For the past 17 years I’ve been struggling to understand a troubling phenomenon manifesting itself in American public life. For the life of me, I haven’t been able to understand why many progressive Jews in America express shame over the actions of Israel while so many young Arabs and Muslims in the United States — who drape themselves in the mantle of progressivism — are so confident and aggressive in their support for the cause of Palestinian statehood, which by most objective measures is one of the more retrograde movements on the global agenda today.
I say that as a pro-Israel Christian who hopes that the Israel-Palestinian conflict will ultimately be ended through the application of a two-state solution.
Given the events of the past two decades, which I’ve watched from my vantage point as a researcher for the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis, I could not understand why many, but not all, progressive Jews have proven to be so ambivalent in their support for Israel.
Israel is by no means a perfect nation, but it treats its own citizens, minorities, dissidents, and even its adversaries who seek its destruction, better than any other country in the Middle East.
I’ve also had a tough time understanding why pro-Palestinian activists have been so much more confident and frankly aggressive in their activism over the past few years.
This puzzlement came to an end on Thursday, June 24th, 2021.
This was the date when I was mobbed by a group of anti-Israel protesters at a rally organized and promoted by the UMass Boston chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, which is part of a network of anti-Israel organizations that have a well-earned reputation for inciting hostility towards the Jewish state and violence towards Jews on college campuses in the United States.