At USC, the Rose Ritch Saga Continues

Hat tip Middle East Forum, Campus Watch, and Jewish Journal


We have been following the story of Rose Ritch, a Jewish student at the University of Southern California, who recently was driven to resign from student government as a result of a campaign by the usual suspects- the pro-Palestinian brown shirts on campus. Ritch was unacceptable in student government because not only is she Jewish, but she supports Israel.

Carol Folt, the president of USC, issued a statement to the campus expressing sympathy for what Ritch had to endure and condemning anti-Semitism in general. Whatever criticism Folt may or may not deserve for allowing such a climate to exist in the first place, her statement was the decent and human thing to do.

But that didn't sit well with the Middle East Studies Association (MESA), a nationwide organization that represents the very institution that is largely contributing to campus anti-Semitism in the first place- the various Middle East studies departments around the country, most of which are propaganda centers for everything pro-Arab and everything against Israel and the West. MESA sent a letter to President Folt objecting to her letter.

I am cross-posting an article by Winfield Myers of Middle East Forum and Campus Watch. In the link here, you can read the MESA letter as well as Folt's statement to the campus community. Myers also effectively deals with the argument over whether all criticism of Israel is or isn't anti-Semitic.

In addition, on Monday this week (September 7) a rally against anti-Semitism was held in Los Angeles, largely in response to the USC matter. I suppose MESA probably objected to that as well, but who cares? I myself had planned to go, but full disclosure, I decided against it due to my family concerns over the Covid issue.

It's a sad day in America when we have interest groups who formally object to a university president speaking out against Jew hatred. It reminds me of 1933 when the newly-installed Nazis objected to international press coverage of how they were mistreating Jews, and responded by holding their Jewish shop boycott in retaliation. Today, we have our own Brown Shirts right here in the USA.

Shame on MESA. Nobody is trying to silence their voices; the fact is that pro-Palestinian voices rule the roost on university campuses. It is the pro-Israel events and speakers who are routinely disrupted-not theirs. Jewish students and others who support Israel would simply like to answer their arguments and enjoy the same rights of expression without being shouted down or forced to resign from student government.

We know what MESA's agenda is, and we will resist it here in America. Their values have nothing in common whatsoever with American values. They are peddling Jew hatred, and this case at USC is a perfect example.