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‘Take Back the Campus’: Hundreds of Pro-Israel Activists Gather in DC for Major Unity Conference
Israel on Campus Coalition Conference 2025. Photo: ICC
Over 500 Jewish and pro-Israel students from across the US gathered in Washington, DC this week to craft strategies for countering the anti-Zionist movement on college campuses and attend lectures by dozens of the biggest scholars and social media influencers in the American Jewish community.
As The Algemeiner has previously reported, Jewish college students face an unprecedented crisis in American academia. Following Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel, higher education saw paroxysms of antisemitic and pro-Hamas protests, as well as acts of violence, vandalism, and assault. Elite colleges such as Harvard University, the University of California, Berkeley, and Columbia University became centers of anti-Zionist agitation, exporting methods and tactics to other campuses and upending the assumptions Jewish Zoomers believed about their place in the progressive movement and, more broadly, the United States.
Held at the Grand Hyatt, the event was the third National Leadership Summit held by the Israel on Campus Coalition (ICC). According to the organization, 153 colleges and universities were represented there.
Founded in 2002, the Israel on Campus Coalition is a nonprofit organization that describes its mission as inspiring college students to defend and be proud of Israel. One of its major initiatives is the “microgrants” program, which helps pro-Israel campus groups organize events about Israeli culture and society. Another, the ICC Community Impact Fellowship, awards college students a $1,000 stipend for completing a leadership seminar in which they are trained in civic engagement, coalition building, and rapidly responding to antisemitic and anti-Israel events on their campuses.
On Tuesday, ICC chief executive officer Jacob Baime told The Algemeiner how Oct. 7 changed college life for Jewish students and how this year’s conference prepared them for what will likely be two more semesters of pandemonium, during which the US will elect its next president and Israel’s wars against Hamas and Hezbollah may escalate into a region-wide conflagration.
“After this explosion of vile antisemitism that we’ve seen on campuses from coast to coast, it’s time to empower Jewish and pro-Israel students to take back the campus — to take it back from these forces of hatred, antisemitism, and anti-Americanism,” Baime explained. “What I said to the students, and I really think that it’s true, is that the challenges are enormous, but there is hope right here. And it’s been really interesting to see how many students want to get up off the bench.”
He continued, “We have 500 people here at this conference, and there’s still a large waiting list also. Logistically, we could not accommodate the surge of interest, which isn’t going to go away. There’s a renewed sense among pro-Israel Americans and students of purpose and identity. The interest and the passion of Jewish students and their friends is at an all-time high, and next year we’ll need to have a much larger gathering to include the student leaders who want to stand up for what’s right.”
The idea of pro-Zionists reclaiming their place in higher education inspired University of California, San Diego student Shani Menna, who attended for the first time, said. She stressed the importance of a speech by Tel Aviv Institute senior fellow and co-founder Hen Mazzig.
“In Hen Mazzig’s speech, he said, ‘If you’re not on the table, you’re on the menu,’” Menna told The Algemeiner. “And it’s true. We saw throughout this year the importance of Jewish student involvement in student government and conversations with administration. Overall, this conference reminded Jewish students of the strength that we have as a people, as well as the strength of the values of democracy, Western civilization, and peace of love — all of these things that have been clouded with all the hate on campus.”
Netanel Crispe, an Orthodox student at Yale University, stressed that the state of college campuses is still perilous.
“It’s a very hard time to be on campus, and we have faced horrific opposition. I gain strength from knowing I have the backing of so many wonderful people,” he said. “A primary concern for everybody on campus is the upcoming election. We recently got a new president at Yale who has yet to be tested, and while a lot of people are trying to give her the benefit of the doubt, there is a lot of concern that we have yet to see any proactive measures being taken by the administration to prepare or address what we expect or what many of the [anti-Zionist] organizations have clearly publicly stated will be a repetition of the previous year’s events — activism, protests, mobs, and encampments.”
Several students who attended the conference noted that many of its speakers — which included Nova Music Festival survivor Shye Klein, Aviva Klompas, Miriam Elman of the Academic Engagement Network (AEN), and Adam Lehman — were highly accessible, sharing advice, book recommendations, and opportunities for further involvement in pro-Israel activism. Social media influencers, who have amassed hundreds of thousands of followers on platforms such as Instagram, proved to be popular with Zoomer students, 50 percent of whom receive daily news from social media.
As The Algemeiner walked through the Grand Hyatt, it spotted one such Instagram favorite who is immensely popular with students, Emily Austin. She was surrounded by students seeking selfies and counsel on how to merge the Zionist and professional components of their identities. During an interview, she told the paper that the students gave her hope that higher education is not lost yet.
“I attend a lot of conferences, but the room of students that gathered for this one were super, super motivated, and they are actually move makers and game changers. Many of them are leading Jewish clubs on their campuses or suing their school for antisemitism,” Austin said. “It was nice to see that students are starting to fight back and defend themselves, because most of my speeches aim at making students feel motivated or empowered, and it seemed that this cohort of students are already strong. It’s refreshing to know that this is our next generation of Jewish leaders.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post ‘Take Back the Campus’: Hundreds of Pro-Israel Activists Gather in DC for Major Unity Conference first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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US Official Calls Gaza Ceasefire Talks in Doha the Most Constructive in Months
An Israeli tank maneuvers, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, near the Israel-Gaza border, in Israel, July 9, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
The latest negotiations in Doha to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza and a hostage deal have been the most productive in months, and negotiators will reconvene next week in Cairo hoping to conclude it, a senior Biden administration official said on Friday.
“It was consensus of all of the participants over the past 48 hours that there’s really a new spirit here to drive it to a conclusion,” the official said, speaking to reporters on the condition of anonymity.
He still cautioned that work remained to be done.
“This is a very difficult, complex deal.”
On Friday, the US, with help from mediators Qatar and Egypt, put forward a bridging proposal the three countries believe would close all gaps between warring parties Israel and Hamas, the official said.
The past two days in Doha were probably “the most constructive 48 hours” that the parties have had in months, the official said.
“The Israeli team that was here was empowered … We made a lot of progress in the number of issues that we’ve been working on,” the official said.
The latest round in months of talks to end the war in Hamas-ruled Gaza began on Thursday between Israel and mediators. The Palestinian terrorist group Hamas was not directly involved in the talks but was kept briefed on progress.
The White House sent CIA Director Bill Burns and US Middle East envoy Brett McGurk. Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and Egypt’s intelligence chief Abbas Kamel were also taking part.
The negotiations took place in the shadow of a feared regional escalation. Iran, which backs Hamas, has threatened to retaliate against Israel after the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on July 31.
There will be engagements over the course of next week between working groups that will discuss everything from the list of hostages, the sequence by which the hostages would be released and the Palestinian prisoners.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Israel on Sunday.
The conflict began on Oct. 7 when Hamas fighters rampaged into Israel, killing around 1,200 people and seizing around 250 hostages. Israel responded with a military campaign in neighboring Gaza aimed at freeing the hostages and dismantling Hamas’ military and governing capabilities.
The Israeli military says it has eliminated 17,000 terrorists in Gaza during its campaign.
The post US Official Calls Gaza Ceasefire Talks in Doha the Most Constructive in Months first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Court injunction at Vancouver Island University ends the campus encampment trend (for now)
A Supreme Court of British Columbia justice in Vancouver issued an injunction to Vancouver Island University on Aug. 15 to remove a pro-Palestinian encampment, the last of its kind at a Canadian university, from its campus in Nanaimo within 72 hours, or by Aug, 18 at 9:30 a.m. PDT. Jewish organizations were pleased by the […]
The post Court injunction at Vancouver Island University ends the campus encampment trend (for now) appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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‘Token Ethnic President’: Pro-Hamas Crowd Launches Racist Verbal Assault on Black Americans Over Harris Support
Anti-Zionist TikTok user calls African Americans “disgusting” for supporting Kamala Harris. Photo: Screenshot
Anti-Zionist activists recently launched a barrage of racist attacks against African Americans on social media, triggering an exchange of insults as well as arguments over the Arab world’s role in enslaving Black Africans.
“Black people also wear a uniform and get on a plane and come to our countries and kill us!” one influencer said in a compilation of TikTok posts shared by pro-Israel activist Hen Mazzig. “You vote the same f—king melanated f—king people to government that sign papers to kill us. I don’t want to hear it anymore!”
“Keep Palestinians names out of your f—king mouths when you’re trying to defend your decision for voting for Kamala,” another said, referring to Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris, who is Black.
TikTok user “Dan1ahan” charged that Black Americans “switched up 180 on Palestinians and people who are Palestinian activists the second we have a Black woman running for office,” describing the alleged betrayal as “disgusting.” Touching on the upcoming US presidential election, one Arab woman said all Black people want is a “token ethnic president” in office.
Black TikTok influencers descended on the platform in droves to denounce the comments, with several announcing that they intended not only to remove Gaza-related content from their profiles but also to cease engaging in anti-Zionist activity entirely. The conversation escalated in subsequent posts, touching on the continuance of Black slavery in the Arab world and what young woman called “voracious racism” against African Americans.
“What’s even crazier is that earlier people were like, oh these are bots, no — this is how people really feel. And she made a video that’s a real human being that feels exactly that way,” an African American woman said. “These are people who feel like they are entitled to the support of Black people no matter what, that they get to push us around and tell us who the hell we get to vote for if we support them … They’ve lost their minds.”
An African American male said, “Why don’t we talk about the Arab slave trade? And keep in mind that the Arabs have enslaved more Black people than the Europeans combined.” Another African American woman accused Arabs of not denouncing slavery in Antebellum America.
“We spend our money with you,” she said. “We stand in solidarity with you, and you keep asking for more, and more, and more, and it’s never enough.”
This is not the first time that anti-Zionists have hurled racist abuse and expletives at Black Americans while denigrating their accomplishments and status as full citizens of the United States.
In April, an anti-Zionist student group at George Washington University (GWU) in Washington, DC staged an unprecedented protest of a talk by US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield at the university’s Elliot School of International Affairs.
“Zionist imperial puppet,” “imperial and blackface,” and “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” were among the chants yelled by members of the Student Coalition for Palestine (GWSCP) outside the building — a clamoring which could be heard throughout the Elliot School. Thomas-Greenfield was at GWU to speak at an event held to encourage Black youth to pursue careers in foreign affairs. GWSCP protested her appearance because she had vetoed multiple UN Security Council resolutions calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, where Israel has been waging a military campaign against Hamas following the terrorist group’s Oct. 7 massacre of Israeli civilians.
In a pamphlet distributed to everyone who showed up to the event, the students accused Greenfield of being a “puppet,” alluding to the fact that she is a Black woman holding a distinguished presidential appointment. GWSCP seemed to suggest that the color of Greenfield’s skin excluded the possibility that she is an agent of her own destiny.
“For as long as we have been here, we have resisted these systems of oppression, but the United States of Amerikkka [sic] has always used Black bodies as puppets to carry out repression and dissent,” the pamphlet said. It also compared Greenfield to Black enslaved persons who had been assigned, against their will, to work as overseers of other enslaved persons on cotton plantations.
Later, according to GWU’s official student newspaper, the group encircled Dean of Student Affairs Colette Coleman, an African American woman, outside the building. One member of the group began “clapping in her face” while others screamed that she should resign.
That same month, at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, anti-Zionists occupying an administrative building verbally abused a Black officer, whom they accused of betraying his racial identity. “Shame on you!” they shouted at him. Someone else said, “You are Black in America, and you’re not standing with the marginalized people of the world. What does that make you?”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post ‘Token Ethnic President’: Pro-Hamas Crowd Launches Racist Verbal Assault on Black Americans Over Harris Support first appeared on Algemeiner.com.