Authorities keep whining and snarling about anti Semitism 
, but no news clip across various media outlet (BBC, CBC, ABC, DW) could produce any evidence.
Do you really believe that there is no anti-Semitism happening in these highly charged situations? I can assure you there is. Simply the fact that groups are turning Passover activities into an opportunity to protest conflates Judaism with Israel, and intimidates. It is important to note however that Muslims are facing rising hostility as well.
I think Columbia has handled this situation incredibly poorly. The students had/have a right to protest. That is not a limitless right, and in some instances individual behaviour has been problematic - Jewish students should not be physically confronted simply because they are recognized as Jews. But the university administration somehow managed to get both sides badly wrong. They failed to police that sort of action, then got sucked into a massive overreaction when some Jewish activists counterprotested.
At the same time, I heard on Swiss radio yesterday that some Jewish student organizations are also a full part of these protest movements in Columbia University, and have denied that they are subject to antisemitism, or that this is the reason of these demonstrations.
So, itâs a complicated situation anyway.
Despite Netanyahuâs efforts, the protests at Columbia are not driven by anti-Semitism. They are a legitimate form of protest. However, there have definitely been acts of protest that conflate Israel with Judaism. Disrupting a seder at a Hillel House because there are Jews inside is problematic, even if those Jews do support Israel.
Equally, a Jewish faculty member deciding to walk into the middle of that protest waving a flag of Israel knows exactly what he is doing, engineering a confrontation to produce a police response.
Yeah, as I said, itâs a complicated situation with all shades of grey involved. What I find disturbing is that there is a lot of political manipulation around these student demonstrations, which are primarily about Gaza and the necessity to re-establish peace there. They are totally legitime and shouldnât be forbidden.
It is complicated. Protests are always subject to isolated bad actors deviating from the core of what the protests are actually about. In todayâs social media connected society I think you have to assume that most high profile protests will have purposefully planted bad actors put there with the intention of pushing public opinion away from the true message of the protests. Coverage of them always tends to focus on those isolated incidents regardless of what the protest leaders etc say.
These Colombia protests are further complicated by the campus being in NYC, a place where there are no end of weirdos willing to stand on a soapbox and say awful spiteful shit. There has been a tremendous amount of conflation between what people see happening in isolated areas of the city vs what is happening on campus, which is a very different situation. Campus has actually managed to be fairly well locked down and so the army of journalists who live in NYC and want to comment on this are not seeing what is happening on campus and so are performing professional negligence by lazily making this conflation (these things in unrelated areas of the city that are being pointed out to me must surely be the same thing as what is happening on that campus). The difference in coverage from the Colombia student newspaper vs the world renowned NYT has been striking. And no lessons will be taken from this or learned to be applied next time.
I think the other big tell is how much of the criticism of these campus protests are coming from people and places that have spent so much time over the past few years yelling about violations of free speech and the problems with cancel culture. Those were bad faith complaints then and these are bad faith complaints now.
EDIT: Of course, none of this justifies targeting jewish students for abuse. There have been isolated reports of that and you have to assume lots of these are true. However, there have also been several high profile ones that are clearly caused by purposeful agitation of someone desperate to catch something on film of someone confronting them, or in some cases of just outright inventing abuse in their minds.
This is from a report made to Ottawa PoliceâŚ
Somebody felt this needed police intervention. What a nightmare time to be a cop.
Two of the most high profile ones are Colombia and Yale, and these have a different angle. These are two of the countryâs oldest and richest universities that have enormous endowments - $14 and $40 billion respectively. While the existence of these endowments allow the universities to do a lot of good, there has been increasing focus in recent years on the social responsibility of that money. Where did it come from (slavery, in the US the answer is always slavery), and do you have a responsibility to make good for past evils? How are you investing that money now? The relevance of this is that while there are differences in the specific demands being made, both protests are also focused on demanding the university divests from investments in companies contributing to the situation in Gaza.
Must probably be regarded as an Israeli victory visa vi Iran. For now:
https://twitter.com/ragipsoylu/status/1783220802080379347
If accurateâŚ
She forgot Putin.
While few expected arms donations to Ukraine from Israel, they refused to sell at market price critical weaponry when asked (several times) due to Israeli-Russian relations and Netanyahuâs Middle of the Road foreign policy, where he deftly plays off and exploits the United States, while preserving good relations with Russia (US allows him to do this, while they would create quite the scene if some other friendly state did the same).
https://twitter.com/MairavZ/status/1783344378255196431
Is it a display/distribution of Kafiya?
I donât remember which, but a state parliament recently debated the ban on Kafiya.
Presumably the Palestine flag? I believe the vendor was checked to ensure that no hate material was being sold, but essentially someone just didnât believe that expression of support for Palestine should be allowed, per @Limiescouseâs point.
This is an unusual development
18 countries including US release letter offering âimmediate and prolonged Gaza ceasefireâ in return for hostage release
The White House has issued a joint letter signed by the leaders of 18 countries calling for the release of hostages by Hamas, and offering âan immediate and prolonged ceasefire in Gazaâ in return.
I donât understand what the motivation/strategy is.
to stop people from dyingâŚ
As long as Hamas holds those hostages (however many are actually left alive), Biden really cannot go much further to pressure Netanyahu. At the same time, that fundamental demand is Netanyahuâs domestic weak point. There is a large swathe of Israeli society not willing to contemplate a ceasefire that doesnât involve the release of hostages.
If Hamas releases the hostages, further prosecution of the attacks in Gaza are on a very different political footing, globally and in Israel.
He can withdraw all financial support and not provide the Israeli government with any more weapons.
See what Bibi does then.
Hmm, but if the hostages are released, wouldnât that embolden Netanyahu to go all out on Rafah?
I feel Hamas has proved themselves as a very incompetent negotiator, specially with respect to the hostages. They know Netanyahu donât care about the hostages and holding on to them didnât give them any leverage. Instead, they could/should have released the hostages in a trickle and that would have disrupted the Israeli carnage.
Not as long as Hamas has those hostages. He would lose too many of his own Democratic Senators and Congress members, and arm the Republicans for a win in November that would simply reinstate the support, likely increase it, and replace any sort of braking effect that is coming from Washington with full-throated support for expulsion.