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Table of Contents -->> Next Dateline:
Middle East WHAT IS TO BE DONE?
REFLECTIONS ON CAMPUS ACTIVISM In February, a handful of
McGill students shut down a one-sided student union resolution condemning Fortunately, this particular resolution did not pass. Concerned students came together to stop it. Unfortunately, almost as
soon as this particular challenge was defeated, new ones appeared. On
February 12 at York University in Toronto, a news conference held by a
coalition of diverse students to support their campaign to impeach the
York Federation of Students was shut down by anti-Israel organizers. Yelling
antisemitic slurs and physically intimidating the Jewish students, they
barricaded them inside Hillel’s lounge on campus when the Jewish
students took refuge there. Police officers were required to escort the
students out of the office to ensure their safety. Also, coming up next
month, a number of student groups in my own This brings me to the subject of this article: what, in Lenin’s and Chernyshevksy’s words, is to be done? The following suggestions may be helpful: 1) Try not to get discouraged. As the recent SSMU vote proves, there is, indeed, a “market” for pro-Israel activity on campus. We may not be as outnumbered as we think. 2) Network. So-called Facebook politics stopped SSMU’s Gaza resolution, and has put a hefty dent in the budget of QPIRG—a hub of radical, hard-left groups that are militantly anti-Israel (and anti-everything else, too). Moreover, these Facebook groups and pages give advocates easy access to like-minded individuals to recruit for later campaigns. 3) Bring in “backup”. Established organizations like CIJR, businesspeople, sympathetic journalists, and other adult community figures may be powerful allies. A petition asking administrators to allow a pro-Israel event to balance propaganda may look more impressive if it includes a few high profile names as well as many ordinary students. Similarly, the threat of calling up some pro-Israel columnists at the National Post may be helpful should school officials decide to make life difficult for students espousing unpopular views. 4) Take action against bias. Be original. Instead of simply staging counter-protests on campus, consider contacting your university’s alumni. For example, if anti-Israel bias at McGill crosses a certain threshold, consider launching a campaign to show alumni and donors the extent of anti-Israel and antisemitic acts occurring on campus, and urge them to withhold all donations to the university until this is improved. (This is another case where help from “grown-ups” would be very much appreciated.) 5) Talk some sense into Israel supporters who insist that they “don’t want to politicize the campus” — particularly when “Israel Apartheid Week” is happening two feet away from them. The campus is politicized whether you wanted it to be or not, so behave accordingly. I hope these ideas will stir some people’s imaginations and lead to positive actions. Judging from the recent SSMU votes, it seems that they already have. The fact that Obama, a man of African-American descent who spent some of his early years in Islamic Indonesia, is in the race for the U.S. presidency is in and of itself groundbreaking. If he is nominated, and the American people elect him, the symbolic importance in terms of global public opinion would be enormous. Table of Contents -->> Next |
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