Considering Campus Antisemitism

College is the first time that many young people live away from home. Young adults find new friends and community to experience learning and fun for several important formative years.

Alas, it is not always simple for Jews at universities.

Campus antisemitism has been a growing issue, and after the October 7 Hamas massacre, it has escalated and made Jewish students fear for their basic safety. Threats against students at Cornell, Cooper Union, New York University, Columbia and Hunter College are seemingly mentioned daily.

And that’s just in New York, home to the largest population of Jews outside of Israel.

As the current Gaza War is likely to go on for some time, it is likely that the tepid reaction of universities will enable more antisemitism on campuses, so this article is meant as a guide for how to ingest the latest incidents.

First Framework: 98% and 2% of Campuses with Jews

In the United States, there are roughly 5,300 colleges. Of those, roughly 100 have a Jewish presence of note, whether by number of Jewish students, percentage of Jews or those with a visibly Orthodox presence. That means that 98% of American colleges might have antisemitic incidents that do not actively harm Jews at that moment in time. While the toxicity of antisemitism spreading should not be overlooked, the antisemitism may go unnoticed and unreported.

The figures may hold true for other countries with large Jewish populations including Canada, United Kingdom and France. While there are many fewer universities there, it is likely that 90%-plus percentage of them have under-reported antisemitic occurrences.

Second Framework: The Three Groups of Antisemitic Actors

Antisemitism at universities have three principle actors: the alt-right, jihadists and the alt-left.

The alt-right and neo-Nazis were historically viewed as the classic antisemites. While the alt-right continues to taunt and attack Jews, they have a quiet presence thus far at the two percent of universities where most Jews attend. They have greater voices in the other 98% of campuses so that antisemitism is often unreported.

When White Supremacists marched at the University of Virginia in 2017, the world took notice. There wasn’t a need for the Hillel, which claims there are 1,000 Jews at UVA, to alert the press as everyone was shocked by the scale of the provocative march meant to intimidate the relatively small Jewish population and other minorities.

The jihadists have been gaining significant ground since the turn of the century. Led by Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), the pro-Hamas group has roughly 250 chapters around the United States, including almost all of the 2% schools which Jews attend including the large state universities (Florida, Michigan, Maryland, Indiana, Wisconsin), the City of New York/ State of New York and University of California school systems, as well as the Ivy League schools. Their presence on campus directly correlates to more antisemitic actions on campuses as shown by work done by the AMCHA Initiative.

In the current environment after the October 7 Hamas attack, they are a leading cause of anti-Jewish hostility on campus, and Jews are directly feeling the brunt of their extremism and hatred.

The third category of antisemites comes from the alt-left, such as groups associated with the Democratic Socialists of America. They are profoundly anti-Zionist, and have falsely labeled Israel as a “settler colonial state”, denying Jews their history and heritage in the holy land. Since the 2014/15 Black Lives Matter protests, socialists have bonded with the jihadists in coming for Jews and Zionists. Like the jihadists, they are found in almost school where Jews are located.

The cumulative effect is that one doesn’t hear much about campus antisemitism from the alt-right, especially during conflicts in the Middle East. If one hears about it at all, it will be from something major like the “United the Right” UVA march which included many people from outside the university.

In contrast, jihadists feel uncomfortably close with their daily confrontations with Jews and the spectacle is frightening.

The alt-left socialists feel even closer for progressive Jews. They belong to the same clubs and advocated for many of the same causes. To see them celebrating the murder and butchering of Jews is deeply hurtful and shocking.

Third Framework: The Three Levels at Universities

The third way to consider antisemitism is understanding the three tiers of a university: the institution, the teachers and the students.

Groups like SJP are made up of students and tend to be the most vocal actors on campuses. They stage die-ins, put on Israel Apartheid Weeks and are the ones generally responsible for vandalism. The university has little sway over them, other than the ability to not officially recognize them or allow them to hold events on campus grounds, or expel them if they go against rules of conduct.

Teachers are directly employed by the university so the institution has much greater influence on them. However, once a teacher gets tenure, it becomes very difficult to discipline them unless they do something egregious.

The institutions are businesses, whether they are not-for-profit or for-profit, public or private universities. They need funding, students, professors, accreditation, real estate and many other things to operate. As such, it is possible to impact their direction by donors and federal mandates.

Using these three lenses about universities, one can better evaluate the impact of campus antisemitism.

Examining Donors Via The Frameworks

Many wealthy Jewish university benefactors lashed out about the state of antisemitism on campuses. Marc Rowan, Bill Ackman, Leon Cooperman, David Magerman and others stated that they will no longer send universities millions of dollars as they have in the past.

It matters much less than they think. Not only do the universities have billions of dollars already in endowments, but the monies those benefactors spent were on hospitals and center for the arts and to put their names on buildings. The Jews gave money at the institutional level.

That is in sharp contrast to the Gulf states including Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Foreign forces gave over $10 billion to American universities at every level including the student and professor levels. At the institutional level, they spent money opening up campuses in their kingdoms to legitimize their autocratic regimes.

At the student level, the governments sent tens of thousands of students onto American campuses, changing the nature of the schools. The universities appreciate the fully-funded tuitions and the ability to appear diverse and international. In the 2015/6 school year, over 61,000 Saudi students attended American schools. That represented 0.2% of the entire population of Saudi Arabia to a single country. By way of comparison, the ENTIRE American students abroad cohort all over the world is around 162,000, or 0.05% of the U.S. population. Imagine 650,000 American college students all going to Brazil for college, and you get the absurdity of what transpired on American campuses with petrodollars.

The Gulf money also funded professors and chairs of departments. In July 2000, the president of the United Arab Emirates, Sheik Zayed bin Sultan al-Nahyan, donated $2.5 million to the Harvard Divinity School to endow the Sheik Zayed Al Nahyan Professorship in Islamic Religious Studies. Within a short period of time, the Zayed Center became a noxious fountain of anti-Semitic screed complete with Holocaust denials and blood libels. It took the non-profit group The David Project and a student at the Harvard Divinity School, Rachel Fish, to loudly protest the donation and Center itself.

But the damage is often already done. With an application of two students and approval of a professor, a new SJP chapter comes to campus. The AMCHA Initiative has shown that campuses with five or more professors who support the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) of Israel and has an anti-Zionist group like SJP on campus, is over seven times more likely to have antisemitic incidents.

These professors actively push the antisemitic narrative to Decolonize Palestine, framing Jews as interlopers and the Jewish State as a European Colonial State. It is inherently antisemitic, as it negates Jewish heritage and history. The professors claim that it is worthy of debate and administrations remain silent.

Ramifications

Historically, Jews focused on choosing schools with a good Jewish campus life. If there was a Hillel, AEPi Jewish fraternity, Chabad or OU-JLIC couple on campus, students and parents felt comfortable with a supportive environment. Walking through campus and seeing Jewish names on buildings like Stern and Lauder gave people comfort that they would not confront antisemitism.

That is simply not the case.

The correct questions are whether the university has an SJP or Jewish Voice for Peace on campus. Does the university take millions of dollars from Gulf states? Are there tenured professors with a history of antisemitic remarks like Columbia’s Joseph Massad? Does it promote the antisemitic libel that Jews have no history in the holy land and that it is noble to “normalize and globalize Hamas” the way Brown University suggests?

Action Items

The jihadists have focused on American universities for twenty years, and the alt-left has long had a hold on campus life but only bonded with the jihadists since 2014/5. It will take time to undo the damage that has been done.

But there are several things which can be effectuated to start the change. For those who don’t want or cannot wait, consider Yeshiva University or Touro which are Jewish institutions with no jihadist groups and very few members of the alt-left.

Get universities to stop taking money from toxic regimes. Qatar openly supports the terrorist group Hamas. Saudi Arabia beheads minors. There must be some human rights bright lines which should block universities from taking money. At a minimum, there should be a cap of say $5 million over any five year period for any foreign government or agency to pour money into American schools.
Label SJP a hate group and kick them off campus. With seven times more antisemitic incidents with their presence, the groups should be blocked from school recognition.
Place a morality clause in all contracts. If misgendering someone can be cause for dismissal, then certainly celebrating the slaughter of babies and raping of women should result in immediate firings.
Get the Biden Administration to adopt the IHRA definition of antisemitism as it relates to Title VI for universities. The administration already approved it as the best working definition of antisemitism but has not applied it to Title VI which would pull government funding to universities that allow rampant anti-Zionism and antisemitism.
Expel foreign students involved in hate crimes. Universities like MIT have been loathe to suspend foreign students as it would result in their deportation. American Jews should not be forced to endure visiting students’ antisemitism because the university wants to keep the foreign nation’s tuition funnel flowing.
Support Jewish and Israel groups. OU-JLIC, Hillel and other groups need active support, as do external groups which help out university students like StandWithUs and Students Supporting Israel. The infrastructure must be continuously enhanced for a strong Jewish campus life.
Get benefactors to fund Jewish scholarships and Jewish and Israel studies departments. Just like the Gulf states, Jewish benefactors should fund scholarships for Jews to their alma maters as well as professors focused on Jewish studies.
Write about the problem. Penning letters to the school administrators, posting on social media, and telling members of congress and governors about the horrific situation on campuses will help drive change. Write letters to the media that they must cover campus antisemitism more regularly and honestly.