university campuses

Universities have obligations

My mom left Brooklyn, NY, to attend Cornell University in the early 1960s at age 16. Among other things, women students had nighttime curfews. This type of legal responsibility or intervention, called in loco parentis (in place of a parent), was common, but, by the time my mother graduated, in the mid-1960s, times had changed. Curfews became a thing of the past.

When I got to Cornell in the 1990s, some things were the same. Cornell impressed upon its new students that “actions have consequences” and that “with rights and privileges come responsibilities.” That is, you were privileged to be there. If you did something stupid, you were held responsible. All this hit me while watching North American college campuses’ turmoil since the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre of Israelis.

I have a front row seat to the drama. My husband is a professor in Manitoba. Between the two of us, we have six degrees from five different universities. We’ve got insider knowledge. I watched some of the behaviour on campuses with horror during the first days after the attack, including seeing Dr. Russell Rickford, a Cornell professor, speak of his “exhilaration” in response to Hamas’s actions. I’m not listing all of the concerning antisemitic events that continue to occur at North American universities. We’re all seeing it on social media and the news.

The first good news I read was from an article written by Rob Eshman in the Forward, which covered Dartmouth University’s response. Dartmouth is a small school. Its academic experts on the Middle East collaborated quickly. On Oct. 9, they announced two public teach-ins, with expectations of a small crowd. Hundreds attended, and there were thousands of YouTube views. What’s the primary responsibility of a university? To educate and encourage students to be critical thinkers. Dartmouth rose to the challenge.

There are other universities following this educational approach, with mixed results. Some universities don’t have the academic firepower or the will to provide an appropriately diverse panel of experts. Some attempts have been derailed by harassment or protest. Other institutions have made poor educational efforts by platforming only one side (usually the pro-Hamas/genocide/apartheid side) of the conversation.

Most professors are evaluated for their performance and tenure on several measures: teaching, research and service. To do these aspects of their job, many feel that free speech is essential and that, while the university employs them, the administration may not hamper their speech as it pertains to teaching or research. Since early October, many professors have felt stifled when expressing their political views, particularly when it comes to anti-Israel political rhetoric about the war.

I recently read a Canadian university faculty union’s stance. The document stated all members had a right to academic freedom and free expression and the union would defend that. However, that right comes with “the responsibility to respect the rights and freedoms of others” and “does not confer legal immunity from hate speech and other violations of the law.” It also doesn’t protect a professor from criticism or condemnation from others.

This document reminds academic professionals what I was taught as an undergraduate: actions have consequences, and they must take responsibility for any consequences that may occur.

Many Jewish students are being physically harassed, verbally assaulted and intimidated on college campuses. Some universities are trying to take action. Cornell had a situation where a student made death threats towards Jewish students at the kosher dining hall. The FBI was quickly involved, the student was arrested. Soon after, the president of the university and the New York State governor sat down to eat in that dining hall with students. Rickford, the professor who spoke out about the Hamas attack as an exhilarating sign of liberation, is now on leave.

Other US universities have responded with less force. Some, like George Washington University, suspended student groups who used pro-Hamas rhetoric. Others, for example, MIT, have suspended students who participate in violent or disruptive protest from all non-academic activities. There are efforts to offer antisemitism education and awareness at some universities. Hillel, the Jewish student organization on many American and Canadian campuses, offers support and advocacy for struggling Jewish students.

Universities now also face legal action when they fail to protect Jewish students. The US Department of Education is opening investigations of antisemitism (and Islamophobia) at US schools such as Cornell, Columbia, Cooper Union, University of Pennsylvania and Wellesley College. There’s a lawsuit being brought against McGill in Montreal, with support from B’nai Brith Canada, and the University of British Columbia, York University, Toronto Metropolitan University and Queen’s University have had class action lawsuits filed against them for alleged antisemitic incidents.

Where does this lead? Consider again the notion that actions have consequences. In some widely circulated video clips, university students or professors scream obscenities and tear down posters of kidnapped victims of the Hamas attack. Some cover their faces; others sneer at the camera. Sometimes, a student is seized by regret later and begs others not to post the images. These choices, caught on video and distributed online, may affect students’ careers forever – and I think that’s OK.

Yes, university students are often (but not always) still adolescents. Perhaps, according to the research, their brains are still developing and they have poor impulse control. But they are also adults in our society. These are people who legally drink, drive, vote and fight in wars. These students are old enough to work, marry and have kids. With all these rights and also the privilege of attending university, they have the responsibility to behave appropriately. Think you might be embarrassed to be caught vandalizing posters of missing persons? Don’t do it.

University leadership and professors have an important role to play “in loco parentis.” It appears many have forgotten this. Students attend universities to get an education, to become critical thinkers and to contribute to leading and shaping our future society. They deserve more than “free speech” from their teachers. They need to learn multiple perspectives, history and policy, and that includes understanding nuance.

While most universities no longer impose curfews or other restrictions, professors owe it to their students to be mentors and role models. Professors should be upstanding community members beyond academic research and teaching. They should behave with integrity. The obligation to do service means different things in various academic disciplines, but, in every case, professors shape the next generation’s professionals beyond giving exams and classroom lectures. Teaching students how they should behave, with compassion and respect for others, matters.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s OK to speak out. Academic freedom is important, but universities have an obligation, too. They should expect students to behave with dignity and respect for the law, even when speaking out. Alumni can pressure universities to do better, as can lawsuits.

There’s no “one size fits all” answer. However, we should expect that every student should have access to education without discrimination. All students – Jewish and non-Jewish – deserve nothing less.

Joanne Seiff has written regularly for CBC Manitoba and various Jewish publications. She is the author of three books, including From the Outside In: Jewish Post Columns 2015-2016, a collection of essays available for digital download or as a paperback from Amazon. Check her out on Instagram @yrnspinner or at joanneseiff.blogspot.com.

Tensions at university

On Nov. 1, about 200 Jewish students and their supporters engaged in a low-key demonstration, with many holding posters of kidnapped Israelis. (photo by Pat Johnson)

When the new president of the University of British Columbia arrived for his first day on the job Nov. 1, he already had a full plate, including a 9 a.m. meeting with Jewish representatives and an urgent letter from community organizations expressing concerns about the safety of Jewish students on campus.

Dr. Benoit-Antoine Bacon starts his tenure at a contentious time, as Jewish, pro-Israel, anti-Israel and other students engage, sometimes constructively but often much less so, with events taking place in the Middle East.

Rob Philipp, executive director of Hillel BC, was joined by his assistant executive director, Ohad Gavrieli, and Nico Slobinsky, Pacific region vice-president for the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, at the meeting with Bacon. Afterward, Philipp told the Independent the university has been on the right track but needs guidance.

“Generally speaking, I would say UBC has been very supportive of us, to the best of their ability,” he said, noting that Bacon’s welcoming of Jewish representatives is a good sign. “I had one of the very first meetings with him, so that speaks to how important this is on their radar.”

The university administration has been “somewhat consistent,” said Philipp.

“We are seeing support,” he said. “We don’t always see the right action, so that’s where we have to help and guide them.”

The larger issues, he said, are the serious affronts to civility on campus during the weeks since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.

“There are so many red lines being crossed right now, it’s incredible,” said Philipp. “It seems OK now to kill civilians, to murder people for the ‘just’ cause and it keeps spilling over. People aren’t always understanding the details behind it all, so it’s as difficult a time as I have ever seen in this community – and it’s not just UBC, it’s all the university campuses all over North America.”

Hours after the meeting with the university president, about 200 Jewish students and their supporters engaged in a low-key demonstration, walking from Hillel House to the student union building, with many marchers holding posters of kidnapped Israelis. A student entered the building to deliver a letter to the president of the student government, the Alma Mater Society, expressing the group’s collective concerns. An emailed response to the letter from the AMS president was characterized by Hillel officials as positive.

photo - Jewish students and their supporters at the University of British Columbia on Nov. 1 — Jewish students and their supporters at the University of British Columbia on Nov. 1. *(photo by Pat Johnson)*

A Jewish student leader from Simon Fraser University who asked that her name not be published said she came to the rally to protest the antisemitism in the world and, specifically, the lack of regard among student bodies to recognize what happened in Israel.

“It’s an extremely complex conflict that isn’t just black-and-white and I wish people would pay more attention or just seek a more nuanced view on the subject,” she said, adding that the climate at Simon Fraser does not seem as negative as at UBC, but that could change. In the last couple of years, the student government at SFU has demonstrated unbalanced, anti-Israel approaches, including adopting a motion on Israel and Palestine for which they consulted what the student called “tokenized [Jewish] fringe groups” while excluding Hillel and other mainstream Jewish voices.

Other participants at the rally said they felt the need to attend to be seen, and to register empathy with Israelis overseas and with Jewish students in Canada.

“We are here today so UBC acknowledges what’s going on in Israel – the kidnapped kids, elderly, children, women, Israelis – and what happened on Oct. 7,” said a 21-year-old Israeli-born woman who is not a student but came to support her brother, who is.

“I’m feeling very alone and feeling a lack of empathy and sympathy with what’s going on in Israel, feeling like people are too quick to comment sometimes,” she added.

Several non-Jewish students participated in the rally.

“I’m here because even though I’m not Jewish, I have a lot of Jewish friends and I believe the Hamas attacks against Israel are terrorism,” said fourth-year political science student Joe Latam. “The university’s attitude towards these literal terrorist organizations has been completely inadequate and they need to take better action.… The Jewish people have been systematically discriminated against for thousands of years and Israel is the one place where they can feel safe.”

Zara Nybo, who is also not Jewish, was motivated in part because her partner is Jewish and she sees the impact of events on him and his family.

“It’s important for me to stand up against terrorism and help spread the word that there are still innocent hostages who have been taken out of their home country,” she said. “We see a lot on the news that is politicized and very emotionally heartbreaking. I’m not here to say that Palestinian citizens have not died in this war, but I am here to say that death is death and we need to be able to recognize that heartbreak is heartbreak, so we are all here together.”

A first-year student who is Sikh called statements he has seen from peers and student leaders “frankly shameful.”

“I think there are many international students here that have been espousing hate, that have been espousing terrorist beliefs,” he said. “They have been saying they are pro-Hamas, they are saying [the Oct. 7 attacks were] a ‘beautiful act of resistance.’ I think we should double-check whether they deserve to be students at our wonderful university institutions.”

Bar Wolpert, an Israeli doing a one-semester landscape architecture exchange at UBC, said he was accosted by someone who tried to “shame” him as an Israeli.

“He just approached me out of the blue,” said Wolpert. “He was [aiming] his camera in front of my face.”

The person asked Wolpert if he supports “genocide.”

“I’m holding a [poster of a] kidnapped woman,” he said. “I am Israeli. I have a loss. So, please, first, respect my loss, respect my grief. And we are all standing here with many signs of kidnapped people and dead people, that is what is mattering for us right now, so before you are attacking me, respect my loss.”

Also at the rally were two brothers, Israeli high school students, whose parents sent them to stay with Canadian friends and family during the conflict.

A mother, walking with her young adult daughter, teared up when she realized that the poster she was carrying of a 21-year-old French-Israeli hostage could have been her own daughter.

“I can understand the pain,” said Evelyn Fichmann. “I think anybody can understand the pain.”

As he walked alongside scores of Jewish students and allies, a UBC student said the event gave him much-needed optimism.

“It really gave me some hope about unity,” he said.

A call for toughness

Rabbi Dr. Michael Berenbaum spoke at Congregation Schara Tzedeck on Nov. 5. He said: “We can’t raise a generation that is scared of being Jewish.” (photo from kolotmanagement.com)

The mood at Congregation Schara Tzedeck was solemn Sunday night, Nov. 5, when parents, grandparents and students from the Jewish community gathered to listen to Rabbi Dr. Michael Berenbaum, an American professor who is considered one of the world’s preeminent Holocaust scholars. Berenbaum came to discuss the importance of campus conversations, and specifically how to handle the critics of Israel who are voicing their support of Palestinians vociferously on college campuses throughout Canada and the United States.

Until the Oct. 7 terror attacks, Berenbaum said, our children had never known serious difficulty as Jews. “They’ve had the privilege of living in the greatest time to be Jewish, maybe in the history of the Jewish people,” he said. “Now, we’re asking our kids to toughen up, because they’re now going to face difficulty, pain, anguish and danger – physical or intellectual – for being Jews. This is our test of the hour, and it comes with the shattering of easily held assumptions about Jewish life.”

The Oct. 7 pogrom, he said, was worse than the 1906 Kishinev pogrom and worse than Kristallnacht in 1938 in terms of the number of Jews killed and the vehemence with which they were killed. “We believed Israel was founded to protect its people from these pogroms, and yet we were not safe.”

Berenbaum said it is crucial for Jewish students to be armed with accurate knowledge so they can counter the anti-Israel rhetoric they hear on campus. That means refuting claims that Israel is committing genocide. “Understand that this is war, and it has both direct and collateral consequences,” he said. “You cannot deal with war at this point without significant civilian casualties. While Israel is taking significant steps to avoid that, it’s unavoidable.” He noted that, since March 2011, the conflict in Syria has claimed the lives of 500,000 people – “and the rest of the world has heard nothing about this.”

On the claim that Israel is “occupying Gaza,” he clarified that Israel left Gaza in 2005, displacing 8,000 settlers so that Gazans would take control of their lives. “Israel is the only country in the world who has sacrificed land for normalization. We gave up Sinai for normalization with Egypt, and the reason the invasion happened now was because it appeared Saudi Arabia would establish a certain kind of peace with Israel,” he said. “Normalization represented a danger to the lateral forces in the region and that’s why this broke out now.”

On the claim that “Jews are colonizers,” he noted that Jews have never forsaken their connection to the land of Israel, and that there have been five cities with a permanent Jewish settlement in Israel. “When they came to Israel, they settled and worked the land, which is the opposite of colonization,” he said. “They didn’t take its resources and export it elsewhere.”

He noted that Palestinians were offered a state in 2000 and again in 2006, and they turned both opportunities down. “The Palestinians have never lost an opportunity to lose an opportunity, because their leadership is weak and corrupt,” he said.

There are a few things we can do now to ensure we are strong, he continued. One is to educate ourselves on the history of the state of Israel and Zionism. Another is to ensure we have solidarity by reaching out to one another.

“These are not easy times and we need Jewish toughness and resilience,” said Berenbaum. “We can’t raise a generation that is scared of being Jewish. I want our Jewish students to be proud, tough and confident enough to accept the animus that will come their way, but to have the human capacity to respond to it.”

He ended his talk by calling Jews the “canary in the coalmine. You want to know if a society is healthy? See how it treats its Jews. We’re living in a world that’s fundamentally unhealthy, but it’s important to remember that we have many friends, we are not alone. We have to cultivate and respect those friendships, and not take them for granted.”

The events of Oct. 7 precipitated an earthquake, he added, “and the ground won’t settle for awhile. But earthquakes give the opportunity to build in a different way. We are in for a tough and difficult time, which will demand the best of us. But I fundamentally believe we have it in us to rise to the occasion.”

Lauren Kramer, an award-winning writer and editor, lives in Richmond.

Complex issues up for debate – IHRA definition

I met my husband long ago at Cornell University Hillel events. One event celebrated what looked like the success of the Israel-Palestinian peace process. It was part of the Oslo Accords and, in October 1994, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Yasser Arafat, Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres. It was a sunny, warm day, but things have shifted often since then. These are thorny political issues, but one can hope.

I recently completed studying the talmudic tractate of Pesachim. When finishing a tractate, one says a prayer called Hadran. It ends with Kaddish, much like what’s said at any Jewish service. It ends with praying for peace. We have lots of prayers for peace.

Meanwhile, my husband, now a biology professor, asked me to look at a motion from his faculty union. It claimed a deep concern with academic freedom. The motion proposed rejecting the IHRA’s definition of antisemitism. (The IHRA stands for International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.) This motion theoretically responded to a student union motion that supported the IHRA’s definition. Many countries, including Canada, have adopted the IHRA’s working definition.

The politics behind this are tangled. Many on the political left suggest that to truly support truth and reconciliation and BIPOC (Black and Indigenous People of Colour), one must support all Indigenous movements worldwide. According to this argument, Palestinians must be supported as the sole true Indigenous people – against the colonial-settler narrative of Israel. There are issues with this position. One is that Britain is the colonial power whose actions helped lead to the creation of Israel. Also, Jews have been indigenous to, or lived in what is now, Israel for thousands of years.

There are practical consequences when universities debate these topics. North American Jews are a minority. This vote, which affects us, is one where we have no majority voting power. We rely on non-Jews to advocate for us and support anti-discrimination guidelines. We often must confront those who feel these definitions threaten them intellectually – while we’re feeling threatened in reality.

Jewish students on campus feel attacked. Jewish academics are forced to step up and speak out. In some cases, Jewish professors and students face discrimination as a result of this advocacy.

Just before Passover this year, at a special meeting, the faculty union put forth its agenda. The meeting agenda was to consider this motion that opposes the IHRA’s working definition of antisemitism. Those attending the meeting wouldn’t approve the agenda. (Note that approving the agenda is usually not a big deal.) Without an agenda, the motion couldn’t go forward. There was no vote.

Some attendees suggested that the entire union membership should vote. First though, they said, this motion should be considered by the cultural diversity and academic freedom committees. In the end? This meeting’s outcome just puts off the problem for the Jewish community.

Multiple professors in relevant fields spoke out against this motion, which opposed using a working definition of antisemitism. Behind the scenes, the local Jewish federation got involved. The motion was problematic – and it’s still out there. It could be voted on at another meeting, potentially one with even less notice or publicity.

It’s particularly troublesome that those voting on whether one can use the IHRA definition at this university in teaching or research aren’t all relevant experts. Most aren’t professors in religious studies, Jewish studies, Holocaust studies, Near Eastern studies. Most of the voting representatives won’t be Jewish. In their argument to maintain “academic freedom,” they’re proposing to limit the freedoms of colleagues. This limits others’ right to use whatever definitions they prefer when they speak about anti-Jewish discrimination.

There’s a bigger argument here. If Canadian universities want to show ally-ship with Indigenous communities and to be partners in truth and reconciliation, the way is clear. It starts much closer to home. Stand with Canada’s Indigenous peoples on the issues that matter to them. For instance, pressure the government to provide all Canadians with clean drinking water. Support Indigenous students at universities. Hire and appoint Indigenous peoples (First Nations, Inuit and Métis) to academic positions. The list is long. To start, read the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s 94 calls to action.

None of these feuds are new. My husband and several other Jewish professor friends spent a lot of time on how to address this motion. This is “their” problem because they’re Jewish, but not because this is in their fields of research.

This gut-wrenching position is familiar. Does supporting academic freedom mean that antisemitism is up for discussion? It shouldn’t mean this, but antisemitic incidents are on the rise. Freedom of speech shouldn’t mean danger to minority students and professors.

Complexity isn’t resolved easily. Delving into these issues without lots of prior knowledge reflects badly on this faculty union and, by extension, the university. Smart people know there aren’t easy answers to entrenched political problems. Motions such as this one show a lack of rigour.

Canadian university professors should be sophisticated enough to know that complex issues aren’t resolved by simply opposing a working definition. It’s useless virtue signaling. Just as it shouldn’t be up to Black people or Indigenous people to fight every battle without allies, we, as Jewish people, shouldn’t have to keep fighting these battles alone over how to define antisemitism.

My husband and I met with a hope for peace. We care about human rights, but this union issue just seems to be wasting time during a pandemic. Opposing this working definition that protects a minority population, because it could possibly affect free speech? This really isn’t what a biology professor wants to be doing at work – even if he’s Jewish.

If Canadians care about peace, truth and reconciliation, and about the well-being of all people, we shouldn’t be attacking one group to elevate others. We shouldn’t have to keep fighting over definitions about discrimination against minorities.

Perhaps, we can leave the global political issues and their definitions up to the relevant experts. For us, it might be simple: we should show up to care for one another with respect instead. Advocate for better conditions close to home: safety without discrimination, fresh food, clean water, housing security, and economic and social supports. Even at their preschool, my children learned about key Jewish concepts like “Shalom Ba-bayit.” In other words, peace and tolerance start at home.

IHRA definition stifles speech

On June 25, 2019, the Liberal government of Justin Trudeau adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, as part of Canada’s anti-racism strategy. Widely proposed around the world, the definition has evoked fierce debate.

In Canada, the NDP will consider a resolution against the definition at its national convention this month, one penned by B.C. former MPs Libby Davies and Svend Robinson. Meanwhile, a coalition of 100 Canadian Jewish organizations has objected to the NDP resolution.

Wherein lies the controversy with the IHRA definition?

The definition, though vague, is not, in itself, controversial: “Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.” IHRA has promoted it as a “non-legally binding working definition.”

As is so often the case, the devil is in the details, and the details here are found in the 11 examples of what the definition considers actionable antisemitism: seven of them concern the state of Israel.

Those who defend the definition argue that Israel is treated unfairly in the media and in international political discourse and see antisemitism as the root of this discriminatory treatment. Yet Israel is a country whose founding wars and subsequent military occupation of the West Bank and Gaza have meant displacement of millions of Palestinians followed by the occupation and policing of that same population. The circumstances of the displacement and occupation are such that even the most generous interpretation of Israeli actions should recognize that an ongoing critical scrutiny of the Israeli state is a moral duty. Voices within and without Israel – and especially the voices of Palestinians and their allies – must be free to speak their experience and, yes, their accusations.

This is exactly the freedom that the IHRA definition would curtail. The burden should not be on those who criticize the Israeli state to prove that their statements are not antisemitic. Rather, the Israeli state, like any other, should bear the burden of demonstrating that criticisms of it are discriminatory, made in bad faith and nonfactual.

The definition’s history

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance was initiated in 1998. In 2016, it adopted a definition drafted by Kenneth Stern, director of the Bard Centre for the Study of Hate, to aid in the collection and sorting of possible instances of antisemitism. Stern has acknowledged that the definition has been misappropriated and is being “weaponized” against critics of Israel and has warned against the definition “being employed in an attempt to restrict academic freedom and punish political speech.”

In Canada, the adoption of the definition has been opposed by the B.C. Civil Liberties Association and the Ontario Civil Liberties Association. More than 450 Canadian academics have signed on to an open letter opposing its adoption by governing bodies. In 2021, the New Israel Fund Canada, which had previously urged Ontario to adopt the definition, reversed its position, citing concerns over free speech and academic freedom.

There have already been unjust consequences. Lives, livelihoods and reputations have been damaged, particularly in universities where academics have been harassed, censured and dismissed for teaching about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or scheduling speakers on that topic – instances where the definition is acknowledged to be in play. The definition also has created what some argue is a limiting of speech critical of the Israeli state on social media platforms like Zoom or Facebook.

In one example, law professor Faisal Bhabha was accused of antisemitism by B’nai Brith Canada for his remarks in a debate that was sponsored by the Centre for Free Expression at Ryerson University. A petition was launched using the IHRA definition, calling for Bhabha to no longer teach human rights classes. The professor’s allegedly antisemitic act was to argue that Zionism as practised today in Israel amounts to “Jewish supremacy,” an opinion shared not only by many human rights organizations and Palestinian activists, but also by many Jews. Yet for those wielders of the definition the question cannot even be debated.

Similar incidents have been reported in the United States. To get a sense of the extreme rhetoric involved, consider that, in 2020, the U.S. State Department announced its intentions to declare the advocacy groups Oxfam, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch antisemitic and to withdraw U.S. support for these groups. If only advocacy groups in Canada and the United States could find a way to declare criticism of the genocidal actions of the Burmese state to be merely anti-Asian prejudice, what a coup for Myanmar’s military junta that would be.

Not only is the speech of Jews not immune to these accusations, but even Jewish Holocaust survivors are not immune. When survivor Marika Sherwood attempted to give a talk at Manchester University called You’re Doing to the Palestinians What the Nazis Did to Me, Mark Regev, Israeli ambassador to the United Kingdom, intervened. The embassy claimed the title breached the definition and accused the Holocaust survivor of hate speech towards Jews.

Incredibly, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre listed the European Union’s insistence that products made in Israeli settlements must be so labeled as the third most serious antisemitic incident in 2015.

These examples, which are only a sample of many more, should be enough to convince anyone that there are few limits to the measures that Israel’s absolute defenders will take to use the IHRA definition to silence criticism of the Israeli state.

Opinions in Canada

Can the centuries-old hatred of Jews be redefined as criticism of the state of Israel or is this an unacceptable slippage of meaning? A recent (2020) poll indicated that a strong majority of Canadians believe that criticism of Israel is not antisemitic. Considering the importance of holding the state of Israel up to criticism, it must be demonstrated that said criticism is rooted in antisemitism, not assumed.

One of the examples in the IHRA definition states that referring to Israel as a “racist endeavour” is antisemitic, because it denies the Jewish people their right to self-determination. But surely there are methods of national self-determination that can be judged to be racist.

The definition claims that holding Israel to a higher moral standard than other countries is antisemitic. Considering the fact that every government on the planet receives vitriolic criticism, together with the previous claim that calling Israel a “racist endeavour” is antisemitic, one gets the sense that what is sought for Israel is a higher level of exemption from criticism than any other nation receives. We are perfectly free to call Canada a “racist endeavour,” after all. This happens frequently, often by the main victims of Canada’s very real history of racism, Indigenous peoples. Would we want to criminalize such speech in Canada as somehow a form of racism against Anglo-Saxons, or the French? Obviously not, yet our prime minister is willing to penalize the speech of Palestinians calling out Israel’s structural racism.

Most Jews live outside of Israel. Some are not Zionists or do not identify with the Israeli state as part of their Jewish identity. Yet, since Israel was founded as a reclamation of the ancient Jewish homeland and seeks to identify itself as “the Jewish state,” obviously those who hate Jews may hate the Israeli state and attempt to attack it. Yet states are prone, by their very nature, to all kinds of ethical challenges and must be held open to free and vociferous criticism. Again, the burden should be on the Israeli state to demonstrate that criticism of its actions is unfair and rooted in antisemitism. The claim that criticism of Israel is antisemitic should not be the first assumption but rather the last, after the criticisms – or, in the case of the recent investigation of Israel launched by the International Criminal Court, the legal allegations – have been fairly assessed.

Matthew Gindin is an independent journalist, writer and teacher of Jewish studies. You can follow his writing at matthewgindin.substack.com. Marty Roth is a retired professor of American literature and film studies, a freelance writer and member of Independent Jewish Voices.

IHRA definition a vital tool

Synagogues damaged. Community centres defaced. Children bullied. Threats of violence online. Hate targeting Jewish Canadians is growing. When it comes to hate crime, the Jewish community is the most frequently targeted group. According to Statistics Canada, an anti-Jewish hate crime occurs, on average, once every 24 hours.

We in British Columbia are not immune. The Vancouver Police Department reports that, in 2018, there were 141 hate crimes, of which Jews were the most targeted.

This rising threat is either unseen or misunderstood by most Canadians, which is why the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism is so important. It can empower our political leaders, judges, educators, and others to recognize and address rising antisemitism. After all, if you cannot identify the problem, you will not solve it.

Grounded in decades of research by experts in Holocaust remembrance, antisemitism and Holocaust denial, IHRA, an international group comprising 34 member countries, including Canada, adopted – by consensus – a working definition of antisemitism.

The definition includes 11 illustrative examples that help Canadians understand the evolving nature of antisemitism. In all, the IHRA definition is a vital, non-legally binding instrument to combat antisemitism, one that provides flexibility, consistency and understanding of its many manifestations.

Since its publication in 2016, the IHRA definition has become the most widely supported definition of antisemitism for organizations and governments at home and abroad. It is an important instrument in the coordinated, consistent response to a grave international threat.

In Canada, support for the IHRA definition is widespread – backed by almost every Canadian Jewish organization, including the Canadian Rabbinic Caucus and rabbis and lay leaders of the Canadian Reform movement. The definition is a foundational part of the federal government’s national anti-racism strategy and is supported by the Canadian Human Rights Commission, the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, the Province of Ontario, and many municipalities.

Internationally, the definition has received extensive backing. From the European Union, to the United Nations Secretary General, to the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief, to governments throughout the world, the IHRA definition of antisemitism is supported by leaders of every political stripe.

Notwithstanding the IHRA definition’s widespread recognition, there is a small but vocal cadre of detractors, unrepresentative of the Canadian Jewish community, who reject the IHRA definition, claiming it is a conspiracy to stifle criticism of the state of Israel. This contention is false.

The IHRA definition states explicitly that, “criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic.”

Here, the IHRA definition distinguishes between political expression on Israeli policies and hate targeting Israel as a Jewish collectivity. The IHRA definition describes manifestations of antisemitism, such as denying Jewish self-determination and characterizing Israel or Israelis with classic antisemitic images or symbols.

For nearly all Jewish Canadians, a connection with Israel is central to their Jewish identity. For 86% of Jewish Canadians, caring about Israel is an essential or important part of being Jewish, according to the 2018 Study of Jews in Canada. This link cannot be ignored or denied, nor can the link between anti-Zionism and antisemitism. Those denying the Jewish right to self-determination are, in essence, rejecting the heart of Jewish identity: peoplehood – a right to control our own destiny.

This tiny group of detractors also criticizes the IHRA definition as too vague. The IHRA definition is not a checklist. Context is critical. The real world is rarely black and white. When read together with the 11 examples, the IHRA definition provides a nuanced understanding that allows the specifics of a situation to be duly considered.

This unrepresentative faction goes on to assert that “real” antisemitism is rooted exclusively in white supremacy. This one-sided, dangerously narrow view erases Jewish experience, history and identity. While antisemitism is undoubtedly a prominent feature of white supremacy, antisemitism is not confined to any single position on the political spectrum. There is as much antisemitism on the extreme left as on the extreme right.

Antisemitism is not limited to a place, a time, or a specific political ideology. That is precisely one of the reasons that the IHRA definition is important. It is a tool to identify antisemitism wherever it may root, breaking through the subterfuge and identifying antisemitism in a thoughtful and context-specific manner, so that we can stand together as a society against antisemitism, building a better tomorrow.

Visit cija.ca/ihra to learn more about the IHRA definition of antisemitism and how you can get involved.

Geoffrey Druker chairs the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) Pacific Region Local Partnership Council. CIJA is the advocacy agent of the Jewish Federations of Canada, including the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver. CIJA is a national, non-partisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting Jewish life in Canada through advocacy. It represents hundreds of thousands of Jewish Canadians affiliated with Jewish federations across Canada.

A testament to free speech

A new book on an incendiary topic turns out to be not quite as expected. The Conflict over the Conflict: The Israel/Palestine Campus Debate, by Kenneth S. Stern, may be the most comprehensive assessment of the (at least) 20-year battle on North American campuses between pro-Israel and anti-Israel forces.

Jewish and pro-Israel readers picking up the work might anticipate a litany of horrors, anti-Zionist if not antisemitic incidents, brawls, screaming matches, vandalism, boycotts and the like. There is that. But Stern argues that the perception that campuses are aflame in anti-Zionist rage is simply not true. More, he offers proof that the pro-Israel side is far from innocent of engaging in disgraceful tactics, too. There is ill will and there are bad actors on both sides. Most unexpectedly, as much as the book is about the conflict, it is more than anything an exercise in applied ethics on the topic of free expression.

Stern is the director of the Bard Centre for the Study of Hate, an attorney and an author. For 25 years, he was the American Jewish Committee’s expert on antisemitism and he was a lead drafter of the Working Definition of Antisemitism. He is also, it appears, something close to a free speech purist. As such, he rails against efforts by Israel advocates who have organized campaigns to censure (and censor) anti-Israel voices. He doesn’t let the other side off easily, either, calling out acts of harassment like drowning out pro-Israel speakers with the “heckler’s veto.”

The book, from New Jewish Press, an imprint of University of Toronto Press, begins with an empirical assessment. In institutions of higher learning in the United States, Israel is an issue in very few, he writes.

When speaking with Jewish audiences, Stern asks for a show of hands to gauge perceptions on anti-Israel attitudes. He asks for guesses on how many American colleges have divested from Israel.

“Many seem surprised when I say ‘zero,’” he writes. “There are relatively few campuses where Israel is a burning issue, and every year the number of pro-Israel programs … is usually at least double the anti-Israel ones. There are over 4,000 campuses in the U.S. – in the 2017-18 academic year, 149 had anti-Israel activity.… So the campuses aren’t burning.”

He does not dismiss the extreme tensions on a few campuses, however.

“[O]n some campuses where anti-Israel activity is prominent, pro-Israel Jewish students may feel marginalized, dismissed or vilified, sometimes with antisemitic tropes.” Identity politics and the conflation of Jewish people with “whiteness” creates racial conflict. “[T]he labeling of Jews as white becomes a problem when shared victimhood becomes a sacred symbol, a badge of honour, a precondition to enter a club of the oppressed. Antisemitic discrimination is rendered invisible.”

Though bigotry may play a role in the discussion, Stern does not see constructive resolutions in neologisms like trigger warnings, safe spaces and microaggressions.

“Faculty should have the right to give trigger warnings if they want, but I never do, and I think the idea is a horrid one,” he writes. “I teach Mein Kampf. It’s disturbing – get over it. College should prepare one to be an adult, and there are no trigger warnings after graduation day. Why are we encouraging students to be ostriches? Shouldn’t they, rather, be learning how to navigate things that will likely unsettle them over the rest of their lives?”

He quotes CNN commentator Van Jones, a strong civil rights proponent, who opposes “safe spaces” on campus: “I don’t want you to be safe ideologically. I don’t want you to be safe emotionally. I want you to be strong. That’s different. I’m not going to pave the jungle for you. Put on some boots and learn how to deal with adversity. I’m not going to take the weights out of the gym. That’s the whole point of the gym.”

Stern contends a fundamental error has been made in defining terms.

“We want campuses that are open to expression – including, perhaps even especially, difficult and disturbing ideas – but which protect students from real harassment and intimidation. Hate speech codes were efforts to say that ideas themselves can harass and intimidate. Ideas can and should make one uncomfortable (a comfortable college education is a wasted college education). But harassment is something different.”

Strategically, he argues, trying to censor hateful ideas is self-defeating and advances hate agents by martyring them.

“By trying to censor, rather than expose and combat, speech the students perceived as hateful, they were actually helping the alt-right and white supremacists,” writes Stern. “It’s no coincidence that the white nationalists in recent years have wrapped their racist and antisemitic messages around the concept of free speech. Why would progressives allow these haters to steal the bedrock democratic principle of free speech, disingenuously saying that this is what their fight is about? By trying to deny alleged racists platforms, progressives are helping white supremacists recast their vile message as noble protection of a right.”

Another strategic failure, he argues, is buying into the Palestinian narrative’s good/evil dichotomy.

“Israel’s case is best understood as inherently complex and difficult; playing into the ‘all bad’ and ‘all good’ binary of the other side renders those complexities invisible,” he writes.

The conflict on campus spills over, of course. Israel has created a list of 20 organizations, those that urge boycotts of the country, for instance, and bars their members from entering the country. Stern sees this as counterproductive: “You don’t make the case that blacklists (especially of academics) are proper if your goal is to oppose blacklists. You are conceding the argument.”

He gives an example of an anti-Israel campus activist who defends his group’s refusal to meet with Zionists “over cookies and cake” because “you Jews, in all due respect, you wouldn’t sit down with Nazis for tea and cake.”

He also reflects on the “Standards of Partnership” adopted by Hillel International, the Jewish campus organization, which proscribe engaging with groups or individuals that deny Israel’s right to exist, or who delegitimize, demonize or apply a double standard Israel, who support BDS or who exhibit “a pattern of disruptive behaviour towards campus events or guest speakers or foster an atmosphere of incivility.”

Writes Stern: “For those who are not yet ideological soldiers, but want to learn more, and want to do it around their campus Hillel, what sense does it make that adults are telling them they can only bring in certain types of speakers? Yes, the adults defined BDS as hateful. But does it make sense to tell students they have to go elsewhere than the Jewish address on campus to hear about it firsthand from those who support it?”

The litany of bad behaviours on all sides of the ideological divide is likely to make readers of Stern’s book uneasy, whether the reader is Zionist or anti-Zionist. But it is a rare and uncompromising testament to free expression that should give genuine free speech advocates an uplift, particularly in an era when ideologically driven regulation of expression and ideas, especially on campuses, has left many advocates of core liberal, academic values feeling beleaguered.