ArcaMax

SAN DIEGO -- I feel sick. But that is par for the course. America is also not well. Too many Americans are afflicted with what Israeli Ambassador to the United States Yechiel Leiter this week correctly diagnosed as "moral depravity."

Leiter was responding to the killing of Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim, a young couple who worked for the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. Lischinsky, 30, was a research assistant in the embassy, and Milgrim, 26, organized missions and visits to Israel.

According to Leiter, Lischinsky was preparing to propose to Milgrim in Jerusalem in the next several days. The love story ended Wednesday when both were gunned down near the Capital Jewish Museum, where an event was being held by the American Jewish Committee. Lischinsky and Milgrim were exiting the building after attending the event when shots rang out.

The alleged assailant has been identified as 31-year-old Elias Rodriguez of Chicago, who appears to be Latino and lives in a neighborhood on the city's West Side that is home to many Mexican families. When police arrived, Rodriguez pulled out a red keffiyeh, or Palestinian scarf, from his pocket and chanted, "Free Palestine ... there's only one solution, intifada revolution." Other witnesses said that the assailant shouted: "I did it for Gaza!"

The brutal attack on Israel by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, resulted in the deaths of more than 1,200 Israelis and the taking of at least 247 hostages into Gaza. In response, Israel leveled Gaza. This created even more hatred for Israel, and for its chief benefactor: the United States.

The story of the D.C. murders is both foreign and domestic. The Middle East is dysfunctional. Yet, at times, the same goes for the United States.

In this country, there is no empathy. We hammer each other with cruelty and insult. Some Americans commit evil deeds. Others empower evil by looking away or making excuses or refusing to call antisemitism or racism or xenophobia by their proper name.

If I befriend like-minded people with similar backgrounds, that's a community. And it's celebrated. If you do the same thing, that's a tribe. And it's unacceptable.

In 2025, Americans are so deep in the well of denial that we can't see -- or perhaps refuse to see -- that the world's oldest form of hatred is on the march even when we hear the footsteps loud and clear.

In January 2012, along with a handful of other Latino journalists, I took a life-changing trip to the Holy Land, which was sponsored by the New York-based group America's Voices in Israel. I was never the same.

I now see clearly the similarities between the Jewish community and my own. Both Latinos and Jews have strong immigrant traditions, and both have been accused of harboring divided loyalties. Both have histories of being targeted by nativists and subjected to vicious hate crimes meant to make us feel unwelcome in our own country.

Come to think of it, I recognize this pain. I felt it on Aug. 3, 2019, a day that broke the hearts of millions of Mexicans and Mexican Americans.

A 21-year-old white supremacist named Patrick Crusius tried to singlehandedly fend off a "Hispanic invasion" and make America white again. He grabbed a high-powered rifle and drove about eight hours from his home in North Texas to a Walmart in El Paso, Texas. Crusius wanted to "kill as many Mexicans as possible," according to what he told police. He slaughtered 23 people and injured 22 others. Most of the victims were Mexican or Mexican American. Crusius was arrested, charged, convicted and given multiple life sentences.

How do these stories fit together? Wait for it.

According to white supremacist lore, the Mexicans have an accomplice in their planned takeover of the United States. The conspiracy theory alleges that the Jewish community is pulling the strings, consistent with the fabled "replacement theory" where white Americans will supposedly be pushed out of this country and replaced with Asians, Latinos and African Americans. In August 2017, when white supremacist MAGA supporters carried tiki torches and marched through the University of Virginia campus, they chanted: "Jews will not replace us."

These are not two separate wars. They're two fronts in the same war. Nearly six years ago, after the El Paso massacre, Mexicans and Mexican Americans felt as if we stood alone.

Now we have to make sure that our Jewish friends and family members know that they're not alone. We stand with them. If you come for one, you'd better come for all.

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To find out more about Ruben Navarrette and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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