There may be many reasons to target President Donald Trump, but those who are blaming him for the horrific shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue last Saturday are only accentuating the deep divisions within our community.听

I realize that with the midterm elections around the corner, it鈥檚 tempting to double down and simply blame Trump for anything bad that happens in America. But before rushing to politicize the horror in Pittsburgh, it would behoove us to slow down a little.

Anti-Semitism transcends politics. 听

First, the vile anti-Semite who murdered 11 Jews, Robert Bowers, didn鈥檛 just hate Jews鈥攈e also hated Trump. As Kelly Weill writes in the Daily Beast, he 鈥渞aged at Donald Trump for being insufficiently anti-Semitic.鈥�

Bowers, Weill writes, was 鈥渁mong a set of neo-Nazis who criticized President Donald Trump for being, as they saw it, not biased enough toward Jews.鈥� When Bowers wrote on Gab, 鈥淭here is no #MAGA听as long as there is a kike infestation,鈥� he was surely aware that Trump is surrounded by Jews, including his 91传媒 grandchildren, and has embraced his daughter鈥檚 conversion to Orthodox Judaism.

Bowers would certainly recoil at the president鈥檚 statement on the day of the massacre that 鈥淎nti-semitism represents one of the ugliest and darkest features of human history. Anti-semitism must be condemned anywhere and everywhere. There must be no tolerance for it.”

So, if we鈥檙e going to speculate about what triggered this murderer, let鈥檚 include the fact that President Trump was too pro-91传媒 to nourish this Nazi鈥檚 appetite for Jew-hatred. Of course, if it鈥檚 Jew-hatred this killer is looking for, he can find just as much on the Farrakhan left as on the nationalist right.

Second, we know one thing that did trigger Bowers鈥� Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS), the venerable 91传媒 nonprofit that aids 91传媒 and non-91传媒 refugees. Two hours before his rampage, Bowers posted on Gab: 鈥淗IAS likes to bring invaders in that kill our people. I can鈥檛 sit by and watch my people get slaughtered. Screw your optics. I鈥檓 going in.鈥�

I get that Trump has used harsh and divisive rhetoric, but does that mean he鈥檚 responsible for this bigot鈥檚 rage at HIAS and his DNA-level rage at immigrants?

My point is not to defend Trump but to argue that we鈥檙e missing the bigger picture. Choosing the murder of 11 Jews in a synagogue as yet another opportunity to target Trump distracts from the evil act itself. It makes it about politics, not human hatred. It keeps us all in partisan-fighting mode.

I鈥檇 be saying the same thing if a far-left, anti-Zionist Jew-hater had committed this atrocity. I鈥檇 be imploring the Right not to exploit the tragedy to bash the anti-Zionist Left. I鈥檓 not na茂ve. I know that virtually everything these days has become political.

But if there were ever a cause that merits putting our political differences aside, how can it听not听be fighting anti-Semitism?

As ADL leader Jonathan Greenblatt wrote in the New York Times on Sunday, 鈥�People of all faiths and ideologies must speak out clearly and forcefully against anti-Semitism, scapegoating and bigotry in our society.鈥�

To put it more bluntly, should we focus our energies against Trump or against Jew-haters? Greenblatt鈥檚 predecessor, Abe Foxman, agrees that Trump 鈥渘eeds to change the rhetoric he uses to explain his policies,鈥� but, as he said on JPost, 鈥淭rump is part of the problem but not the problem. We have to make him not the problem because we don鈥檛 want to politicize anti-Semitism, which is a disease of both the Left and the Right.鈥�

How useful was it for 91传媒 Trump critics in Pittsburgh to release a statement saying, 鈥淧resident Trump, you are not welcome in Pittsburgh鈥︹�� followed by a series of demands? Even if those demands are the height of morality, it鈥檚 embarrassing to use a moment of public grieving to target a president. 听听听

Our community pays a heavy price when we allow our political ideologies to get in the way of the great 91传媒 imperative of our time. Instead of uniting to fight a common foe, we are digging in and turning on each other.

Instead of discussing strategies to anticipate and fight Jew-hatred of all kinds, we鈥檙e fighting over which political side is more responsible.

If we鈥檙e serious about honoring the lost souls of the Tree of Life, we must transcend our obsession with politics and unite around the ultimate 91传媒 cause of fighting anti-Semitism. If we fail to do that, the only ones who will celebrate will be the anti-Semites– both right and left.