It's a fine piece, and I share your dismay - I've been trying to get people to pay attention since 2004.

I was disturbed though by the tenor of many comments appended to the PM thread. These comments place blame on American Jews who vote Democratic.

First, this isn't a right/left issue. Using the fact that antisemitism is on the rise as an excuse to attack Democrats or other liberals is really a red herring - it's true that most American Jews vote Democratic and consider ourselves left/liberal.

So?

Antisemitism is a broad-spectrum disease. It's found all across the political spectrum, in Europe, in the Middle East, in places where there are no Jews. It's found among communists, Christians, Muslims, fascists, and of course on the "progressive" far left.

We shouldn't have to make a choice between supporting causes like the environment, which is absolutely critical to my mind, and fighting antisemitism.

Fighting antisemitism shouldn't be a right/left issue - it's something we should all be engaged with - whether we're Jews or Gentiles, secular or religious - there's simply no excuse for it.

So, I think it's time to pull together, Right and Left, stop accusing each other of nefarious misdeeds because we voted either for Obama or McCain, Bush or Gore, and deal with this problem head on.

One commentator on the PM thread mentioned the huge influx of petrodollars, accompanied by propaganda geared toward the demonization and destruction of Israel.

That's certainly a major factor and neither Republicans nor Democrats, nor liberals or conservatives in Europe, were/are prepared to handle it. Most won't even discuss it.

Worse we have cheerleaders for said propaganda on both Left and Right in the West.

Left/liberal academics are frequently cited as factors, people arguing against Israel's very existence on ideological grounds - but Chas Freeman the "realist" is no leftist. He, Mearscheimer and Walt and many other enemies of Israel and the Jewish people are from the Right.

No - this problem affects all of us. I'd like to see discourse on antisemitism and antizionism that doesn't devolve into accusations against Jewish Democrats - that's pointless.

I do think we should look hard at the anti-Israel anti-Jewish lobbies - and at the fact that they involve many roots from Stormfront to the Middle East to the Archibishop of Canterbury; religious organizations both Christian and Islamic seek to harm both Israel and the Jews.

"Realists" and other corporate interests, such as the oil industry, also have little use for Israel and the Arab League boycott against the Yishuv has had affects on Jews around the world since the 1930's. That should be discussed openly as it's really illegal but the UN isn't focused on human rights violations if they are violating the rights of human Jews.

The MSM is sponsored - bought and paid for - by big business - so people shouldn't be surprised when CNN, Time, NYT seem anti-Israel or even antisemitic - but we should stand up and yell about it.

Again, this isn't because such outlets are "liberal" or "left" - they't not. They may pretend to be - but in fact they're self-interested and that's something altogether different. Note the vacillations of Andrew Sullivan - and whose interests are being served by Roger Cohen?

Ask yourself this: who has oil - Iran or Israel? Cohen who has the chutzpah to lecture expatriot Iranian Jews may be perfectly sincere (alas) but the people who give him a platform - what's their angle?

Anyway it's deeply depressing that the only solution to the world's woes once again seems to be focusing on the Jews, be we in Diaspora in in Israel.

If only those Jews were gone - thus goes the reasoning -

I'm scared.

Unfortunately, it appears that fund raising has become a raison d'etre rather than a means to a goal in American Jewish organizations. In the end, they'll be left with only money.

On the other hand, why should we expect someone else to do our job for us. With the internet, we have all the means we need to self-organize and charge ahead ... like you're doing!