Passover arrives each year with a familiar structure. Jewish people gather, retell the same story, and move through a ritual that has barely changed in centuries. Slavery, redemption, freedom. The sequence is fixed.

This year, the question is not whether Jews remember the past. It is whether they understand the present and are willing to describe it without euphemism.

Hostility toward Israel no longer hides behind coded language or careful phrasing. It is stated openly across campuses, in newsrooms, in NGOs, and throughout the institutions that shape public discourse. Israel is described as illegitimate. Zionism is labeled immoral. Jewish sovereignty is framed as a mistake that should be corrected.

These are not policy critiques. These are arguments against existence.

That distinction is often blurred, and not by accident. The language of “human rights” and “decolonization” has been used to recast a very old idea in modern terms, that Jews, uniquely, are not entitled to self-determination. In a world where about 27 countries proclaim Islam as their official state religion, some 14 countries officially recognize Christianity as their state religion or have a specific established church, and at least four carry Buddhism as theirs, no other people are asked to defend their right to exist in this way. That asymmetry is not incidental. It is the point!

This shift did not happen overnight. It developed slowly, in part because key terms were left undefined long enough to be reshaped. “Zionism” has come to mean entirely different things depending on who is using it. For some, it is simply the expression of Jewish self-determination. For others, it has been transformed into a global symbol of oppression. Once a term is allowed to float without definition, it becomes easy to weaponize.

That is why a phrase like “I don’t hate Jews; I just hate Zionists” can be tossed around by pundits, podcasters, and influencers without honest scrutiny. The distinction holds only as long as a mere few insist on defining it.

External hostility explains part of what is happening. It does not explain why it spreads so easily.

A point I have consistently heard from my rabbi, Rabbi Ephraim Simon, someone I rely on for guidance and perspective, is that false narratives do not sustain themselves. They take hold where there is space for them. That space is created not by malice, but by lack of clarity, uncertainty about definitions, boundaries, and identity. Confusion makes distortion possible. Division allows it to stick.

That idea becomes easier to understand in practice. In my volunteer work with Jewish community security groups and organizations, the difference between reactive and proactive environments is clear. Communities that depend entirely on outside protection are always one step behind. They respond after something has already happened.

Communities that take responsibility for their own awareness operate differently. The people who live in a neighborhood understand it in ways outsiders cannot. They recognize patterns: who belongs, who moves with familiarity, who does not. All based on behavior and intimacy. That kind of awareness allows for early recognition when something is off, before it escalates.

Law enforcement plays an essential role. They respond, investigate, and enforce. They are not designed to replace internal awareness. They rely on it.

The same principle applies more broadly. A community that cannot define itself clearly cannot recognize when it is being misrepresented or targeted. It becomes reactive by default.

None of this is new. The pattern is familiar: internal confusion or division, followed by the hardening of external narratives, followed by a shift in which facts become secondary and the argument moves from conduct to existence.

That pattern is visible again. Jewish students are excluded unless they disavow Israel. Israeli identity is treated as inherently suspect. Calls for dismantling the Jewish state are framed not as extreme, but as morally necessary. At that point, the discussion is no longer political. It is foundational.

Passover, in that context, carries a different weight. It is often framed as a story of survival and triumph. It is more demanding than that. It insists on clarity.

The Haggadah does not allow distance. It requires each person to see themselves as if they personally left the bondage and oppression of ancient Egypt. The point is not memory for its own sake. It is recognition of patterns that do not stay in the past.

Rabbi Simon suggested a reading of V’hi She’amda that shifts how that recognition works. The familiar translation is comforting: “this (G-d’s promise and the Torah) is what has stood by us, that in every generation they rise against us, and God saves us.”

His interpretation is less reassuring.

The same phrase can be read not only as “this stood by us,” but also as “this has held us back.” The vulnerability is not only external. It is internal; a weakening of cohesion, a loss of clarity, a hesitation to define what should be obvious.

That idea is uncomfortable, but it explains something important. Falsehoods, even extreme ones, do not persist because they are strong. They persist because they are given space. That space is created when there is fragmentation, when identity is unclear, when language is imprecise, when boundaries are not stated.

When there is cohesion – shared understanding, confidence in identity, alignment – external attacks struggle to take hold. When there is confusion, disarray, or even disharmony, baseless claims can spread and become normalized.

That is the shift in perspective. It moves the question from “Why do they keep doing this?” to “What conditions are allowing this to work?”

There is still a reluctance, especially in institutional settings, to say this plainly. Antizionism is often treated as a neutral or legitimate political position adjacent to antisemitism, rather than recognized for what it frequently becomes in practice.

That hesitation has consequences. If the elimination of the Jewish state is framed as a moral good, then Jewish self-determination becomes uniquely illegitimate. No other national movement is treated this way. No one else is asked to justify their existence under these conditions.

At the same time, not every criticism of Israel is antisemitic. That distinction matters. The line is crossed when Israel’s existence itself is denied, when Jews are excluded unless they renounce it, and when Jewish identity becomes conditional.

At that point, the argument is no longer about policy. It is about erasure.

Passover is built around telling a story correctly. Not approximately. Not selectively. Correctly.

That responsibility does not end at the Seder table.

If Jews cannot define their own identity with precision, others will define it for them. That process is already underway.

External hostility is not new. Internal hesitation is what makes it effective.

Clarity is not a luxury. It is a requirement. Passover 2026 arrives at a moment when that is no longer theoretical.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)