From Dreyfus to David Milstein: The enduring accusation of Jewish dual loyalty - opinion

Jews have always been the canary in the coal mine. This fight concerns the West itself: democracy, freedom, the idea that people can build better societies through faith, family, and responsibility.

On October 7, as Jews around the world mourned the largest massacre of our people since the Holocaust, New York’s Mayor Zohran Mamdani could not bring himself to give us even that one day.

Mamdani, who has accused Israel of genocide and campaigned on arresting its prime minister, marked the anniversary with a statement reminding New Yorkers that the suffering neither began nor ended on October 7.

The word “Israel” did not appear in it. He attended a vigil, made some hollow statements, then went on to his next meeting. For parts of his own base, even that brief appearance at a memorial was too much, and they protested against his attendance.

The next morning, October 8, The New York Times published a long investigation into David Milstein, senior adviser to US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee. I have watched many hit jobs over the years, and this one is among the most disturbing.

The Times said it interviewed 15 American officials. Every one of them is anonymous. Nine former diplomats were consulted for context, also anonymous. The few people who speak on the record are a former ambassador and a Democratic senator, and neither describes anything he personally saw Milstein do.

In a government the size of ours, a reporter can always find unnamed people willing to say unflattering things about someone. Those sources might sit on the Left. They might sit on the Right. Anyone who has followed the strange alliance of people who loathe Israel knows they can be found on both sides.

The core accusation is that David reviewed and revised embassy reports before they went to Washington. The article itself admits that reviewing and amending those reports is part of his job, and that political advisers to previous ambassadors did the same. So the charge comes down to this: he did his job with a point of view the Times dislikes.

The charge of dual loyalty

The article mentions that he left Washington to study in a Jerusalem yeshiva. It mentions his family. It describes him as a familiar figure in circles that support Israel. The message is that this man is too Jewish, too devoted, too close to Israel to be trusted with American interests. We have a name for that accusation. It is the oldest charge against Jews in public life: dual loyalty.

Huckabee has said he has absolute confidence in David and calls him a man of impeccable integrity. In response to the Times, he categorically rejected the story. I know David’s reputation, and I agree with the ambassador.

Here is a young man who served on Capitol Hill, who served two administrations, who has given his career to strengthening the alliance between America and its closest friend in the Middle East. He is a proud American patriot. He was preparing for his wedding when the Times decided he would make a useful target.

In 1894, Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish captain in the French army, was convicted of treason on forged evidence. He was publicly stripped of his rank while crowds outside shouted for death to the Jews. His real crime, as all of France would eventually learn, was being a Jew in a position of trust.

A young journalist from Vienna named Theodor Herzl watched that spectacle. What he saw convinced him that Jews would remain vulnerable until they had a land of their own to defend them. Two years later, he published the book that launched modern Zionism.

The tactics have changed very little since then. Today the weapon is a newspaper story stitched together from unnamed accusers rather than a forged letter. The goal is the same: to push Jews out of positions of influence, and eventually out of public life altogether, by suggesting their loyalty lies elsewhere.

The difference is that now we have Israel. That fact infuriates those who would prefer we had nowhere to go. Israel is the answer Herzl found in Paris, and it remains the reason so much hatred is aimed at any Jew who stands with it openly.

This is a message for my fellow Jews in New York who believe they can keep their Judaism while holding Israel at arm’s length. I understand the instinct. History offers no example of it working.

If Israel did not exist, the people who hate us would find another excuse, as they always have. Recently I watched a prominent voice in one hassidic community publicly side with Mamdani over Israel’s prime minister. That path will not protect anyone. When they come for the Jew who supports Israel, they will not stop to check how strongly the next Jew feels about it.

Jews have always been the canary in the coal mine. This fight concerns the West itself: democracy, freedom, the idea that people can build better societies through faith, family and responsibility.

The movements now rising on the far Left, many with roots in socialist and communist ideology, have brought ruin wherever they have taken power. Jews stand in their way, and so does Israel. That is why the attacks come first for us.

Mamdani showed us on October 7 exactly how much our grief is worth to him: a few hollow words, quickly followed by the same accusations he has hurled at Israel for years.

The Times showed us on October 8 what comes next, when a dedicated public servant is dragged through the mud by faceless accusers for the crime of loving Israel while serving America. Anyone fooled by a single day of sympathy has not been paying attention.

The men and women who stand with the Jewish people, as Milstein has done his entire career, deserve our loudest and most public defense.

Milstein deserves our support. The Times owes its readers names, evidence, and context. The rest of us owe ourselves the clarity Herzl found in Paris more than a century ago: our safety depends on standing together, with Israel, and without apology.

The writer is the International CEO of Aish, a global Jewish educational movement. He formerly served as eastern director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, where he oversaw the Museum of Tolerance in New York City.