Jewish Community Leader Sounds Alarm on Security Concerns From Antisemitism

A top leader in the Jewish community is sounding the alarm about rising security concerns for Jews and supporters of Israel in the United States.

“You cannot have one faith group, one community, that has to be behind barricades, just to go practice our faith,” Eric Fingerhut, the president and CEO of the Jewish Federations of North America, told The Daily Signal.

The Anti-Defamation League reported 9,354 antisemitic incidents in the U.S. in 2024 alone, the highest number since the organization began tracking them more than 40 years ago. And the dramatic rise in antisemitism in America is being felt on the ground by the Jewish community.

“The costs of security [in] the Jewish community are rising so dramatically that it’s almost to the point of infringing on our constitutional right to practice our faith, that people are having to cancel events or not engage in activities that they want to and that are part of being free,” Fingerhut explained.

Fingerhut has been a longtime leader of the Jewish community in America, having represented Ohio’s 19th Congressional District in the House of Representatives as a Democrat during the 1990s.

The organization he now heads represents Jewish organizations that fundraise and distribute more than $2 billion to build prosperous Jewish communities in the U.S., Israel, and elsewhere around the world. 

“There are lots, lots of organizations that work on it [the problem of antisemitism], but we have the primary responsibility for security in each of the 140 communities in which there are organized federations, and that has become an overwhelming responsibility,” Fingerhut said. 

He noted that many synagogues and Jewish institutions have Stars of David or Israeli flags identifying them, and that has made them potential targets for attacks. Fingerhut explained that there have been antisemitic incidents that occur because Jews can be publicly identifiable.

“When I walk down the street, and it’s happened to me here in Washington, D.C., with a kippah on my head, they shout at me Zionists are, Israel’s committing genocide,” Fingerhut explained. A kippah is another name for a yarmulke.

“They don’t know what I think. All they know is I’m Jewish, right? So, the link between those things is what’s driving this rise in violence since Oct. 7,” he noted, referencing the Hamas attacks in October of 2023 that initiated the Israel-Hamas war.

Fingerhut outlined how existing federal programs could be boosted to provide assistance in a time of rising antisemitism and anti-Israel sentiment.

“There’s a program called the nonprofit security grant program, and it’s a good program, a solid program,” he said.

The nonprofit security program is administered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and provides funding to harden buildings with things like blast-proof windows, reinforced doors, locks, gates, and video cameras. It provided $454.5 million in funding for facility hardening and physical security enhancements, according to FEMA, for fiscal year 2024.

“So, we really need to go from what was half a billion last year to a billion,” Fingerhut said.

The security threats also affect supporters of the Jewish state. Fingerhut described what he heard from members of Congress in his conversations on Capitol Hill.

“If a member of Congress stands up and defends Israel in their fight against Hamas or against the existential threat from Iran, they start getting just viciously attacked and threatened and incitements to violence against them,” he said.

Fingerhut is also an authority on the state of higher education’s relationship with the Jewish community in America, having served as president and CEO of Hillel International, the largest Jewish student organization in the world, from 2013 to 2019. He also served as the chancellor of the Ohio Board of Regents from 2007 to 2011.

“[T]he frustrating thing about the [pro-Palestinian protest] encampments was that, first of all, they were violating every rule that the universities had in place, about time, place and manner of protest,” he noted.

Dozens of people were arrested for illegally occupying Hamilton Hall at Columbia University. Others were arrested for storming Butler Library on the Ivy League campus. Similar protests elsewhere led to arrests across the country. 

“The universities weren’t enforcing—they were selectively not enforcing—their rules, but the content of the protests was incitement to violence, but was being excused as free speech,” he continued.

When asked what Americans could do to support their Jewish friends and neighbors, Fingerhut said “You’ve got to stand up. You’ve got to speak out.”

“[W]e can make sure that our local officials, that the principals of the schools, the ministers of the large churches know that this is absolutely unacceptable, that anyone who pervades this [antisemitic] material should not be given positions of responsibility in our community,” he said.

The post Jewish Community Leader Sounds Alarm on Security Concerns From Antisemitism appeared first on The Daily Signal.