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Anti-Israel Crybullies and the Free Speech Inversion
University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill testifies during a House Education and Workforce Committee hearing on holding campus leaders accountable and confronting antisemitism, at the US Capitol, in Washington, DC, on Dec. 5, 2023. Photo: Graeme Sloan/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
The term “crybully” rose to prominence over the last decade, and describes a phenomenon that has become increasingly common on campus.
As defined at Dictionary.com, a crybully is “a person who self-righteously harasses or intimidates others while playing the victim, especially of a perceived social injustice.”
This is a particularly accurate label for the crowd of anti-Israel activists who have spent decades working to silence and intimidate Jewish and Israeli voices on campuses, while also portraying themselves as victims of an attack on their free speech.
Anti-Israel activists have long engaged in conduct designed to suppress the ability of Jewish and Israeli voices to speak on campus. Through the so-called “Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions” (BDS) movement, these activists have openly called to silence an entire category of speakers — namely, Israelis and anyone who supports Israel.
For decades, BDS activists have disrupted events, even including Holocaust memorial events, and one can only guess as to how many Israelis and Zionists have been overtly or quietly denied opportunities or platforms because of their identity.
The bullying became even more extreme over time. Student groups began banning Zionists, a term that includes most American Jews, or declaring that Zionists were not welcome on campus.
Jewish institutions on campuses became increasingly targeted for vandalism and threats. Overt expressions of antisemitism became increasingly normalized. And the effect has been palpable.
A recent survey found that 31.9% of Jewish students have “felt unable to speak out about campus antisemitism,” and 38.3% said they “would be uncomfortable with others on campus knowing about their views of Israel.” Less than half of Jewish students said they felt “very” or “extremely” physically safe on campus.
Another study found that among Jewish sorority and fraternity members, two-thirds had felt unsafe on campus at some point, and half had felt the need to hide their identity. Those students were not just withholding their speech; they felt afraid to even be identified as Jewish on campus.
Their fear is not unjustified.
Nationally, hate crimes against Jews are at shockingly high and disproportionate levels, with four times as many anti-Jewish crimes as anti-Muslim and anti-Arab crimes combined. One need only look at some of the recent scenes on campus, such as anti-Israel demonstrators besieging Jewish students locked in a room at Cooper Union, to understand why Jewish students are afraid.
Moreover, it is not the pro-Israel rallies and activists that have regularly descended into violence, intimidation, and vandalism — or barrages of antisemitic and genocidal chants.
It is the Jewish students who are being attacked at their own rallies or while putting up posters of innocent Israeli civilians taken hostage by Hamas. It is Jewish students who are being forced to reject a central part of their Jewish identity if they want to participate in university functions.
We know where much of this hate is coming from. As shown by one study, the presence of the major anti-Israel student organization, Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), is one of the best predictors for the perception of a hostile climate for Jews on campuses.
As one New York appellate court ruling explained, a university’s conclusion that an SJP chapter would “work against, rather than enhance [a university’s] commitment [to] open dialogue” was “not without sound basis in reason” nor “taken without regard to the facts.”
Which brings us to the “cry” part of “crybully.”
Anti-Israel activists shriek and howl over alleged threats to their free speech. But the evidence is thin that there is any reason for anti-Israel students to feel that their freedom of expression is under any serious threat on campus.
Moves against various SJP chapters on universities have not been on the basis of their beliefs or expression, but rather their violations of legitimate university rules, and even plausible arguments that National SJP has run afoul of the Anti-Terrorism Act.
That a handful of students have lost out on job offers because they expressed support for a designated terrorist organization that had just murdered and raped its way through southern Israel is hardly a threat to free speech, either. Private actors are not restrained by the First Amendment, and as explained in Ilya Shapiro’s brilliant piece at The Free Press, one can hardly qualify these examples as “cancel culture.”
And while there has been a rise in hate crimes against Arabs and Muslims, the demographic typically associated with the Palestinian cause, the figures still pale in comparison to hate crimes against Jews, which have skyrocketed from their already disturbingly high levels. And those hate crimes are not being committed by Jews.
Unfortunately, some otherwise laudable free speech advocates are falling for the crybully trick, and adopting some perplexing positions. The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), for example, has repeatedly opposed the use of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s non-legally binding definition of antisemitism, incorrectly suggesting that it would limit speech. On the other hand, FIRE has curiously refused to take a position on BDS — which openly works to limit the speech of an entire category of people — and has even joined failed lawsuits against anti-BDS laws.
This is not to say that FIRE shouldn’t stand up for anti-Israel activists when their legitimate rights are infringed. To the contrary, I encourage FIRE to continue to do so. But free speech advocates, like those at FIRE, should rethink their role in protecting America’s sacred belief in free speech. When substantial numbers of Jews and Israelis are afraid to express themselves and are being pushed out of entire academic communities because of who they are, that is as big of a threat to free expression as any.
Just the other day, the concerned father of a Jewish student, who was personally facing intimidation on campus, shared with me his conversation with a senior university official. The official acknowledged that most Jewish students were afraid to even report the antisemitism they were facing, given the hostile climate. But, the father explained, the official wasn’t saying this because he had any intention of addressing the hostile environment he just acknowledged existed. Rather, it was a warning: make a fuss over this and it might get even worse for your son.
That is the disturbing reality Jews and Israelis are facing on campus: not just hostility, but apathy from those in a position of responsibility to address the situation. That is why I hope free speech advocates will find a constructive way to help address the situation before it gets even worse.
David M. Litman is a Senior Analyst at the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA).
The post Anti-Israel Crybullies and the Free Speech Inversion first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iran Rejects US Nuclear Proposal, Says ‘Counteroffer’ Coming as Talks Stall Over Uranium Enrichment, Sanctions
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaks during a meeting in Tehran, Iran, May 20, 2025. Photo: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
Iran has denounced the latest nuclear proposal from the United States as “unprofessional and untechnical,” reaffirming the country’s right to enrich uranium and announcing plans to present a counteroffer in the coming days.
“After receiving the American proposal regarding the Iranian nuclear program, we are now preparing a counteroffer,” Ali Shamkhnai, political adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said in an interview on Wednesday.
Shamkhani criticized the White House draft proposal as “not well thought out,” emphasizing its alleged failure to address sanction relief — a key demand for Tehran under any deal with Washington.
“There is no mention whatsoever of lifting sanctions in the latest American proposal, even though the issue of sanctions is a fundamental matter for Iran,” Shamkhnai said.
The Iranian official also warned that Tehran will not allow the US to dismantle its “peaceful nuclear program” or force uranium enrichment down to zero.
“Iran will never relinquish its natural rights,” Shamkhani said.
Washington’s draft proposal for a new nuclear deal was delivered by Omani officials — who have been mediating negotiations between Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and US Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff — during last month’s talks in Rome.
On Wednesday, Khamenei dismissed such an offer, saying it “contradicts our nation’s belief in self-reliance” and runs counter to Iran’s key objectives.
“The proposal that the Americans have presented is 100 percent against our interests,” the Iranian leader said during a televised speech.
“The rude and arrogant leaders of America repeatedly demand that we should not have a nuclear program. Who are you to decide whether Iran should have enrichment?” Khamenei continued.
After five rounds of talks, diplomatic efforts have yet to yield results as both adversaries clash over Iran’s demand to maintain its domestic uranium enrichment program — a condition the White House has firmly rejected.
In April, Tehran and Washington held their first official nuclear negotiation since the US withdrew from a now-defunct 2015 nuclear deal that had imposed temporary limits on Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for sanction relief.
Since taking office, US President Donald Trump has sought to curtail Tehran’s potential to develop a nuclear weapon that could spark a regional arms race and pose a threat to Israel.
Meanwhile, Iran seeks to have Western sanctions on its oil-dependent economy lifted, while maintaining its nuclear enrichment program — which the country insists is solely for civilian purposes.
As part of the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran — which aims to cut the country’s crude exports to zero and prevent it from obtaining a nuclear weapon — Washington has been targeting Tehran’s oil industry with mounting sanctions.
Amid the ongoing diplomatic deadlock, Israel has declared it will never allow the Islamist regime to acquire nuclear weapons, as the country views Iran’s nuclear program as an existential threat.
However, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged to uphold any agreement that prevents Tehran from enriching uranium.
“But in any case, Israel maintains the right to defend itself from a regime that is threatening to annihilate it,” Netanyahu said in a press conference last month, following reports that Jerusalem could strike Iranian nuclear sites if ongoing negotiations between Washington and Tehran fail.
The post Iran Rejects US Nuclear Proposal, Says ‘Counteroffer’ Coming as Talks Stall Over Uranium Enrichment, Sanctions first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Day After Colorado Attack, Founder of Anti-Israel Group Chides Activists Who Are Insufficiently ‘Pro-Resistance’
Nerdeen Kiswani, founder of WithinOurLifetime (WOL), leading a pro-Hamas demonstration in New York City on Aug. 14, 2024. Photo: Michael Nigro via Reuters Connect
Nerdeen Kiswani, the founder of the radical anti-Israel organization Within Our Lifetime, chastised those within the pro-Palestinian movement who only support “resistance” in the abstract but not in practice following Sunday’s antisemitic attack in Boulder, Colorado.
“A lot of people who call themselves anti-Zionist or pro-resistance don’t actually understand what resistance is,” Kiswani posted on X/Twitter on Monday. “They support it in theory, but when it shows up in practice, they hesitate, distance themselves, or shift the conversation entirely.”
She continued, “And it makes it even harder for those of us who are principled to take public stances. We’re already marginalized, already painted as extreme or dangerous and that isolation only deepens when others in the movement won’t stand firm when it counts.”
Kiswani’s comments came the day after a man threw Molotov cocktails at a Boulder gathering where participants were rallying in support of the Israeli hostages who remain in captivity in Gaza — which resulted in 15 injuries, including some critically, in what US authorities called a targeted terrorist attack. Her tweets also came less than two weeks after a gunman murdered two Israeli embassy staffers in Washington, DC, while they were leaving an at the Capital Jewish Museum hosted by the American Jewish Committee. In both attacks, the perpetrator yelled “Free Palestine” as they targeted innocent civilians, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
After Kiswani’s social media posts sparked some backlash among pro-Israel users on X, she provided limited pushback on the idea that it was an expression of support for the prior day’s attack in Colorado.
“Zionists are freaking out in the QTs about this, insisting it’s about Colorado,” she wrote. “Newsflash: the world doesn’t revolve around you. Resistance hasn’t stopped in Gaza, look at what just happened in Jabalia [where three IDF soldiers were killed] for instance. The perpetual victimhood is getting old.”
However, Kiswani did not say her comment had no connection to the attack in Colorado, and she did not say that she opposed the firebombing.
Kiswani and her group, Within Our Lifetime (WOL), have been at the forefront of anti-Israel and pro-Hamas activism since Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists killed 1,200 people and abducted 251 hostages during their invasion of southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, a massacre that started the war in Gaza.
On Oct. 8, 2023, one day after the biggest single-day slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust, WOL organized a protest to celebrate the prior day’s attack, which it described as an effort to “defend the heroic Palestinian resistance.” Kiswani notably refused to condemn Hamas and the Oct. 7 massacre following the atrocities.
Then, in Apil 2024, Kiswani refused to condemn the chant “Death to America” and organized a mass demonstration to block the “arteries of capitalism” by staging a blockade of commercial shipping ports across the world in protest of Western support for the Jewish state. That same month, she was banned from Columbia University’s campus in New York City after leading chants calling for an “intifada,” or violent uprising.
The following month, Kiswani led a demonstration in Brooklyn, New York in which she lambasted the local police department, claimed then-US President Joe Biden will soon die, and called for the destruction of Israel.
That proceeded the activist saying she does not want Zionists “anywhere” in the world while speaking in defense of a person who called for “Zionists” to leave a crowded subway car in New York City.
WOL, which planned a protest last year to celebrate the one-year anniversary of the Oct. 7 massacre, was also behind demonstrations at the Nova Music Festival exhibit, which commemorated the more than 300 civilians slaughtered by Hamas while at a music festival.
The latter protest prompted widespread condemnation, including from Biden and even progressive members of the US Congress who are outspoken against Israel.
US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), for example, posted on social media that the “callousness, dehumanization, and targeting of Jews on display at last night’s protest outside the Nova Festival exhibit was atrocious antisemitism – plain and simple.”
The post Day After Colorado Attack, Founder of Anti-Israel Group Chides Activists Who Are Insufficiently ‘Pro-Resistance’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Israel’s Defense Exports Hit Record $15 Billion in 2024 Despite European Pressure, Calls for Arms Embargo
Israeli troops on the ground in Gaza. Photo: IDF via Reuters
Israel reached a new all-time high in defense exports in 2024, nearing $15 billion — the fourth consecutive year of record-breaking sales — despite mounting international criticism over the war in Gaza and growing pressure from European countries to suspend arms deals.
In a press release on Wednesday, Israel’s Defense Ministry announced that defense exports reached over $14.7 billion last year — a 13 percent increase from 2023 — with more than half of the deals valued at over $100 million.
According to the ministry, Israel’s military exports have more than doubled over the past five years, highlighting the industry’s rapid expansion and growing global demand.
“This tremendous achievement is a direct result of the successes of the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] and defense industries against Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, the Ayatollah regime in Iran, and in additional arenas where we operate against Israel’s enemies,” Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a statement.
“The world sees Israeli strength and seeks to be a partner in it. We will continue strengthening the IDF and the Israeli economy through security innovation to ensure clear superiority against any threat – anywhere and anytime,” Katz continued.
In 2024, over half of the Jewish state’s defense contracts were with European countries — up from 35 percent the previous year — as many in the region have increased their defense spending following Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
Despite increasing pressure and widespread anti-Israel sentiment among European governments amid the current conflict in Gaza, this latest data seems to contradict recent calls by European leaders to impose an arms embargo on the Jewish state over its defensive campaign in Gaza against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.
On Wednesday, Germany reversed its earlier threat to halt arms deliveries to Israel, reaffirming its commitment to continue cooperation and maintain defense contracts with Jerusalem.
“Germany will continue to support the State of Israel, including with arms deliveries,” German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul told lawmakers in parliament.
Last week, Berlin warned it would take unspecified measures against Israel if it continued its military campaign in Gaza, citing concerns that exported weapons were being used in violation of humanitarian law.
“Our full support for the right to exist and the security of the State of Israel must not be instrumentalized for the conflict and the warfare currently being waged in the Gaza Strip,” Wadephul said in a statement.
Germany would be “examining whether what is happening in the Gaza Strip is compatible with international humanitarian law,” he continued. “Further arms deliveries will be authorized based on the outcome of that review.”
Spain and Ireland are among the countries in Europe that have threatened or taken steps to limit arms deals with Israel, while others such as France have threatened unspecified harsh measures against the Jewish state.
According to the Israeli defense ministry’s report, since the outbreak of war on Oct. 7, 2023, after the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel, the operational successes and proven battlefield performance of Israeli systems have fueled strong international demand for Israel’s defense technology.
Last year, the export of missiles, rockets, and air defense systems reached a new high, making up 48 percent of the total deal volume — up from 36 percent in 2023.
Similarly, satellite and space systems exports surged, accounting for 8 percent of total deals in 2024 — quadrupling their share from 2 percent in 2023.
While Europe dominated Israel’s defense export market in 2024, significant portions also went to other regions. Asia and the Pacific made up 23 percent of total sales — slightly lower than in previous years, when the region approached 30 percent.
Exports to Abraham Accords countries fell to 12 percent, down from 23 percent in 2022, while North America remained stable at around 9 percent.
The post Israel’s Defense Exports Hit Record $15 Billion in 2024 Despite European Pressure, Calls for Arms Embargo first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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