Click here to see Ha’Am’s Fall 2017 Print Edition: “Growing Pains”
I sat down with Ben Shapiro, American conservative political commentator and editor-in-chief of The Daily Wire, to discuss his experiences at UCLA, his Jewish image, anti-Semitism, his views on Zionism and his politics.
Ben’s message to Jewish students at UCLA:
“Keep your heads up and don’t abandon your values without fully investigating what those values are. It’s very easy to get seduced into abandoning the values you grew up with because people have told you that it’s more sophisticated to do so. Do your own research and reading.”
On his political awakening:
“The Jewish experience at UCLA is actually what got me started in politics. I was walking around campus and saw people from the Daily Bruin comparing then Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, to Eichmann, the Nazi. I walked into the Daily Bruin office and I struck up a very good counterpoint — that’s how I started writing political stuff publicly.”
On campus Jewish experiences:
“When I was at UCLA, I was very involved with both Ha’Am and Bruins for Israel. I was probably the most militant member of both (chuckles), in terms of being the most right-wing member of both. I lived at home, so I wasn’t super involved with a Jewish frat or anything, but I knew everybody.”
On campus Orthodoxy:
“There wasn’t a big orthodox contingent on campus at the time. There was JAM with Rabbi Klatzko, but JLI showed up after I left, and the Hillel was run by Rabbi Chaim Seidler-Feller, who I would not get along with.”
On campus conflicts:
“There were frequent conflicts with folks like Rabbi Chaim, whose power at Hillel has since diminished. Chaim was a challenge because Chaim and I disagreed about politics radically. Chaim is very much to the left, he was a Peace Now kind of guy — even now — he’d use whatever resources were available to counter my perspectives. There was even a point where I got to editorship of Ha’Am, and he wanted to impact the editorial of Ha’Am. I told him I wasn’t going to allow him to do so, and he militate very strongly to have me removed as editor of Ha’Am. So yeah, there were some conflicts at the time.”
On the role religion plays on his politics:
“Religion helps define my values and values impact my politics. However, every policy that I espouse on has a secular, rational basis, so you’ll never hear me use the Bible as a source for policy.”
On the pressure of representing other Jews:
“I definitely feel a responsibility to represent a rational Judaic perspective as best as I can. However, whether other people choose feel represented by me, is up to them.”
On whether his speaking style is “too abrasive for someone wearing a yarmulke:”
“If I thought it were negative, I wouldn’t do it. I’m representing what I think are correct viewpoints both politically and morally, and I happen to be wearing a yarmulke while doing it because I’ve always worn a yarmulke. It’s not like I wake up in the morning and decide whether or not to wear a yarmulke, I’ve been wearing one since I was a kid. And so it’s a representation of my world views. If people are going to have a problem with my world views, they are gonna have a problem with me wearing a yarmulke. It is what it is. We can have disagreements in the “yarmulke community” over what represents a positive message to push. But the idea that we should not wear yarmulke in order not to offend someone who might feel offended that we are wearing a yarmulke — I think that is kind of dumb.”
On how people view him because of his Orthodoxy:
“I don’t think it has had much of an impact. I’ve been engaging in debates virtually my entire life. I’ve never felt that people are pulling their punches because I’m an Orthodox Jew, nor should they.”
On the differences between the left’s and right’s anti-Semitism:
“The anti-Semitism from the left is closer to the heart of the Democratic party than the anti-Semitism of the right is to the heart of the Republican party. (—) In the sense that they almost made Keith Ellison the chair of the DNC, but the right would never even consider Richard Spencer as head of the RNC.”
On the left’s anti-Semitism:
“The left’s anti-Semitism is heavily tied to the incorrect notion that inequality equals inequity. For example, Because Israel is very rich, and the Palestinians are not, it must be that Israel screwed them and therefore Israel does not deserve our support.” That is the logic behind why many left wing parties are anti-Israel. The Republican party, just by numbers, is more pro Israel. It is also more pro-freedom of religion than the Democratic party, which also opposes many people who have biblical values. So from that perspective, they hate the Constitution, they disagree with a lot of guided principles and they really are more anti-Semitic than the Conservatives.”
On the right’s anti-Semitism:
“The anti-Semitism from the “alt-right” is basically of the old school — neo-Nazi form: “Jews are cheap, Jews are liars, Jews are secretly Bolsheviks,” and all that kind of nonsense.
So I think the first group is larger than the second. I believe the Alt Right is a relatively small group. I should know, I was one of their biggest targets last year. However, I don’t want to make light of the alt right — they are awful, evil people. They made my life miserable for a year. But, as far as which one is closer to the heart of the movement, I think the left — Anti-Israel tendencies which tends to bleed over into anti-Semitism — is much more dangerous towards Jews.”
On the “alt-right” posing a real threat to Jews:
“Towards individual Jews but not the Jewish community at large. They would need to have actual political power to pose a real threat to the Jewish community.”
On whether Trump’s pro-Israel stance caused many to overlook the “alt-right”:
“I think that there are many Jews who pretend that the “alt-right” doesn’t exist or that ignore Trump’s winks and nods to them because of where Trump stands on Israel, and I do not think that is right.”
On “I hate Zionism, not Jews”:
“If you are anti-Zionist in the sense where you believe that Jews, who are their own unique people, do not deserve their own homeland and there should be no Judaic based nation — but you’re fine with Muslim based nations in the Middle East or Christian based nations in Europe — than you’re an anti-Semite. If you believe that Israel should be held to a standard that no other country should be held to and singling out Israel for criticism, than you are an anti-Semite. You don’t have to agree with every policy in Israel — I don’t agree with many — but you do have to believe that Israel has the right to exist as a Jewish state, a state that has Judaic principles at its center. You also cannot hold Israel to a different standard than other countries — something people on the left repeatedly do. People repeatedly push Israel to make deals with open terrorist groups who seek to destroy them and murder their children — a standard no other country is given.”
On how to criticize Israel:
“The same way we criticize U.S. politics. But when you suggest that Israel should make concessions to terrorist or that Israel does not have the right to defend itself from Hamas, that looks more like anti-Semitism to me than legitimate criticism of Israel.”
On comparing modern day figures and events to the Holocaust:
“Anybody who uses the Holocaust as their leaping off point is working in delicate territory. The targeted death of six million people based on ethnicity is a pretty outrageous charge to throw towards anybody. I generally don’t like historical parallels as a general rule. You have to determine if the comparison you’re making is actually apt or if you are just attempting to string the point while disrespecting the Holocaust.
If you’re trying to say Trump is a fascist then why not compare him to Mussolini? The only reason people compare Trump to Hitler is because Hitler was responsible for the Holocaust. That comparison would be fair game if Trump was actually a perpetuator of something like the Holocaust — but he is not — and even calling him a fascist is being generous. People evoke Hitler because he was the worst of the worst of the worst of the worst. However, no one ever makes comparisons to other fascists, such as Mussolini. If you’re going to be exact, then be exact.”
On Ambassador to Israel David Friedman’s “Jews criticizing Israel are far worse than kapos”:
“I disagree, obviously. However, it depends on the criticism of Israel. If you, for example, say that ‘Israel should not be fighting a defensive war against Hamas,’ I don’t think it’s inappropriate to say that it is like a Jew betraying another Jew in the face of someone who wants to murder them, which is what the kapo comparison is.”
On noteworthy position changes:
1. “The legalization of marijuana.”
2. “The government should get completely out of the business of marriage. I think the government does a bad job promoting it and they are now providing a club for people to use against religious organizations by enshrining same-sex marriage alongside heterosexual marriages.”
3. “When I was 19, I wrote a column that talked about transferring Arabs out of Israel, and I think that was immoral and wrong. So I’m changing my position on that.”
On stances that are unpopular with conservatives:
1. “Vowing ‘Never Trump.’ There were a lot of people who were angry at me, but there were also a lot of people who felt the same way I did. It was a very controversial position to take.”
2. “I believe that before you determine if a policy is good or bad you should put the shoe on the other foot. You should see how it feels if Obama was doing that to you. There are some conservatives who reject that logic.”
3. “I also say that although the media is bias to the left, not everything they say is fake news. There are people who object that too.”
