Campus antisemitism contains a Passover lesson for all of us

This is one of the rare years that separates Passover from Easter on the calendar by a few weeks.  As such, as Passover is observed this week, it isn’t lumped in as “how Jewish people observe Easter” the same way too often is assumed that Hanukkah is just Jewish Christmas.  Each are distinct holidays with completely different origins, observances, and meanings.

Passover is significant every year, but this year deserves its own spotlight.  It was, after all, when Jews had to put a mark of blood on their doors – and identifying themselves and their households as Jewish – to avoid the fate of the last plague sent to Egypt.  

We’ve again been reminded that openly identifying as Jewish comes at a cost since October 7^th.  This isn’t limited to those in Israel.  It’s becoming increasingly difficult even for Jews in America who are supposedly protected by the First Amendment and Civil Rights Act for freedom of religion and association.  

The focal point for these open acts of hostility and antisemitism have become college campuses.  The privileged children attending Ivy League schools, along with too many of their faculty and administrators, have been taking the lead here, and not in a good way.

Last year three college Presidents – representing Harvard, MIT, and the University of Pennsylvania – appeared before Congress to address antisemitism and “mostly peaceful” protests on their campuses aimed at Jewish students.  None would give a yes or no answer as to whether calling for genocide of Jews violated the schools’ codes of conduct.  Each hid behind highly scripted mealy-mouthed answers citing the need for “context”.

The context is clear.  Jews have been dealing with this context for thousands of years.

The appearance cost two of the Presidents their jobs, though it took an academic fraud scandal to eventually oust Harvard’s President.  It seems it didn’t fundamentally change the business-as-usual attitude of the administration of those schools nor too many other elite universities.  

Antisemitism has found a home at too many of our institutions.  Too many have looked the other way as hatred and discrimination against Jewish people – not just Israel – has become glaringly institutionalized within their organizations.

Nowhere has this been more glaring than at Columbia University.  A mass encampment of protestors has taken over the school’s public commons, with the school administration mostly ignoring the growing aggressive hostility to Jewish students.  

Over the weekend leading into Passover, a tipping point was reached.  Columbia’s Rabbi for their Jewish Learning on Campus Orthodox Union, send an email to Jewish students suggested they return home and remain there until the campus is safe.  

Video evidence of the environment is easy to find online.  Protestors blocked a Jewish student from leaving a building, surrounding him and prohibiting his ability to move in any direction.  Another stood in front of a group of Jewish students with a sign reading “Al Qasam’s (Hamas’ military wing) next targets.”  Groups surrounded Jewish students and began yelling and throwing stuff at them in another video.  One Jewish student reported being stabbed in her eye by a protestor carrying a flag.

Oddly – yet by now not at all surprisingly – major media outlets have mostly ignored or tried to downplay the story.  One of the most brazen is NBC and MSNBC news correspondent Antonia Hylton, who despite mounting evidence to the contrary, took to X/Twitter Sunday evening to declare that she spent “long hours” on campus Thursday and Friday and “didn’t see a single instance of violence or aggression.”  

Follow up tweets appeared to try to insulate Columbia and its students, saying that the conflict and aggression she did witness took place off campus, and none of those protestors said they were students.  Again, this is directly contradicted by numerous pictures and videos taken the same days on campus.

Her claims would be counter to those of New York City Mayor Adams, who has said the NYC Police stand ready to investigate reports received, but Columbia was private property and thus Columbia’s problem to deal with.  NYC’s Mayor and New York’s Governor have failed to protect students under their care.

Bulwark political reporter Mark Caputo tied Columbia’s intersection of failing institutions together in a series of posts on X, noting that Columbia houses perhaps the most prestigious journalism school in the country, and is the granter of the Pulitzer prizes. He openly asks how did the Columbia Journalism Review, the professors, and the reporters Columbia produces miss the rise of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic bias fostered at the school.

Maybe they didn’t miss it.  Maybe, to them, it’s a feature and not a bug.

When neo-nazi cosplayers marched with Tiki torches in Charlottesville it was news in every corner of the media landscape.  Donald Trump failed his party and his country by not aggressively denouncing it.  

Joe Biden’s initial response via his Press Secretary when asked about campus antisemitism was to talk about Islamophobia, without even mentioning Jews in her statement.  It’s an equal and opposite failure for the same reason – fear of losing losers in the party’s base – this time with media playing along.

Meanwhile, Jews are once again left to fend for themselves and their own protection.  It’s a Passover lesson for all of us:  Government will only protect us when it is convenient for them to do so.  The ultimate protection is sought and received from God.