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Most Russians Don’t Support Israel, Even as It Fights for Its Survival

Russian President Vladimir Putin shakes hands with then-Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi during a meeting in Moscow, Russia, Dec. 7, 2023. Photo: Sputnik/Sergei Bobylev/Pool via REUTERS

It is hard not to notice that the war Israel is waging, with the support of the United States and other allies in the Western bloc, against Iran’s terrorist alliance and its radical Islamist Arab proxies — Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, Shiite militias in Syria and Iraq, and others — has its reflection in the ideological, political, and diplomatic discourse of post-Soviet conflicts, primarily the Russian-Ukrainian  and Armenian-Azerbaijani conflicts.

This also introduces adjustments to the foreign policy stance of those USSR successor states that have various geopolitical interests in the Middle East.

A prime example in this regard is the Russian Federation, whose return as a key player in the second half of the 2000s became an important factor in the new configuration of political forces in the region. In Israel, the early Middle Eastern reflections of Russia’s bid to reclaim its status as a global superpower was met with mixed assessments. Optimists were inclined to believe that Moscow was returning to the Middle East not as a proponent of any particular ideology, but out of purely pragmatic considerations. Therefore, even if global geopolitical interests might, in principle, place Israel and Russia on opposite sides of the barricades, this would not necessarily lead to direct confrontation between the two countries, leaving ample room for cooperation beyond points of disagreement.

On the other hand, pessimists were convinced that Russia would sooner or later revert to the global political models and views of the late Soviet era — including seeing Israel as a potential adversary, given its strategic partnership with the United States.

Consequently, the dynamics of a potential intensification of US-Russian competition in the Middle East would ultimately shift almost any discrepancies between Jerusalem and Moscow from the category of “disagreements between partners” to that of “direct confrontation, leaving little room for compromise,” according to experts and staff from relevant Israeli, American, and Russian think tanks.

Initially, Moscow indeed attempted — with some success at times — to position itself as a party capable of cooperating with virtually all actors in the Middle Eastern conflict and even mediating between them.

However, after October 7, 2023, Russia explicitly supported Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Iranian bloc as a whole. At the same time, the profile of the rapidly developing Russian-Israeli relations of the past decade sharply diminished, although Moscow and Jerusalem attempted to maintain a semblance of “business as usual”.

In other words, recent events appear to conclude the nearly 15 year debate between “Kremlin optimists” and “Kremlin pessimists.” The current situation fits into a normative framework characteristic of a substantial and influential segment of Russia’s foreign policy elites: Russia’s strategic partner in the region is Iran, which supplies critically important weapons for use on the Ukrainian front and secures Russia’s “southern flanks” in terms of geopolitical interests. This logic does not, however, extend to Russia’s view of Israel’s interests, as Israel is a strategic ally of Russia’s adversary — the United States. Against this backdrop, it is unsurprising that numerous practical steps and statements by Russian leaders have been widely interpreted as expressing solidarity with Iran’s Arab satellites, including Hamas and Hezbollah.

 “Overnight” Shifts in Russian Public Discourse

The Russian public’s response has closely mirrored the foreign policy positions of the Russian political establishment, shaped largely by state-controlled information channels, as outlined in Part 1 of this article.

According to one of the earliest sociological surveys conducted in the USSR — though not fully representative, it provided some insight into the effectiveness of Soviet propaganda and the internal and external policies of Soviet leadership — Israel was among the top five enemies of the USSR, along with the United States, the United Kingdom, West Germany, and China.

This survey, conducted by Professor B. Grushin in the late 1960s, highlighted these perceptions. However, after the collapse of the USSR and a shift in foreign policy, attitudes toward Israel appeared to change drastically. Regular sociological measurements by the reputable Yuri Levada Center in Moscow, beginning in the late 1980s, indicated that in the absence of state-driven anti-Israel or anti-Semitic sentiment, Russian public opinion toward Israel was predominantly neutral (“similar to other countries in the region”) or mildly positive.

From the mid-1990s and over the next 25 years, approximately 60% of respondents consistently reported a lack of hostility or animosity toward Israel. About one-fifth of those surveyed expressed positive sentiments or interest in Israel, while an average of only 1 in 10 respondents indicated a negative view of the country. Isolated years marked by “spikes” in anti-Israel or “negatively neutral” attitudes — such as during the 2006 Lebanon War, noted in the first part of our article—were unfortunate exceptions.

Despite this generally neutral or favorable stance, research from this and other sociological agencies found that a considerable legacy of Soviet anti-Zionist propaganda persisted in the public consciousness, particularly among older individuals, residents of rural areas, and those with lower levels of education and income.

Superficially, the longstanding Arab-Israeli conflict seems to have little effect on current levels of anti-Semitism in Russia or public attitudes toward Israel. Only 3% of Russians closely follow Middle Eastern political news or actively seek related information, primarily those who have traveled to Israel or have relatives or close friends there. Another 17% follow the situation “from time to time,” while the majority remain indifferent, uninformed, or simply do not follow developments in the region. Three-quarters of respondents stated they do not support either side in the conflict, while 10% expressed sympathy for both. Among the remaining respondents, support was almost evenly split: 8% sided with Israelis, and 7% with Arabs. This neutrality is gradually increasing, as previous surveys showed support levels at 12% and 10%, respectively.

Nevertheless, anti-Zionism, though less overt than in the Soviet era, remains an “acceptable” expression of latent antisemitism among certain groups. This includes belief in Zionist conspiracies and notions of Jewish plans for global dominance. “Traces of this ideological indoctrination and propaganda, along with a rejection of liberal values and democracy,” note the authors of a 2020 study by the Levada Center, commissioned by the Russian Jewish Congress, “are still evident today in attitudes toward Israel and Jewish emigration.”

The reversion of Russian leadership to Soviet-era narratives on the Arab-Israeli conflict has notably shifted public sentiment. In an October 2024 Levada Center survey, respondents had a favorable view of China (81%), Brazil (55%), Turkey (52%), and Iran (50%), with only 27% expressing positive views of Israel — comparable to views of France (20%), the UN (19%), the EU (16%), the US (16%), and Ukraine (14%).

This is a marked contrast from 2013, when respondents viewed Israel as a friendly state. In September 2018, 52% of Russians surveyed by the Public Opinion Foundation also viewed Israel as friendly, with only 16% holding an opposing view.

Who Is Responsible for the Middle Eastern Conflict?

There is little doubt that the current decline in public sympathy for Israel stems from the official rhetoric and stance of Russian authorities. This trend has had a noticeable impact on Russian public opinion.

survey conducted by the Levada Center in late October 2023 revealed that while two-thirds (66%) of respondents did not support either side in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, those who sympathized with the Palestinian Arabs (in this case, Hamas) outnumbered those sympathetic to Israel by 3.5 times. Support for Israel was more common among members of the “internet party” — younger people aged 25-39 and residents of major cities.

In general, compared to data from 2007–2010, the share of supporters of Palestinian Arabs in the conflict with Israel has doubled (from 9–14% to 21%), while support for the Jewish State has similarly halved, dropping to 6%.

Nevertheless, Russians largely consider the United States and NATO countries to be primarily responsible for ongoing bloodshed and instability in the Middle East — a view shaped by both Soviet-era and current Russian state propaganda. The belief that the US and NATO bear the main responsibility is most prevalent among older respondents (44% of those aged 55 and older), low-income respondents (44%), those who believe the country is on the right track (40%), and those who rely on television for information (44%).

However, compared to the 2023 survey, support for this viewpoint has dropped by nearly a quarter — from 45% to 38% — largely due to a nearly twofold increase (from 12% to 22%) in those blaming Israel entirely. The proportion attributing responsibility to Hamas and Palestinian extremists has remained steady over the past year, with less than 10% of respondents holding this view. Meanwhile, the percentage assigning blame to Iran and its allies, or to Russia, hovered around or below the margin of error.

Some demographic divides are present, though not pronounced, along lines of gender, age, political outlook, and socioeconomic status. Men (27%), respondents aged 55 and older, and those who believe “things in Russia are going in the right direction” (25%) are more likely to hold Israel responsible for the continuation and escalation of the conflict. On the other hand, younger respondents under 24 (13%), more affluent respondents (10% of those able to afford durable goods), and those who believe the country is on the wrong track (13%) are more likely to attribute responsibility to Hamas and Palestinian Arabs.

Interest within Russian society in Israel’s conflict with Arab terrorist groups has noticeably waned over the year since the beginning of the IDF’s “Operation Iron Swords” in Gaza. While over 80% of Russians surveyed by the Levada Center in September 2024 stated that they were aware of Israel’s war with Hamas, only one in five respondents (19%) reported closely following the developments — almost half the figure from October 2023 (32%). Nearly two-thirds (62%) of respondents said they had “heard something but without details,” which is only slightly higher than the previous year (56%). Those who admitted to hearing about the conflict “for the first time during the survey” nearly doubled, reaching 18% in September 2024 compared to 11% in October 2023.

In other words, Russian public engagement with Israel’s fight against Iranian-backed Arab terror — and the Middle Eastern conflict more broadly — remains limited. The “television party,” which represents a significant portion of Russian society, continues to follow official narratives. Should a direct confrontation between Russia and Israel occur in the Middle East, Russian society is likely to accept it with the same “understanding” that many Russians displayed toward the military aggression against Ukraine.

That said, another perspective also exists, such as among the dwindling number of “optimists” in Israel who argue that the differences, or even sharp disagreements, between Israel and Russia on various issues do not reflect a fundamental conflict of interests between the two nations but rather the current global context of Russia’s interests. They believe that if the context shifts or Israel’s role within it changes, so too could the state of Russian-Israeli relations — and, with it, Russian public sentiment.

In any case, if this shift does happen, it likely won’t occur until after the wars in Eastern Europe and the Middle East have concluded — something that does not appear imminent.

Prof. Vladimir (Ze’ev) Khanin lectures in Political Studies at Bar-Ilan University and is Academic Chairman of the Institute for Euro-Asian Jewish Studies in Herzliya, Israel. A version of this article was originally published by The BESA Center.

The post Most Russians Don’t Support Israel, Even as It Fights for Its Survival first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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‘The Jewish Spirit’: Holocaust Survivors, Freed Israeli Hostages Gather at Auschwitz for ‘March of the Living’

Holocaust survivors, relatives of Israeli hostages, and survivors of Hamas captivity marched together at Auschwitz for the annual March of the Living on April 24, 2025. Photo: Chen Schimmel

Oswiecim, Poland — Holocaust survivors, relatives of Israeli hostages, and survivors of Hamas captivity marched together at Auschwitz, the infamous former Nazi concentration camp in Poland, for the first time on Thursday, joining Israeli President Isaac Herzog in the annual March of the Living.

The march from Auschwitz I to Auschwitz II-Birkenau — the Nazis’ largest death camp where 1 million Jews were murdered during World War II — took place on Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day and included 80 Holocaust survivors, many of whom were also death march survivors, to mark 80 years since the liberation of the camps. 

March of the Living president Phyllis Greenberg Heideman addressed the survivors, who were seated next to the gate bearing the notorious inscription, “Work sets you free.”

“It’s a strange thing to say, but we welcome you to Auschwitz,” she said. “You are the true heroes. We will treasure your legacy forever.”

Almog Meir Jan and his mother Orit. Almog was rescued by the IDF on June 5 during the Arnon Mission. Photo: Chen Schimmel

Standing outside the crematoria and gas chambers at Auschwitz I, recently released hostage Eli Sharabi said, “The Holocaust was unlike anything else — we will never forget and never forgive.”

“But our presence here is the triumph of the Jewish spirit. The Jewish people sanctify life, not death. I endured horrors in enemy captivity, but I chose life. That gives me hope to get up each morning and begin rebuilding,” he added. 

Sharabi, whose wife and daughters were murdered during Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, was released in February after nearly 500 days in captivity. His emaciated appearance as he was paraded through Gaza on his release led to comparisons with concentration camp survivors. 

Pro-Israel influencer Shiraz Shukran broke down after seeing Sharabi. The two embraced for several minutes. “Seeing him in real life, in this place, just made it all suddenly seem very close. This is no longer something that happened 80 years ago; it’s continuing until this day,” Shukran told The Algemeiner.

Pro-Israel influencer Shiraz Shukran embracing former hostage Eli Sharabi. Photo: Debbie Weiss / The Algemeiner

In remarks to reporters prior to the march, Herzog called the return of the hostages a “universal human imperative.”

“With a broken heart, I remind us all that although after the Holocaust we vowed, ‘Never again,’ today, even as we stand here, the souls of dozens of Jews again ‘yearn within a cage,’ ‘thirsting for water and for freedom,’ as 59 of our brothers and sisters are held by terrorist murderers in Gaza, in a horrific crime against humanity,” Herzog said, referring to the hostages kidnapped during Hamas’s Oct. 7 invasion who remain in captivity.

His Polish counterpart, President Andrzej Duda, said the march was “a dramatic call of ‘never again.’ No more hatred, no more discrimination, no more antisemitism.”

He called for “all wars in the Middle East to end,” and for a two-state solution, which he said was the “most rational solution [to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict] that gives hope for achieving stable and lasting peace.”

The two leaders signed the visitors’ book and laid a wreath at Auschwitz’s Black Wall, where the Nazis executed prisoners.

At the march’s opening ceremony, the head of the Republican Jewish Coalition, Matt Brooks, lit one of six candles — representing the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis — and addressed rising antisemitism in the world.  

“Jews all over the world fear walking streets with a kippah and it’s unacceptable. College students are being attacked verbally and physically,” he told The Algemeiner. 

He praised US President Donald Trump for “combating this scourge.”

“There’s a new sheriff in town. It’s my hope the rest of the world can look to him to see how to support and defend the Jewish community against these vile attacks,” he said.

Matt Brooks, chief executive officer of the Republican Jewish Coalition, with Malcolm Hoenlein, vice chairman emeritus of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. Photo: Debbie Weiss / The Algemeiner

In Block 5, where thousands of victims’ eyeglasses are displayed behind glass, Laly Dery told a delegation of Israeli teenagers from the national civil service about her son, Sgt. First Class (res.) Saadia, who fell in battle in Gaza in June.  

“Just like my son, who served the country with every fiber of his being, you have earned the enormous privilege of serving the state of Israel,” Dery said. 

Derai’s words resonated with Sara Bisan, the only member of the national service delegation not wearing an Israeli flag. Instead, Bisan wore the distinctive multi-colored flag of the Druze community to which she belongs.

“I feel her pain, and it hurts,” Bisan said, reflecting on the death of her own friend from the northern Druze village of Kfar Yarka, who was also killed in Gaza.  

“But our people, the Druze and the Jews, share a lot, including a love of Israel. I also feel that serving the state of Israel is a privilege,” she added.

Sara Bisan. Photo: Debbie Weiss / The Algemeiner

Twelve thousand participants marched the 1.7 miles from Auschwitz to Birkenau for the main ceremony, which was cut short this year due to heavy rain.

As thunder echoed overhead, released hostage Agam Berger played the theme from “Schindler’s List” on a 150-year-old violin rescued during the Holocaust. Daniel Weiss, a survivor from Kibbutz Be’eri whose father was murdered on Oct. 7 and whose mother was abducted and later killed in Gaza, performed a musical rendition of the psalm Shir Lamaalot alongside her.

The Lord will guard you from all evil; He will guard your soul,” Weiss sang, his voice quavering.

The post ‘The Jewish Spirit’: Holocaust Survivors, Freed Israeli Hostages Gather at Auschwitz for ‘March of the Living’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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French Far-Left Party Calls for Ban on Israeli Pop Star Eyal Golan’s Paris Concert

Eyal Golan. Photo: Screenshot

France’s leading far-left party has called for the cancellation of Israeli pop star Eyal Golan’s upcoming concert in Paris, describing him as “a true mouthpiece for supporters of genocide” in Gaza.

In a statement released on Wednesday, the La France Insoumise party (LFI — “France Unbowed”), led by leftist Jean-Luc Mélenchon, urged the National Assembly — the lower house of the French Parliament — to ban Golan’s upcoming concert, claiming that he “should not come to sing the praises of genocide in Paris.”

“We call for a broad mobilization to prevent this event from taking place,” LFI lawmakers wrote in the statement, referring to Golan’s concert scheduled for May 20. “We ask the prefect to ban it immediately.”

“No one should come to Paris to sing hymns to the genocide of the Palestinian people,” the statement continued.

According to the party, the 54-year-old singer called for “the extermination of the Palestinian people” in a social media post the day after the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on October 7, 2023, in which he wrote, “Leave no soul alive.”

LFI also said that Golan “repeated the statement a week later, before receiving support from far-right minister Itamar Ben-Gvir,” who serves as Israel’s national security minister.

In their statement, LFI lawmakers claimed that Golan’s concert, expected to gather more than 4,500 people, “constitutes a real voice for genocide supporters.”

“France cannot tolerate such an unnecessary insult to the thousands of Gaza victims and their loved ones,” the statement read.

In response to these accusations, Liam Productions, the event organizer, denounced the push to cancel Golan’s concert as antisemitic and expressed their eagerness to meet the Jewish community in France, promising a “unifying and special evening.”

“On Holocaust Remembrance Day, as we remember the consequences of staying silent in the face of hate, far-left parties in France seek to boycott an Israeli artist simply because he is Israeli,” the statement read.

“This is not freedom of expression — it is antisemitism disguised as morality. The people of Israel will not be silent, will not apologize, and will not stop singing.”

Mélenchon and his party have a long history of pushing anti-Israel policies and, according to Jewish leaders, of making antisemitic comments — such as suggesting that Jews killed Jesus, echoing a false claim that was used to justify antisemitic violence and discrimination throughout the Middle Ages in Europe.

The French diplomat has been criticized by French Jews as a threat to their community, as well as to those who support Israel.

Mélenchon has previously described the French Jewish community as “an arrogant minority that lectures to the rest.” He has also urged the French government to recognize a “Palestinian state.”

In the wake of the Hamas onslaught on Israel, Mélenchon and his party issued a statement calling the attacks “an armed offensive by Palestinian forces” in response to the ongoing Israeli “occupation.”

Last year, Mélenchon openly expressed support for Hezbollah on social media, as the Iran-backed terrorist organization based in Lebanon continued to clash with Israel.

“Mass killing in Lebanon by Netanyahu’s invading army,” Melenchon wrote in a post on X, referring to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “The toll is getting worse by the hour. Full support for the national resistance of the Lebanese.”

France has experienced a disturbing surge in antisemitic incidents since the Oct. 7 atrocities, with 1,570 anti-Jewish hate crimes recorded last year.

The total number of antisemitic outrages last year was a slight dip from 2023’s record total of 1,676, but it marked a striking increase from the 436 antisemitic acts recorded in 2022, according to a report by the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF) — the main representative body of French Jews.

“LFI has given antisemitism a political endorsement,” CRIF president Yonathan Arfi told the French publication Le Point last year. “We observe this toxic porosity between criticism of Israel and the ostracization of French Jews. The Palestinian cause becomes a license to hate.”

In late May and early June, antisemitic acts rose by more than 140 percent in France, far surpassing the weekly average of slightly more than 30 incidents.

The report also found that 65.2 percent of antisemitic acts last year targeted individuals, with more than 10 percent of these offenses involving physical violence.

The post French Far-Left Party Calls for Ban on Israeli Pop Star Eyal Golan’s Paris Concert first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Trump Signs Seismic Executive Order on Foreign Funding in Higher Education

US Secretary of Education Linda McMahon shakes hands with Annette Albright next to US President Donald Trump during an event to sign executive orders in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, DC, US, April 23, 2025. Photo: Leah Millis via Reuters Connect.

US President Donald Trump has signed a seismic executive order to strengthen federal law which colleges and universities have long circumvented to avoid reporting donations they receive from illiberal foreign governments and individuals.

“Protecting American educational, cultural, and national security interests requires transparency regarding foreign funds flowing to American higher education and research institutions,” Trump said in the order, which was signed in the Oval Office in the presence of the Secretary of Education Linda McMahon on Wednesday. “It is the policy of my administration to end the secrecy surrounding foreign funds in American educational institutions, protect the marketplace of ideas from propaganda sponsored by foreign governments, and safeguard America’s students and research from foreign exploitation.”

The executive order noted that during Trump’s first term in office, the Education Department launched investigations of 19 higher education institutions suspected of concealing foreign donations and any undue influence the immense sums may have gained the country from which they originated — inquiries that led to the disclosure of $6.5 billion worth of unreported gifts. The Biden administration, he said, “undid” that work, “hindering public access to information on foreign gifts and contracts.”

The remainder of the order enumerates enforcement duties delegated to McMahon, which include reversing Biden-era policies which countenanced lax observance of the law — Section 117 of the Higher Education Act (HEA) of 1965 — updating the public on the department’s findings, and impounding federal funds appropriated to institutions that continue to shroud their foreign donations behind a veil of secrecy and corporate spin.

“Unfortunately, in the last four years, the Biden administration undermined the structures the president built to do this critical work, allowing nations like China and Qatar to funnel billions of dollars to US universities with little to no oversight,” McMahon said in a statement. “This financial infiltration enabled foreign governments to steal taxpayer-funded intellectual property and reshape how our elite campuses teach about Israel and the Middle East.”

Foreign money in higher education is an issue to which scholars and nonprofit groups have called attention for years, arguing that it is an instrument of hostile powers that aim to distort US foreign policy by exposing students to propaganda or other ideas which undermine faith in liberal values such as free markets, limited government, and freedom of the press. Some of it is used to rehabilitate the reputations of authoritarian governments, a tactic which, experts argue, effectively converts the openness of American society into a force of its own self-subversion.

For example, according to the 2017 National Association of Scholars (NAS) report “Outsourced to China: Confucius Institutes and Soft Power in American Higher Education,” the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for years planted “Confucius Institutes” at universities across the US, teaching students that Taiwan is Chinese territory while censoring darker moments in the regime’s history, such as the Tiananmen Square massacre that killed thousands of Chinese citizens. The institutes, the report added, came with substantial financial benefits, such as extra funds for the University at Buffalo’s Asian studies department and “opera costumes and materials in the lobby of Binghamton University.”

At other times, the Confucius Institutes were allegedly used as bases from which to conduct espionage and theft of American research and intellectual property.

NAS president Peter Wood told The Algemeiner on Thursday that Trump’s executive order is the right move, but that higher education will “resist” complying with it.

“What is at stake here is not just compliance with a good accounting principle. What is really at stake is the contempt with which many college and university presidents regard America’s national interest,” Wood said. “Allowing our universities to become beholden to the Chinese Community Party endangers Americans. The National Association of Scholars has helped to track the theft of intellectual property, the duplicity of American researchers, and the diversion research programs all under the influence of Chinese funding. China is far from the only source of such subversive funding, but it is by far the largest source.”

He added, “President Trump’s forceful executive order will go a long way towards curing this problem. We can be under no illusion, however, that America’s colleges and universities will cheerfully comply. They have a long record of ignoring lawful requirements for such disclosure and they are now more eager than ever to demonstrate their defiance of America’s laws. In light of other executive orders against [diversity, equity, and inclusion] and other forms of academic malfeasance, dozens of prominent research universities are openly declaring that they intend to resist.”

NAS has recorded copious data on foreign funding of higher education, notably in the Foreign Donor Database it created in 2024 that led to the uncovering of vast sums the Qatari government had pumped into American universities — Cornell University received over $322 million, for example, from the Qatar National Research Fund between 2015 and 2018 — to promote pro-Hamas propaganda.

Alex Joffe, anthropologist and editor of BDS Monitor for Scholars for Peace in the Middle East (SPME), told The Algemeiner that Qatar has “given billions to universities, including to share their Middle East studies program which then in turn develop and disseminate K-12 curriculums which are dramatically anti-Israel, antisemitic, and pro-Islamist.”

The donation of billions of unreported dollars to US institutions of higher education is strongly correlated with an erosion of liberal democratic norms and increased antisemitism on college campuses, according to a 2023 report by the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP) titled, “The Corruption of the American Mind.”

From 2015-2020, the report noted, schools that accepted money from Middle Eastern donors had, on average, 300 percent more antisemitic incidents than schools that did not accept such donations. The largest donor it named is Qatar, which former US President Joe Biden described in 2022 as a “major non-NATO ally.” From 2014-2019, Qatar gave American universities a striking $2.7 billion in undocumented funds.

Additionally, students attending universities that received foreign funding witnessed antisemitism “significantly more often” than those attending schools that did not.

“A lack of transparency in funding reporting occurred in tandem with antidemocratic norms and antisemitism across American institutions of higher education,” the report said. “A massive influx of foreign, concealed donations to American institutions of higher learning, much of it from authoritarian regimes with notable support from Middle Eastern sources, reflects or supports heightened levels of intolerance towards Jews, open inquiry, and free expression.”

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

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