For LGBTQ+ Jews, annual Pride Month celebrations were once a treasured safe space — but not anymore.
"I've never felt more excluded in an inclusive space. More than angering me or being demoralizing — it was depressing," Yuval David said.
Yuval David and Yoav Davis tell Scripps News anecdote after anecdote: Death threats. Physical altercations. Cancelled events. A Brooklyn interfaith pride service cancelled this month at synagogue supportive of Israel.
For Davis, his identities are now duelling.
"Before October 7, I would consider myself first of all gay, then Jewish, then Israeli. And today, post October 7, I feel like I'm first of all Jewish, and then Israeli and then gay," Davis said. "And the reason is, I believe that a person kind of identifies who he is by the parts within him that are most targeted and most discriminated against. And I feel like today being Jewish and being Israeli is far more controversial and far more dangerous than just being gay."
Eshel, an LGBTQ+ Jewish group, surveyed the community over the last two years and found they are experiencing alienation at incredibly high rates.
90% of LGBTQ+ Jews surveyed said when they participated in online queer spaces they were either "Kicked out, "Blocked," "Experienced verbal harassment," or "Made to feel uncomfortable."
"People being extremely cruel to each other online. There was a lot of that. There's also some people in our community were attacked physically, you know, yelled at publicly," says Miryam Kabakov, who co-founded Eshel.
43% say they've disengaged from online LGBTQ+ spaces and 41% say they've removed themselves from in person spaces.
But the fraying didn't start with this war.
In 2017 the Chicago Dyke March banned pride flags with Stars of David. Two years later the D.C. Dyke March did the same.
Now the NYC Dyke March is labeling itself antizionist.
Kabakov says such celebrations were crucial to her.
"It was a very big part of my coming out," Kabakov said. "And to know that thousands and thousands of women are banning other women from marching and from participating in this huge celebration is just it's kind of devastating, and it's very it feel, you feel really, really alone."
"Those who seek the most amount of tolerance end up becoming the most intolerant of people who don't completely agree with them," David said. "That makes me sad as a progressive liberal."
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Over the last two years David documented on social media his experience at DC Pride.
"My camera girl was punched. My Jewish pride flag was broken and stolen. People spit on us. People threw things at us. Somebody ran up and stole some of our signs. They ran up to one of the women and pulled her backpack and knocked her down to the ground," David said.
But for these Jews, there is a silver lining. Queer LGBTQ+ Jews supportive of Israel are seeking new shared spaces to connect.
"When a minority is threatened, their reaction is to stick together because they don't know who they can trust, aside from themselves," Davis said.
Still, they hope those in the wider LGBTQ+ community who might not have considered their plight see that it's not all that different than their own.
"The same hate the Jewish community is facing is not that different than the hate that the LGBTQ+ community faced when it started its revolution and liberation, because what people hated and what people are fearful from are the same thing, the things they don't know," Davis said.
