Latest Mid-East War Shines The Light On Blatant Antisemitism 

The pictures and videos coming out of Israel last week following the terrorist incursions by Gaza-based Hamas on the holiday of Simchas Torah, which this year coincided with the Jewish Sabbath, were horrific. The stories subsequently emerging—many of which proudly documented and shared by the terrorists themselves, not only showed the launching of thousands of rockets targeting Israeli civilians, but also detailed mass slaughter of women, children, and the elderly in their own homes. Many women were raped, babies were beheaded, and hostages were taken back into the Gaza territory and paraded through the streets. Many are still unaccounted for, and their families are languishing in fear of what has befallen their loved ones. In some instances, the best these families can hope for is that their missing family members are in fact being held hostage—and are still alive—at least for now.

For the most part, the aftermath of the Hamas terrorist attacks against innocent civilians brought condemnation in most circles and a call to “Stand With Israel” as they move to avenge this latest attack and more importantly defend themselves from future terrorism by once and for all  rooting out and destroying Hamas in the Gaza Strip and beyond. 

There were of course predictable exceptions to this condemnation. Most notably, the Islamic Republic of Iran, easily the most prominent supporter and financer of world-wide terrorism congratulated and praised Hamas for the attacks on Israel. They also pledged full support for Hamas in what will no doubt be a bloody battle in Gaza in the days and weeks ahead. While it is still being debated and investigated, many credible sources are indicating that it was in fact Iran who masterminded, supported, and gave the green light for the Hamas attacks one week ago. Other Islamic nations such as Yemen, Turkey, Pakistan, Iraq, Lebanon and others also laid their sympathies with Hamas and Palestinians in Gaza and staged massive demonstrations in their streets to show their solidarity with Hamas’ “anti-Zionist” efforts.

Elsewhere, while there might not have been outright support voiced for Hamas, many who decried the attack, or came up just short of doing so, placed qualifiers on their statements by setting forth that it was Israeli policies toward Gaza Palestinians that facilitated the conditions necessary for Hamas to launch its bloody incursions into Israel. Look no further than the halls of the United States Congress to see such evidence. Extreme Leftists in Congress who have routinely sided with Palestinians and condemned Israel did not disappoint in this regard.

In the immediate aftermath of the Hamas terror attacks, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) called on the U.S. government to cease all military and financial support for “Israel’s occupying and apartheid government.”

Other members such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (D-NY) and Ilhan Omar (D-MN) while condemning the terrorist attacks into Israel, called for an immediate cease fire and “de-escalation” in an obvious effort to hamstring Israel from defending itself from future terror attacks.

Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) wrote in a tweet:

“As a part of achieving a just and lasting peace, we must do our part to stop this violence and trauma by ending U.S. government support for military occupation and apartheid.”

Other members of Congress such as Ayana Pressley (D-MA) and Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) similarly called for a de-escalation and also an end of the Israeli and Egyptian blockade of Gaza which has been in place to stem the flow of weapons and other support for Hamas.

To their credit, others in the U.S. government—both Republican and Democrat, denounced these insensitive and rather transparent types of statements that were made in the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks on Israel. When asked by reporters about the statements coming from these fringe Democrat members of Congress, White House spokesperson Karine Jeanne Pierre said:

“So, I’ve seen some of those statements this weekend. And we’re gonna continue to be very clear. We believe they’re wrong. We believe they’re repugnant and we believe they’re disgraceful.” 

Dueling demonstrations have been ongoing in many American cities in support of both Israel and the Palestinians. While many of the rallies in support of Palestinians are focused on the developing humanitarian crisis the population of Gaza now faces, much of the rhetoric has descended into ugly antisemitic tropes and continued calls for Israel to be wiped off the face of the map.  Their mantra “from the river to the sea” is a not-so-subtle overture for the elimination of the Jewish State, a nation that recently celebrated its 75^th year of existence. 

Nowhere has the rhetoric been more abhorrent than on college campuses across the nation. It has been patently obvious that the organized protests and demonstrations on America’s university campuses have been less about supporting the plight of Palestinians and more about celebrating the savage terrorism perpetrated by Hamas in the name of “freedom fighting” and “resistance”. The timing of these demonstrations and rallies in the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attack is clear evidence here.

At Harvard University 34 student groups sign a letter crafted by the Harvard Palestine Solidarity Committee stating they 

“hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence” and that,

“the apartheid regime is the only one to blame.”

At a rally on the Cambridge Massachusetts campus, among other vitriolic signs being carried were posters showing and celebrating the Hamas terrorists using hang gliders on their way to slaughter hundreds of young concert attendees in southern Israel.

At another Ivy League institution, a statement from Columbia Students for Justice in Palestine said of the Hamas attack:

“Despite the odds against them, Palestinians launched a counter-offensive against their settler-colonial oppressor — which receives billions of US dollars annually in military aid and possesses one of the world’s most robust surveillance and security apparatuses. Any omission of this context — any rhetoric of ‘an unprovoked Palestinian attack’ — is shamefully misleading,” 

Last Thursday Columbia University officials were forced to take the extraordinary step of closing the campus to the public as they were concerned competing protests were getting out of hand.

The tensions and ugliness were not just confined to the Ivy League. The Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) which has 200 chapters at universities across North America, called for a “Day of Resistance” on all college campuses with a statement labeling the Oct. 7 attacks on Israeli civilians as:

“a historic win for the Palestinian resistance.”

And of course, California institutions of higher learning were most assuredly and unsurprisingly not immune to the nasty venom on its campuses. 

At UCLA, the day following a candlelight vigil to remember the victims of the Hamas terrorist attacks, hundreds of Bruin students heeding the call for the SJP “National Day of Resistance” took to campus to march in protesting Israel as colonizers, and occupiers of Palestine. Speakers at the rally ridiculed Israelis for “killing Palestinians and dehumanizing them by treating them like animals. Oher students carried signs that read “Zionism=Terrorism”.

Cal Berkeley’s “Bears For Palestine” issued a statement on the day of the Hamas attacks that they 

“display unwavering support for the resistance in Gaza…”

At Stanford University, freshmen Jewish students in a required introductory class called College 101 were reportedly singled out by an instructor ostensibly providing a lesson on colonialism. The professor asked the Jewish students to stand, leave their possessions behind and move to the back of the class to demonstrate the plight of those historic victims of colonialism. The instructor went on to downplay the Holocaust, allegedly claiming that the 6 million Jews murdered during World War II pales in comparison to those who have lost their lives to the oppression of colonialism. The instructor has been suspended from teaching as university officials investigate.

Zach Kessel, a William F. Buckley Jr. Fellow in Political Journalism, and a recent graduate of Northwestern University provided a detailed account of the support for the Hamas attacks across U.S. college campuses. It can be found here:   

The Campus War on Israel

For the most part, reactions from university officials have been tepid at best. 

USC President Carol Folt initially put out a statement that simply lamented the loss of life in both Israel and Gaza without even a hint of condemnation for the heinous terroristic actions of Hamas. After two days’ worth of criticism for her weak approach she returned with a statement reading:

“terrorist attacks by Hamas and their brutal threats to execute kidnapped civilians and commit other atrocities.”

Similarly, Stanford University President Richard Saller and Provost Jenny Martinez put out a perfunctory, all but wishy-washy release stating:

“We are deeply saddened and horrified by the death and human suffering. We also know that many on campus are afraid of what the future holds for them and their communities and are feeling extremely vulnerable.”

Finding themselves also at the butt of ridicule, the two were forced to issue a supplemental statement that was more extensive and did single out the vicious atrocities committed by Hamas.

Yet, you would be hard pressed to find a statement or action from any university official taking to task their students or faculty whose reprehensible rhetoric this past week celebrated the actions of a recognized terrorist organization and verbally attacked members of the Jewish community in what can be construed as nothing other than hate speech.

On today’s college campuses any so-called micro-aggressions such as using the wrong pronouns, “dead-naming” a trans student or faculty member or even donning what is deemed to be an inappropriate or insensitive Halloween costume could place you in front of a university disciplinary board. In these academic atmospheres, challenging or departing from the prevailing Woke orthodoxy could have you cancelled and then fired or expelled from campus. At most any university today, it is now accepted that such speech is equated with violence. How then can what we have seen and heard on college campuses across the nation over this last week be condoned?

While university officials appear to be tolerating such ugliness, one U.S. government official is not. U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) has contacted the Biden administration and demanded that the president uphold existing U.S. law and rescind the visas of foreign nationals—many of whom are present on our university campuses, who voice support for terrorist organizations such as Hamas. He went further in calling for the removal of federal funding for universities that allow protests and demonstrations that “can be reasonably construed to endorse or espouse terrorist activity or persuades others to endorse or espouse terrorist activity or support a terrorist organization.”

We shouldn’t expect for Biden to take such action in the middle of his reelection campaign at a time when he is once again courting and counting on the college youth vote shoring up his left flank. That said, Sen. Rubio is spot on with his position that allowing advocacy for terrorist groups and activities on our shores is intolerable on our college campuses, let alone anywhere in American society.

There can be little doubt that antisemitism is on the rise worldwide and especially on our college campuses. What we have witnessed there this past week, however, is more insidious than anything that can be simply labeled as antisemitism. It has been exposed  and is better defined as outright Jew-hatred and it must be confronted, condemned, and beaten back without equivocation.