New threats to the freedom of religion—and new areas of constitutional uncertainty—have arisen in the U.S. in recent years, as seen in the desire of Hobby Lobby and the Little Sisters of the Poor to be exempted from new healthcare regulations regarding the provision of contraceptives and abortion, the case of Masterpiece Cakeshop, and even attempts to outlaw such Jewish rituals as circumcision and kapparot (the ritual dedication of chickens to charity on the eve of Yom Kippur). Yuval Levin addresses some of these questions with reference to the Jewish experience in America; Leonard Leo argues that religious liberty will be safe only if the government abides by constitutional restraints on its authority and on the separation of powers—both of which, he believes, have been too often ignored. (Moderated by Aylana Meisel. Video, 73 minutes.)

Two extraordinary events demonstrate something important about Israel’s most fervent adversaries. One was a speech given at something called The People’s Forum (funded generously by Goldman Sachs), which stated, “When the state of Israel is finally destroyed and erased from history, that will be the single most important blow we can give to destroying capitalism and imperialism.”

The suggestion that this tiny state is the linchpin of a global, centuries-old phenomenon like capitalism goes well beyond anything resembling rational criticism. Even if Israel were guilty of genocide, apartheid, and oppression—which of course it is not—it would not follow that its destruction would help end capitalism or imperialism.

The other was an anti-Israel protest that took place in front of New York City’s Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, deemed “complicit” in Israel’s evils. At organizers’ urging, participants shouted their slogans at kids in the cancer ward, who were watching from the windows. Given Hamas’s indifference toward the lives of Gazan children, such callousness toward non-Palestinian children from Hamas’s Western allies shouldn’t be surprising. The protest—like the abovementioned speech—deliberately conveyed the message that Israel is the ultimate evil and its destruction the ultimate good, cancer patients be damned.

The fact that Israel’s adversaries are almost comically perverse does not mean that they can be dismissed. If its allies fail to understand the obsessive and irrational hatred that it faces, they cannot effectively help it defend itself.