Throughout history, anti-Semites have attempted to link viruses to Jewish communities, in order to marginalize and oppress them. The coronavirus is no exception

Even while the world grapples with the most pressing health issue of our time, there are those who are using the coronavirus pandemic as another excuse to attack the Jewish people, a phenomenon I am calling “coronasemitism.”

This week, the FBI warned that white supremacist groups are targeting police and Jewish people by planning to expose them to coronavirus. If their members contract the virus, they are being encouraged to use themselves as bio-weapons, to infect synagogues, marketplaces and areas where Jewish people might congregate.

Behind the COVID-19 headlines, it was reported yesterday that the FBI foiled a neo-Nazi plot to blow up a packed hospital in Missouri. The suspect behind the plot was a white supremacist who was shot and killed by a joint terrorism task force. While under surveillance, he considered bombing a school with a large number of African-American students, a mosque and a synagogue, before settling on a local hospital filled with coronavirus patients. In an online post, he claimed that “this whole thing (the virus) was engineered by Jews as a power grab.”

This sickening hate-motivated behaviour is consistent with the general growth of anti-Semitism worldwide. In recent years, we have seen attacks on a Pittsburgh synagogue, which killed 11 worshippers, and a shul in Poway, Calif., where one person died. More recently, a man stabbed five Orthodox Jews in Monsey, N.Y., and a Jersey City kosher market was attacked, leaving four dead, including a police officer.

And just this week, a New York car dealership was accused of discrimination after a Hasidic Jew was denied a pre-scheduled service appointment on the alleged grounds that he was “spreading” the coronavirus. It’s being reported that when he arrived at his appointment, he was turned away, despite the fact that the dealership was continuing to see customers.

Throughout history, anti-Semites have attempted to link viruses to Jewish communities, in order to marginalize and oppress them. The coronavirus is no exception. In the 14th century, Jews were falsely accused of poisoning wells and spreading the bubonic plague. This accusation had the desired effect: Jewish communities were massacred throughout Europe. Sound familiar?

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