Ep. 187: A new surge of college antisemitism this fall?

Jewish students should expect to be confronted by more pro-Hamas mobs and antisemitism when returning to college this fall, says JNS editor-in-chief Jonathan Tobin.  With legacy media mainstreaming Hamas propaganda and blood libels against Israel,  it’s likely that the surge of antisemitism throughout American education that began after the Hamas-led Palestinian Arab attacks on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, will continue in the coming months. He’s joined in the week’s episode of Think Twice by Cornell Law professor and Legalinsurrection.com founder William Jacobson who says it’s “going to be a very hot fall” with respect to anti-Israel activity. Jacobson believes that the pro-Hamas movement is in retreat as a result of Trump’s crackdown, which has caused many schools to act swiftly to quash antisemitism on campus, lest they lose federal funding. But given the widespread belief in the lies about Israel committing “genocide” in Gaza, antisemitic groups like Students for Justice in Palestine will be even more aggressive than in the past two years. It will be up to colleges and universities to ensure that those who break the rules and engage in illegal activity in the name of “Palestine” are held accountable. Israel-haters have, Jacobson says, co-opted the entire left-wing movement, sidelining causes like Black Lives Matter and making activism for the destruction of Israel their main goal. This movement is being aided with funding from Qatar and other malign actors and is also seeking to co-opt the right via influencers like Tucker Carlson. But, he says, their main target is America itself and not just the Jews. “If you wanted to destroy the United States from inside, what would you do differently than the left and now the Islamists are doing to our educational system, which is pitting students against each other based on skin color and identity group? And that's what the mainstream Jewish community refuses to address.  Jacobson says that Trump’s attempts to broker deals with universities like Harvard and Columbia is having an impact on the spread of antisemitism, in part, because of the decline in foreign students who have been a big part of the problem. But he cautions that enforcement of the provisions of those agreements are key, since these institutions are hoping to wait out Trump and go back to their discriminatory policies once he leaves office. The key to the problem is ridding the system of the plague of the woke catechism of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) which is at the core of the spread of anti-Jewish prejudice because it falsely identifies Jews and Israel as “white” oppressors. He criticized those mainstream liberal Jewish groups that refuse to oppose DEI.  Jacobson said he’s not sure whether the education system can be saved. “We need to now figure out how we protect ourselves from the universities, not how we reform the universities. I do not believe that universities can reform themselves, at least not the so-called elite universities where we're having most of these problems.” Listen/Subscribe to weekly episodes on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube Music, iHeart Radio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.   Watch new episodes every week by subscribing to the JNS YouTube Channel.