JERUSALEM, Israel – A group of American college students returns to campus this year better prepared to counter any anti-Israel protests that might develop. That’s because of how and where they spent their summer.
Last year’s anti-Israel protests led the Trump administration to cut federal funds to universities that they say allowed antisemitism to run rampant on campus.
How the federal action might curtail protests this year remains to be seen as students head back to class.
The ongoing conflict prompted a group of U.S. college students to visit Israel over the summer to see what’s happening for themselves
Nicknamed the “Student Intifada,” the U.S. saw thousands of pro-Palestinian protests on college campuses since the October 7th, 2023, terrorist attack on Israel.
Many of the students who came to Jerusalem were considered the enemy.
Naamah Murphy from the University of Minnesota told CBN News, “Somebody walked up to me, screamed at me that I was complicit in genocide, and spit on me.”
Another student, Urriel Appel’s college classmate, was also a victim of antisemitism.
Appel recalled, “Somebody entered her room and flushed her Israeli flag down the toilet, then continued to break her Mezuzah, the religious scroll that we put on our doors.”
Tired of tolerating the intolerance, the college students chose to spend part of their summer in Israel.
Indiana University student Alex Ogden commented, “I would say coming here post-October 7th was a new awakening for me.”
Most of the students are Jewish, although some are Christian. All are being equipped to better battle the anti-Israel rhetoric at home.
Justin Sherman from Hasbara Fellowship, the group that brought the students to Israel, told us, “Right now, we have a group of speakers from across a few different organizations that are doing media training.”
The training is part of Hasbara Fellowship’s Student Leadership Mission. The program is active on nearly one hundred North American college campuses, aiming to encourage students to return to school as pro-Israel activists and leaders.
Ogden, who is a Christian, remarked, “You have to be able to stand up for that. I didn’t necessarily know how to do that. But this organization has really taught me the almost grassroots tactics, if you will, to be able to combat this.”
On the day we were there, the lecture was designed to help them answer tough questions from critics with strong logic and historical accuracy.
“Just even hearing the different things that some of my peers have been doing on this trip really gives me a whole lot of ideas of how to go back and build coalitions with different groups and be more present online, and do all of the things that, you know, really bring the issue to the table,” Naama Murphy said.
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The group is composed of 26 students from 24 U.S. universities. In the ten days they were in Israel, they have heard lectures, met soldiers, spoken to hostages and toured the sites of the October 7th massacre.
Appel was moved by the sights of war. “Just sheer destruction,” he revealed. ” I’ve never expected to see what a grenade blast aftermath would look like.”
Murphy recalled, “In Be’eri, the kibbutz that we went to that was persecuted on October 7th, I walked around. The playgrounds are empty. Like the silence is eerie.”
Appel noted, “It was less about what I saw when I was in Be’eri. It was the smell, the fact, the putrid smell of death.”
Joseph Moskowvitz from Georgia Institute of Technology was affected by the conversations he had with Israel Defense Forces soldiers. He believes it shattered the accusations of Israeli genocide he heard from the college protesters.
He told us, “When you talk to them, they say, you know, we really are the most moral army. We risked our own lives to make it safer for civilians. And it’s one thing to read that, you know, from the chief of staff of the IDF, but it’s another to hear it time and time again from people who are literally on the ground.”
Moskowitz also noted that when it comes to the anti-Israel college protests, it’s easy to rail against it if you never have to live in a war environment.
“You realize how small everything is. You really understand the security and how little time you have when rockets are fired. And even, just if you’ve ever been here to experience a rocket. You know, Americans, we have the privilege. And we to never experienced something like, that is almost unthinkable to the American imagination, to have to live under constant rocket fire,” he related.
By now, these college students have returned home. Most are back on campus. They told me before they left that they’re now better prepared to speak for truth and against antisemitism. And it all comes from what they’ve seen, heard, and experienced in Israel for themselves.
Sherman explained, “If they’re able to say that I am able to have these conversations, I know what I’m talking about now, I feel that I can really say what I need to say. I feel that what we have done has been a success.”
Ogden observed, “Antisemitism has been around forever, and it probably will be around forever. It’s just how we as Christians, or people in general, stand up for a community that needs to be stood up for, that kind of makes it very important.”
