Anti-Semitism In North American Universities
At least two recent articles discuss the surge of anti-Semitism in North American universities. Excerpts follow.
From "Israel on Campus: How did American colleges get so anti-Semitic?" by Ruth Wisse, Wall Street Journal Opinion Page, American colleges get so anti-Semitic?" December 15, 2002:
"The claim of universities to be fostering diversity and preventing discrimination against vulnerable minorities is oddly compromised by a surge of anti-Semitism. With the recent addition of Columbia and Yale, over 50 campuses are currently circulating faculty petitions to divest from Israel and from American firms selling arms to Israel. Faculty at Georgetown, Michigan and Harvard have gone out of their way to invite speakers best known for their defamation of Israel and the Jews.
"…Like many such initiatives since the 1960s, the petition campaign['s] driving force are Arabs, Arabists and their sympathizers, who help prosecute the war against Israel as a way of diverting attention away from Arab regimes... Most university professors and students who support divestment do so in the misguided belief that it will force Israel to improve its human-rights record in the West Bank and Gaza. What they fail to recognize is that, far from championing human rights, the divestment petition is a springboard for the spread of anti-Semitic hostility to American campuses. The economic boycott has been part of the Arab arsenal in the war against Israel for the past 50 years... The divestment petitioners are asking their universities to join the Arab boycott that has the destruction of Israel as its larger goal.
"The divestment campaign did not just happen, and speakers assaulting Israel do not appear of themselves. This antipathy toward Israel grows from a campus culture that is selectively repressive… [S]ome Arab and Muslim students have been actively fomenting hatred of Israel as an expression of their "identity." On campuses with a large Arab presence, such as Wayne State in Detroit, this has resulted in a palpable threat to Jewish students, and outbreaks of physical violence have actually occurred at San Francisco State and Concordia University in Montreal… It is hardly surprising that they should be joined by others looking for a villain or scapegoat. Anti-Semitism thrives because slandering Israel is the only aggression against a minority that is encouraged by the rules of political correctness.
"Along similar lines, universities have allowed Middle East departments to disseminate anti-Israel propaganda to an extent unimaginable a generation ago, representing violations of intellectual honesty and academic impartiality that may be unique in our academic life..."
From an editorial entitled "An Ugly Infection" in The Montreal Gazette, December 15:
"Common sense has prevailed at a Montreal university, but that should lull no one into blissful ignorance about the ugliness infecting campuses across North America.
"The ugliness is anti-Semitism… What happened at the University of Quebec in Montreal last weekend gives Canadian context to [this matter]. In the face of two anonymous threats, administrators cited security concerns as they prohibited Israeli journalist and professor Gideon Kouts from speaking to the Jewish student group Hillel. After Montreal's Jewish community and others raised proper hell, the university regained its nerve and stood up for freedom of speech... Yet the initial, reflexive administrative silencing of Kouts remains deeply troubling, shaking us awake to the reality that anti-Semitism is never incidental. It is always insidious. It is insidious because it's not just an action but also a habit. As much as it is acts of insult or violence, it is even more the habit of minds schooled to ignore clear patterns of hatred… Kouts, after all, is not the only prominent Israeli recently prevented from speaking at a Montreal (read: Canadian) university. In September, glass-smashing thugs silenced former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Concordia…
"…It is a pattern that finds repetition in the deplorable action of Concordia's Student Union in expelling Hillel, the Jewish student group, on the flimsiest of pretexts. The CSU-Hillel incident might be written off as a petty post-secondary shenanigan were it not for the chilling, ugly reality that it meant Jewish voices being silenced on a Canadian university campus. History is witness to the evils that can spring from such silencing…"
At least two recent articles discuss the surge of anti-Semitism in North American universities. Excerpts follow.
From "Israel on Campus: How did American colleges get so anti-Semitic?" by Ruth Wisse, Wall Street Journal Opinion Page, American colleges get so anti-Semitic?" December 15, 2002:
"The claim of universities to be fostering diversity and preventing discrimination against vulnerable minorities is oddly compromised by a surge of anti-Semitism. With the recent addition of Columbia and Yale, over 50 campuses are currently circulating faculty petitions to divest from Israel and from American firms selling arms to Israel. Faculty at Georgetown, Michigan and Harvard have gone out of their way to invite speakers best known for their defamation of Israel and the Jews.
"…Like many such initiatives since the 1960s, the petition campaign['s] driving force are Arabs, Arabists and their sympathizers, who help prosecute the war against Israel as a way of diverting attention away from Arab regimes... Most university professors and students who support divestment do so in the misguided belief that it will force Israel to improve its human-rights record in the West Bank and Gaza. What they fail to recognize is that, far from championing human rights, the divestment petition is a springboard for the spread of anti-Semitic hostility to American campuses. The economic boycott has been part of the Arab arsenal in the war against Israel for the past 50 years... The divestment petitioners are asking their universities to join the Arab boycott that has the destruction of Israel as its larger goal.
"The divestment campaign did not just happen, and speakers assaulting Israel do not appear of themselves. This antipathy toward Israel grows from a campus culture that is selectively repressive… [S]ome Arab and Muslim students have been actively fomenting hatred of Israel as an expression of their "identity." On campuses with a large Arab presence, such as Wayne State in Detroit, this has resulted in a palpable threat to Jewish students, and outbreaks of physical violence have actually occurred at San Francisco State and Concordia University in Montreal… It is hardly surprising that they should be joined by others looking for a villain or scapegoat. Anti-Semitism thrives because slandering Israel is the only aggression against a minority that is encouraged by the rules of political correctness.
"Along similar lines, universities have allowed Middle East departments to disseminate anti-Israel propaganda to an extent unimaginable a generation ago, representing violations of intellectual honesty and academic impartiality that may be unique in our academic life..."
From an editorial entitled "An Ugly Infection" in The Montreal Gazette, December 15:
"Common sense has prevailed at a Montreal university, but that should lull no one into blissful ignorance about the ugliness infecting campuses across North America.
"The ugliness is anti-Semitism… What happened at the University of Quebec in Montreal last weekend gives Canadian context to [this matter]. In the face of two anonymous threats, administrators cited security concerns as they prohibited Israeli journalist and professor Gideon Kouts from speaking to the Jewish student group Hillel. After Montreal's Jewish community and others raised proper hell, the university regained its nerve and stood up for freedom of speech... Yet the initial, reflexive administrative silencing of Kouts remains deeply troubling, shaking us awake to the reality that anti-Semitism is never incidental. It is always insidious. It is insidious because it's not just an action but also a habit. As much as it is acts of insult or violence, it is even more the habit of minds schooled to ignore clear patterns of hatred… Kouts, after all, is not the only prominent Israeli recently prevented from speaking at a Montreal (read: Canadian) university. In September, glass-smashing thugs silenced former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Concordia…
"…It is a pattern that finds repetition in the deplorable action of Concordia's Student Union in expelling Hillel, the Jewish student group, on the flimsiest of pretexts. The CSU-Hillel incident might be written off as a petty post-secondary shenanigan were it not for the chilling, ugly reality that it meant Jewish voices being silenced on a Canadian university campus. History is witness to the evils that can spring from such silencing…"