Dangerous antisemitism or peaceful protest against genocide?
You can find whatever story you want to read.
Protests against Israel’s US-backed war in Gaza have broken out on college campuses around the country, with a wide variety of responses from campus officials and police. Some of the tent encampments are being left alone, while on other campuses the demonstrators are being forcibly removed.
Similarly, press coverage has been all over the map. Some sources essentially repeat the Netanyahu claim that “antisemitic mobs have taken over the leading universities”, while others interview demonstrators with more sympathy.
Even the coverage from supposedly liberal sources has been mixed. I was listening to MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Wednesday when host Joe Scarborough cited the fact that students had not protested the mass killing of Arabs by Saddam in Iraq or Assad in Syria, clearly implying that Israel is being viewed differently because of antisemitism. I couldn’t decide whether Scarborough was being clueless or actively disingenuous: The obvious difference is that Israel is carrying out its operations with American funds, American weapons, and American support at the UN. Whether we see Israel’s Gaza war as just or unjust, Americans should view these Palestinian deaths differently because we are implicated in them.
Given this diverse press coverage, I should probably go visit an encampment and make my own judgment, but I haven’t. The conclusion I’ve come to from reading a variety of sources is that, as is true with any large group of people, you can find whatever you look for. If you look for antisemitism, you can find it, like the Columbia student who said “Zionists do not deserve to live.” He has been banned from campus.
The large majority of demonstrators, though, look to me to be exactly what they say they are: peaceful protesters who think the killing in Gaza is unjust, want it to stop, and want the US (and their universities) to stop supporting it.
Vox reports:
Student protests on Columbia’s campus have been nonviolent so far. Representatives from the New York Police Department said during a press conference Monday that there had been some incidents in which Israeli flags were snatched from students and unspecified hateful things said. But they said that there have not been any reports of Columbia students being physically harmed or any credible threats made against individuals or groups associated with the university community ahead of the start of the Jewish holiday of Passover.
… On Tuesday, a student draped in an Israeli flag spoke to reporters from within the fenced-in area of the encampment. Jewish students who have been suspended from Columbia and Barnard stated that they had celebrated a Passover Seder within the encampment at a press conference.
I agree with Robert Reich:
Antisemitism should have no place in America — not on college campuses or anywhere else.
But there is nothing inherently antisemitic about condemning the ongoing bloodshed in Gaza that has so far killed at least 34,000 people, mostly women and children.
Protesting this slaughter is not hate speech. It is what should be done on a college campus — taking a stand against a perceived wrong, at least provoking discussion and debate.
In the end, you may decide that Israel’s actions in Gaza are entirely justified, given the horror of Hamas’ October 7 attacks and the likelihood of similar attacks in the future. (Or you might not.) But reasonable people can disagree about this, and they should be allowed to express their views in public.
Many Republican politicians have responded cynically to the protests, trying to recreate Ronald Reagan’s successful demonization of campus protests during the Vietnam War. For example, it’s hard to take Texas Governor Greg Abbott seriously when he talks like this:
These protesters belong in jail. Antisemitism will not be tolerated in Texas. Period.
But Abbott is only intolerant of apparent left-wing antisemitism; he’s always been fine with right-wing antisemitism. Reporter Steven Monacelli of the Texas Observer comments:
I’ve seen no credible reporting of actual antisemitic incidents at the UT Austin protest. What I can tell you is that I’ve reported on numerous neo-Nazi events and Greg Abbott never once tried to put any of them in jail.
The Weekly Sift 