GUEST POST: Focus shifts over fall semester

The focus of the controversies on anti-Semitism on American universities has changed during the fall semester. Increasingly the implications of the incoming Trump administration and a Republican congress are coming to the fore.

In September it looked as if campuses would face a level of disruption even worse than they did in the 2023-2024 academic year. Anti-Israel protestors at Washington University in Seattle forced a meeting called to discuss the safety of Jewish students and staff to close prematurely. There was no discussion of the main topic and divestment was not on the agenda.

Another egregious example of anti-Semitism on campus was the defacing of buildings at Rochester University in New York state. In November they were defaced with wanted posters targeting Jewish staff. Four students have been arrested and charged with felony criminal mischief and a fifth is being investigated. 

Columbia university in New York was, as is so often the case, a centre for anti-Israel activity. Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD) called on the university to sever all ties with Hillel a Jewish campus organisation. It also tried to disrupt an event featuring an Israeli CNN journalist, Barak Ravid, at which he discussed the conflict between Israel and Hamas.

However, divisions between anti-Israel activists have begun to become apparent at Columbia. A group called Columbia Palestine Solidarity Coalition (CPSC) has itself disowned CUAD. CPSC accuses CUAD of placing the interests of individual student organisers and general revolutionary ideals over and above the concerns of Palestinians themselves.

In November the student body at the University of Michigan voted to impeach its staunchly anti-Israel president and vice president. It accused them of inciting violence against student colleagues. They had entered office the previous semester on the back of a campaign for divestment from Israel. This policy included disrupting what they termed all business as usual, which led to the withholding of the allocation of funds to student groups.

Meanwhile, the congressional committee investigating campus antisemitism has announced it is willing to pass responsibility to the executive branch for ensuring campus order. This decision took on new significance with Donald Trump’s victory in the November presidential race. 

Trump’s pledge to close the federal Department of Education was part of his presidential election campaign. This was not just because of concerns related to anti-Semitism but as a means of reducing government expenditure and tackling woke ideology. If Trump implements this initiative the Department of Justice will probably become the focus for controversies regarding anti-Semitism on campus. His choice for attorney-general, Pam Bondi (pictured above), who is known as a hardliner, would head the department. She has promised to deport overseas student leaders of anti-Israel campus protests. Bondi has also spoken of removing the accreditation of universities found not to be adequately tackling anti-Semitism. 

Trump’s victory has prompted concern from anti-Israel campaigners at Harvard and elsewhere. Their claim is that Republicans could weaponise anti-Semitism as part of a broader culture war against the left.

The danger of attention switching to the high-level political aspects of all this is that the experience of Jewish students and staff get overlooked. It will be a while before anyone has surveyed the experience of students and staff during the fall semester in the round. It is perhaps inevitable that those who have suffered the most are the least likely to speak out.

Two main themes emerge from anti-Israel activity in the most recent semester. One of them featured in the previous academic year and one is new. The by now familiar theme is the hypocrisy of those who claim to be pro-Palestinian activists who complain about their free speech being curtailed. They are only too willing to silence their opponents, if necessary through intimidation and threat. The second is the possible beginnings of the fragmentation of the anti-Israel movement. There is no guarantee that the Harvard Palestine Solidarity Coalition will be any more reasonable than CUAD, but disunity always saps energy.

*While large-scale anti-Israel student protests have died down in America the opposite seems true in Canada. In Quebec 50,000 students from 13 university campuses participated in an anti-Israel protest in November. They occupied 12 floors of the main Concordia building in Montreal. “Free Palestine” was reportedly sprayed on lockers.

Guy Whitehouse is a member of the Academy of Ideas and the Free Speech Union. His views do not necessarily reflect those of those organisations.

The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of the Radicalism of fools project.

PHOTO: Pam Bondi. From the America First Policy Institute.