More U.S. Jews Shield Identity in Public Amid Antisemitism Fears, Post Poll Finds

The Washington Post

13:03 JST, October 16, 2025

U.S. Jews increasingly say they are hiding their identity in a country where they believe they continue to face significant antisemitism and where slightly fewer than 1 in 5 feel very safe, a Washington Post poll finds.

The nation’s 6 million Jewish adults also are skeptical of President Donald Trump’s campaign to fight antisemitism on college campuses, with nearly two-thirds suggesting he is conducting it for other reasons, according to the poll. Jews widely disapprove of Trump’s performance overall, the results show.

The poll was conducted in early September, before Trump helped negotiate a ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza war and the release of Israeli hostages and Palestinian detainees.

Nearly half of U.S. Jews say there is “a lot” of antisemitism in the U.S., and a similar share say there is “some” – numbers almost identical to the results of a Pew Research Center survey conducted five years ago.

A third say they don’t feel safe in the United States, and two-thirds report seeing antisemitic content online at least once a month. At the same time, a large majority – 73 percent – say they have not been the target of antisemitic remarks online or in person in the past year.

In one clear development, the poll finds 42 percent of Jewish Americans say they’ve avoided publicly wearing, carrying or displaying anything that might help people identify them as Jewish in the past year. That is up from 26 percent who said that to a similar question in a 2023 poll by the American Jewish Committee and from 23 percent in 2022 but similar to 40 percent tracked by the group last year.

Joan Rubin, 55, who works at a housing development in the Bronx, said she recently stopped wearing a six-pointed Star of David after someone in her neighborhood approached her about the necklace.

“They said: ‘Oh you like the idea of killing babies?’ I said ‘No of course not.’ Then they said: ‘Then you better take that f—ing thing off your neck, or maybe you need to not walk around this neighborhood,’” Rubin recalled.

Just 18 percent of Jews say they feel “very” safe in the U.S., while 51 percent say they feel somewhat safe, 26 percent say “not too” safe and 6 percent say “not at all.”

There have been several high-profile threats and attacks on Jews and Jewish organizations in recent months. In April, an attacker set fire to the residence of Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (D), who is Jewish, during the Passover holiday; a Pennsylvania man pleaded guilty to the charges Tuesday. In late May, a gunman shot and killed two Israeli Embassy employees as they left a reception at a Jewish museum in D.C. Less than two weeks later, a man in Boulder, Colorado, was accused of hurling molotov cocktails at a demonstration where people had gathered to call for the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza.

Those attacks are increasingly motivated by Israel’s conflict with Hamas in Gaza, the Anti-Defamation League concluded in June. In 2024, 58 percent of antisemitic incidents “contained elements related to Israel or Zionism,” according to the organization’s annual antisemitism report, released this year. That has risen since the group began tracking the data with a new definition two years ago.

During the months after the war began in 2023, Jewish students and watchdog groups saw a series of antisemitic incidents on campuses. Jewish students at Cooper Union in New York sheltered in a library as pro-Palestinian demonstrators banged on the glass walls of the building. At a pro-Palestinian protest near Tulane University in New Orleans, at least two students were assaulted in a melee that began when someone tried to burn an Israeli flag.

In the 2024-2025 school year, as the war continued, vandalism and assaults on campuses were down sharply, but online antisemitic bullying was up, according to Hillel International, a Jewish student organization.

The Post poll finds Jewish women are more likely than men to say they avoided displaying Jewish symbols (51 percent vs. 36 percent). Younger Jews also are more likely to say that: 53 percent among those under age 35, compared with 45 percent of those ages 35-49, 40 percent among those ages 50-64 and 34 percent of those age 65 and older.

The administration has cited fighting anti-Jewish harassment as the motivation for everything from deporting pro-Palestinian international students to cutting billions in science and medical research grants from colleges it says have tolerated bias against Jews.

But 69 percent say a task force created by Trump won’t be effective at reducing antisemitism on college campuses, and 71 percent of U.S. Jews disapprove generally of the way Trump is handling his job.

Asked in the poll how effective the Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism, based at the Department of Justice, would be at reducing antisemitism on college campuses, 27 percent said “not too” effective and 42 percent said “not at all.”

When asked what they believe the main goal of the task force is, 35 percent said to “reduce antisemitism on college campuses.” Forty-five percent said the goal is to “make college campuses more politically conservative” and 21 percent offered other ideas. Those included: “attack his political enemies,” “assert dominance over people in academia” and “crack down on free speech and dissent.”

The findings show U.S. Jews “react to experiences of antisemitism very differently” depending on their expectations or when their ideas on the topic were formed, said Stacy Burdett, who has worked for decades in antisemitism prevention.

“For the most part, people are shocked [antisemitism] would reemerge again in our country,” she said. “Baby boomers and Gen Xers were raised in an America in which the Jewish story of marginalization and discrimination and otherness was over. So it’s shocking.”

Hadar Susskind, CEO of New Jewish Narrative, a group that advocates a pluralistic, democratic Israel, said U.S. Jews are trying to sort through the rise in the number of antisemitic incidents, more openly anti-Jewish hate online and the complex effects of the Israel-Gaza war.

Some have painted criticism of Israel and its campaign in Gaza as motivated by anti-Jewish attitudes.

“We have to hold in our minds, at the same time, that there is a serious increase in virulent and deadly incidents and also a massive explosion in the weaponization of antisemitism in order to shut down criticism of Israel,” he said.

Shift away from Democrats

The poll reveals a Jewish community that is wary and divided about its domestic political allies.

Asked how friendly or unfriendly the GOP, the Democratic Party and Trump are to Jews, the poll finds all three are seen as roughly equal.

That assessment is a plunge for the Democratic Party since 2020, when 52 percent of U.S. Jews considered the party friendly, compared with 36 percent who say this today. Trump and Republicans made gains over the same period.

Rubin, who works at the Bronx housing development, said she used to vote Democratic but has shifted right in recent years because some of that party’s leaders have intensely criticized Israel. Now she identifies as Republican and voted for Trump last year.

“I’ve seen the Democratic Party become less and less supportive of Israel and now it seems to have escalated to the point where I don’t feel confident the Democrats are protecting us against antisemitism,” Rubin said. “I’m tending towards feeling safer with Trump and the Republicans. It’s just a gut feeling.”

About 3 in 10 American Jews say the Democratic Party is unfriendly toward Jews (31 percent), roughly triple the proportion in a 2020 Pew survey and on par with 29 percent who say the Republican Party is unfriendly. This shift is much sharper among Jews who identify or lean Republican.

Burdett, who has worked with the Anti-Defamation League and the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, believes there’s a tribal, emotional reason U.S. Jews increasingly see the Democratic Party as “unfriendly,” even as they overwhelmingly disapprove of Trump’s presidency.

Most U.S. Jews think of the Democratic Party “as their home,” she said. “Jews have been leaders of liberal social movements through U.S. history. … When antisemitism is in a liberal movement it feels like the call is coming from inside the house.”

Trump administration

But the poll finds most American Jews are skeptical of Trump.

Among the roughly 7 in 10 who disapprove generally of the way he’s handling his job, 64 percent do so strongly – and 65 percent say he doesn’t understand the concerns of Jewish Americans. About 35 percent say he understands Jewish Americans’ concerns at least “somewhat well,” including 15 percent who say he understands their concerns “very well.”

Eden Stern, 30, who lives in Arlington, Virginia, and works in urban forestry, said she sees Trump’s citing of antisemitism as “more about the power dynamic” between him and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “It’s not about protecting American Jews; I think it’s more about political gain,” Stern said.

She said GOP leaders have failed to consistently denounce antisemitism when it comes from their allies, some of whom have ties to white supremacists. “You can’t say you are pro-Jewish and you’re for the Jewish people and not denounce neo-Nazis. I don’t think you can be both,” she said.

Post-election surveys showed Trump in 2024 gained some support from Jewish voters compared with 2020. Pew Research Center surveys of validated voters found 34 percent of Jewish voters supported Trump in 2024, up from 27 percent in 2020. The Post poll finds 97 percent of Jewish Trump voters approve of his performance, including 51 percent who do so strongly.

Stern is extremely critical of Israel’s campaign in Gaza, where she believes the Jewish state has committed war crimes and genocide. But she also sees the war being used to attack U.S. Jews.

“I see people posting about the war, and there’s no religious context but they’ll say: ‘Oh yeah, Jews are the cause of all evil, they own the government’ – the generic antisemitic commentary,” she said.

Antisemitism on campus

There are divisions among Jewish Americans as to what they see as antisemitic behavior.

Just 15 percent say criticizing Israel “for any reason” is antisemitic, and 22 percent said it is antisemitic to criticize Israel for its actions in Gaza. Roughly three-quarters say challenging Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state is antisemitic, and 71 percent believe it is antisemitic to suggest U.S. Jews bear responsibility for Israel’s actions in Gaza. A smaller 54 percent majority say it’s antisemitic to demand U.S. universities divest from companies that do business with Israel.

Megan Rust, a 37-year-old state employee who lives in Lincoln, Nebraska, said opposition to Zionism is getting muddled with antisemitism – which to her are different concepts.

“I am anti-Zionist for sure and some people would say that’s antisemitic, and then we have to get into a whole debate,” Rust said.

Rust lives near the University of Nebraska campus and said she knows of no antisemitic or anti-Israel incidents there or in the area. Generally she believes the topic is being used as a political football “to bring separation within the country.”

Forty-four percent of Jewish Americans say there is “a lot” of antisemitism on college and university campuses. A similar percentage of Jews under the age of 35, most of whom have attended college in the past decade, hold the same view, but are more likely than Jews in general to say there is “not much” or “none at all.”

Jewish Republicans are more than twice as likely as Democrats to say there is “a lot” of antisemitism on college campuses, 76 percent vs. 31 percent, with independents in the middle at 50 percent. That contrasts with beliefs on antisemitism in the United States, which are more evenly divided: 47 percent of Democrats and 53 percent of Republicans.

“The worst problem for Jews is social media and its ability to amplify this hate,” said Pamela Nadell, a historian of American Judaism at American University. “What people don’t understand is the power of being attacked for this aspect of one’s identity.”

The Washington Post poll was conducted Sept. 2-9, among a random national sample of 815 Jewish Americans drawn through SSRS’s Opinion Panel, an ongoing survey panel recruited through random sampling of U.S. households. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 4.7 percentage points.

The sample includes adults who identify as Jewish by religion as well as those who identify as adults with no religious affiliation but Jewish ethnically, culturally or through their family background – and either were raised Jewish or have a parent who is Jewish.

In all, 76 percent of the sample was Jewish by religion and 24 percent was Jewish without a religious affiliation.