Antisemitism Imposes a $1 Billion Security Tax on Jewish Life

A Jewish Federations of North America study estimates that more than 4,500 Jewish communal institutions spent $1.015 billion on security in 2025. That is a 33% increase from the $765 million estimate for 2024, before counting privately owned kosher businesses, markets, Judaica shops or bookstores.

• The average annual security cost across the institutions studied was approximately $225,000 per institution.
• Most spending went to guards and security directors; another $150 million went to security technology and building hardening.
• JFNA is linking the findings to the bipartisan Jewish American Security Act, which would fund the federal Nonprofit Security Grant Program at $1 billion.
• The study excluded more than 1,600 kosher restaurants, roughly 500 kosher markets and other privately owned Jewish businesses.

Antisemitism is imposing a recurring operating cost on Jewish life, redirecting communal resources from education, worship and social services into physical protection. The 33% one-year increase gives Congress a measurable test of whether federal security support is keeping pace with the threat burden borne by Jewish institutions.

HHS told federally funded healthcare providers, medical schools, training programs and research institutions that discrimination against Jewish or Israeli patients and professionals can violate federal law. The guidance cites Title VI, Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act and the IHRA working definition.

• Covered entities may not deny, delay, downgrade or segregate care based on Jewish ancestry, ethnic characteristics or Israeli national origin.
• The guidance also reaches admissions, grading, clerkships, research and official ceremonies in HHS-funded medical education and training programs.
• ADL, Hadassah, JFNA and four other Jewish organizations jointly welcomed the guidance and emphasized enforcement.

The guidance moves antisemitism in medicine from institutional-policy discretion into an explicit federal compliance framework. Its practical effect will depend on whether HHS investigations translate the stated protections into enforceable consequences.

Four Israeli athletes were removed from a Europe Triathlon Cup race in Londonderry after the local club objected to Israeli participation. Separately, Leuven authorities canceled a soccer match involving Israel’s Hapoel Beersheba, citing an inability to guarantee safety.

• The Northern Ireland race was expected to include up to 200 athletes from around the world, but organizers said there would be no Israeli representation.
• The local triathlon club said its position concerned representation of Israel, not religion or ethnicity.
• Belgian Jewish leaders warned that invoking security to bar Israelis makes threatened disorder a mechanism for nationality-based exclusion.

The pattern rewards threatened disruption by removing Israeli participants rather than securing the event. That creates a replicable boycott mechanism in which hostile activists can convert public-order pressure into institutional exclusion without obtaining a formal sports ban.

CAIR designated the Republican Jewish Coalition and Jewish American Summit as “anti-Muslim extremist organizations”, citing speakers and rhetoric at recent events. The RJC rejected the designation as “laughable” and called it a “badge of honor.”

• CAIR’s September 3 announcement targeted two Jewish organizations and threatened possible designations for their sponsors.
• CAIR cited statements by event speakers, including an explicit call for Muslims to leave the United States that drew audience applause.
• RJC spokesman Sam Markstein answered by citing CAIR’s history in the Holy Land Foundation case and Nihad Awad’s post-October 7 remarks.

CAIR is attempting to place established Jewish advocacy organizations inside an extremism taxonomy it controls, shifting the dispute from criticism of specific remarks to organizational delegitimization. The episode also shows how inflammatory statements at allied events can create exploitable openings for a hostile actor’s broader campaign.