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Anti-Israel Campus Protests Were Filled with Hate; College Teachers Tell You Not to Believe the Truth

Pro-Hamas protesters at Columbia University on April 19, 2024. Photo: Melissa Bender via Reuters Connect

How history will treat the post-October 7 anti-Israel protests on college campuses across America will depend in part on how much longer they last.

As we approach the two-year mark, there seems little room for indifference. Normal people are appalled by the Hamas Hipsters — privileged adolescents at $80,000 per-year schools — calling to “Globalize the Intifada.” But not everyone. Some people, especially some academics, are proud of them.

Danielle K. Brown, a journalism professor at Michigan State University who has devoted “over a decade” to researching protests and media coverage, wrote about the “disconnect” between “outside onlookers” and “those on the ground.”

Whereas the former can’t see past the ugliness of the anti-Israel protests, the latter understand and appreciate “the meticulous planning by advocacy groups and leaders aimed at getting a message out.” She calls it the “protest paradigm” and argues that this divide was particularly noticeable during the Spring 2024 semester of encampments.

Breaking the Protest Paradigm

Brown blames the media for highlighting “the spectacle rather than the substance,” which leaves “audiences uninformed about the nuances of the protests.” She claims that the protest paradigm is only broken “in the work produced by journalists who have engaged deeply and frequently with the advocacy groups” responsible for the protests, especially students.

Student journalists may be more likely to identify with protesters than with university administrations and public officials, but since the Left has adopted the Hamas cause, there are plenty of equally-enthusiastic and more capable “insiders” willing to “control the narrative,” including professional journalists, politicians, and especially professors.

Where outsiders saw antisemitism, violence, and disruption of expensive educations, these academics and other “insiders” uniformly praise the protesting students for their bravery and deny that they are antisemitic. They blame someone else for any violence that occurs, and they minimize harassment of Jewish students, property destruction, and building takeovers. Some even have the audacity to portray the protesters as morally superior to the universities they are protesting.

Aren’t They Beautiful?

Since the primary “advocacy group” behind the post-October 7 protests is Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), it’s not surprising that Faculty for Justice in Palestine (FJP) has been its primary ally on “the inside.” FJP, after all, exists solely to provide public relations services for SJP.

When University of Michigan students attempted to take over a building on the Ann Arbor campus, they were met with force from campus and local police. The university’s FJP chapter described it as “a beautiful display of unity, moral courage and justice.”

Georgetown University’s Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine published an “Open Letter” on May 13, 2024, calling the encampment at George Washington University “a positive, peaceful, respectful protest” and lavishly praising the “students [who] managed to create and sustain an orderly, clean, and lively encampment, with two kitchens, a medical center, and an outdoor classroom where students learned, discussed, sang, prayed, and danced.”

Representative Virginia Foxx (R-NC) saw something different with her own eyes: “defacement of buildings, destruction of property [and] threats against Jewish students.”

Definitely Not Antisemitic

Describing the encampments as beautiful was often not enough. It was equally important to assert that, contrary to what anyone could plainly see, they were not antisemitic. Outright denials were common, such as the University of Michigan FSJP’s denunciation of “the repressive actions and demonizing language of President Ono … – in particular, using the mendacious cudgel of anti-semitism.”

But mere denials were not enough for “insiders” defending the encampments at Columbia University and George Washington University, which received the most attention of the 100-plus encampments at schools in the US. They found it important to impart a Jewish character to the protests.

George Mason University’s Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine’s praised the encampment at GWU as “an inclusive space of free education, food security, medical care, and creativity. They organized teach-ins, prayed, made art, held a Shabbat service.”

Reuters article describing the Columbia encampment as a “living history lesson,” nonchalantly adds that protesters ate “free kidney beans and rice and kosher Passover snacks,” and asserts that “Reuters journalists have seen students peacefully chatting, reading, eating and holding both Jewish and Muslim prayer ceremonies.”

When four of the most far-left members of the New York City Council toured the Columbia encampment, they wrote about what it was “really like.” Taking umbrage with descriptions of “a cesspit of antisemitic hatred and a threat to the safety of all Jewish students and faculty,” they countered that, “Far from a danger zone where Jews should fear to tread, the encampment hosted a large kabbalat shabbat service on Friday evening, followed the next night by an equally well-attended Havdalah service.”

Enlisting anti-Zionist Jews in the cause provides a shield against charges of antisemitism. As Clemens Heni puts it, “Jewish anti-Zionists give hatred of Israel a kind of Kosher stamp.” But it a weak shield based on a false premise.

Curiously, the same Left that portrayed Larry Elder as “the black face of white supremacy” during his candidacy for the 2021 California gubernatorial recall election is quite comfortable implying that Jews can’t be antisemitic.

It’s Someone Else’s Fault

Another common goal of encampment defenders is to absolve the protesters of all violence by deflecting blame onto others, especially university administrations and police departments. Georgetown University’s FSJP blames “Mayor Bowser and the GWU administration [for having] created the very conditions that it had accused the students of fostering: chaos, conflict, and violence.”

Likewise, George Mason University’s FSJP “condemns in the strongest terms possible GW President Ellen Granberg’s decision to call the MPD on students who were demonstrating peacefully and endangering no one.”

The University of Texas FSJP denounced university “President Hartzell’s decision to once again order a military-style invasion of the UT campus.”

Brown herself criticizes Texas Governor Greg Abbot for having “equated protesters [at the University of Texas, Austin] to criminals with antisemitic intentions” and unfairly shaping the narrative by overshadowing “rebuttal from protest participants.”

Protesters Are Better Than Everyone

The most exorbitant white-washing tactics portray student protesters as wiser and better at educating than the universities where they protest.

At the University of San Francisco, where the anti-Israel protesters gave their encampment the grandiose name “The Peoples’ University for Palestine,” the school’s FJP chapter, “Educators for Justice in Palestine,” praised the “peaceful movement that has created a robust learning environment where students have learned to engage in collaborative work and discussion.”

Harvard’s FJP was equally impressed: “With their encampment, our students aim to construct a liberated space for collective education.”

But the most over-the-top, bombastic hyperbole in praise of any post-October 7 protest came from Timothy Kaufman-Osborn, an emeritus professor of politics at Whitman College who wants The Federalist Papers banned from college classes.

In Kaufman-Osborn’s effusive defense of the Columbia encampment for Project MUSE, the university is “an autocratic property corporation,” and the student protesters are “the encampment’s residents.” In language only an academic would write, he explains that the protesters’ “embrace of procedural democracy was subtended by a struggle to meet mundane needs whose satisfaction is a necessary precondition of the possibility of autonomous self-governance.”

Representative Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) saw something different with his own eyes: “Jewish students … being verbally – and even physically – assaulted. Masked protesters … cheering on and actively calling for the genocide of Jews.”

Conclusion

Contrary to what anonymous FJP members, socialist politicians, and others “on the ground” wrote, post-October 7 anti-Israel protesters have created nothing but hostile environments. The encampment students in particular pilfered university resources and disrupted the educations of their peers who want nothing to do with pro-Hamas demonstrations. If any “created food security,” it was on someone else’s dime.

They also weren’t “residents” but trespassers, and they neither saved democracy nor challenged authoritarianism. What will the Fall 2025 semester bring? Will there be more protests and encampments in solidarity with Hamas? Or maybe the Islamic Republic of Iran will be the new cause.

Whatever comes, there will be no shortage of “insiders” to explain why you should not believe your lying eyes.

Chief Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT) Political Correspondent A.J. Caschetta is a principal lecturer at the Rochester Institute of Technology and a fellow at Campus Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum where he is also a Milstein fellow. A version of this article was originally published by IPT.

The post Anti-Israel Campus Protests Were Filled with Hate; College Teachers Tell You Not to Believe the Truth first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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US House Members Ask Marco Rubio to Bar Turkey From Rejoining F-35 Program

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio attends a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, US, April 10, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Nathan Howard

A bipartisan coalition of more than 40 US lawmakers is pressing Secretary of State Marco Rubio to prevent Turkey from rejoining the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, citing ongoing national security concerns and violations of US law.

Members of Congress on Thursday warned that lifting existing sanctions or readmitting Turkey to the US F-35 fifth-generation fighter program would “jeopardize the integrity of F-35 systems” and risk exposing sensitive US military technology to Russia. The letter pointed to Ankara’s 2017 purchase of the Russian S-400 surface-to-air missile system, despite repeated US warnings, as the central reason Turkey was expelled from the multibillion-dollar fighter jet program in 2019.

“The S-400 poses a direct threat to US aircraft, including the F-16 and F-35,” the lawmakers wrote. “If operated alongside these platforms, it risks exposing sensitive military technology to Russian intelligence.”

The group of signatories, spanning both parties, stressed that Turkey still possesses the Russian weapons systems and has shown “no willingness to comply with US law.” They urged Rubio and the Trump administration to uphold the Countering American Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) and maintain Ankara’s exclusion from the F-35 program until the S-400s are fully removed.

The letter comes after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan claimed during a NATO summit in June that Ankara and Washington have begun discussing Turkey’s readmission into the program.

Lawmakers argued that reversing course now would undermine both US credibility and allied confidence in American defense commitments. They also warned it could disrupt development of the next-generation fighter jet announced by the administration earlier this year.

“This is not a partisan issue,” the letter emphasized. “We must continue to hold allies and adversaries alike accountable when their actions threaten US interests.”

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US Lawmakers Urge Treasury to Investigate Whether Irish Bill Targeting Israel Violates Anti-Boycott Law

A pro-Hamas demonstration in Ireland led by nationalist party Sinn Fein. Photo: Reuters/Clodagh Kilcoyne

A group of US lawmakers is calling on the Treasury Department to investigate and potentially penalize Ireland over proposed legislation targeting Israeli goods, warning that the move could trigger sanctions under longstanding US anti-boycott laws.

In a letter sent on Thursday to US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, 16 Republican members of Congress expressed “serious concerns” about Ireland’s recent legislative push to ban trade with territories under Israeli administration, including the West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights.

The letter, spearheaded by Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY), called for the US to “send a clear signal” that any attempts to economically isolate Israel will “carry consequences.”

The Irish measure, introduced by Foreign Affairs and Trade Minister Simon Harris, seeks to prohibit the import of goods and services originating from what the legislation refers to as “occupied Palestinian territories,” including Israeli communities in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Supporters say the bill aligns with international law and human rights principles, while opponents, including the signatories of the letter, characterize it as a direct extension of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, which seeks to isolate Israel as a step toward the destruction of the world’s lone Jewish state.

Some US lawmakers have also described the Irish bill as an example of “antisemitic hate” that could risk hurting relations between Dublin and Washington.

“Such policies not only promote economic discrimination but also create legal uncertainty for US companies operating in Ireland,” the lawmakers wrote in this week’s letter, urging Bessent to determine whether Ireland’s actions qualify as participation in an “unsanctioned international boycott” under Section 999 of the Internal Revenue Code, also known as the Ribicoff Amendment.

Under that statute, the Treasury Department is required to maintain a list of countries that pressure companies to comply with international boycotts not sanctioned by the US. Inclusion on the list carries tax-reporting burdens and possible penalties for American firms and individuals doing business in those nations.

“If the criteria are met, Ireland should be added to the boycott list,” the letter said, arguing that such a step would help protect US companies from legal exposure and reaffirm American opposition to economic efforts aimed at isolating Israel.

Legal experts have argued that if the Irish bill becomes law, it could chase American capital out of the country while also hurting companies that do business with Ireland. Under US law, it is illegal for American companies to participate in boycotts of Israel backed by foreign governments. Several US states have also gone beyond federal restrictions to pass separate measures that bar companies from receiving state contracts if they boycott Israel.

Ireland has been one of the fiercest critics of Israel on the international stage since the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, amid the ensuing war in Gaza, leading the Jewish state to shutter its embassy in Dublin.

Last year, Ireland officially recognized a Palestinian state, a decision that Israel described as a “reward for terrorism.”

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US Families File Lawsuit Accusing UNRWA of Supporting Hamas, Hezbollah

A truck, marked with United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) logo, crosses into Egypt from Gaza, at the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, during a temporary truce between Hamas and Israel, in Rafah, Egypt, Nov. 27, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh

American families of victims of Hamas and Hezbollah attacks have filed a lawsuit against the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, accusing the organization of violating US antiterrorism laws by providing material support to the Islamist terror groups behind the deadly assaults.

Last week, more than 200 families filed a lawsuit in a Washington, DC district court accusing the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) of violating US antiterrorism laws by providing funding and support to Hamas and Hezbollah, both designated as foreign terrorist organizations.

The lawsuit alleges that UNRWA employs staff with direct ties to the Iran-backed terror group, including individuals allegedly involved in carrying out attacks against the Jewish state.

However, UNRWA has firmly denied the allegations, labeling them as “baseless” and condemning the lawsuit as “meritless, absurd, dangerous, and morally reprehensible.”

According to the organization, the lawsuit is part of a wider campaign of “misinformation and lawfare” targeting its work in the Gaza Strip, where it says Palestinians are enduring “mass, deliberate and forced starvation.”

The UN agency reports that more than 150,000 donors across the United States have supported its programs providing food, medical aid, education, and trauma assistance in the war-torn enclave amid the ongoing conflict.

In a press release, UNRWA USA affirmed that it will continue its humanitarian efforts despite facing legal challenges aimed at undermining its work.

“Starvation does not pause for politics. Neither will we,” the statement read.

Last year, Israeli security documents revealed that of UNRWA’s 13,000 employees in Gaza, 440 were actively involved in Hamas’s military operations, with 2,000 registered as Hamas operatives.

According to these documents, at least nine UNRWA employees took part directly in the terror group’s Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of and massacre across southern Israel.

Israeli officials also uncovered a large Hamas data center beneath UNRWA headquarters, with cables running through the facility above, and found that Hamas also stored weapons in other UNRWA sites.

The UN agency has also aligned with Hamas in efforts against the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), an Israeli and US-backed program that delivers aid directly to Palestinians, blocking Hamas from diverting supplies for terror activities and selling them at inflated prices.

These Israeli intelligence documents also revealed that a senior Hamas leader, killed in an Israeli strike in September 2024, had served as the head of the UNRWA teachers’ union in Lebanon, where Lebanon is based,

UNRWA’s education programs have been found by IMPACT-se, an international organization that monitors global education, to contribute to the radicalization of younger generations of Palestinians.

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