Separating anti-Zionists from antisemites on campus
ASPartOfMe
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But what about the remaining third? Researchers found that group split roughly equally between those who expressed hostility toward Israel (but not Jews) and those who thought poorly of Jews (but not Israel).
It represents the second recent study to find that animosity toward Israel is not clearly linked to an embrace of antisemitic ideas — even while these hostile attitudes can alienate them from Jews on campus.
The Brandeis team polled 4,123 undergraduates at 60 schools with a significant number of Jewish students. The academics asked a battery of questions, and then using a complex process grouped respondents into one of four buckets: Those not hostile toward Israel or Jews (66% of the total); those hostile toward Israel but not Jews (15%); those hostile toward Jews but not Israel (16%) and those hostile toward both Israel and Jews (2%).
One datapoint that caught my eye is that the students who were more hostile toward Jews than Israel also were more supportive of terrorism against Israel. For example, 24% of the hostile-to-Jews group agreed that “all Israeli civilians should be considered legitimate targets for Hamas,” compared to 6% of those hostile to Israel.
Also: Among the group that agreed with statements including “Jews don’t care what happens to anyone but their own kind,” 66% said that Israel had a right to exist.
These findings track with a study I shared here in March showing that more conservative college students are more likely to support Hamas killing Israeli civilians.
What’s going on here?
So we now have two new studies showing that hardcore anti-Zionists on campus — around 15% of students nationally, according to the Brandeis study — are not especially likely to participate in “consensus antisemitism,” a term that the scholar Keith Kahn-Harris uses to describe ideas that disparage all Jews because they are Jews.
But there’s a similar share of students who do hold those sorts of views — they agree with antisemitic tropes and are more likely support Hamas terrorist attacks — who tend to be more conservative and more supportive of Israel (26% of them had a favorable view of the Israeli government, compared with 21% of the majority of students who were not hostile toward either Israel or Jews).
Some might see these findings as validation of the anti-Zionists’ refrain that their only objection is to the state of Israel, and a comfort to Jews worried that the growing animosity toward Israel will fuel a further rise in antisemitism. Among the anti-Zionists in the survey, for example, only 4% agreed that “Jews should be held accountable for Israel’s actions.”
Len Saxe, the lead researcher on the study, is skeptical. “It’s just a different way of expressing the same old hostility, the same old prejudices,” he said in an interview. “I would call it a new expression of traditional antisemitism.”
But the study may be another signal that while mainstream Jewish organizations have focused in recent years, and especially since Oct. 7, on left-wing threats, there may be an equal — or greater — threat festering among right-wing students.
Alas, the Brandeis study also confirmed a problem I highlighted in last week’s newsletter about the exclusion of “Zionists,” broadly defined, from progressive spaces: Roughly 11% of college students are effectively refusing to socialize with the vast majority of their Jewish peers over disagreements related to Israel.
That ostracism is a serious problem — but it’s more complicated than the simple story we’re often told of protesters who have turned their sights on Israel because they hate Jews, and policymakers trying to address the campus climate would do well to read the Brandeis study in full.
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But what about the remaining third? Researchers found that group split roughly equally between those who expressed hostility toward Israel (but not Jews) and those who thought poorly of Jews (but not Israel).
It represents the second recent study to find that animosity toward Israel is not clearly linked to an embrace of antisemitic ideas — even while these hostile attitudes can alienate them from Jews on campus.
The Brandeis team polled 4,123 undergraduates at 60 schools with a significant number of Jewish students. The academics asked a battery of questions, and then using a complex process grouped respondents into one of four buckets: Those not hostile toward Israel or Jews (66% of the total); those hostile toward Israel but not Jews (15%); those hostile toward Jews but not Israel (16%) and those hostile toward both Israel and Jews (2%).
One datapoint that caught my eye is that the students who were more hostile toward Jews than Israel also were more supportive of terrorism against Israel. For example, 24% of the hostile-to-Jews group agreed that “all Israeli civilians should be considered legitimate targets for Hamas,” compared to 6% of those hostile to Israel.
Also: Among the group that agreed with statements including “Jews don’t care what happens to anyone but their own kind,” 66% said that Israel had a right to exist.
These findings track with a study I shared here in March showing that more conservative college students are more likely to support Hamas killing Israeli civilians.
What’s going on here?
So we now have two new studies showing that hardcore anti-Zionists on campus — around 15% of students nationally, according to the Brandeis study — are not especially likely to participate in “consensus antisemitism,” a term that the scholar Keith Kahn-Harris uses to describe ideas that disparage all Jews because they are Jews.
But there’s a similar share of students who do hold those sorts of views — they agree with antisemitic tropes and are more likely support Hamas terrorist attacks — who tend to be more conservative and more supportive of Israel (26% of them had a favorable view of the Israeli government, compared with 21% of the majority of students who were not hostile toward either Israel or Jews).
Some might see these findings as validation of the anti-Zionists’ refrain that their only objection is to the state of Israel, and a comfort to Jews worried that the growing animosity toward Israel will fuel a further rise in antisemitism. Among the anti-Zionists in the survey, for example, only 4% agreed that “Jews should be held accountable for Israel’s actions.”
Len Saxe, the lead researcher on the study, is skeptical. “It’s just a different way of expressing the same old hostility, the same old prejudices,” he said in an interview. “I would call it a new expression of traditional antisemitism.”
Why? Because he is determined to support what has, unfortunately, become the mainstream Zionist party line on this issue, notwithstanding his own data to the contrary???
Well, duh.
That ostracism is a serious problem — but it’s more complicated than the simple story we’re often told of protesters who have turned their sights on Israel because they hate Jews, and policymakers trying to address the campus climate would do well to read the Brandeis study in full.
Sounds to me like the problem here is people being unable, or refusing, to socialize or communicate with people they have strong disagreements with. It seems to me that this has become more and more of a problem in American society generally, on many different issues, not just Zionism.
It is quite a stretch to see this as "just a different way of expressing the same old hostility, the same old prejudices."
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The way this article is written shows the prejudices of the author.
The whole point is that anti-Zionists are NOT the ones who are prejudiced against Jews, not even Jews living in Israel. In fact, many of them ARE Jews.
So when the two groups get conflated and both accused of being 'anti-Semitic', as they are in the U.S. government and colleges these days, it's pretending that those who are against genocide are 'just as bad' as those who are prejudiced against Jews.
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funeralxempire
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Agreed. It sounds like the data from his research didn't support his pre-existing beliefs so Saxe just insisted that despite what the data showed, the anti-Zionists are actually antisemites because that's what he feels is true.
That might be his emotional truth, but it's in conflict with reality.
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How U.S. News Media Manufactured ‘Antisemitism on Campuses’ - Al Jazeera
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ASPartOfMe
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See my opinion in the OP of this thread as to what is hyperbole and what is real.
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funeralxempire
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Source: Trust me bro.
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“Anyone who wants to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state has to support bolstering Hamas and transferring money to Hamas, this is part of our strategy” —Netanyahu
戦争ではなく戦争と戦う
Faschismus ist die Gewalt der Schwachen.
From 2016:
Close to 50% were able to locate Iraq and Iran on a map, with 61% able to identify Saudi Arabia.A small number of respondents — 29% — were able to identify Indonesia and its distinction as the country with the largest majority Muslim population in the world.
CFR and National Geographic concluded that the survey “revealed significant gaps between what young people understand about today’s world and what they need to know to successfully navigate and compete in it.”
The average score of respondents “was only 55% correct,” the report said. “Just 29% of respondents earned a minimal pass — 66% correct or better. Just over one percent…earned an A, 91% or higher.”
Despite the bleak results of the survey, CFR and National Geographic wrote, the “good news is that [it] also reflects an opportunity” to capitalize on the interest of young Americans regarding world affairs and educate them on important global issues.
The survey was conducted online and is based on responses of 1,203 participants aged 18 to 26 who currently attend or have recently attended a two or four-year college or university in the US.
https://www.algemeiner.com/2016/09/14/s ... el-on-map/
In a 2006 poll of 18-24 year olds, 25% could find Israel on a map:
https://archive.blogs.harvard.edu/mesh/ ... st_on_map/
Sure, the numbers aren’t good, but they are much better than 1%. I actually would expect the numbers to be significantly higher now given the current conflict, especially among protesters/activists. My son is 13 and knows exactly where Israel is (and did before October 7th). They covered it in 6th and 7th grade in his 3rd rate, public school. I have a better understanding of the region now than I previously did. As a homeschooler in a fundie household, my education was abysmal, though.
Whatever the case may be, I don’t think you need to know where Israel is to have an opinion on what’s going on there. Some folks have disabilities (e.g. dyslexia) which may make it difficult for them to read maps. It doesn’t mean that their view is otherwise uninformed or that they can’t stand up for what they believe is right.
Sorry for being off-topic!
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No love for terrorist groups including the Most Moral Army in the World TM, Hamas, and Hezbollah OR their supporters and sympathizers.
despite correctly pointing out going off topic - Your point of dragging people with disabilities into a discussion about anti-Israel protests on campuses is a non-sequitur.
Does not having an informed opinion on an issue that a young person chooses to get behind and protest in a non-violent way? Of course not. Many important issues like the Vietnam war, civil rights, women's rights, climate change or anti-apartheid protests involved young people showing up in numbers.
I have no problem with young people on campuses getting behind anti-war protests or protesting against Israel's occupation of Gaza. Even if 75% of them don't know where Israel is on a map.
the problem is where they choose to use language that is clearly antisemitic or choose to hurt police, damage buildings or disrupt the flow of traffic or business. MLK, Malcolm X and Gandhi never asked their followers to do these things. I have a problem where a protestor says they are passionate but are they really? or do they get caught up in the moment and choose to break the law for technically an issue they aren't really informed about in the first place.
Overall, my post was pointing out that it is not helpful talking about Americans not knowing where Israel is on a map because it doesn’t matter and says more about your own biases than anything else. That’s made abundantly clear by the fact that you pulled a made-up statistic out of your ass instead of providing research on this off-topic side point.
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No love for terrorist groups including the Most Moral Army in the World TM, Hamas, and Hezbollah OR their supporters and sympathizers.
the 75% is actually based on your statistic that 25% of American campus kids protesting know where Israel is on a map, so I used simple arithmetic to deduct 25 from 100 to give me 75%.
the 75% is actually based on your statistic that 25% of American campus kids protesting know where Israel is on a map, so I used simple arithmetic to deduct 25 from 100 to give me 75%.
I was referring to the 99%.
It is and you know it.
It’s not in this context but you can think what you want.
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No love for terrorist groups including the Most Moral Army in the World TM, Hamas, and Hezbollah OR their supporters and sympathizers.
Last edited by TwilightPrincess on 13 Sep 2024, 9:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Yes I am referring to those kids who are being antisemitic or causing damage (not every kid protesting).
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