As anti-Semitic protests advocating support for Hamas and Palestine continue to sweep across America’s colleges and universities, it is strikingly eye-opening to see the support they are receiving. It’s not just the typical fringe groups, but rather mainstream businesses, high-profile elected officials, and possibly the most dangerous, ivory-tower academics who laud themselves as progressives.
Their demands are nothing new, calling for the divestment from their supposed-oppressor, in this case Israel. But what is new is their advocacy for the Intifada – and New Jersey is no exception. One image from the Rutgers University encampment that was particularly disturbing brandished the words “Globalize the Intifada.”
To the average person, that might not seem shocking. Intifada literally translates to ‘uprising’ or ‘shake off’ in Arabic but it’s the deeper, more sinister context that we should worry about. The years between 2000 and 2005 were known as the “Second Intifada” in Israel, which marked the deaths of over 1,000 Israelis. Many of these deaths were innocent civilians murdered by suicide bombings, rocket strikes, stabbings, and other cruel means. Most gruesomely, two Israeli Defense Force reservists were lynched by a Palestinian mob after accidentally entering the Palestinian-controlled West Bank.
More personally, this June will be 21 years since my daughter, along with hundreds of others, was injured in the epicenter of one of these attacks. A 19 year old who was radicalized by the sinister ideology we are seeing permeate throughout campuses like Princeton University and Rutgers University strapped an explosive to their body with the intent to kill innocent Israeli civilians and instill terror into the minds of Jews across the world.
They boarded a bus disguised as an Orthodox Jew, detonated the explosive, which was filled with metal shrapnel to cause maximum harm to those in the area, and killed nearly 20 people while sending shockwaves through Jerusalem.
Hamas claimed responsibility for the attack.
So while others assume that chanting “Globalize the Intifada” is an innocent but assertive way to express their feelings, myself and other members of the Jewish community hear this repugnant phrase and understand their true intent: global violence against Jews and Israelis, and presumably their supporters and allies.
When someone calls for the globalization of “the Intifada” this is not a call for a peaceful protest. It’s an anti-Semitic attack cloaked in ignorance, or worse, deceit. The years of the Second Intifada were horribly violent, forcing Israelis to live in fear much like the brutal attack carried out by Hamas on October 7.
Now, I fear, that Jewish students in New Jersey and across America may be living in that same fear on their own college campuses. And while I support the fundamental American rights of assembly and speech, I could not disagree more with what these protests are advocating for.
I couldn’t agree more with the sentiment of what Rutgers’s President Jonathan Holloway said in his statement about the protests, “we value free speech and the right to protest, but it should not come at the cost of our students’ education and safety. We strive to balance these rights and maintain a safe and secure environment for our students to learn and succeed,” Holloway wrote in a statement.
But I am upset and concerned by the reports of Rutgers, a school with one of the highest Jewish student populations in the country, capitulating to those calling for a global Intifada and for the annihilation of Israel. The rhetoric of the protestors in New Brunswick left little to the imagination, and videos on social media show that no matter what the protest leaders’ claim, antisemitism is rampant among their ranks.
You can write me off as a concerned dad, but put yourself or your child in my or my daughter’s shoes and think about how years from now your actions will be viewed by the rest of the world.
Senator Singer is New Jersey’s longest-serving State Senator and an active member of the New Jersey’s Jewish community. He lives in and represents Lakewood, the town with the 8th highest Jewish population by percentage outside of Israel, a town in which he previously served as mayor. His daughter was injured in the 2003 bus bombing in Jerusalem by a Hamas suicide bomber. Senator Singer is also the ranking member of New Jersey’s Senate Higher Education Committee.
This whole article is a blatant lie! The vast majority of these protests against the Israeli Governments war on Gaza, is for the most part peaceful. There have been a handful of incidences that have been shameful. Any person, believing that Israel’s government is not carrying out genocide against the Palestinian civilians is out of touch with reality. Israeli government, who actually has members that are open anti-Arabs in it, have stated numerous times that Gaza needs to be wiped off the map and the Palestinians must go. Students on these college campuses are NOT protesting for the death of Israelis or the destruction of Isreal as a democratic state. Stop filling your readers with propaganda!
Even when the protesters are not threatening the Jewish students, or proclaiming “From the River to the sea, Palestine will be free”, which has always been the call of the enemies of Israel for Israel to be wiped off the map, and which is the current theme of all the protests, they are taking over areas inside the campus, damaging property etc. (In Columbia University, the police retrieved makeshift weapons.) To call these protests peaceful is a blatant lie. And to demand that Israel allow Hamas to remain intact due to Hamas embedding itself in the civilian population is cruel and unfair to Israel. As far as the numbers of Palestinian civilian casualties are concerned, we’ll never know the truth. Case in point: Several months ago, when an Islamic Jihad missile landed in the vicinity of a Gazan hospital, they claimed the missile was an Israeli missile, when in fact, American intelligence confirmed it was an Islamic Jihad missile. The Gaza Health Ministry, which is controlled by Hamas, claimed at the time that 500 palestinians were killed in the errant Islamic Jihad hospital missile attack. But video footage later showed that the errant Islamic Jihad missile barely inflicted any damage to the hospital, and that the missile struck the hospital parking lot, which makes the 500 casualty number virtually impossible. One EU official pegged the number of casulaties from the errant missile attack at 50. Which means the Hamas-appointed Health ministry can not be trusted with their numbers. Even now, the Hamas Health Ministry can not provide the names of many of the individuals they say have died. And a good portion of the casualties are Hamas casualties.
Bottom line: Israel must defend itself by taking out Hamas. Hamas can not remain intact! I know it, and YOU know it! But you refuse to acknowledge the truth and the dire situation that Israel finds iteself in.
Incidentally, New York Mayor Eric Adams has already reported that there are sinister elements who are leading these protests. The husband of one woman, who was among the protest agitators in Columbia University, the Mayor said, was married to someone who had been arrested on terrorism charges. The NY investigation is continuing, but it seems there are other sinister and terrorist elements involved in the protests that they are looking into.
Good luck in defending the protests and good luck in lambasting Israel for trying to defeat and defend themselves from the blood-thirsty Hamas sadists.
You have no clue what you are talking about. Please seek help from a mental health professional.
If all these students are so infatuated w/the Palestinian people, why don’t they just uproot themselves & go to Palestine to possibly ameliorate their situation? These protesters are just interupting the lives of non-protesters who are trying to get an education & better their lives.