are not living through another Holocaust right now. But Jews today are under attack—sometimes violently—and too many people would like to see the American Jewish community keep quiet.
We historians may not be able to assist the police in clearing bridges or highways. But we can help a museum. I have served as a consultant to a number of museums and co-curated several exhibits. So I’ve informed the Wing Luke Museum that I will gladly volunteer to replace any historical consultants who have walked out in protest against the anti-racism exhibit. I hope other historians and museum professionals around the country will do likewise. Because if anti-Israel extremists can shut down an entire museum, or intimidate its leaders into altering historically-accurate exhibits, then a precious aspect of our free society is in grave danger.
(June 2024)