After more than a year of Israel’s relentless genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, establishment and mainstream people and institutions finally feel it is safe to criticize the Jewish state. This is the latest instance of a dispiriting aspect of social behavior. Most people can identify wrongdoing when they see it, but they will not call it out until it feels safe to do so. This is especially true when the perpetrator is rich or powerful. However, that can take a long time—so long that it is often too late for the victims.
Avoid Premature Compassion
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication and WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a contributor to Centerclip and co-host of "The TMI Show" talk show. He is a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "2024: Revisited."
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I confess to having not followed this issue minutely in that I couldn’t find specifics readily enough. To wit: What — EXACTLY — was the “antisemitism” being committed at the universities in question? Every time (this has happened multiple times in my life) that “antisemitism is on the rise” at campuses, we never get a breakdown on it.
What were the events that led to the conclusion? Is someone handing out angry pamphlets in the quad? Are students being followed to Hillel by gangs threatening them? Did some student finds a one-inch swastika on a bathroom stall and, after reporting it, other students started noticing them too?
Perhaps Tawana Brawley has some insights?
Israel and its supporters conflate any criticism of Israel, even by Jews, as “Anti-Semitism.” On that Orwellian basis, multiple US states have passed laws codifying this, and hundreds of students and teachers have been kicked out of/fired from multiple colleges and universities on the grounds that, while it was evil for the Nazis to kill Jewish children, it’s OK for Israelis (presumed “Jews”) to kill Palestinian children, and that protestingIsraelis killing Palestinian children is “a hate crime.”
I say “presumed Jews” because the Judaism I was raised in was based around Hillel’s aphorism that the core teaching of Judaism is “do not do unto others what is hateful to you.” So, those who torture and kill Palestinians either want to be tortured and killed, or else they are not really Jews.