Israelis often insist that words matter. If terrorism is not called terrorism, it cannot be confronted honestly. Yet when facing the ideology behind much of the terror directed against Israel and the West, we frequently avoid using the clearest language ourselves.
The violent Islamist movement confronting Israel is not merely “extremism.” It carries many of the defining characteristics of Nazism: racial and religious supremacy, the dehumanization of entire peoples, the glorification of violence, and the declared ambition to impose its rule on the rest of the world.
The historical connection is also real. Arab leaders, most notoriously the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, often seen as “the father of Palestinians”, collaborated with Hitler during World War II and embraced the Nazi campaign against the Jews. The Muslim Brotherhood also colluded with them, and that alliance did not create every form of modern Islamist hatred, but it helped strengthen and legitimize a political culture built around antisemitism and extermination.
Today, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Iranian regime, ISIS, and similar movements openly teach that Jews, Christians, and other non-Muslims are inferior enemies. They do not merely oppose Israeli policies. While they reject Jewish sovereignty, they reject the very ideals of Western freedom and the basic equality of human beings.