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‘I Find Myself Feeling Quite Scared’: Jews in America Lie Low as Antisemitism Spirals in Wake of Gaza War

For the first time in their lives, Jewish Americans are feeling the need to hide their religious and ethnic identity. Some explain why, while others reveal why they refuse to disguise their Jewishness despite the widespread anti-Israel sentiment in some cities

NEW YORK – Eitan Gutenmacher never thought the day would come when he would feel compelled to remove his kippa – let alone in the biggest Jewish city in the world.

But that just goes to prove how unsafe the New York University junior feels these days displaying visible signs of his Jewishness.

“For someone who grew up in New York, I find what’s going on shocking,” says Gutenmacher, an art and religious studies major. “It’s not that I don’t wear my kippa at all. But in the past few weeks, there have been occasions when I felt that for my personal safety it was not a good idea to have it on.”

“Just the other day,” he continues, “I passed by a [pro-Palestinian] rally near the library, where someone was carrying a sign that had a Jewish star on it next the words ‘absolute evil.’ That day, I didn’t wear my kippa at all.”

It’s not the only change he’s made in his daily routine this past month.

A guerrilla billboard states "NYC stands with Palestine," in New York last month.Credit: Emil Salman

“Beforethe war in Gaza, I’d hang out at the Hillel building maybe once or twice a week,” recounts Gutenmacher. “Now I’m there every single day in-between classes. My friends and I would rather be there than in the library, and when we leave, we now walk in groups. Nobody walks home alone anymore.”

Yael (who asked that her real name not be published), a relocation consultant from San Francisco’s Bay Area, did something this year she has never done in her 18 years of living in the United States: She kept her door locked on Halloween.

“Halloween is a huge thing in our neighborhood, and my girls and I always look forward to handing out candy. But this year I was concerned about possible acts of retaliation against Jews for the war in Gaza,” she says. “Since it’s easy to identify us as Jews by the mezuzah on our door, I figured it would be best if we just shut the lights, locked the door and left the house for the evening.”

Yael, who was born and raised in Israel, says she has also stopped wearing T-shirts that might identify her as Jewish or Israeli – including one of her favorites that has the word “ balabusta ” (the Yiddish word for an outstanding homemaker) written on it.

“My daughters are active in the Israeli Scouts movement here in the Bay,” Yael relays. “This week, for the first time, I told them not to wear their uniforms with the Israeli flag insignias when walking to their clubhouse. Instead, I instructed them to keep the uniforms in their bags and only change their clothes once they’re safely inside.”

‘Record antisemitism’

Since the war between Israel and Hamas erupted on October 7, antisemitism in the United States seems to bespiraling out of control. Jewish students on college campuses, presumed to be loyal to Israel, have been harassed, intimidated and even received death threats. Pro-Palestinian advocates have taken to the streets in numbers never seen before, calling for the destruction of Israel and justifyingHamas’ massacreas an act of “resistance.” Seemingly normal-looking people have beentearing up photos of Israeli childrentaken hostage by a terrorist organization.

Posters calling for the release of kidnapped Israelis in Gaza, on a Harvard noticeboard last month. "Normal-looking Americans" have been tearing them down.Credit: Brian Snyder/Reuters

On Friday nights, when I was an undergrad, I’d put on my kippa before going to the Hillel for Shabbat services and walk around with it, not thinking twice. Nowadays, I’m not sure I’d walk through the streets of Cambridge with a kippa on my head. Sam Meyerson

It all helps to explain why so many Jewish Americans, for the first time in their lives, have felt the need to hide their religious and ethnic identity as well as avoid certain places to protect themselves.

“The United States always seemed like a much safer place for Jews than other parts of the world,” says Sam Meyerson, a first-year law student at Harvard. “But the experience of the past month has left me with some questions about where things will go in the future. I don’t think the United States will turn into Europe, so to speak, but it has definitely left me anxious and on edge, especially in public.”

Secure Community Network, the organization officially tasked with guaranteeing the security and safety of American Jews, can barely keep track of all the complaints flooding its hotline.

“We are facing record antisemitism in the wake of the Hamas attacks,” says national director and CEO Michael Masters. “In the month of October, we logged a record 770 incident reports – more than double the previous month, and 192 percent above the same month last year.”

The organization also monitored 914 protests around the country last month that were flagged for “potential escalation” – compared with only 35 the previous month. “It gives a sense of the energy we’re dealing with,” Masters says.

Some Jewish Americans have been responding to rising antisemitism, according to Masters, by becoming more “adamantly frontal” about who they are. “We’re seeing growing numbers participating in demonstrations and vigils in solidarity with Israel,” he notes.

A demonstration against antisemitism, in New York last month. While some American Jews are hiding their ethnicity, others are becoming more openly proud about their religion.Credit: Emil Salman

I would be hard-pressed to recommend to any Jewish person to hide their identity. If it ever came to that, it would mean that we have failed in our collective responsibility as Americans to ensure the safety and security of our community. Michael Masters

But many more are opting to lie low and wait for better times to display their Jewish pride.

Rather than joining pro-Israel rallies and drawing attention to themselves, they are staying home behind closed doors. In neighborhoods or at events where they are in danger of being targeted, religious men are tucking in their tzitzit and either going bareheaded or covering their kippas with baseball caps. Star of David necklaces are being left in the jewelry box at home, and in some cases, even mezuzahs are being taken down.

Aware of the challenges facing many young Jews on campus, Jody Gordon has been encouraging her college student son to “be loud and be proud” about his Jewishness. She admits, however, that she sometimes has trouble taking her own advice.

“We live outside Philadelphia in an area that’s safe, but I work in the city and do think twice every time I park my car now and walk to work,” says the 56-year-old early childhood intervention specialist.

“There are moments – not many, but there are – when I zip up my jacket to hide my Star of David [necklace], which is something I never did before. Maybe it’s because I’m a child of Holocaust survivors, but I find myself feeling quite scared.”

Because he attended Harvard as an undergraduate student as well, law student Meyerson feels he has a good benchmark for comparison. “On Friday nights, when I was an undergrad I’d put on my kippa, before going to the Hillel for Shabbat services and walk around with it, not thinking twice,” he recalls. “Nowadays, I’m not sure I’d walk through the streets of Cambridge with a kippa on my head.”

He and his fiancée have a mezuzah on the front door of their home, “but we did talk about taking it off because of all the stuff going on here on campus,” he says, noting that Harvard has been a hotbed of anti-Israel activism this past month.

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators protesting at Harvard University last month.Credit: Brian Snyder/Reuters

Zach Leslie, a junior at NYU, avoids walking through Washington Square Park these days. “I used to hang out there a lot with my friends,” he says of the storied Greenwich Village park, situated in the heart of the campus. “But it just doesn’t feel like a safe space anymore.”

Leslie, who grew up in Palo Alto in a nonobservant family, says he also avoids wearing a favorite T-shirt of his featuring an Israeli flag.

Difficult encounter

Born and raised in Israel, Dalia Zahger-Levy recently became a mom. To celebrate the occasion, her parents flew in from Israel. “I’ve been telling them, as well as my husband, not to speak Hebrew outside – especially in certain places,” says Zahger-Levy, 30, who serves as civic and community engagement director for the Jewish Federation of Northern New Jersey.

Anna, who asked that her full name not be published, was born in Ukraine, grew up in Israel and has been living in the Bay Area for 12 years. Until a month ago, she made a point of speaking Hebrew with her 4-year-old daughter. “I no longer speak Hebrew with her in public,” she says. What prompted this change of habit, she explains, was a difficult encounter she experienced in the neighborhood recently.

Anna and her daughter had gone to place flowers on a memorial for victims of the Hamas attack, when a man approached them and began cursing Israel. “My daughter was absolutely startled, and I don’t want her to have to experience anything like that ever again,” says the 37-year-old management consultant.

In a rare warning, Israel’s National Security Council and Foreign Ministryurged Israelis last weekto reconsider travel abroad because of the high level of threats to their safety. In case they were already out of the country, it strongly recommended they hide symbols of their Israeli and Jewish identity and avoid protests.

The Secure Community Network has no intention of following suit – at least not at this point.

“Understanding the role religious freedom plays as a core tenet in our country,” says Masters, “I would be hard-pressed to recommend to any Jewish person to hide their identity. If it ever came to that, it would mean that we have failed in our collective responsibility as Americans to ensure the safety and security of our community.”

What the network is recommending, however, is ratcheting up security measures at Jewish institutions and Jewish gatherings. “We believe that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” Masters says.

When her son was born a month ago, Zahger-Levy and her husband affixed a mezuzah to the front door of their home in honor of his birth.

“Now I’m concerned about it,” she says of this well-known marker of a Jewish home. “I mean, just a few days ago a Jewish woman in France who had a mezuzah on her door was stabbed,” she notes,referring to an antisemitic attack in Lyon.

As a student at Columbia University, Zahger-Levy recounts, she had been active in campus organizations fighting antisemitism and an outspoken advocate for Israel.

“I’ve always been very proud of being Jewish, and I think it’s important that we remain proud of who we are – despite all our fears and concerns these days,” she says. “That’s why my mezuzah is still up.”