Antisemitism, an outdated ...
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Alejandro Baer, former director of the Holocaust and Genocide Studies Center at Minnesota University and CSIC researcher, told the same newspaper that the Israeli Prime Minister uses antisemitism as a weapon to discredit political opponents.
The newspaper referred to a gathering of 300 specialists in antisemitism, Judaism, and the Middle East from around the world in Al-Quds (Jerusalem) in 2019, which promoted the Jerusalem Declaration in 2019.
According to the Jerusalem Declaration, “evidence-based criticism” is legitimate. It is not antisemitic to oppose “its policies and practices […] such as the conduct of Israel in the West Bank and Gaza.” Nor is it antisemitic “to point out systematic racial discrimination.” And “even if contentious, it is not antisemitic, in and of itself, to compare Israel with other historical cases, including settler colonialism or apartheid.”
Therefore, what is happening these days worldwide, including in American society and especially in its universities, is a direct criticism of the inhumane actions of the Israeli regime in Gaza and has no connection to antisemitism.
Also, Bernie Sanders, the progressive senator from Vermont – who is Jewish – has hit back fiercely at Netanyahu over his claim that US universities were being overrun by antisemitism on a scale comparable to the rise of Nazism in Germany. He accused Netanyahu of “insult[ing] the intelligence of the American people” by using antisemitism to distract attention from the policies of his “extremist and racist government” in the military offensive in Gaza.
“No Mr. Netanyahu, it is not antisemitic or pro-Hamas to point out that, in a little over six months, your extremist government has killed over 34,000 Palestinians and wounded more than 78,000, 70% of whom are women and children,” he said.
In response to this wave of accusations, protesting students at Columbia University emphasized in their statement: “We firmly reject any form of hate or bigotry and stand vigilant against non-students attempting to disrupt the solidarity being forged among students,” they continued. “Palestinian, Muslim, Arab, Jewish, Black and pro-Palestinian classmates and colleagues who represent the full diversity of our country,” the statement said.