Guest Commentary: Israel Advocacy on Campus – It’s Easier Than You Think
January 2, 2013 13:52 by GuestPostAidan Fishman is a student of International Relations and Near and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Toronto and the winner of HonestReporting’s inaugural Blankfeld Award for Quality Journalism.
For far too many people, any mention of the words “Israel” and “university campus” in close conjunction conjure up images of doom and gloom. University students are steadily growing hostile toward the Jewish State, and the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) Movement is gaining credibility on campuses across the United States and Canada – or so we are led to believe.
In fact, the situation is not nearly so dire. There are many indications that the university anti-Israel movement is actually losing steam, due to both its inherent contradictions and the hard work of passionate Zionists on campus. Better yet, whether you’re a student, a parent or even a potential donor, standing up for Israel and for basic principles of equality and civility on campus is easier than you would expect.
In this piece, relying on both personal anecdotes and more formal North American studies, I’ll review three basic trends in the battle for Israel on our campuses.
1. The University is not Universal
Paradoxically, the first key thing to remember about defending Israel on campus is that it’s not as significant as you might expect. Universities have long ceased to be useful barometers of what average citizens, even well-educated average citizens, believe, think or vote. Most students come to university to explore their intellectual passions or simply acquire the degree(s) necessary for their dream job, not to become politically active or fight for social justice.
Since the 1960′s at least, North American campuses have been reliable strongholds of the far-left. A quick glance at any electoral map makes this obvious; college towns in the U.S. often deliver the Democratic votes necessary to swing a municipality, a congressional district, or even a state, while Canadian ridings with heavy student populations plump reliably for the NDP.
For whatever reason, the “Palestinian cause” has been the pet issue of the global far-left for decades now, giving anti-Israel activists a distinctive edge on campus as compared to the rest of the electorate. However, there’s nothing “progressive” about the anti-Semitism of Hamas or Hezbollah, or the suicide bombings that necessitated Israel’s security barrier. But the lack of a level playing field that favors anti-Israel forces is simply a fact of life that pro-Israel activists must accept.
This left-leaning bias has two key implications. Firstly, most student governments lean far to the left, even more so than the average student population. This renders them hostile to pro-Israel forces, who are generally wise to assume that their own elected representatives are working against them.
However, there is a more positive corollary to this unfortunate state of affairs. Since student governments are institutionally left-wing, and often feature extremely low turnout rates and even rigged elections, anti-Israel declarations on their behalf are essentially meaningless. For example, the University of Toronto’s Graduate Students Union recently passed a motion demanding that the administration divest from firms that support “Israeli war crimes”. The motion allegedly passed with “97% percent of students in favour” – greatly aided by the fact that the union never notified its members of the divisive resolution, meaning that no pro-Israel students even bothered to attend the union’s typically banal Annual General Meeting!
Clearly, this “great victory” for BDS does not truly reflect the views of U of T graduate students, let alone the student body as a whole. Only a few pro-Israel and anti-Israel partisans are aware that it occurred; evidently, the BDS ideological clique isn’t doing much to reach out to unaffiliated students.
The second critical implication of universities’ leftist tilt is the centrality of tailoring our pro-Israel message for this student audience. Most university students don’t give a fig that Jerusalem is the religious capital of the Jewish people, mentioned hundreds of times in the Bible – in fact, many would dismiss Israel altogether merely because one of its advocates made a religious argument. It is typically far more productive to highlight its role in advancing cellphone technology, its pioneering techniques of water conservation, and its relatively robust record on gay rights, women’s equality and ethno-religious minorities that puts its rivals to shame. Campus advocates need to reach students on their level, appealing to factors present in their everyday lives or favorable to them politically.
2. Every Campus is Different
Of course, there is an important caveat to all this talk of an inherently hostile university atmosphere – every campus is unique, and each demands a slightly different approach to Israel advocacy.
Take the late Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia, for example. There, it’s fair to assume that the vast majority of students are already friends of the Jewish State; thus, local friends of Israel would spend their time galvanizing the pro-Israel community and encouraging them to donate to Zionist organizations and remember Israel at the ballot box, utilizing the same biblical arguments that are anathema to students at most Western universities.
Finer nuances between relatively similar campuses also effect our responses to anti-Israel activity. A few years ago, local anti-Israel activists erected an ersatz Israeli checkpoint outside a major student center of Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. They then demanded students provide them with their student ID’s before entering the building seeking to emulate the “humiliation” inflicted upon West Bank Palestinians. Seeing that this tactic was effective, pro-Israel students at Queen’s hit back in ingenious fashion, popping balloons and throwing confetti at “the checkpoint” to simulate a Palestinian terrorist attack, demonstrating the sad necessity of Israeli security measures.
By contrast, when the local chapter of anti-Israel fanatics unveiled the same strategy outside Robarts Library at the University of Toronto, angry students simply pushed right past them, unwilling to waste their time on such chicanery.
Unfortunately, these variations between campuses tend to reduce the efficacy of continent-wide initiatives sponsored by groups like Hillel and B’nai B’rith. A great example of this phenomenon is the “Size Doesn’t Matter” campaign, which tries to ameliorate Israel’s image on campus by highlighting the hip and “sexy” side of the Jewish State. While it has proved to be a roaring success at more party-oriented Canadian universities such as Western University and the University of British Columbia, it has been less successful at academic hot spots like the University of Toronto. In Canada’s largest city, students are more likely to back Israel after hearing a well-reasoned refutation of bogus anti-Israel claims than upon receiving a free t-shirt or condom.
This article is continued on Page 2
Asher Garber
2:19 pm
Jan 02, 2013
To suggest Israel is not a Left Wing cause ignores how and why Israel was created. What can be said is that Israel haters have tried to manipulate Left Wing thinking and debate. There are some parallels in this regard, but in reality, when people discuss the Left Wing supporting the Palestinian Cause, we’re talking a bunch of Middle East neophytes combined with an actual Jew-hating public combining forces and, say, voting for thousands of UN resolutions that have nothing to do with reality.
Israel is a multi-ethnic country that that is economically part Socialist, and environmentally, the only country with more trees now than 60 years ago. 3 examples right there.
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
24 
4
Mark
11:29 pm
Jan 02, 2013
Asher, your preposterous claim that poor little innocent lefties are being ‘manipulated’ into hating Jews and Israel is pure bunk. Old and new leftists have been singing hymns to the damnation of Israel since before the ’67 war, nearly fifty unbroken years of leftist ‘anti-Zionism’…so mentioning support from the left for the founding of Israel as some kind of evidence is misdirection at best, willful deception at worst. Was the majority at the 2012 DNC convention, booing inclusion of a platform plank weakly supporting Israel, a “bunch of Middle East neophytes” infiltrated by a few Jew haters? Israel-hating, and Jew-hating, IS mainstream leftism, in the US and all over the world.
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
14 
1
Guest Commentary: Israel Advocacy on Campus – It’s Easier Than You Think | The Conservative Papers
5:31 am
Jan 03, 2013
[...] January 2, 2013 13:52 by GuestPost [...]
Agree or Disagree:
0 
0
Study: Iranian Meddling Hijacked Bahraini Uprising | Blogs about Israel aggregation
9:58 am
Jan 03, 2013
[...] 4. Israel Advocacy on Campus: It’s Easier Than You Think [...]
Agree or Disagree:
0 
0
Fred Leitner
6:46 pm
Jan 03, 2013
A well-written and cautiously reassuring article. We can’t be complacent – we have to speak up and stand up for what is right. I would like to know how to go about finding about these grass roots campus organizations so we can support them.
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
8 
0
M Boxenbaum
8:38 pm
Jan 03, 2013
Anti Israel info war has escalated 4 years Lng before 911 I knew of Left Jewish Berkeley Prof scared to death after a propalestinian demonstration No moral support fm fellow nonJewish profs I knew the tide had turned I emailed Knesset to alert them The info war was being lost Warned them putting their faith in a US President or Congress was big mistake Go to the people Constantly use a massive PR campaign
Use attractive women sorry to you feminists Use eloquent speakers like Netanyahu
Now w/ massive support of misinformed Jewish Liberals we have an Anti Israel President
Unless we ovetake this left effort Israel is in deep trouble
Must use their own Alinsky type warfare against them.shalom
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
10 
1
Michael T
9:35 pm
Jan 03, 2013
The US President is certainly no friend to Israel.
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
10 
1
M Boxenbaum
10:46 pm
Jan 03, 2013
No. He is no friend to Israel. As he graciously entertained members of the Muslim Brotherihood in the Castle…errr..Whitehouse who received a gift of $1.5 Billion of our tax dollars..no wait..is that fiat capital from the Fed or debt your grandchildren will pay to China..no matter..8 Israelis died in a terror attack in Eilat..by the very same friends of Obama…
G-d help those Jews that are still too blind to see what they have helped put in our Whitehouse..
Obama is NO FRIEND of Israel..
Wake UP!
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
8 
1
John Jaffe
6:31 am
Jan 04, 2013
Of course you’re exactly right about Obama. How stupid can some Jews be in their blind allegiance to some vague liberal mindset that it blinds them to the beyond obvious conclusion regarding Obama’s negative bias toward Israel.
Who do they think approved that plank in the Democratic convention platform removing support for Jerusalem as Israel’s capital? Who do they think appointed notoriously Israel Administration representatives like Susan Rice, Chuck Engel, Brezhinski, Suzanne Power, etc., etc.?
If you need any more proof of this Administration’s animus toward Israel, just check out the YouTube video of Susan Rice’s vile anti-Israel rant @ the UN Security Council!
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
7 
0
Ron
1:16 am
Jan 04, 2013
Despite the protestations of some, the left’s very roots are virtually identical with terrorist regimes that included the former Soviet Union and the nazi machine. There wasn’t a deutschemark’s worth of ideological difference between them. Nor are there between those and the pro-Palestinian, anti-Zionist gang of college thugs. It’s fact that the leftists have done a better job in the modern era of communications, and have wrapped their arms around a willing media infrastructure that has turned its back on journalistic ethics. Hence, a continual assault by campus Islamists against Jewish and pro-Israel students on campuses across North America.
A very well-done article by this young man.
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
6 
0
Alfred Neuman
6:21 am
Jan 04, 2013
Thanks to Aiden Fishman for his well-researched and reasoned piece. There’s no question the the Left has decided that the Palestinians and Islamists are the “victims” in the Mideast conflict and will stop at nothing to promulgate their hateful lies and antiIsrael propaganda.
While i generally agree with Aiden that education is the best tool to combat this very serious demonization of Israel (with usually a thinly disguised antiSemitism included), i also think that pro-Israel and pro-Western values people need to be more aggressive in showing how truly destructive the world’s jihadists and radical Islamists are.
This could include exhibits of Islamic murderous terrorism with photos for exa
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
6 
0
Alfred Neuman
6:24 am
Jan 04, 2013
…for example, i.e. a counter-protest labelled “Islamofascist Murder Week”. I really don’t think anything less than dramatically demonstrating exactly what Israel (and the rest of the world!) is up against is up against currently will catch the necessary attention.
These counter-demonstrations could also include loud picketing of BDS events with signs like “stop the lying”, “no more Islamofascist murder”, “say no to antiSemitism”, etc. Jews don’t have a great track record when it comes to being passive in the face of persecution.
Well-loved. Agree or Disagree:
6 
0
Mark
8:25 am
Jan 04, 2013
Alfred, the actions you propose have long been needed. But I believe that education must be the initial priority, as absent a proper analytical framework, I fear the actions would be futile, even counter-productive. The knee-jerk response from those who hold the big megaphones – media, academics, pundits, NGOs, foundations – will be the same braying accusations of islamophobia and racism used to shut down debate and stifle free thought. Speaking the facts about Islamism and defending Israel elicits the drooling Pavlovian response of ‘hate’ speech. That conditioning, which has poisoned the minds of millions, must be broken before people can listen to, and actually hear, the truth.
Agree or Disagree:
1 
0
Miriyam
10:26 pm
Feb 12, 2013
Alfred, I speak from the campus where Rachel Corrie’s teachers set her up to be a suicide martyr. I am a very liberal, even left, person. But the echo-chamber left has gone off the deep end in the past 30 years, betraying its constituents. Many of us are not following it there but looking for reason and adult discourse.
Mr. Fishman is exactly correct: although BDS and other anti-Semitic movements get magnified by the anti-Israel newsmedia they exploit so well, the hearts and minds of rank and file people are won with reason, decency, and occupying higher ground. That debars orchestrated outbreaks of reaction formation disorder. Stay calm. Trust diversity. In any room, be the adult.
Agree or Disagree:
0 
0
Anton Alexander
10:42 pm
Jan 04, 2013
A problem for many is that 100 years ago, Palestine was either thinly populated or uninhabitable in many areas. Why? See http://www.eradication-of-malaria.com
Agree or Disagree:
1 
0
Weekly Meanderings
8:12 am
Jan 05, 2013
[...] may soon rival print subscriptions if the trend continues.”Twelve (almost) historic speeches.Defending the State of Israel on campuses: “For far too many people, any mention of the words “Israel” and “university campus” [...]
Agree or Disagree:
1 
0
Jim
7:13 am
Jan 06, 2013
This world is divided – thank God for ‘the tower of Babble’ incident (Genesis 11:1-9)!
If the whole world supported Israel, I’d be concerned that Israel might become arrogant, and become lax. Likewise if the Palestinians were mostly accepted by the international community; the Palestinians might enact what it perceives as vengeance towards Jewish settlers/businessmen, in such a way that brings later regret (upon later reflection or judgement).
Call me crazy but I think it is good to have separation. About the comment of ‘the tower of Babble,’ I must say it doesn’t relate perfectly; but what I am trying to say is it prevents massive conglomerates, which could end up as a greater evil.
Agree or Disagree:
0 
1
Mark
7:31 am
Jan 06, 2013
“Likewise if the Palestinians were mostly accepted by the international community….” IF???? The UN, EU, OIC, Non-Aligned [sic] Movement, ad nauseum are firmly in the Palies’ pockets…so who’s left? A mere handful of nations, sometimes, not always, in Israel’s corner. So you were saying?
Agree or Disagree:
0 
0