An Open Letter to American University Presidents:
On October 7Israel has suffered the worst terrorist attack since its founding and is one of the worst terrorist attacks in human history. About 3,000 terrorists Hamas And Islamic Jihad – Iran’s proxies – infiltrated Israel on the morning of Simchat Torah. Armed to the teeth, they broke into the homes of civilians and dragged men, women, babies and children from their beds.
They brutally assaulted, tortured, burned, mutilated, killed and abducted about 1,500 people.
After many days, IDF Forces entered the Gaza Strip to destroy Hamas infrastructure and rescue the hostages. Hamas fires hundreds of rockets a day from Gaza into Israeli fronts, along with other terrorist organizations – Hezbollah from Lebanon, Shiite militias from Syria and Yemen’s Houthis – all coordinated and orchestrated by the terrorist state of Iran.
The terrorist organizations fled underground through a number of fortified tunnels built over the years. Gaza Strip, under civilian settlements.
They forced Israeli hostages underground and Palestinians above ground to act as human shields against attacks on the headquarters, leaders and rocket launchers.
Even before an Israeli soldier closed Gaza, many around the world, especially in American academia, started a slander and defamation campaign against Israel, ignoring and sometimes denying the massacre of Israeli civilians by Hamas.
Running a defamation campaign against Israel
For example, on October 18, members of the Women’s and Gender Studies Department at Syracuse University published a statement of solidarity with “the Palestinian people over 75 years old in their struggle against Israeli settler colonialism and occupation.”
These self-proclaimed feminists cannot condemn Hamas’s brutal mass-rape of Israeli women, or perhaps express their solidarity with the young Israeli mothers who were burned to death while holding their infants and young children. .
At Harvard University, 34 pro-Palestinian organizations published an open letter declaring that Israel is fully responsible for the massacre. A few days later, about 20 pro-Palestinian student groups at Columbia University signed a solidarity letter calling for a review of the “actions of Palestinian fighters” against what they called a 16-year “inhumane siege.” ” At George Washington University, messages such as “Honor to our Martyrs” and “Palestine from River to Sea” were plastered on campus walls.
At Northwestern University, students in Palestine have issued a statement to members of the justice system, saying that Israel does not have the right to claim that Israel is a victim of mass murder, as the attack is the result of a Palestinian “demand for self-determination.”
The University of Virginia branch of the SJP added that it supports the right of Palestinians to “claim their land in any way they see fit.” And these are just a few examples of what happened at prestigious American universities last month.
The outpouring of hatred that has quickly engulfed university campuses is a significant manifestation of contemporary anti-Semitism directed at Israel and Jews in general. These blatant attacks should not be seen as legitimate criticism of Israel’s policies or actions, but rather as a clear attempt to undermine the right of the State of Israel to exist as a Jewish state.
Worse, in most cases, university presidents’ responses to these anti-Semitic expressions within their institutions were weak and tainted by political correctness, which expressed solidarity with the suffering of both Israelis and Palestinians.
Antisemites in general, especially on American campuses, can be divided into three groups: ancient antisemites, modern antisemites, and ignorant “useful idiots.”
The classic anti-Semites inherited a deep-seated hatred of Jews. Often, these have never met a Jew in their lives, but have been raised and educated by their parents and teachers on stories of blood libels and horrors that provide scriptural narratives.
Most of today’s anti-Semites are Arabs and Islamists who instinctively and firmly oppose the existence of the State of Israel, regardless of its location in the historic Land of Israel. Their burning hatred for Jews has turned into widespread anti-Jewish hatred.
However, the largest and largest group is the third, which is what can only be called “useful idiots” (a reference to naive individuals prone to exploitation, historically associated with communist activists in Western countries). These useful idiots are often sympathetic people who have been exploited or oppressed – villains.
The problem is that many of them are not fully aware of the overall agenda they are unwittingly serving, and are unaware of the manipulation of their beliefs and actions.
Most of the useful idiots on American campuses suffer from the “white-guilt” syndrome characterized by a collective sense of guilt for the human suffering of various population groups throughout the world as a result of racist behavior and colonialist policies.
In this ambiguous arena, anti-Semitic propaganda thrives, Zionism, and the Israeli government, which promotes colonialist ideals of dispossessing the indigenous people – the Palestinians – of their land.
This perspective, of course, ignores both the ancient and modern historical context, and ignores the continued physical presence of the Jewish people in their homeland and their indigenous rights to the land.
A prevalent issue on American campuses today revolves around the ignorance of useful idiots that align with modern and classic anti-Semitism. Hatred of Israel and the Zionist ideology has spilled over into broader hatred of Jews, and has become anathema among progressive, liberal circles, primarily in the US but also in other Western countries.
This trend is further fueled by demographic changes and the rapid growth of the Muslim population in European countries, which is reflected in voting patterns, and exacerbates the polarization between the radical left and the extreme right, the latter often anti-immigration (and anti-immigration). holds Jews) views.
Scholars who promote the anti-Israel narrative
The modern problem of anti-Semitism, especially fueled by useful idiots, will not go away as long as there are large numbers of intellectuals around the world working to fuel the agitation and advance the anti-Zionist and anti-Israeli narrative. These professors work deliberately to brainwash and burn their students with lies and half-truths, without explaining the whole picture or at least presenting Israel’s narrative.
Many make no effort to hide their agenda; As the Syracuse University signatories state, “As women educators, we are committed to creating classroom environments that foster critical and anti-racist thinking… We pledge to you, our students, to teach what you cannot learn anywhere else.”
University leaders around the world, and especially in the US, must prevent the misuse of academic platforms for systematic indoctrination that can lead to terrorism and anti-Semitic hate crimes. Claims of free speech and academic freedom cannot justify such behavior.
This commitment of university presidents is not to Israel, Jews, or historical justice, but to the benefit of their students. They must fulfill the essential role of any institution of higher education: to follow the truth and provide students with knowledge free from political, ideological or other bias.
The writer is president of Richmond University.
