The many faces of Jewish courage

A new movie, “Blind Spot,” focuses on antisemitism on American campuses and how Jewish students demonstrate courage in the face of virulent hatred.

Douglas Altabef | November 27, 2024

A pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel encampment at Rutgers University in New Jersey in April 2024. Photo by Faygie Holt.

It is a world-class understatement to say that these are challenging times for the Jewish people, particularly for Jewish youth. Hundreds of thousands of young and not-so-young people in Israel have had to take up arms for more than a year against murderous enemies.

Their American counterparts, particularly those on university campuses, while not having to tote weapons, are, in their way, also fighting a war against another implacable foe.

“Blind Spot,” a newly released independently produced film, focuses on the virulence of the antisemitism aimed at American Jewish students and their efforts to maintain their safety, dignity and identity while defending Israel and themselves.

The film focuses on a variety of public and private, large and small schools across the country. The campuses are beautiful spaces, but the environments are, to varying degrees, toxic.

The unifying element on all these campuses is hatred: hatred above all for Israel and, by extension, anyone who identifies with the Jewish state. Of course, asking a Jew to toss his or her affinity for Israel on the raging bonfire of vilification or else is a form of the purest antisemitism since only Jews are not allowed the integrity of their beliefs and associations.

Just as Israeli soldiers are drafted and not asked but required to serve in a war begun by Israel’s enemies, so, too, America’s Jewish students have been thrust into a crisis not of their choosing.

These students had prepared for a course of study, not conflict. Many of them had likely not previously focused on their Judaism, wearing it lightly as part of their identity or seeing it as a personal and spiritual part of themselves. What the movie makes clear is that American Jewish students and faculty cannot hide—not only from hateful Hamas sympathizers but from themselves.

In other words, the hatred expressed towards Jews is forcing a reckoning on these young people. Who are you really? How important is your Jewishness to you, and what are you going to do about it?

“Blind Spot” shows several students who answer these questions and their responses to hate. Some seek to engage the haters, and some seek to protect themselves and their fellow Jews.

Some turn to on-campus Jewish groups, such as Hillel and Chabad on Campus, and some fashion their own responses. Some found their own voices, creating messaging and seeking on a grassroots level to rally their fellow Jewish students.

The film is not focused on the future of academia but on the here-and-now reality facing Jewish students. Indirectly, however, the pervasive hatred on many campuses must inevitably raise the issue of the viability of having Jews continuing as students in universities where they have every reason to expect that they will be facing implacable hostility.

This is likely the takeaway for anyone watching the scenes on campuses. Why stay at these places? What are the alternatives out there? How can Jews facing rejection, isolation and hostility create an alternative structure that bypasses (and, ultimately, eclipses) the status quo?

And as we shake our heads in disbelief, inevitably, the very viability and worthiness of academia must be questioned.

But that is not the focus of the film. “Blind Spot” is a fire alarm ringing and a profile of many of the firefighters trying to deal with the flames. While the film features wisdom and context from a variety of Jewish commentators, pundits and observers who put the hostility into a broader context, the emotional power is found in the stories of the students thrust into the conflict. It is inspiring to watch some of these individual profiles in courage as regular people provide extraordinary and, yes, heroic responses to adversity.

The problem of antisemitism is not going away. However, the wherewithal of how to deal with it, counter it and suppress can be found in some of the experiences of these young people who are getting a true education in dealing with hostility and hatred.

Douglas Altabef is chairman of the board of Im Tirtzu and a director of the Israel Independence Fund. He can be reached at: dougaltabef@gmail.com.