The origins of antisemitism

Plus: Rosh Hashanah and Constitution Day |

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By Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer In the walkup to the holiest days on the Jewish calendar—Rosh Hashanah (Sept. 15) and Yom Kippur (Sep. 24-25)—many Jews will be faced with long lines for security checks at religious services. The Anti-Defamation League documented more antisemitic incidents in 2022 than any other year since it started tracking them in 1979.  A new book called Jewish Space Lasers: The Rothschilds and 200 Years of Conspiracy Theories—out on Sep. 19— provides context for what fuels antisemitism and explores why so many conspiracy theories revolve around wealthy Jewish businessmen like George Soros and members of the Rothschild family. I spoke to author Mike Rothschild (no relation to the bankers) about the truth and myths about the Rothschilds’ financial success, and about how those lies still echo in American politics today. As he describes the common grievance at the root of antisemitism throughout the years, “There's always going to be a need for someone to blame when things go wrong—someone who has gotten too powerful, too rich, and needs to be knocked down a peg.” Click here to read the full conversation.

HISTORY ON TIME.COM The Rosh Hashanah Warning That Saved Denmark’s Jews By Lily Rothman The Jewish New Year, which begins Sept. 13 this year, was the occasion for a daring World War II rescue Read More » On Rosh Hashanah, Meet the Woman Who Made History as a Female Cantor By Olivia B. Waxman Just over 60 years ago, a New York congregation marked the Jewish new year with what was widely considered a new stage in the history of the faith: the debut of the first female cantor Read More » National Hispanic Heritage Month Is Incomplete Without Afro-Latino History By Natasha S. Alford The intersection of Black and Hispanic history tends to occupy an uncomfortable middle ground Read More » Constitution Day Celebrates America's Coming of Age By Denise Kiernan and Joseph D'Agnese The Fourth of July is the nation's birthday, but Sept. 17 matters too Read More » The Most Controversial Constitution Day in American History By Lily Rothman The annual Sept. 17 observance was the occasion for one of FDR's more scandalous oratories Read More »

FROM THE TIME VAULT This week in 1966: Bobby Kennedy TIME The Sept. 16, 1966, cover of TIME “Few observers doubt that some day, probably no later than 1972, the junior Senator from New York will try to cash in those coins for the presidency of the U.S. Conservative Columnist William F. Buckley Jr., with an almost perceptible shudder, talks of ‘the inevitability of Bobby.’ Playwright-Novelist Gore Vidal, a longtime foe, protests that ‘we now have a three-party system in America—the Democrats, the Republicans and the Kennedys.’...But with the possible exception of Lyndon Johnson, Bobby Kennedy is the most-talked-about politician in the U.S. today, and the most sought after.” Read More » This week in 1996: Bill Gates DAVID STRICK The Sep. 16, 1996, cover of TIME “Netscape and Microsoft are competing not against each other so much as against their own obsolescence. The victor will be not the company with the best browser but the team that can run the longest on this insanely fast product-development treadmill.I n fact, the Netscape-Microsoft battle may be our first good look at information-age corporate warfare…Nathan Myhrvold, the physics Ph.D. who is one of Gates' most trusted deputies, told Time a year ago that 'no matter how good your product, you are only 18 months away from failure.' He was wrong. That span has been cut to six months. And shrinking.” Read More » This week in 2005: Hurricane Katrina KATHLEEN FLYNN / ST. PETERSBURG TIMES / WPN The Sep. 12, 2005, cover of TIME “The larger lesson may be more humbling: after all the post-9/11 vows, are we still not well enough armed for the next big one? Humans are not very good at understanding risk, and in this country, they perform worst when it costs a lot to prevent or prepare for a disaster--especially when the people who would otherwise suffer the most are poor. Katrina was a big, vicious storm, it must be said. But Katrina was not the worst-case scenario. Katrina was a test.” Read More »

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