Do not cry or tranquilizers, plan how to act so as to beat them at their own game.
By Rabbi Prof. Dov Fischer, INN
Dear Ms. Ranon,
I just read your account in Arutz Sheva/ Israel National News of the recent Columbia College Student Council vote to endorse BDS. As a regular op-ed contributor to Arutz Sheva and as a Columbia alumnus, I write you in this same public forum.
I graduated from Columbia in the mid-1970s. I was openly an Orthodox Jew, wore a yarmulka on my head, and I expressed conservative political views on that uniformly leftist campus. I marched for Soviet Jews and for Israel. My professors included some who hated Israel. I was assigned a dorm roommate one year who turned out to be an antisemite. I knew all the Jewish leftists and other leftists on campus who hated Israel because, like ants on a summer sidewalk where no one has cleaned off melted ice cream, they were teeming all over the place.
Ms. Ranon, I never cried. I never teared up. Rather, for the sake of Zion, I simply would not hold my peace nor be silent. Student-organized hate for Israel never caused me to have a panic attack. You mention all those kinds of reactions by Israel supporters on the night of the vote. Not in my day.
Rather, I organized my friends, then I organized non-Jewish dorm mates and classmates who either were (i) conservative, or (ii) mostly were apolitical but just could not stand the whiny know-it-all Leftists who kept trying to superimpose their values on us and who tried to force our professors to cancel classes to accommodate their nonsense.
In time, I ran for the Columbia University Senate. The University Senate was comprised of representatives from every school in Columbia University, with each school getting a few seats set aside, some for administrators, some for faculty, and some for students. The college students were entitled only to three seats. I got elected to one of them. Yes, without apologizing for being pro-Israel, pro-Judea and Samaria, and conservative, I was elected.
Dear Ms. Ranon, I am telling you what I am about to write, as a guy who now is a few decades older but never stopped being a kid. I still teach approximately 200 new graduate students each year. They keep me in touch: all about “Game of Thrones” and the terrible final season, “13 Reasons Why,” “Stranger Things” and Eggos waffles. I knew about “woke” the day it became a meme. I despised Harvey Weinstein long before it became cool. So please give me a listen.
Forgive me for tough love, but you never will win for Israel by shedding tears on the battleground, and those who get heart palpitations and need Xanax when the showdown comes are not the people to lead Israel’s fight at this moment. Hold back the tears, and save them for weddings and silver anniversaries, and for when Israel finally annexes the Jordan Valley and utterly cleans out the problem in Gaza. Instead, here is what Jewish students on American colleges need to do:
Kids have to stop apologizing for Israel. We have to stop agreeing that the “Palestinians” deserve their own country in Judea and Samaria. They “deserve” the “Hashemite Kingdom” of Jordan — if they want it. We have to change our own paradigm to understand that we Jews have every right to the Land of Israel, and they have no right to Judea and Samaria other than what Israel decides to allow them. That is our land. If you feel uncomfortable pointing to the Bible, then point to the Balfour Declaration and to the international agreements after World War I. You are in Columbia, so I will let you look them up. That land belongs to Jews.
When Israel was created in 1948, the Arabs went to war to destroy Israel. If Political Science 101 at Columbia is the writings of Marx, Engels, Frantz Fanon, and Eldridge Cleaver, then the elective of Political Science 4001x is that any country that is attacked in war may hold permanently any land that it wins while defending itself. This exact situation recurred especially in 1967. The so-called “Green Line” that existed before 1967 was not viable. Until after Israel defended herself successfully during those six days and, by G-d’s grace, survived the attack of extermination by three invading Arab armies did Israel finally emerge with realistic borders. It is realistic for Israel’s western border to be at the Mediterranean and for the eastern border to be along the Jordan River and the Kineret farther north. It is realistic to have the Golan Heights as a northern border. These are natural boundaries, and they provide necessary security from rapid land invasion. That land all belongs to us.
Ms. Ranon, that is first. Palestine is a myth. And the Jews at Columbia who want to support Israel have got to internalize that as a fact. Certainly, there is no question that we sometimes do not say to other people truths that they cannot handle. For example, you don’t tell a person with a big pimple that he has a big pimple. Unless you are incredibly close to someone, you do not comment on their weight, their hairstyle, their hygiene. So it is not necessary to tell others what they cannot possibly grasp in light of the Political Correctness culture and cancel culture that now permeates colleges like Columbia and Barnard. But you — for your own self-respect and your own grasp of the issues, so that you can lead others in the defensive struggle for Israel — must internalize this.
I respectfully point you to three articles for starters: (i) this, (ii) this, and (iii) this. Read them, learn them, and share them with others in your internal circle. And if Columbia students in JStreet, which has been funded with approximately one million dollars of George Soros money, will not agree, then wish them well, eat jelly donuts with them on Hanukkah, and focus on those with whom you can build a real pro-Israel coalition. Forget about JStreet; in time, you will come to realize that, like their George Soros benefactor, they are at the core of the problem, not the solution.
Next: You must begin a campus-wide movement on Morningside Heights to BDS Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. Blame it on Khashoggi’s killing. Blame it on Saudi persecution of gays and women. Blame it on the 15 of 19 who caused 9-11 all being from Saudi Arabia. But you have to start demanding a university-wide boycott of Saudi and Kuwaiti products, a ban of all Saudi armed forces from training anywhere in America, Columbia and Barnard divestment from all American companies (hint: energy) that deal with Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, a ban on all student-exchange programs that see Saudi or Kuwaiti students coming to Columbia, or Columbia students going for a semester there. Boycott. Divestiture. And sanctions.
Side by side — but do not entangle the two campaigns — you must also begin a university-wide campaign to BDS China. Blame it on their persecution of Muslims because Columbia students will not be moved by hearing that China suppresses freedom movements. Demand a complete boycott at Columbia-Barnard of all products made in China. Y’know, like iPhones and computers and clothes. Divestiture from all Columbia corporate investments in companies that trade with China. Y’know, like Microsoft and Apple and Facebook and pretty much everyone that the snowflakes need for life.
Then, next autumn, your group demands that the Columbia College Student Council pass two BDS resolutions, identical to the one that caused you to cry, one aimed this time at BDS’ing Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, and the other at BDS’ing China. If you do this — if you demand this the way that college students at Columbia always have known how to make demands (look up “Mark Rudd” and look up “SDS 1968”) — then one of two things will happen. Either they also will BDS Saudi Arabia and Kuwait and China. (Not gonna happen.) Or, to avoid insulting Muslims and Arabs on campus, and to keep their iPhones for texting and tweeting their anti-Israel hate, they will realize that they have to drop the recent anti-Israel BDS thing, too, or they will have their recta (a Latin term you can look up) sued in federal court for civil rights violations.
Ms. Ranon, there is one more reason not to cry. The University Administration, just as with Barnard’s across the street last year, will never dare implement a single syllable of a BDS resolution against Israel. Because if they would so dare, their tens of thousands of Jewish alumni from the last half century — alumni from eras before Obama and snowflakes and micro-aggressions and safe spaces and trigger warnings — would cut them off so dry that Hamilton Hall would end up being converted to a homeless shelter, also Earl Hall, and also Butler Library.
The bucks would dry up, and suddenly all the tenured social-sciences professors would have to go out and get real jobs in the real world. And, please do believe me, Ms. Ranon, that prospect would terrify those effete snobs so badly that even the Jewish BDS professors would rather spend their spare time singing “Hatikvah” alongside the alma mater statue on the steps of Low Library than ever having to go out and get a real job in the real world.
@ Adam Dalgliesh:
There were 5.0 murders per 100,000 people in 2018 in USA (16K murders)
Israel murder rate in 2018 was 1.14 people per 100,000 inhabitants ( a little over 100)
Israel makes lots of news for some the problems it has but is generally very safe.
It is hard to compare places like the USA and Israel, especially as Israel about the size of New Jersey. New Jersey had about 3 times the murders committed in Israel over 300 and the rate was roughly 4 per 100K.
@ Bear Klein: Life for visibly Jewish people has definitely become unsafe in the United States. Whether this is a result of a rising tide of violence of all sorts, targetting people all races and creeds, is a little less clear. Official FBI statistics, (which may well be inaccurate), seem to suggest that violent crime in general has not incresed much over the past ten years on a nationwide basis–although the overall increase since around 1960 has been enormous, and violence has certainly increased in some cities over the past ten years, especially Baltimore and Chicago.
It seems clear, however, that violence specifically directed against Jews, and motivated by anti-Jewish bias, has been increasing at a much faster rate than violent crime in general.
I agree with you 100% that aliya to Israel is the only way to plan a specifically Jewish life. Jews are not necessarily safer from anti-Semitic violence in Israel than in the diaspora. But at least there is Jewish culture and religion all around the Jewish individual, sponsored by the state, and a Jewish citizen army willing and even eager to protect the Jewish population, of which the armed forces are part and parcel.
@ Kenny:
You are wrong Kenny. Do not allow yourself to be isolated as an individual Jew. Fight for armed Jewish militias for defence of all Jews and join with any American workers who will join you.
Jews in America need to get organized in armed Jewish militias and seek support from Americans also, against all forms of antisemitism. revenge needs to be enacted for every killing of Jews. Do not let anything go by. Take the armed struggle to these antisemitic fascists.
Fischer
Marx and Engels were not around at the time of Franz Fanon. Stop your lying crap and learn some history.
Fischer is Norman Gary Finkelstein not a Jew? yes…so put your own house in order you liar.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/273062?fbclid=IwAR3JnGx9u3OYGZOyKV8GWE93eTZSFz1wFfbPkD4aPwTUu5H-mvnb1taQWqo
@ Adam Dalgliesh:I believe there is a clear violent pattern now unfolding in the USA against Jews by antiSemites who come from various races and political views. The USA is racked with violence and people are getting numb to it.
Pattern there is a massacre and then it gets reported, the local and federal officials talk about the event. The Dems scream gun control. The incident is forgotten and life goes on.
Life in the USA for Jews who are visible is no longer safe. Jews need to protect themselves and their communities. If they and their families care about a Jewish future they will make aliyah. Only in Israel can one plan a Jewish future.
Every Jew should own a gun, learn how to use it, keep it handy, and understand that not the police, the judges, or anyone other non Jew is going to give a tinker’s damn about your Jewish life or the good for your family, only a Jew with a gun can protect himself and his family/
There are many other important questions raised by the worldwide uptick of terrorism against Jews that have not been adequately addressed by the MSM. For example: to what extent do Jews’ verbal violence against each other contribute to the physical violence directed at Jews by members of other groups? To what extent do the antisemitic stereotypes in the mass media, also sometimes fostered by Jews (such as Woody Allen), contribute to the antisemitic violence? To what extent do the justifications of anti-Israel terrorism, denials of Jewish peoplehood, denial of Jewish history, even affirmations of the blood libel,etc., by Israel’s intellectual elite contribute to Arab terrorism and violence against Jews? To the violence against Jews abroad?
Is there anything that Jews can do to stop or at least reduce the violence directed against us? Or is it simply something that is inherent in the Jewish condition and our relationship with “the nations?” Can education reduce the occurrence of antisemitic violence, as so many Jewish organizations and community leaders claim? Or is antisemitism a permanent fixture of Christian, post-Christian and Islamic culture that can never be changed? Analysis and debate in Israpundit of these issues that are raised by the rising tide of anti-Jewish violence would be a useful contribution to the Jewish people’s struggle for survival in an increasingly hostile world.
@ Ted Belman: I think this is a mistake. While these events in and of themselves receive media coverage most of the time, the analyses of them by U.S. authorities of them tend to be deeply flawed and inaccurate, and the press is reluctant to challenge the misleading or improbable denials of terrorist and/or antisemitic intent by the police and prosecutors. It is this denial syndrome of law enforcement. that Israpundit, in my view, should analyze and discuss. Why do official investigators regularly claim that there is “no evidence” of terrorism when the terrorist motive of violent crimes is self-evident? What does this tell us about the motivations of law enforcement?
@ Adam Dalgliesh:I tend not to cover events like this where ever they take place. In my mind everybody is covering it so nothing is lost if I don’t. I prefer to cover things we differ on rather than things we agree on.
Why is nobody at Israpundit reporting on the Jersey City massacre and the Pensacola massacre. Both antisemitic in motivation. And why did the FBi claim there was “no evidence” that either attack was motivated by terrorism? Why are they, and the U.S. attorney for northern New Jersey, still denying that antisemitism was the motivation for the Jersey City massacre? Instead they claim it was directed at “all communities” in Jersey City. Also, they are claiming that drugs and alcohol was the “primary” motive for the massacre, and antisemitism only a “secondary” motivation? (?????). The FBI has a long and disgraceful record of both terrorism denial and antisemitism denial, whenever terrorists kill Jews. It’s about time someone did a little research to expose this disgraceful pattern.
Why are we at Israpundit not screaming (literally), “bloody murder?” Why is n’t the whole Jewish world? Maybe that is the biggest disgrace.
Romy:
So painful to readmit that such a wonderful nation as the USA, has in
it’s closet such unforgiven skeletons of horrible treatment of AMERINDS !
Eddie
This is a great article, but I have to point out one error. In regard to the eastern border of Israel, the Kinneret is not involved. Israel includes the Golan Heights to the east of the Kinneret all the way to Mt. Hermon in the very NE corner. The eastern border goes south through the valley and passes just west of Quenetra, Syria. Here’s a map: https://www.worldofmaps.net/en/middle-east/map-israel/map-golan-heights-israel.htm Israel annexed the Golan about 50 years ago, and Pres.Trump now has recognized this annexation, further legitimizing this border. Regardless, this land has been under Israeli control since 1967.
Thank you, Rabbi Dov Fischer. Your advice of having tough love with all
those who stand against Israel, the very memory of what it has accomplished,
is the way to g.
Every Jewish college student should read this !
“Hold back the tears, … for when Israel finally annexes the Jordan Valley and utterly cleans out the problem in Gaza.”
Best quote of the year, cannot wait for this to happen.
Hoping the government has the courage. They have the ability.