Anti-Semitism's Resurgence-From Western Europe to American Campuses

It Is Time to Name the Real Perps



This week, Ari Lieberman posted a compelling article here on Frontpage Magazine on anti-semitism in Western Europe. I read it with great interest because I myself have lived in Europe a total of eight years, three in Germany (military service) and five in Italy. I love Europe greatly and return often to Germany. Due to my interest in Germany and my experiences being stationed just outside Nuremberg, I have immersed myself ever since in the history of the Third Reich. As a gentile, I have become very sensitive to anti-semitism because I realize that there is a resurgence going on worldwide in Jew hatred. I have often argued that Germany has tried very hard (at least since the late 1960s) to accept responsibility for the Holocaust and to make itself a decent country in spite of its horrible past. Recent events, however, cause me to question whether I was correct. Mr Lieberman's article pointed out instances where criminals have assaulted Jews and gotten off lightly by what admittedly is a lax justice system. The same can be said for several other Western European countries, such as Sweden, most notably.

In Europe, as Mr Lieberman points out, the problem is primarily caused by Muslim immigrants, so many of whom are young with questionable skills and who bring with them their age-old Islamic hatred of Jews. This is a fact. Most anti-semitism in Europe is not coming from neo-Nazis or skinheads as many would like us to believe.

Today, Europe is back in the 1930s. Jews dare not walk the streets of major cities wearing Jewish garb lest they be insulted, spat upon, or assaulted by young Muslim males.  In fact, Jews in countries like France and Sweden are leaving in droves. The problem has been especially acute in Malmö, Sweden's third largest city, where many of the Jews were descendants of  Danish Jews snuck into the port of Malmö,  by the Danes, whose own Jews were subject to deportation by the occupying Germans. Today, Malmö is not so welcoming of Jews. About 25% of the city's population is made up of restive Muslims, mostly living  in the notorious Rosengård  district. Crime and riots are a frequent occurrence, and you can imagine what happens when they encounter Jews. The city's Jews have been leaving for several years now-even encouraged by the former mayor, Ilmar Reepalu, who was so opposed to Israel, he invited the Jews to leave unless they would speak out against Israeli policies vis-a-vis the Palestinians.

One might ask, "How can Europeans allow this to happen on the very continent on which the Holocaust occurred?" I believe the answer is largely that they are afraid of and intimidated by their ever-restive Muslim population, many of whom are there as refugees, asylum-seekers, and just plain migrants. They know that anything related to the millions of Muslims who are already there with more arriving constantly is a powder keg ready to explode. The Europeans bend over backwards to demonstrate their tolerance for Islam and Muslims even when hate speech against Jews, Christians and infidels pours out of so many radical, largely Salafist mosques. This "tolerance" persists even in the face of violence  not seen in Western Europe since the end of World War II. It seems every week, Germany is rocked by the rape and murder of some innocent German woman by some asylum-seeker. One of the most recent victims was a Jewish teenage girl. Yet, Angela Merkel cannot fathom the problem before her very eyes. As far as the problem with the Jews is concerned, the Europeans are tolerating intolerance in the very name of tolerance. 

In the US, the picture is somewhat different. There is definitely a resurgence in anti-semitism, though not on the European scale, and granted, some of it comes from white racists, KKK, or neo-Nazi types. In my opinion, however, the focal point for the resurgence in Jew hatred in our country is on our college campuses. In our universities, it is not the above categories of people who are the perpetrators. It is first and foremost, the pro-Palestinian crowd, who have succeeded in turning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict into one of the top hot button issues.

I say this based on my own experience as a part-time teacher (English as a Second Language) at the University of California Irvine Extension from 1998-2016. Around 2006 I became involved when I realized what the UC Irvine Muslim Student Union (MSU) was doing in their campaign of vilification against Israel. This campaign also included condemnation of the US and often, Jews as people. Every May, the MSU and Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), an organization I consider to be no better than brown shirts, hold a week of events with a mock apartheid wall and speakers, many of whom are vicious anti-semites. Of course, the MSU and SJP always deny they are anti-semitic-only anti-Zionist. Then they will trot out speakers like the Oakland imam Amir Abdel Malik Ali, who will spit out the word, "Jew" just like the Nazis used to spit out the word, "Jude". He  accuses people of being "Zionist Jews", some of whom, like Rupert Murdoch, are not even Jews. The last time Ali spoke at UC Irvine, (2010) he accused the Jews in the audience of being "the new Nazis". That actually drew a rebuke from then Chancellor Michael Drake. Unfortunately, Drake never mentioned what was said, by whom, who sponsored Ali, what the event was, and lastly, he did not mention the offended group (Jews). Ali has not spoken at UC Irvine since.

I could go on and on. In 2001, a Washington DC imam named Mohamed al Asi, came to UC Irvine and stated that, "You can take the Jew out of the ghetto, but you can't take the ghetto out of the Jew". In 2008, the apartheid wall featured a comic caricature of Ariel Sharon drawn in the style of the old Nazi weekly, Der Stuermer, whose editor, Julius Streicher, was hanged at Nuremberg as a major war criminal.

So when I became involved in the issue, I began attending these events, using the q and a to challenge the speakers, and eventually to videotape them over their objections-and to write about them in an effort to inform the community about what was going on in our universities. Sadly, few university administrators have shown the courage to defend their Jewish students. It is much like the failure of European leaders to protect their Jewish citizens..

I could mention the SJP-led disruptions of pro-Israel events. I have been present at a couple of such events at UCI. SJP's tactics are simple: Disrupt pro-Israel events and intimidate and bully Jewish students who support Israel.  In  2010, I was present when the MSU disrupted the speech of the Israeli ambassador to the US, Michael Oren at UC Irvine. After the MSU was suspended (for 10 weeks), an SJP chapter was established at UC Irvine.

Then you throw in a leftist, anti-Israel faculty and various Middle East studies departments around the nation, and you can start to appreciate the scope of the problem. Middle East studies in our universities invariably consists of condemnation of Israel and the West coupled with Arab chauvanism.

Aside from cowardly university administrators, there is a refusal on the part of many Jewish leaders and national organizations to confront the truth that most anti-semitism is coming from Muslim quarters. Last year, I attended an inter-religious event after President Trump took office. It was held at a synagogue in Newport Beach and was organized by the Jewish Federation of Orange County with participation of other community leaders including law enforcement, and- Muslim community leaders. The theme of the evening was that anti-semitism and Islamophobia were a growing problem and were coming from the alt-right, KKK, neo-Nazis, and Trump supporters, There was no mention of Islam in connection with anti-semitism. For the q and a, we had to send up written questions, the usual tactic of controlling the discourse. When I sent up my written question on a piece of paper, I asked who they thought was responsible for anti-semitism  at UCI. The chief organizer took my card, read it, and said they would not discuss it. By the way, the head imam from Orange County, Muzammil Siddiqi, was present with all his soft-spoken charm. Yet in recent years, he has allowed UCI MSU students to use his Garden Grove mosque to assemble the Apartheid Wall. I have personally witnessed them working on it in the mosque parking lot.

I could go on and on, but let me summarize this by saying that we need to closely follow the events in Europe so as not to make their mistakes. Anti-semitism is on the march once again, and given what we know about history, we (and the Europeans) must meet it head on. I am not condemning all Muslims as Jew haters. Yet, we must be honest as to who is primarily responsible. The truth is uncomfortable. On both sides of the Atlantic, our leaders would rather blame it all on white racists and Trump supporters (no matter how pro-Israel Trump has shown himself to be). To the extent that certain white nationalist groups may be culpable, we need to condemn them. But we cannot stand by and allow political correctness to force us to remain silent as to really is mostly responsible for this worldwide resurgence in anti-semitism.