At an Oct. 16 lecture at SUNY Orange in Middletown, Jewish author David Bernstein said that radical social justice ideology is a source of Hamas-sympathizing attitudes on U.S. campuses.
“Some say, ‘Oh, this is bad Israeli PR,’” Mr. Bernstein said at the lecture. “It has nothing to do with bad Israeli PR; it has to do with an ideology on the left that flattens their worldview into these simplistic terms of oppressors and the oppressed and makes it impossible for them to make the case for Israel.”
Mr. Bernstein is the founder and CEO of the Jewish Institute for Liberal Values.
The ideology, which he called “woke” in a recent book, has two core tenants: One is that bias and oppression aren’t a matter of personal attitudes but deeply ingrained in the entire social structures, and the other is that only people with oppressed experience are qualified to voice opinions on the topic.
When one looks at the world through the lens of “woke” ideology, Mr. Bernstein said: “Jews, who are successful, and Israel, which is a successful country, are going to be viewed as the oppressor ... and it is going to lead to the kind of statement that you saw from those Harvard students every single time.
“So I’d say, don’t be surprised, because if you are surprised, then you are not paying attention to what’s been happening in the background that led to that statement.”
In recent years, the radical woke ideology, with its roots in neo-Marxism, has slowly infiltrated U.S. higher education institutions and worked as a source of anti-Semitism attitudes, and his book “Woke Antisemitism” offers a deep dive into the link between the two, he said.
American students’ sympathizing responses to the Hamas attacks, shocking as they are to many, might help more people wake up to the threats of the harmful ideology in prestigious institutions and be more open to engaging in conversations, he said.
He noted that legitimately criticizing Israeli government policies isn’t anti-Semitism, but fundamentally invalidating the existence of the state of Israel is considered as such.
“That’s where I would draw the line,” Mr. Bernstein said.
Israel was created by a 1947 U.N. declaration and afforded statehood in 1948.
Since its founding, Israel has faced constant conflicts with its Arab neighbors, a key point of tension being Israel’s treatment of the residents in the Palestine region, which generally refers to the Gaza Strip that lines the Mediterranean Sea and the West Bank.
President Joe Biden condemned Hamas immediately after the war broke out.
The lecture by Mr. Bernstein was hosted by the Jewish Federation of Greater Orange County, with help from the Jewish Club at SUNY Orange.
Before the lecture started, Rabbi Emily Cobert from Sinai Temple in Middletown led a prayer and a moment of silence to pay homage and honor to people in Israel.
