‘The church is asleep right now’: Ted Cruz calls on Christians to confront right-wing antisemitism
A flurry of conservative voices is urging the right to police its own
Sen. Ted Cruz speaks at Cornerstone Church in San Antonio as John Hagee looks on during the “Night to Honor Israel,” Oct. 21, 2025. Screenshot of YouTube
(JTA) — Sen. Ted Cruz used his keynote address at a major gathering for Christian supporters of Israel this week to warn of “a growing cancer” of antisemitism on the right, which he said church leaders are failing to address.
“I’m here to tell you, in the last six months, I have seen antisemitism rising on the right in a way I have never seen in my entire life,” Cruz said, speaking on Sunday at a megachurch in San Antonio, led by John Hagee, the founder of Christians United for Israel, which claims to have more than 10 million members.
He continued, “The work that CUFI does is desperately, desperately needed, but I’m here to tell you, the church is asleep right now.”
In the days around Cruz’s speech at Hagee’s 45th annual Night to Honor Israel, a cluster of conservative voices made similar appeals, arguing that antisemitism inside parts of the right can no longer be waved away as fringe. Essays in The Free Press and Tablet mapped how extremist figures and ideas have been normalized and the Jewish educational center and think tank Tikvah warned of a “clear faction” hostile to Israel and Judaism.
In The Free Press, conservative columnist Eli Lake published an essay titled “How Nick Fuentes Went Mainstream,” arguing that the far-right activist — long shunned for racist and antisemitic rhetoric — has lately been welcomed by a roster of popular podcasts and livestreams. In Lake’s telling, the “stigma” around Fuentes has “melted away,” an index of how the Overton window has shifted inside parts of the online right.
At Tablet, a first-person essay by a libertarian insider headlined “Hitler Is Back in Style,” traced what the author describes as a libertarian-to-alt-right pipeline that, over the past decade, normalized conspiratorial thinking about Jews and open flirtations with Hitler apologetics. The piece is both confessional and diagnostic, naming podcast ecosystems and ideological crosscurrents that, the author argues, have turned “antiwar” rhetoric into reflexive anti-Israel sentiment and a broader hostility to Jews.
Meanwhile, Tikvah, one of the most prominent right-wing groups in the Jewish world, noted in an email to supporters Thursday that it has tracked the same trend.
“Today, there is a clear faction of the right that is overtly hostile to Israel and to Judaism. And though small, it is no longer marginal or possible to ignore,” wrote Avi Snyder, a senior director at Tikvah.
The organization pointed to a body of essays it began publishing in 2023, warning that some on the right were reviving old suspicions about Jewish loyalty, casting the U.S.-Israel alliance as a trap, and disputing the moral superiority of the Allied fight in World War II.
In the background is the aftershock of Charlie Kirk’s assassination last month, which unleashed a torrent of conspiracies that quickly turned antisemitic in parts of the right’s online ecosystem. Fact-checkers documented a flood of false claims, while some influencers toyed with theories about Israeli or “Mossad” involvement — rhetoric with enough popular traction that Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, felt compelled to issue a rebuttal. The swirl reinforced how fast fringe ideas migrate in today’s media sphere, even as prosecutors in Utah have charged a suspect and outlined a motive that has nothing to do with Israel.
In his speech, Cruz noted he has talked to Netanyahu about declining support for Israel on the right — and that the two men see the issue differently.
He recounted a recent conversation with the Israeli prime minister, saying that Netanyahu’s first instinct was to chalk much of it up to foreign amplification from places like Qatar and Iran — bots and paid misinformation networks.
Cruz pushed back: “I said, ‘Mr. Prime Minister, yes, but no. Yes, Qatar and Iran are clearly paying for it, and there are bots, and they are putting real money behind it, but I am telling you, this is real, it is organic, these are real human beings, and it is spreading.’”
Later in his address, Cruz highlighted the drift’s theological dimension. He warned of a resurgence of replacement theology, which he characterized as a “lie that the promises God made to Israel and the people of Israel are somehow no longer good, they are no longer valid.”
According to replacement theology, the Israelites were supplanted as God’s chosen people once the Christian church was founded.
Cruz didn’t blame anyone by name, but his comments come as figures with long records of inflammatory commentary toward Jews or Israel have continued to gain oxygen. Fuentes has rebounded from ostracism to high-visibility bookings; Tucker Carlson draws millions of viewers amplifying narratives that edge into Jew-baiting; and Candace Owens’ conspiratorial comments about Israel continue to pull audiences.
Together they form a feedback loop in which algorithmic reach and controversy reward edgier takes — and make it harder for party actors to draw lines.
Adding to the fray is last week’s Young Republicans leak, a Politico exposé of a Telegram chat where early-career GOP activists traded racist slurs, joked about gas chambers and praised Hitler. The episode prompted firings, the shutdown of state Young Republican chapters and bipartisan condemnation. But Vice President J.D. Vance downplayed the messages as immature “jokes” and urged critics to “grow up,” a stance that itself became part of the week’s debate over whether the right will police its own.
Soon after Kirk’s assassination, Rich Goldberg, a senior adviser at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and a veteran of Republican politics, urged more policing on the right. In a post on X, he called on conservatives to stop booking Carlson, calling the former Fox News host’s posture toward Jews and Israel “a disease that is poisoning the Republican Party.”
He added, “It needs to be met with a decision by those we call ‘leaders’ to stop platforming him (and those who echo such vile sentiments).”
More than a month later, the most important right-wing leader in the country, Donald Trump, has yet to weigh in.
