Fuckful Friday
Fuck Fuck Fuck Project Esther
Last night I attended a webinar with Jews for Shared Safety. We discussed combating the authoritarian, anti-semitic, anti-liberty threat of Project Esther, an addendum to the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 that specifically targets American Jews, and the company we keep. Jews have been discussing this manifesto since it was released on October 7th 2024 (mmmhmm) and I’ve read it a few times, it’s only 33 pages— you can read it here.
Many American Jews are comparing Project Esther to the McCarthyism of the 1940s and ‘50s. While I agree, I don’t completely agree. This is much worse than the past, because Senator Joseph McCarthy didn’t have Google, Microsoft, or OpenAI to dig into someone’s entire communications, associations, purchases, daily routines, online habits, and algorithm-created digital twins.
The most important thing to remember about Project Esther is that it wasn’t written by Jews, American or otherwise, and the very first sentence gives this away. They incorrectly identify where the story of Esther comes from and at the same time make no mention of Judaism, only the Torah (the Book of Esther is in the Hebrew Bible, not the Torah) and the document makes zero mention of Hebrew anything.
Another glaring give-away that no Jew touched this document is this language: “the Reformed Jewish movement.” Reform Judaism is a denomination within the faith; there’s no such thing as a reformed Jew… unless a Christian Zionist means a Jew forced to convert or burn, in which case the usage makes perfect sense.
I find it more than odd for a group of people who never shut the fuck up about religious freedom, to suddenly become quiet about the thing that makes Jews—Jews.
Here’s a breakdown of keywords and usage in the document I found interesting:
Mention of Jew or Jewish: 81 times
Antisemitism: 61
Antisemite: 2
Jew-hater: 4
Palestinian: 16
Palestine: 37
Hamas: 50
Hamas Support Network (HSN): 82
Hamas Support Organizations (HSO): 86
148 mentions related to Jews, 53 mentions of Palestine and Palestinians, and a whooping 218 mentions of Hamas.
Might makes some Jews wonder if this is really about protecting Jews, because there is no Hamas in the United States spreading antisemitism or threatening the safety of Jews, or anyone else. Hamas is not in the room with us, and if they were, that would handled by existing US law which covers organizations labeled as terror groups or organizations supporting terror groups.
And although it’s anecdotal, I can assure you that the rise in antisemitism that I’ve experienced since Oct. 7th is overwhelmingly from Christian white people, as it always has been. Nothing new there.
Half-way into the manifesto the blaming of the Jewish American left starts, in combination with the groundwork and language needed to identify ‘self-hating Jews’ (a tired trope about Jews who care about human rights, Palestinians, and Arabs.) The goal is to label some Jews as part of groups promoting Jew-hatred, and call for all Americans, not just Zionists or Jews, to support and assist in the goals of Project Esther.
PROJECT ESTHER A NATIONAL STRATEGY TO COMBAT ANTISEMITISM
The American Jewish community has not demonstrated a unified resolve against the HSN, its HSOs, and their program of Jew-hatred and America-hatred. While a strong, capable element has mustered financial, political, and moral support both for the Jewish state of Israel and for efforts to counter academic intolerance in some select institutions, particularly at the administrator level, significant components of the community remain disengaged. Some may be blind and deaf to the manifestation of HSN-inspired antisemitism at home. Some may be in such disbelief that they cannot even acknowledge the threat. More likely, many simply do not know what to do and are waiting for leadership to guide them. (Project Esther pg 15)
The short, truthful version of what the Heritage Foundation means is this: American leftists Jews (continuing both Jewish and American traditions of being mouthy about human rights) aren’t stepping in line with the genocide (nor will we) and are criticising the US-Israeli relationship too much (and we won’t stop.) We must be confused, or shocked, and are in need of a National Coalition of White Christian Supremacists to protect us from the Big Bad Hamas Wolf.
What I always find fascinating about supremacist ideology is their insistence that one is always both a victim and a complacent participant, as if any of us control the rules and functions of this sick fucking system.
Scapegoating Jews isn’t new, but the language being used, the well-coordinated strategy, and the collaboration of major corporations—ask IBM what slaughtering Jews did for their stock— is the beginning of very bad things if the Christo-fascists don’t get blowback on this.
We will organize rapidly, take immediate action to “stop the bleeding,” and achieve all objectives within two years from the beginning of our efforts. Our hope is that this will represent an opportunity for public–private partnership when a willing Administration occupies the White House. (Project Esther pg 17)
I want to note that the line, “an opportunity for public–private partnership when a willing Administration occupies the White House” appears more than once in Project Esther. It’s a written dog whistle for white supremacy to step up and join this administration in a new era of Americana paranoia and violence.
January 6th was the warning. Our government dropped the fucking ball to such a degree, it’s not crazy to wonder if it was on purpose. Maniacs at the helm, and elected officials are holding little motherfucking signs, and censoring anyone who even pretends to try something in dissent.
The government is not going to help us fight fascism when the government is fascism. We had our warning, and now we are being dragged into the thick of it.
Historically things don’t look good. I’m not feeling good about being designated by the government as a good Jew or a bad Jew in the near future.
Definitely not okay with a bunch of Christo-fascists deciding Jewish identity, who’s what, how much—Jewish parents tend to talk to their children about those things very early on and they never stop. My Dad’s been dead for several years, and he’s still talking to me about this stuff.
The government is taking action to change perceptions within the Jewish community, and the broader American public, to view Jews like me as a safety threat trying to “unravel the fabric of American society.”
As if.
Fuck off.
As serious as all of this is, it is also incredibly comical. All of this is quite absurd. So, I’ll keep giving my fucks and reminding you that fascists have no real appreciation of humor, and they don’t get satire at all. They’re terribly boring and bitter people.
We’re a lot more fun. <3
