Among the paintings that hang in the editorial rooms of The New York Sun is a portrait of the historian Lucy Dawidowicz. The painting captures her seated in an elegant perch in her apartment while staring out with the dour expression well known to her friends during her later years. On the table next to her rests a copy of her seminal history, “The War Against the Jews: 1933 to 1945.” The book reminds us that, among other things, the war that aimed to exterminate the Jews had a long run-up before it finally engulfed the millions. It’s a fact to bear in mind at a time when anti-Jewish protests and in some cases, attacks, are erupting in France and Holland, England, Tunisia and Germany and even right here in America, in places like Berkeley, California, and Times Square, New York.

There has been a conceit going around in recent years — it is being advanced now with growing intensity — that the rallies, demonstrations, and violence we are seeing are aimed only at Israel’s “occupation” or only at Israel. But the conceit is the result of either dishonest intent or ignorance of the logic of Zionism, which is, among other things, precisely an answer to anti-Semitism. No one is saying that Israel, or even, for that matter, the Jews, are off limits to criticism. Neither are we saying that to rally in support of Palestinians need be, axiomatically, to rally against Israel. But the fact is that the rallies being orchestrated ostensibly on behalf of the Palestinian Arabs are by and large rallies that support an anti-Semitism that is unmistakable to those who know the history. These bombings are the work of terrorists who see all of Israel as occupied land, which is to say they see Israel an enemy and Jews themselves as illegitimate among the nations.

This is why Prime Minister Sharon has been describing this as an existential struggle not only for the Jewish State but for the Jewish people. He understands this history better than his detractors. It is why a massive demonstration of support for Israel, for the Jewish people, was mounted almost overnight at Washington. Everyone who traveled to Washington, every Jewish person in New York, in America, knows in his or her bones what this struggle is about. It is why even as Yasser Arafat was feigning moderation for Secretary of State Powell, his wife was being quoted in the Arab press as praising the suicide bombers. The thing to remember about anti-Semitism is this — it is not a hatred of Jewish behavior. It is a hatred of Jews. It is a virus that has claimed millions of lives over the centuries. It is what this war is about. Only from an understanding of that truth can a correct course of policy emerge.