There will be a disaster here against us, and it is only a matter of time" - this phrase is repeated in conversations with Jewish students in the United States in the days following the Hamas terror attack on October 7.
In recent days, with the intensification of IDF activity in Gaza, there has been an escalation in pro-Palestinian activity on American campuses. While presidents of elite universities such as Harvard and Columbia continue their refusal to unequivocally and forcefully condemn Hamas's terrorist campaign, the legitimacy of a violent handful of educational institutions to attack students who support Israel is increasing, sharpening the deepening rift between the progressive faction in the United States and Israel.
Demonstration in support of Israel in Berkeley, Photo: AP
The Jewish students did not have a single day of rest in the past week. In Washington Square Park, adjacent to New York University, a protester held a sign that read, "Please keep the world clean," alongside a drawing of a garbage can with a Star of David inside.
Not far away, at Columbia University in the north of the city, the head of an LGBT student organization issued an invitation to a gay film festival, stressing that "Zionist" students were not invited to the event. "Here we support the liberation of Palestine," she wrote in the invitation, and in an email distributed to members of the organization, she noted: "The Holocaust was not a special event."
A particularly disturbing incident occurred at Cooper College: Jewish students barricaded themselves in the library while anti-Israel demonstrators crowded the locked door. The incident ended only when the NYPD stepped in and escorted the Jewish students out of college.
Video from the @cooperunion library now: pic.twitter.com/skOM1vWsv0
— Jake Novak (@jakejakeny) October 25, 2023
"We reserve the right to protest, but there is no place for hate in New York City," New York City Mayor Eric Adams said after the incident.
Anti-Israel tendencies are also backed by members of the academic staff. For example, at the University of California, Berkeley, a lecturer in the course "Asian-American Communities and Racial Relations" offered credits to students who would participate in an "anti-occupation demonstration" at the university, or who would "watch a movie about Palestine." Students were required to submit a screenshot of their participation in one of the activities in order to receive the points.
Pro-Palestinian demonstration at Harvard University, photo: AFP
The lessons became battlegrounds
Expressions of hatred do not remain only in public places, but enter the classrooms. In the Department of Islam and the Middle East, arguably the most flammable barrel of explosives on Columbia's campus, professors require students to read books with a distinctly Palestinian narrative, including articles by Rashid Khalidi, an American-Palestinian historian known for his anti-Zionist views.
Ella Chizik, an Israeli graduate student in the department, says that the classes have become battlefields. "Students who study with me come to class after reading the incitement materials on the reading list, and in the end it turns out that they justify Hamas terrorism," she says. "They tell me clearly: Why should we believe you and not Hamas? You'll see pictures of decapitated children or women who have been raped, but even if I do, I'm not sure they'll believe me. I feel that facts or truth no longer matter. It really bothers me that these students could be influential leaders in the future."
Chizik talks about a growing sense of insecurity shared by Israeli students on campus. "I choose to express myself in class and know that I will pay a price for it. I'm afraid to leave the classroom, because I don't know who's going to wait for me outside and what they'll do to me. But nothing will deter me: I will not stop telling the story of the State of Israel."
A demonstration in Berkeley, Photo: AP
"Afraid to be targeted"
"I'm afraid of being targeted," shares Omar, an Israeli MBA student at Stanford. "I don't move away from my quarters, make sure to look behind me, and also wonder whether to put a mezuzah on my door in the student quarters. The university administration is simply walking on eggs: afraid to unequivocally condemn and does not want to turn the campus into a political arena." Omar says that as the number of fatalities in Gaza increases, the voices against Israel grow stronger on campus. "All the poison has been coming out in the last few days, and it's only getting worse. I saw a student holding up a sign that said: 'Why are Hamas terrorists and the IDF not terrorists?'"
The students' concerns are shared by faculty members from Israel. "There's a sense of helplessness, that we're running to put out fire after fire, and it's not over," says Prof. Jonathan Levav, a Stanford business professor. "We're really at war for our lives here, with expressions of hatred that I haven't seen in the 20 years I've been in academia. The war in Gaza will end before the war on campuses. If we don't win the war here, the Jewish identity of the students will be eroded, and the Jewish communities in the Diaspora will suffer."
Click Managements
At the same time, across the United States, a movement of alumni and academics is forming that are working against manifestations of hatred, and are also succeeding in bringing about change. More than 1,000 Stanford graduates sent a letter to President Richard Saler demanding that he condemn Hamas' acts of terrorism and make clear that displays of hatred and violence against Jewish students will not be tolerated. "We are disappointed by your response to the atrocities committed by Hamas – the largest mass murder against Jews since the Holocaust – and the subsequent expressions of hatred on campus," the graduates wrote.
Yasmin Lukach, a Stanford graduate and one of the university's donors: "The demand from an academic institution to condemn the Hamas massacre is elementary and necessary, but not sufficient at all." According to her, donations to the university should be channeled towards activities to combat antisemitism on campus. "Instead of stopping the donations, we think that the university should establish a professional body that will build a comprehensive program to close knowledge gaps regarding Israel, and especially include educational content against antisemitism in all educational frameworks on issues of equality and social diversity. Going forward, the university will also have to conduct surveys to see if there is a decline in anti-Semitism on campus."
"To channel donations to the university for activities to combat anti-Semitism", Yasmin Lukach,
Another Stanford graduate, Sophia Khalifa Shremko, joined Israel's propaganda effort and has received mixed reactions. "Students write to me privately thanking me for speaking out, because they're afraid to speak," says Khalifa Sharmko, originally a Bedouin from northern Israel and now an Amazon executive. "Others claim that the Israeli government is paying me." In one case, there was also a not-so-disguised threat. "At a high school in California where I spoke on a panel days after the attack, seven Hamas supporters were waiting for me outside. I had to ask an Israeli instead to protect me." When she was approached by Stanford to participate in a career panel, she declined. "I will not help the university in any way until they issue a clear condemnation of Hamas." In the meantime, Stanford graduates made an achievement, with the dean of the business school issuing an amendment to his statement, explicitly stating that he condemns "Hamas terrorism and its intention to murder innocents."
The president of Berkeley took off the gloves
Meanwhile, the president of UC Berkeley also "took off the gloves" and, along with 300 professors, signed a statement detailing the atrocities committed by Hamas and calling it a "violation of every human and moral code." The signatories stressed: "While Hamas terrorists went from house to house to murder as many Jews as possible, pro-Palestinian student organizations in Berkeley collected signatures for a statement calling the terrorists 'freedom fighters' and rejecting any criticism of their actions."
Support from the political elite
Nor did the U.S. leadership remain indifferent to actions against Jewish students. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis ordered his state's university network to shut down the National Student Organization Justice for Palestine because of its support for Hamas, a terrorist organization in the United States, and threatened punitive measures against faculty and students behind anti-Israel protests.
Nikki Haley, who, like DeSantis, is running for the Republican ticket in the race for the White House, called for a halt to federal funding for educational institutions that allow expressions of antisemitism in their areas.
At the same time, the White House commented on the events, saying: "The actions on campuses turn our stomachs, reminding us of the saying 'never again,' which we must not forget. Delegitimizing the State of Israel while praising Hamas murderers who burned innocents alive, or harming Jewish students – are by definition anti-Semitic."
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