The First Amendment is first for a reason. Free speech is essential to a free democratic society, allowing us to express a diversity of opinions to each other and to our government leadership so that we have the best-informed policies.

Yet, the Israel lobby and supporting groups are working overtime, spending money and energy to attack anyone who dares expose the ethnic cleansing and genocide being committed by Israel against Palestinians in occupied Palestine. They threaten to withdraw their funding to universities, our bastions of free speech, if administrations do not actively suppress any sentiment against Israeli policy and actions.

As moral beings, we must express empathy for our fellow humans and demand changes to U.S. policy so that we are not complicit in war crimes and not ourselves breaking international law. Not only are we allowed to do so, we are morally obligated. Yet, when we do, we are immediately and brutally attacked with the tired antisemitism cudgel, even if one happens to be Jewish or a Semite.

Antisemitism is the hatred of Jewish people for being Jewish. It is real, on the rise, and must be fought with all our might, as we must do with Islamophobia. Despite its claim, Netanyahu’s right-wing government does not represent all Jews everywhere. The 750,000-strong Jewish Voice for Peace opposes Israel’s massacre of innocent Palestinian women and children. Many Hasidic Jews strongly oppose Israel’s apartheid and brutal military campaign because it violates the very essence of Judaism.

Opposing Israeli illegal occupation of Palestinian land and expansion of illegal and violent “settlers” is not antisemitism; it is respect for international law and for basic human rights at the foundation of the United Nations.

Opposing the war crime of collective punishment of a civilian population, cutting off food, water, fuel and electricity, is not antisemitism; it is human and the morally right thing to do.

Opposing the withdrawal of U.S. funding for humanitarian relief through the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) because the Israeli propaganda machine accused 12 — and later four — of its 30,000 workers (0.01%) of some involvement with Hamas is not antisemitism.

Opposing the murder of 30,000 civilians with U.S. weapons and the intentional targeting of civilian infrastructure such as hospitals, ambulances, schools, places of worship, communications and cemeteries is upholding the laws of civilization embodied in international law.

Opposing Israeli apartheid and the herding of Palestinians into crowded ghettos, depriving them of any rights or human dignity, arresting women and children without any charges, shooting unarmed civilians in broad daylight, bulldozing homes on any excuse and then stealing the land for Jewish people, is abhorrent and is to be fought by all good nations.

Opposing the U.S. bombing of countries such as Yemen for attempting to do their duty under international law, the Genocide Conventions of 1948, in stopping military shipments to a regime that is openly committing genocide is what is expected of anyone with a moral compass.

Let us all speak up loud and clear that we will not support Israel’s policies and crimes against humanity. Let us all send a clear message to those we elect that we expect them to obey U.S. and international law over campaign donors. Let us stop cowering in fear when the antisemitism cudgel is trotted out to suppress our voices in doing what we know in our hearts is right. Let us do so while fighting real antisemitism, partly fueled by Israeli leadership’s false claim that they commit these war crimes in the name of all Jews everywhere.

O. Sami Saydjari is a cybersecurity expert and former senior executive of the Defense Department. He lives in Hartland.