There is a particular kind of heartbreak that does not come from shock—but from recognition.
It is the heartbreak of watching a story unfold exactly as you feared it would—step for step, line for line—and being powerless to interrupt its trajectory. It is the grief not of uncertainty, but of prophecy fulfilled. The pain of knowing. And of being right.
This week, in Boulder, Colorado, that heartbreak came crashing through the window—almost literally.
A group of Jews gathered—not to protest, not to shout, not to provoke—but to pray. To mark time together. To chant psalms. To plead for the safe return of the hostages in Gaza, still captive after eight unbearable months. They came in hope, not hatred. They came in grief, not rage.
And someone threw a firebomb at them.
It didn’t land by accident. It wasn’t spontaneous. It was calculated. It was aimed. It was antisemitic.
And the most devastating part?
We knew this was coming.
Back in April, I wrote a piece titled We Knew How This Would End. I warned then that the line between anti-Zionism and antisemitism had all but evaporated. That what masquerades as progressive politics often masks old, violent hatreds. That the slogans on elite campuses would spill into the streets—and eventually into our sanctuaries.
That has now happened. Again.
This wasn’t the first Molotov cocktail hurled at Jews this year. A firebomb was thrown at the governor’s mansion in Pennsylvania over Passover. Two Israeli embassy officials were murdered in Washington, D.C. less than two weeks ago. This is what it looks like to “globalize the Intifada.” It is no longer a slogan. It is a strategy. And it is working.
Arson. Threats. Desecration. Murder. This is not fringe. This is not isolated. This is a pattern. A movement. A campaign.
And we must talk about the slogan behind it:
“Globalize the Intifada.”
Let us be absolutely clear: the First Intifada (1987) and the Second Intifada (2000–2005) were not peace movements. The word “Intifada” actually means “shaking off”, yet these two movements, were not expressions of democratic resistance. They were campaigns of bloodshed—open and unapologetic. Especially the Second Intifada, which included more than 130 suicide bombings in cafés, buses, and markets. Mothers and children blown apart on their way to school. Families incinerated while eating pizza. Weddings turned into mass graves.
The goal was not peace. It was death. It was terror. It was the deliberate murder of civilians—Jews—anywhere they could be found.
That is what “Intifada” means. That is what “Globalize the Intifada” means.
And we are fools—dangerous, willfully blind fools—if we pretend otherwise.
This is no longer about Israel. It is about Jews. All Jews. Everywhere.
What begins with incitement against Israel’s right to exist—and against Zionism, the simple belief that Jews, like any other people, deserve a state of their own—ends in a terror attack. And then another. It ends with a Holocaust survivor set on fire for daring to say that Jewish lives matter. It ends with a woman, feet from the flames, lying on the sidewalk, burned and bleeding, while her attacker continues his antisemitic rant—unmoved, unashamed, and undeterred.
The Molotov in Boulder did not ask who kept Shabbat. It did not check voting records. It did not distinguish between Zionist, anti-Zionist, or unaffiliated.
It simply saw Jews—and decided they should burn.
We are watching, in real time, as the boundary between anti-Israel sentiment and anti-Jewish violence dissolves. While intellectuals split hairs, Jewish students are forced to hide their Stars of David. Jewish faculty are doxxed. Jewish community centers install panic buttons. Synagogues are now behind bulletproof glass.
This is not the return of antisemitism. It is its evolution—sharper, more brazen, and more socially justified than ever before.
And still, too many remain silent. Too many say, “This is just a phase.” Too many refuse to believe what is plain in front of their eyes.
If this were happening to any other community, it would be called what it is: terrorism.
And that’s exactly what it is.
Let us stop pretending. Let us stop excusing. Let us stop allowing our fear of sounding alarmist to keep us from sounding the alarm.
We are not the cause of this hatred.
We are its target.
To the Jews of Boulder: We see you. We stand with you. That firebomb was meant for all of us.
We have seen this story before. We know how it ends.
Unless we have the courage to change it.
So let us change it.
Let us be braver than they expect.
Louder than they can stand.
More united than they can divide.
Let us make this the last part in a story that has gone on far too long.
And may we never again have to write a Part Three.