Does Israel bear some responsibility for increasing global antisemitism? 

The relationship between Israel's conduct in Gaza and the rise of antisemitism in the Diaspora was the central, contentious issue at a panel discussion at the 39th World Zionist Congress in Jerusalem this week. 
 
President of the Zionist Federation of Australia Jeremy Leibler and Professor Michal Bar-Asher Siegal, a Jewish Thought scholar from Ben Gurion University, took opposing views on the question of whether Israeli policies and Israeli politicians are partially responsible for the increase in antisemitic incidents affecting the global Jewish community.  

The exchange revealed a fundamental debate over whether the Diaspora's security is primarily tied to Israel's military strength or its moral conduct. For Bar-Asher Siegal, the lack of coherence between action and values actively undermines Diaspora Jews. For Leibler, antisemitism is an independent virus and conflating it with Israeli policy risks granting moral justification to hatred. 

Professor Bar-Asher Siegal argued that Israeli action and rhetoric have direct, negative consequences for the Diaspora community's security and moral standing, particularly among liberal allies. 

A scholar of rabbinic Judaism who was visiting Harvard Law School at the time of the October 7 attack, she said October 7 forged a moment of unprecedented connection between Israel and Diaspora Jews, but the war which followed had significant costs for the diaspora.