A queer lens on Wiener’s comments
For many queer Jews, shock and disagreement with state Sen. Scott Wiener’s comments about genocide are not an abstract political disagreement. They represent a lived rupture. (“Wiener, in J. interview, elaborates on why he now calls Israel’s war a ‘genocide,’” Jan. 13)
Since Oct. 7, 2023, queer spaces that once functioned as sanctuary have increasingly become sites of exclusion. Jews who refuse to denounce Israel, or who are simply visible as Jewish, have been pushed out, silenced or treated as morally suspect. This is not happening at the margins of queer life, but in social spaces, dating platforms, activist organizations and political discourse.
The data reflect what many already know. A recent study found that 82 percent of LGBTQ+ Jews experienced harassment or exclusion in online queer spaces, and two-thirds reported heightened antisemitism when wearing visibly Jewish symbols. This is not a fringe experience. It is a pattern.
As a psychologist and psychoanalyst working with queer Jewish communities in the aftermath of Oct. 7, I have seen the toll. Queer Jews whose friendships vanished overnight. People pressured to perform public denunciations to regain basic social recognition. Others who have left cities or the country entirely, convinced there is no place where they can be fully queer and fully Jewish. Clinically, this is traumatic invalidation, the systematic delegitimization of one’s identity and emotional reality.
This is the context in which many queer Jews read Sen. Wiener’s statements, not as isolated remarks but as part of a broader cultural shift that increasingly asks Jews to be quiet, apologetic and grateful for conditional acceptance. That is a ritual queer people know well. If queer liberation is to mean more than slogans and symbols, it must include queer Jews who refuse to fragment themselves for conditional belonging.
Joshua Simmons | San Francisco
Wiener conceded to Israel haters
I read state Sen. Scott Wiener’s justification for labeling Israel’s war in Gaza as “genocide” with great disappointment. While Jews and non-Jews alike are entitled to criticize Israel, some words carry precise legal and moral weight. Applying this label reflects a capitulation to pressure and a troubling disregard for context rather than moral clarity.
Like many critics who claim to support Israel while opposing its military response, Wiener offers no viable alternative for Israel’s self-defense following the Oct. 7 massacre. He seems to validate his recent embrace of the word “genocide” by his own early criticism of Israel. Yet, it is the speed with which “genocide” rhetoric emerged — and the haste with which South Africa filed charges at the International Court of Justice, just two months after Oct. 7, 2023 — that suggests a predisposition toward the accusation, rather than a sober legal assessment.
Ironically, the only actors with stated genocidal intent are Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran. Hamas has documented its own crimes, including intentionally placing Gazan civilians in harm’s way in order to boost global pressure on Israel along with hijacking food supplies. These realities receive little attention from those eager to affix the most extreme moral charges to Israel’s response.
War is horrific, and we should feel deep discomfort at civilian suffering. However, when I reflect on the Bibas family, and the faces of the mother and her boys as they were being dragged into Gaza, I must ask: What response was Israel expected to choose? By adopting this language now, Sen. Wiener has not advanced peace or justice; he has simply handed Israel haters another victory.
Alan Zorfas | Foster City
Applauding Wiener’s bravery
I want to express my deep respect for state Sen. Scott Wiener’s bravery in describing Israel’s war in Gaza as a genocide. As someone who has lived in Israel and is deeply connected to that country, I too was very resistant to the word, until my son helped me understand how younger Jews who are proud of their heritage are responding to Israel’s war.
The Jewish Community Relations Council Bay Area’s characterization of his statement as lacking “moral clarity” is both disappointing and further reflects how out of touch the organization is with the sentiments of many young, unaffiliated Jews.
Richard Weiner | Oakland
I hesitated to call it ‘genocide’
Thank you, state Sen. Scott Wiener, for your insights and J. for your coverage of it. Your perspectives have helped clarify my own understanding.
Like Wiener, I initially hesitated to use the term “genocide” and have often removed myself from debates about the issue. However, the situation transcends mere terminology.
It does not contradict our Jewish support for Israel, even if that may seem contradictory to some. The complexity lies in our ability to support our homeland while simultaneously rejecting the consequences of current policies, which undeniably amount to genocide.
The devastating impact — evidenced by the loss of lives, mass displacement, severe trauma and injuries, and the catastrophic results for an ethnic group — clearly corresponds to the definition of genocide.
I learned long ago that intent does not equal impact. We must be held accountable for the effects of our actions, just as the government of Israel is accountable for its policies. This must be our guiding truth, and it is imperative that we strive for a humane, constructive solution, as difficult as that may be. Personally, I believe that the soul of Israel is at stake.
Laurie B. Lippin | Guerneville
Wiener knows what’s good for Israel?
You published three recent letters attacking state Sen. Scott Wiener for his use of the term “genocide” to describe Israel’s behavior toward the Palestinians, and not one that supported his position or acknowledged the moral courage it took to embrace it.
In a debate, Sen. Wiener initially hesitated to describe Israel’s war as a genocide, but after further reflection and painful struggle, and after extensive consultation with colleagues, friends and Jewish leadership, he decided that the horrors inflicted on the Palestians did constitute genocide.
This was his painful, truthful conclusion. But his detractors’ conclusion is that Sen. Wiener is “shameful” and “obsequious.” For them, there is only one question to ask: “Is it good for Israel?”
Maximum respect to Sen. Wiener for acknowledging that the other side of the good-for-Israel coin is the immense suffering of the Palestinians. I believe that as time evolves, Sen. Wiener will prove to know better than the rest what is best for Israel.
John Lovejoy | San Rafael
Not all conflict is ‘genocide’
As another International Holocaust Remembrance Day passes, I am troubled by a persistent lack of knowledge and teaching of the Holocaust, by the repeated Holocaust inversions that are casually accepted by our political leaders, and by the willingness of so many to redefine the word “genocide” downward to encompass any large-scale conflict.
It is true that, over time, many words have their meanings altered. But allowing this term to be expanded so far that it loses its original definition of something well and beyond what happens in war is not an acceptable way to let language grow. Ultimately, if all conflict is genocide, then nothing is. Rather than allow — and even encourage — this inaccuracy, I believe that we have to demand adherence to the concept, definition and historical examples that are no longer in the immediate view of most individuals.
We have an obligation to those who came before us — to those who perished and to those who lived. Personally, I feel a responsibility to Sigi (z”l), the Holocaust survivor I met as a high school senior on March of the Living in 1996, and with whom I literally walked into the former Auschwitz camp. It is our responsibility to help younger generations understand that it’s possible to acknowledge tremendous loss, to question operational tactics and to criticize the words and choices of national leadership, while also maintaining the inviolability of defining actual genocide.
Danielle Feldman | Santa Rosa
Students knew what day it was
Of course the students from Berkeley High School knew the date when they walked out in support of Palestinians on International Holocaust Remembrance Day. If the students did not know, they could have apologized later. (“Berkeley High students stage pro-Palestinian walkout on Holocaust Remembrance Day,” Jan. 27)
Perhaps fewer of these types of articles would be better. Decreased attention on the teenagers would probably result in fewer of these events.
Karen Levi | Potomac, Maryland
‘Never again for anyone’
Your story on the Berkeley High teach-out includes quotes by people suggesting that having the event on International Holocaust Remembrance Day somehow insulted the memory of the Holocaust.
I was one of the adults who attended the teach-out at Martin Luther King Jr. Civic Center Park. The focus of the event was to protest the genocide in Gaza and the recent attempts to censor Palestine-related education, as exemplified by AB 715. When the topic of the Holocaust arose, it was treated with respectfulness and solemnity. At least two of the speakers traced their own roots back to the Holocaust.
In many cases, Zionists have used the Holocaust as a justification for Israel’s genocidal behavior toward Palestine. As a Jew, I believe we should work to prevent all genocides. The Berkeley students echoed this sentiment. “Never again” must mean “never again for anyone.”
Larry Hendel | Berkeley
Remember Palestinian prisoners
Regarding “Jewish world marks first day with no hostages in Gaza” (Jan. 27) — Mazel tov! Now let’s focus on the Palestinian hostages being held in dire conditions, without charges, in Israeli prisons. And let’s remember and mourn those dead Palestinian “prisoners” who were exchanged — without identification, many mutilated — for deceased hostages (Israeli and other) returned by Hamas. They were all humans, too, with names we will never hear.
Avi Black | Berkeley