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| Pre October 7 Anti Israel student protest (TOI) |
Indeed. Over 30,000 civilian casualties is a very disturbing number of innocent people dying in a war. Even if that war is just. It should therefore not be a surprise that students are expressing anger and outrage at those they see as responsible: Israel.
But what if they are protesting the wrong people? What if those really responsible are among the casualties themselves. Terrorists in civilian clothing hiding in plain sight? What if it is the Palestinian leadership in Gaza (Hamas) that is responsible for those numbers as a tactic to gain world sympathy? Problem is that these protestors either don't know it or don't believe it possible that any nation would do that to their people.
What these students must surmise is what hey have been indoctrinated to believe about Israel, from intellectual Palestinian professors and their progressive colleagues who mentor many of these students,. Filling their heads about the evils of Zionism - the foundational principle of the Jewish state. These mentors define Zionism as nothing more than a colonialist enterprise designed to take land away from its indigenous peoples; to subjugate them and to mistreat them.
And that for its entire 76 year existence Zionist Israel has been an Apartheid state where Palestinians have been ruled with an iron military fist - subjected to harassment, humiliation, and poverty.
Some of these leftist academics are quite mainstream and their message is quite subtle, often cleverly stated in the context of tepidly condemning antisemitism.
Problem with that false narrative is that it’s working. This narrative is what is led UN Secretary-General António Guterres to say that October 7th did not happen in a vacuum. While he did condemn what Hamas did, he ended up partially justifying it with that comment.
Anti Israel protests by students on college campuses didn’t start on October 7th. They have been going on for quite some time. That they have increased in intensity now is because they see Hamas’s claim of Israeli Apartheid as true and a justification for what they did on that day.
In my view these protests are more about being anti Israel than they are about protesting the casualties of war and its attendant starvation. The war is just the precipitating factor of a long simmering animosity toward the Zionist Apartheid state
(On this last point, It was quite telling to hear what Pope Francis said about starving Palestinians in answer to a question asked by a mainstream US network news anchor. Based on direct reports from Gazans he said that food was coming in but there has been a distribution problem. That people there are fighting over the food.
To me that says that Israel is not at fault. They are in fact letting food into Gaza. However, those distributing it (the UN?) are not doing a good job. There have also been reports that Hamas has been commandeering the food for themselves and selling it to civilians at exorbitant prices. But I digress.)
If you look at the protest signs and listen to the chants of the students it is mostly anti Zionism (i.e. anti Israel) . Not too much about a cease fire anymore. Zionism is the problem and it must be eradicated so that Palestinians can get their land back.
Sadly there are some Jews are among these protesters who have been chanting the same slogans. It should not be surprising that they are not aware that Zionism - which is about the Jewish people returning to the promised land - is and has always been part of our Jewish identity since ancient times. Not knowing that (or not even caring) is a common error made by much of our Jewish youth bereft of any kind of quality Jewish education.
To many (most) of these people, justice in Palestine means dismantling the Zionist Jewish state. They agree with the Hamas goal if not entirely with their methods (resulting from decades of frustration at the oppression by Zionists).
That there is a leftist bias indoctrinated into these student protestors was exposed by the reaction Columbia students had to House Speaker Mike Johnson - widely known as a conservative Republican. Before he could open his mouth he was booed by the crowd. Without knowing what he was going to say.
There is an eerie similarity between the current protests and the anti Viet Nam War protests of the late 60s - early70s. Back then college campuses were taken over by students. And just like today, some of those protests turned violent and some protestors were arrested. The idealistic students of that time persisted. They considered the Viet Nam War immoral. Just as today’s protestors consider Israel’s war against Hamas immoral
Although they refuse to recognize the truth, there are major differences between this war and the Viet Nam War. Starting with the fact that Hamas first attacked Israel, killing 1200 Jews in the most brutal way imaginable - and took hostages. Israel had no choice but to conduct a war to eliminate that scourge. Doing so with the blessing of the US government, its people, and the rest of the free world. Even now the US still supports Israel’s right to do so albeit now disagreeing with their methods.. Point being that unlike these protestors they do not see Israel as an Apartheid state that needs to be dismantled and given to the Palestinians.
Complicating matters is the fact that there are still over 100 hostages being held by Hamas. Hostage families and Anti Netanyahu protestors are demanding that he make any deal that would that would free them. Hamas has said the only way it will do that is if there is a permanent cease fire. Which of course will only be permanent until the next time they want to perpetrate an October 7th. Israel cannot afford to make that deal. So they are basically caught between a rock and a hard place.
I am not feeling very confident right now about where this is going. Which seems to be in the opposite direction of justice for the Jewish people.
We’ve been here before. I just wish I knew how to instill the truth into these young minds filled with the progressive mush they are being fed so successfully by their morally bankrupt professors.