On the February issue:

American and Israeli Jews

To the Editor:
I was distressed by the following sentence from Elliott Abrams’s article: “It is an obvious principle to American Jews that all people should be treated alike, while most Israelis would find it simple madness to apply that principle to Israelis and Palestinians” (“Jewish Hysterics and Israel’s New Government,” February). His article appears to justify this alleged Israeli view as perfectly acceptable. I get constantly attacked by the left for arguing that we are all individuals and race is irrelevant. Judging people by race rather than as individuals is a left-wing principle, not a conservative one. When I visited Israel with my family, an Israeli babysitter for my youngest child bragged that she came from the most integrated development town in Israel. I asked, “Oh, do you have Arabs in your town?” She looked at me as though I was crazy. She was referring to Ashkenazi and Sephardi. I would think it reasonable that conservatives can hope Israelis will treat Arabs as individuals and not by race.
Tom Horne
Phoenix, Arizona

To the Editor:
I enjoyed Elliott Abrams’s article very much. What we are seeing here, in addition to the growing chasm between the American and Israeli left, is the greater chasm between the American Jews on the left and right, which is becoming more and more defined by religious observance.

Perhaps we are seeing the last generation of nonobservant Jewish Republicans. With the new generation of nonreligious American Jews showing a declining interest in or support for the State of Israel, this responsibility has now been undertaken by the American Orthodox community. Jews have been punching above their weight since the time of Moses, and I am confident that we will respond to this challenge.
Randy Diamond
Cleveland, Ohio

To the Editor:
Elliott Abrams’s article on Israel’s new government is excellent. He offered a very good summary of the recent election’s outcome and the left’s failure to acknowledge its loss.

The word “hysterical” is entirely appropriate, and Abrams could even have elaborated on the inappropriate and irresponsible use of terms such as “coup d’état” to describe current events in Israel. There were no tanks rolling through Jerusalem or Tel Aviv.

The legacy of Israel’s early detractors is still with us today, especially the influence of Aharon Barak. Abrams did well to confront such thinking and show how Israeli and American Jewry are moving further apart. Many claim to speak for Judaism but in fact express only the views of the secular left. A well-known American Reform leader not long ago described the Reform movement as “the democratic party at prayer.”
Joseph Berger
Netanya, Israel

To the Editor:
Thank you to Elliott Abrams for an excellent explication of current Jewish/Israeli angst. The separation of Israeli and American values was inevitable. Many American Jews are part of a cozy liberal elite, not hospitable to Jews from foreign lands who found refuge in Israel. It’s shameful and sometimes racist. Liberals often use the rhetoric of acceptance, which is sharply at odds with their lack of acceptance of tribal Iraqis or Yemenis who have found safety in Israel.

Many of these dress-up liberals seem to cringe at growing anti-Semitism, as if they’re embarrassed because there is little they can do to stop what is becoming a deluge of hate. They instead put their efforts into muting their Jewish identity and supporting wokeness.
Steven Levy
Toronto, Ontario

To the Editor:
Elliott Abrams’s insightful and depressing article gets to the heart of the matter: American Jews share very little with today’s average Israelis save perhaps their last names. Many American Jews have not only lost their religious and Zionist beliefs; they have taken on positions of authority in the woke war against Western civilization. So one should not be surprised that after turning away from Israel, they are now turning on Israel.

The Jewish state should prepare for an America whose Israel policy will be steered by these changes. Israel must determine its own Jewish future based on what is best for the Jews of Israel. It has withstood physical attacks by Arab armies and incessant political attacks from everyone. It cannot cave to left-wing ideologues who believe that Israel is evil and that their Jewish surnames give them cover to attack the only Jewish state.
Alesh Guttman
Fort Lauderdale, Florida

Elliott Abrams writes:
I am grateful for the many kind words and insightful comments in these letters. Tom Horne in his letter makes the error of confusing Arab Israelis with Palestinians (of whom I wrote). Arab Israelis are citizens and equal before the law. Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza are not citizens of Israel and accordingly do not have equal rights there. I would also differ with his suggestion that Arabs and Jews in Israel are divided by “race.” By language, religion, and ethnicity for sure, but neither Jews nor Arabs are properly called a “race.” 

Mr. Horne’s ideal that we all be judged solely as individuals is of course right, but not in every context. In a courtroom or in an application for college admissions, the principle should govern. But when Israel faces waves of terrorism, to take one example, it is justified in building walls and fences that require an identified group to pass through checkpoints. Within Israel, such checkpoints do not exist, and all citizens move freely. 

Bot Wars

To the Editor:
Many thanks to James B. Meigs for his test of ChatGPT demonstrating that “the bot defaults to what [Brian] Chau calls the ‘woke catechism’” (“A.I. Yai-Yai,” February). This also demonstrates the casual bias, parochialism, and lack of imagination of Google strategist Cory Wang, who wrote, “We are witnessing the end of the college essay in real time.”

No, Mr. Wang, we are witnessing the end of the partisan, woke, leftist college essay. 

College professors with an ounce of independent thought can instantly circumvent ChatGPT by giving their students essay prompts that ChatGPT has been program-med to refuse—something easy to verify ahead of time. 

Even better, to make full use of ChatGPT, while preserving ideologic balance in the classroom, crea-tive professors could use the bot to compile essays to present the case for, say, carbon bans or reinstating Roe v. Wade or keeping race-based discrimination against Asian-American applicants to colleges, medical schools, and law schools (a.k.a. affirmative action)—and then test their students’ thinking and writing skills by assigning them to argue against the bot. It’s standard practice in debating competitions: Contestants are assigned which side of an issue to argue, with no implication of endorsement, just a test of ability. 

Contrary to current academic practice, students would actually get to see both sides of an issue—one spoon-fed from ChatGPT and the other from their own work, writing an unassisted college essay in real time.

All of this would be flipped if the masters of ChatGPT somehow chose to give the bot a far-right bias instead. We humans can be smarter than bots with bias—but only if we will it.
Kevin Jon Williams
Wynnewood, Pennsylvania

James B. Meigs writes:
Kevin Jon Williams makes a good point: Educators are going to have to get creative if they hope to overcome the challenges that ChatGPT and other AI programs pose to today’s model of teaching. Asking students to produce essays that merely summarize the conventional wisdom will no longer be enough; that’s what ChatGPT does best. Perhaps a few adventurous professors will follow Mr. Williams’s suggestion and develop lessons that ask students to detect and challenge the ideological biases that have been programmed into the chatbot. At the very least, educators will need to find ways to reward students for producing genuinely original ideas—something no AI program can do (at least not yet).

Hizzoner Koch

To the Editor:
Tevi Troy’s article on Ed Koch reminded me of the time I spent with Koch when I was a press secretary for his friend Henry Stern, city-councilman-at-large and then the parks commissioner (“Ed Koch, Ten Years Gone,” February). Henry helped Koch in all his campaigns and then helped Rudy Giuliani beat David Dinkins in an important mayoral race. Henry was very disappointed after Koch said that Jews would be crazy to vote for Jesse Jackson. He believed the comment cost Koch another term as mayor.

Ed Koch was a noble man who fought for the benefit of all New Yorkers. I once told him that his brash and courageous style of politics reminded me of stories about Al Smith and Fiorello Laguardia. Koch smiled and said, “Thank you. I couldn’t be in better company.”
Jeffrey Sussman
New York City

Tevi Troy writes:
I thank Jeffrey Sussman for his kind letter and Ed Koch anecdotes. I have heard from many people with Koch stories since publishing my article and look forward to using some of them in a future article—perhaps on the 20th anniversary of his death. 

DEI Disaster

To the Editor:
Tal Fortgang wrote an insightful book review and pointed out the absurdities of racial classifications (“Category Error,” February). They are used to manipulate the workforce, which is proving to be a dangerous practice.

After spending billions of dollars in diversity initiatives, not only are these modalities ineffective; they have actually poisoned the work atmosphere, where innocent white people are frequently accused of harming co-workers of color. As Jesse Singal wrote recently in the New York Times, “diversity training that is mandatory or that threatens dominant groups’ sense of belonging or makes them feel blamed may elicit negative backlash or exacerbate biases.” Who, given this state of affairs, are the winners? Not the workers of color, who will continue to be pitted against white co-workers; not management, who will have to delegate funds for extra “training” and expected lawsuits; and not customers, onto whom these costs will be passed. The diversity, equity, and inclusion industry and its naive supporters, however, will thrive.
Irving Thorne
Minneapolis, Minnesota

Pondering McCarthy

To the Editor:
I enjoyed Abe Greenwald’s review of Cormac McCarthy’s latest novels (“The Gnostic Agnostic,” February). What I took away from my reading of The Passenger was that Alice and Bobby’s relationship had been consummated, a child conceived, and perhaps miscarried, or worse, and the presence of the Thalidomide Kid is a consequence of their unholy act, demonstrating that while the subconscious does not speak clearly to us, it really enjoys needling us. It’s much like having a teenager in the house.

In his second novel, Outer Dark, a brother and sister’s child was left to die in the woods but survived. It’s not as if McCarthy is afraid to “go there.” Bobby and Alice are of vastly superior intelligence than the characters in Outer Dark, but despite this, they still fell prey to the same dark impulses that never end happily.
Russell Aborn
Bonita Springs, Florida

Abe Greenwald writes:
Russell Aborn offers a compelling reading of The Passenger. It’s certainly one I’ll continue to think about. But I can’t imagine McCarthy would have gone to such lengths to explain the Kid as some sort of intentional, otherworldly distraction if his presence had a different significance altogether.