Editorial: When protest turns to hatred: There’s far too much antisemitism in the free Palestine movement
Monday, with all classes being held remote, the environs of Columbia University were anything but quiet. On the South Lawn in front of Butler Library was the tent city of students with the misguided idea to boycott Israel. These students were visited by leftwing councilmembers, who hold the same wrongheaded stand.
But far worse, outside the gates on Broadway, exercising their First Amendment right to spread hate under the watchful eyes of a great many NYPD cops, were a hardcore bunch of anti-Israel zealots (be they students or not), with their loud, nasty chants and their banging drums. Their message was that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, a horrendous lie, and the world’s only Jewish state must be destroyed. It was a lot less pro-Palestinian than viciously anti-Israel and antisemitic.
And so once again, the free Palestine movement is infected with antisemitism, the socialism of fools, an embarrassing and disgusting reality that they will not admit.
Columbia President Minouche Shafik was correct to tell Congress last week that there is Jew-hatred on campus and some Jewish students are fearful, with a campus rabbi suggesting they stay away.
Yes, we know that there are Jewish students in the tent city and are there probably Jews in the noxious gang on Broadway, but the presence of an anti-Zionist Jewish minority — which has always existed — does not whitewash the antisemitism coursing through the anti-Israel protests at Columbia and elsewhere, on and off campus.
There are a lot of people who despise Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu and want him out of office and maybe even locked up in jail. That might constitute a majority of the Israeli electorate, but those Israelis do not want their country wiped off the map. There is a great difference in wanting Israel to change its policy, in its war with Hamas, in its treatment of Palestinians on the West Bank, in its relations with its Arab neighbors, and wanting there not to be an Israel.
As for Shafik, she followed up her congressional testimony by suspending the original group in tents in front of Butler for violating university policies (which they were doing) and called the cops to remove the trespassers. That move blew up in her face, causing the hateful gang on Broadway to appear and demands for her head.
Monday, Republican congressmen had gathered on the other side of Broadway from the noisy protesters to call for Shafik to resign. Later in the day some Democratic congressmen went to campus to show solidarity with Jewish students being targeted. What an awful way to spend Passover.
Everyone is upset as anti-Israel students feel that their right to legitimate protest (a college tradition) is being impinged, while some Jews on campus are feeling afraid (a tremendous breach of the idea of university) and the professional Israel-haters out in the street raise their voices and the temperature under the protection of the police and the Constitution.
Free speech, even hateful speech, should be respected on and off campus. But intimidation and threats should not be permitted. As for violating campus rules about tents and such, that is a matter between the students and the administration.
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