Current sectionJewish WorldShare to FacebookShare to XArticle printing is available to subscribers onlyPrint in a simple, ad-free formatSubscribeComments: Zen reading is available to subscribers onlyAd-free and in a comfortable reading formatSubscribeEvery society needs someone to bear the unthinkable, and many have been pressed into that role: the heretic, the witch, the foreigner, the infidel. Credit: Pedro Joffily de AraújoWhat we call antisemitism is not a single phenomenon. The functional Jew is a figure the mind reaches for when it needs an object on which to test its own capacity to think. The question is why the mind so often needs a figure outside itself to bear what is unthinkable01:25 PM • July 12 2026 IDTIn 1832 the writer Ludwig Börne made an observation that has lost none of its force: One man attacks him for being a Jew, the next forgives him for it, a third even praises him for it – and each one of them is thinking about it. "It is as if they had been conjured into this magic Jewish circle," he wrote. "None of them can get clear of it." Almost half a century before the word "antisemitism" was coined, Börne had already grasped something essential. Hatred of Jews is not only an attitude. It is a relational mode, and Jew and non-Jew alike are caught inside it.In the NewsIsrael Restricts Red Cross Visits to Palestinian Prisoners Despite Court RulingHamas Disarmament and Israeli Withdrawal Dominate Cairo Talks on Gaza's FutureRep. Khanna Urges Arrest of IDF Soldiers He Says Detained Him in West BankTop GOP Senator Lindsey Graham Dies at 71 After Sudden IllnessTehran Says Hormuz Closed, Gulf States Hit After U.S. Strikes Iran OvernightRemembering and rebuilding two years laterICYMIThe Original Tradwives of Ancient RomeThe 'Special Relationship' Is Gone, and Israel Isn't Ready for What's ComingAs Israel Lacks Hundreds of Patrol Officers, West Bank Staff DoublesMade in Kurdistan, Smuggled via Jordan: The Mysterious Firearms Flooding IsraelInside the German pro-Israel Lobby's Campaign to Defund UNRWAIsraeli Cop Filmed Throwing Stun Grenade Into Car, Trapping Palestinians Inside