Where does the hate come from?

The media is in the simplification business. We try to simplify reality.

In a world that is complex and cruel and fast-moving, our preferred question often is: “Why did it happen?”

Assigning motive following newsworthy events - terrible, horrific events - is what we usually focus on first.

A madman gets in his pickup, armed with a gun, with about $2,000 worth of explosives loaded in the back. And then he drives through the doors of Temple Israel synagogue in West Bloomfield, Michigan - intent on killing hundreds of Jewish kids. A security guard eliminates him before he can do so.

Then the question is inevitably heard: why did it happen?

Some of the answers given by some media, and some experts and politicians, are appalling - or offer questions that already contain the answer. The mayor of nearby Dearborn, Mich., for instance, issues a statement declaring that the terrorist “lost several members of his own family…in an Israeli attack on their home in Lebanon.” Does that imply the attack was justified, somehow?

A CTV headline: “Investigators working to determine exact reason for attack at Michigan synagogue.” They are?

A CBS News veteran with a similarly unaware report: the terrorist “had become reclusive,” she said. “He didn’t show up to work after his family was killed in airstrikes in Lebanon.” Would it not be useful to note “his family” were members of Hezbollah?

A New York Times headline: “Authorities are investigating the attacker’s motive.”

No, in fact. We know the motive: it was antisemitism. The oldest, most-durable hatred; the one that never dies. Antisemitism, as it manifested itself just this week at that synagogue in Michigan, or a synagogue in Norway, or at three (3) synagogues in Toronto.

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