The long-term alliance between American Jews and Hindus on issues of religious freedom and discrimination has spilled over into related conflicts over Hindu nationalism and Zionism. As American Hindus have faced increasing criticism for their support of Indian Prime Minister Narenda Modi and his Hindu nationalist government in recent years, they have taken a new leaf from their Jewish counterparts’ defense of Zionism and Israel, reports Aparna Gopalan in the secular and leftist magazine Jewish Currents (Spring). Gopalan reports that criticism of Modi’s India and its human rights record, especially its actions against Muslims, has led many Hindu activists and organizations to counter that their faith is being subjected to a new kind of discrimination. This pattern was illustrated in the controversy that surrounded last year’s parade celebrating Indian independence in Edison, New Jersey. Among the annual parade’s usual floats, a wheel loader, which resembles a small bulldozer, holding aloft an image of Modi in its bucket rumbled along, an addition which critics charged symbolized the Indian government’s removal of Muslim homes and storefronts in Delhi a few months earlier. When the New Jersey Democratic Party passed a resolution condemning the event and calling for a crackdown on Hindu nationalist operations in the state, nearly 60 Hindu American groups fired back with a statement saying that such condemnation amounted to anti-Indian and anti-Hindu discrimination. The Hindu American Foundation (HAF) has spearheaded a number of these campaigns, as it has moved from its focus on civil rights issues (such as workplace religious protections and immigration reform) to protesting forms of “anti-Hindu hatred” that reflect sectarian conflicts taking place in India.
Source: Swarajya.
“To counter what they view as a rising tide of prejudice, the HAF and other Hindu American groups have turned to American Jewish organizations…Along the way, these Jewish groups have trained a generation of Hindu lobbyists and advocates, offering strategies at joint summits and providing a steady stream of informal advice,” Gopalan writes. Hindu groups have most recently borrowed from their Jewish counterparts’ definition of anti-Semitism as including anti-Israel and anti-Zionist sentiments, arguing that similar prejudice is being seen in criticisms of Hindus who take pro-Modi and patriotic views of India. In 2021, such activists came up with a working definition of “Hinduphobia” that includes attempts to denigrate Hindus as being “agents or pawns of violent, oppressive political agendas,” and the term is now freely used among Hindu groups. Just as Jewish groups have protested against anti-Zionist conferences and groups on campuses, the HAF and other Hindu rights groups are agitating against similar academic initiatives against Hindu nationalism. The politics of Hinduphobia is also seen in inter-ethnic conflicts, such as around initiatives opposing the caste system in various U.S. cities, with the HAF and others arguing that such laws initiated by Dalit or untouchable activists are discriminatory against other Hindus. Gopalan notes that as criticisms of India’s human rights record have mounted, anti-nationalist Hindu activists have also tacked closer to anti-Zionist Jewish protestors against Israel and its treatment of Palestinian Muslims. Herself a critic of Hindu nationalism, she questions the sharp increase in the rate of Hindu hate crimes reported by the HAF, arguing that such incidents are often the result of inter-ethnic disputes rather than actual attacks against Hindus by non-Hindus.
(Jewish Currents, https://jewishcurrents.org/)
