With attacks on Jews worldwide and the State of Israel reaching a fever pitch, the Jewish people commemorate Tisha B’Av, a solemn time that has combined many catastrophes into a single day of mourning, including the destruction of both Temples, expulsions and massacres throughout history.
The ancient Babylonians destroyed the First Jewish Temple on the ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av in 586 BCE. The Roman Empire destroyed the Second Temple on the same date in 70 C.E. Rome renamed the land Palestine to try and sever the Jewish connection to Israel and drove the survivors into exile. This year, Tisha B’Av began at sundown on July 22, a day of fasting, prayer and remembrance. The Babylonian Empire included what is today’s Iran.
The Babylonian and Roman Empires are long gone. The Jewish people remain but continue to face threats from old and new enemies. Since the Temples were destroyed, Jews have prayed facing Jerusalem, and they close Passover seders and Yom Kippur services with the same vow—“Next year in Jerusalem”—nearly 2,000 years before the modern State of Israel existed.
Within days of Tisha B’Av, on July 18, 1290, King Edward I expelled every Jew from England, the first time a European kingdom expelled its entire Jewish population. Those who stayed risked being seized and put to death. The ban held for more than 350 years.
The attempts to erase the Jews did not begin with the medieval world and did not end with the Holocaust. Exactly 704 years after the English expulsion, Iran directed the bombing of the AMIA Jewish center in Buenos Aires on July 18, 1994, killing 85 people and wounding more than 300 others. More than three decades later, no one has been brought to justice, and the regime that ordered the attack is still at work.
Rising extremism threatens Jews
Iran never stopped. The same regime behind the attack in Argentina continues its war against the United States and its regional allies.
Yet as America directly confronts Iran, U.S. Vice President JD Vance has turned the blame toward Israel and the Jews. Vance recently accused Israeli influence campaigns of “manipulating” American opinion on the Iran war, telling influential podcast host Joe Rogan that foreign influencers can “go to hell.” He also told Rogan and his millions of listeners that sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein had “connections” to Israeli intelligence. Both allegations tap into age-old antisemitic conspiracy theories.
The same animosity toward Israel reached the floor of Congress. More than 100 House Democrats, nearly half of their caucus, voted to cut off all U.S. military aid to Israel on July 15. Far-left activists threatened U.S. Democratic Rep. Adam Smith through a campaign of intimidation and violence. Smith changed his position and voted against Israel after “my family’s home was vandalized, a fire has been set in my driveway, and there have been demonstrations in the middle of the night.”
His account confirmed a warning issued the same day. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said American counter-terrorism had long overlooked far-left political violence, and Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar described a “growing operational alliance between leftist activism and Islamist terrorist organizations,” with Israel on the front line.
The growing hostility toward Israel within the Democratic Party is driven by the far-left Democratic Socialists of America. The DSA’s most prominent elected ally is New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Recently, the extremist organization adopted a platform calling to abolish the American two-party system and its presidency, Senate and Supreme Court. The DSA backs the Palestinian “right to resist,” language used by Palestinian terror groups to justify murdering Israelis.
Enemies fall, the Jewish people endure
The Jewish people have outlived every power that set out to erase them. Edward I expelled its Jews in 1290. They returned under Oliver Cromwell in 1656. Soon after, they built London’s Bevis Marks synagogue, where Jews have worshipped without a break for more than 300 years.
British Jews now face a new wave of hatred. An Islamist terrorist carried out a deadly assault on a synagogue, Iranian-backed terrorists torched Jewish ambulances that served the whole community, and many Jews have been harassed in the street.
Renewed antisemitism is driving many British Jews to consider leaving for Israel; still, they do not stand alone. The founder of Muslims Against Antisemitism is challenging fellow Muslims to confront the bigotry in their own ranks, and a London pastor is fighting the Church of England’s recent push to falsely brand Israel “genocidal.”
Some countries are changing course. Argentina was once a safe haven for fleeing Nazis and long obstructed investigations into the Jewish community center bombing on its own soil. Now, the country stands among Israel’s closest allies and is seeking to prosecute those responsible for the attack. Many Israelis cheered for Argentina against Spain in the World Cup final. It lost to Spain, now one of Israel’s loudest accusers in Europe and a hotbed of antisemitism.
Through it all, the Jewish people respond to the hostility with continued resilience. The Chabad-Lubavitch movement launched “Born to Be a Yid,” billboards in New York City to “build confidence, joy, strength and connection” among Jews. In Queens, N.Y., congregants whose synagogue was vandalized with feces vowed to “continue praying and to be proud Americans.”
This is what Tisha B’Av has come to represent: The saddest day on the Jewish calendar is living testimony to survival. Many nations that set out to erase the Jews are gone. However, the Jewish people remain—still facing Jerusalem, still proclaiming, “Next year in Jerusalem.”
Points to consider:
1. Tisha B’Av turns a day of mourning into proof of survival.
The same Jewish nation that watched its Temples burn is still here to mourn the destruction of its holiest sites. That is not weakness; it is defiance. A people truly erased would have no one left to grieve. Yet 2,000 years later, Jews still gather to fast and pray. Tisha B’Av is the saddest day on the Jewish calendar, as well as the surest sign that the Jewish story did not end where its enemies intended.
2. Every empire that attempted to erase the Jewish people fell.
Babylon destroyed the First Temple. Rome destroyed the Second Temple and drove the survivors into exile. Empires and inquisitors spent centuries trying to erase the Jews, and the Nazis murdered 6 million in their attempt. Every one of those empires has fallen; still, the Jewish people remain. Iran vows to destroy the Jewish state today, yet another name on a lengthy list of those who have tried.
3. Jews have prayed toward Jerusalem for 2,000 years.
Many anti-Israel activists claim that no connection exists between Judaism and Israel; 2,000 years of history disproves this lie. Jews have faced Jerusalem in prayer, wept for it on sacred holidays, and ended every Passover and Yom Kippur with a vow to return—all of it long before there was a political movement or a modern-day Jewish state. Many of America’s earliest synagogues honored Israel with their names. A bond this ancient cannot be invented. The tie between the Jewish people and their homeland is not a political stance; it lies at the heart of their faith.
4. The Jewish people answer rising hatred with pride.
Those who hate Jews want them to be smaller, quieter and afraid, if not dead. In every generation, the Jewish answer has been defiance and resilience. When synagogues are vandalized, Jews keep praying. When Palestinian terrorists bombed restaurants and buses, Israelis returned to their routines the next day. Cowering in fear is the surrender the haters expect, but that the Jewish people will never relinquish their identity.
