After the alarming antisemitic
incident at UCLA earlier this year, the national discussion about the problem
of antisemitism on college campuses continues.
While such incidents
are certainly disturbing, it is important to note that these incidents are
relatively rare, and the vast majority of Jewish students report feeling
safe on their campuses. When such incidents do occur, they are generally
condemned by administrators and the wider campus communities at their
respective colleges.
That being said, antisemitic
incidents continue to take place on campuses in 2015. Below are some selected
examples:
– In May at Drexel, a student came back to his
dorm room to find a swastika and the word “JEW” taped next to his Israeli flag.
– Several
swastikas, along with personal slurs and epithets, were spray-painted on Stanford University’s chapter of Sigma Alpha
Epsilon in April.
– In April,
vandalism of a dorm at the University of Missouri included a swastika, the
Illuminati symbol, and the word “heil.” Later, another swastika and the words,
“You’ve been warned,” were discovered in the same area.
– A dorm at Purchase
College, SUNY was vandalized on March 18 with swastikas and other hateful
graffiti.
– Swastikas were
spray-painted inside the house of a Jewish fraternity (Alpha Epsilon Pi) at Vanderbilt University on March 15.
– In March at the University of California, Los Angeles, a
student was asked, “Given that you are a Jewish student and very active in
the Jewish community, how do you see yourself being able to maintain an
unbiased view?” during the Student Council’s confirmation of the
nomination of the student to the council’s Judicial Board.
– At the University
of California, Berkeley, the phrase “Zionists should be sent to the gas
chamber” was found in a campus restroom in March and a swastika was found on
a university owned building in February.
– On February
22, University of Chicago students and staff reported antisemitic posts on a
Facebook page called UChicago Secrets, such as “People are hypocrites. This
is a fact. One example? The Jews at UChicago…” and “As a Person of Palestinian
descent, I don’t think it is unreasonable or horrific for me to
hate Jews…”
– At the end of
February, threatening antisemitic comments were posted on Yik Yak (an
anonymous social media app that allows people to send and receive posts in a
localized area) for the University of Chicago area. Some posts named specific
students, while others expressed more general antisemitic sentiments such
as, “Gas them, burn them and dismantle their power structure. Humanity cannot
progress with the parasitic Jew.”
– In February, three swastikas were drawn
inside a George Washington University dorm.
– On January 31,
two large swastikas were spray-painted on the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity
house at the University of California,
Davis.
