In a move that should surprise no one, Israel’s enemies are busy drawing morally perverse parallels between Jewish life in the Jewish State and Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine. As Ukranians fight for their freedom, Antisemites around the world are racing to hijack Ukraine’s plight to demonize Israel.

A collection of Tweets makes the pattern obvious. #UkraineIsTheNewPalestine is making the rounds among Israel-haters, who complain that the outpouring of public support for beleaguered Ukraine does not compare to the attention paid to their favorite cause. They’re right, of course. Support for Ukraine’s civilians and defense pales in comparison with almost a century of devotion to the “Palestinian cause” and billions upon billions of dollars spent mostly on enriching Arab leaders and murdering Jews. The haters’ real problem is that for a few days, Ukrainian suffering has overshadowed the ongoing saga that is “Palestine.”

That Israel withdrew its forces and all Jewish residents from Gaza more than 15 years ago in 2005, or that the Palestinian Authority governs much of Judea and Samaria means nothing to them. Neither do they care that Hamas — a terrorist organization armed and funded by Putin’s friends in Tehran — has spent the past several decades targeting Israeli civilians as Russia is now doing in Ukraine. They aren’t interested in the fact that Israeli forces do everything in their power to avoid harming civilians when they defend their own citizens, going so far as to warn Gazans by texts and phone calls before making a retaliatory strike, while Hamas hides weapons under hospitals, holds prisoners in hospitals, and sends its people to their rooftops to act as human shields.

Instead, they use Putin’s invasion and Ukraine’s defense to justify violence against Israel and its people. In one Tweet, American political activist and self-proclaimed civil rights defender Shaun King wrote, “It appears it’s now publicly acceptable to take up arms, make & use Molotov cocktails, and take any measure possible to defend your literal home & homeland from violent occupying forces & invaders … (Notes to self for Palestine).” Will King’s Palestinian Arab “defenders” focus their Molotov cocktails on combatants alone, as Ukraine’s have done?

Meanwhile, Palestinian Arab leaders remain mum on the Ukraine war and carefully avoided taking sides. But in the streets of Bethlehem, they demonstrate in support of Putin, and it’s not hard to understand why.