WHO’S REALLY FIGHTING ANTI-SEMITISM, AND WHO’S JUST USING IT POLITICALLY

 

CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: TUESDAY, DECEMBER 9, 2025 OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS

“WHO’S REALLY FIGHTING ANTI-SEMITISM, AND WHO’S JUST USING IT POLITICALLY”

 

Anti-Semitism has been a plague on college campuses for more than a decade, never more visibly than in the aftermath of the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas surprise attack that killed more than 1,200 Israeli civilians and saw some 250 more abducted as hostages.

 

Protests erupted immediately on campuses across America after that massacre. But not against the attackers. Rather, against the attacked. Why? Without doubt, the protests were planned in advance, and they succeeded largely because the victims were Jews. They capitalized on a deep vein of anti-Jewish feeling that’s grown up in America.

 

Now President Trump accuses dozens of American universities of anti-Semitism, attempting to extract large sums of money from them in return for continuing to operate as usual. He’s trying to impose conditions on universities in order for their faculties to continue getting the federal grant money that has facilitated inventions from the Internet to cures for formerly unstoppable diseases.

 

How did the outpouring of anti-Semitism arise in a country where polls only a few years ago showed both strong support for the Jewish state of Israel and rated Jews among the finest marriage partners for people of most ethnic derivations?

 

Arguably, at least some of the new feelings stem from “critical race theory” (CRT) taught in many colleges and some high schools. A “discipline” of victimization, CRT portrays Jews as helping perpetuate prejudice against Blacks and also as participants in “white privilege,” through which Jews have supposedly gained financial well-being denied to other minorities.

 

The spreaders of CRT ignore the fact Jews have been persecuted longer than any racial or religious group, dating back to the days of slavery in Egypt commemorated in observances of Passover.

 

CRT insinuated into the education schools and departments of many universities, its proponents becoming dominant in shaping the curriculum of California’s first few plans for an ethnic studies course to be required for high school graduation. Among its leaders are top officials of the California Faculty Assn., including Melina Abdullah, professor of Pan American Studies at Cal State Los Angeles and Rabab Abdulhadi, founding director of the Arab and Muslim Ethnicities and Diasporas program at San Francisco State College.

 

Ethnic studies curriculum drafts they helped produce were never fully accepted by the state Legislature, but similar ones were bought and adopted by several school districts after being rewritten slightly by CRT advocates.

 

Early drafts of the statewide curriculum were never taught widely because the Legislature refused funding, and funding was a necessity under the law that set up the ethnic studies requirement.

 

Now the money will flow, primarily because the curriculum has been completely rewritten and approved by the Legislature via a bill called AB 715, which Gov. Gavin Newsom signed this fall over the objections of virtually every significant Arab-American group in California.

 

They claimed the rewritten curriculum “sets a dangerous precedent of censorship” because, for one example, it demands fact-based, two-sided discussion of the Israel-Palestinian conflict and its history. Previous versions, and some curricula adopted by individual districts, put all blame on Israel, which was invaded by armies from seven Arab countries within moments of declaring independence.

 

Although it was watered down somewhat, the new statewide blueprint will train teachers, administrators and local school boards in spotting, preventing and responding to anti-Semitism, which has caused bullying of Jewish schoolchildren from Berkeley to the Etiwanda school district in San Bernardino County.

 

Districts will also be required to investigate complaints of anti-Semitism and “be factually accurate” and “consistent with accepted standards of professional responsibility, rather than advocacy, personal opinion, bias or partisanship.”

 

The Arab-American groups contended that will “silence discussion,” when it really is an attempt at fair discussions in classrooms.

 

By signing AB 715, Newsom actively fought the anti-Semitism that’s been rampant in California schools for years, if not decades, and fueled the campus protests.

 

Meanwhile, Trump’s attempts to extort billions of dollars from universities that did not act quickly to quell bigoted demonstrations on their campuses do nothing to change future behavior.

 

So who is really fighting anti-Semitism and bigotry here, the president who touts himself as a leader against intolerance or the governor who with little fanfare signed a bill that has some chance of at least reducing the world’s oldest prejudice?

 

    -30-

    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net