Since the October 7 massacre, driving Zionists off campus has become a rallying cry. Democrats just threw fuel on the fire by capitulating to the anti-Israel base of the party in denying Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro the vice presidential nomination.
It’s hard to overstate how toxic and endemic anti-Zionism has become on many campuses.
At Harvard last year, Jewish students were harassed and physically assaulted by anti-Israel activists. Jewish students were hounded out of public spaces and hid in their dorms. A federal judge just allowed a lawsuit to go forward against Harvard over its failure to address campus antisemitism.
Similarly, at Columbia, a Jewish student had a rock thrown in his face and his Israeli flag was torched. He and his friends were chased out of campus and told to “go back to Poland.” At UCLA, “Zionists” were attacked and physically blocked on campus, and proclaiming anti-Zionism was the price of admission to public spaces.
As numerous congressional hearings and investigations have documented, anti-Zionism has become the cover for antisemitism.
Shapiro should have been Democrats’ dream vice presidential nominee – hugely popular in a critical must-win swing state, articulate, young, and liberal. Shapiro was the VP candidate Democrats had been waiting for. Shapiro was at the top of almost every list as the likely nominee.
Shapiro had an insurmountable problem, however, and it was not that he was Jewish. Shapiro was the wrong type of Jew for the progressive Democrat base, sharing with the overwhelming majority of American Jews an open support for Israel.
That vocal support created “progressive” opposition to Shapiro that exploded when Shapiro’s 1993 op-ed in his college newspaper regarding the Oslo Accords was revealed. In the column, Shapiro expressed a hope for peace, but recognized that a Palestinian society steeped in political dysfunction and an unwillingness to accept Jewish sovereignty in any part of Israel made that dream unlikely. Shapiro’s essay was prophetic and has stood the test of time, but it was too much for Democrats to tolerate.
He was called “Genocide Josh” by detractors who launched a website and social media campaign to scuttle a Shapiro pick. Influential groups like the Democratic Socialists of America started organizing against him on the grounds that “Governor Shapiro is an outspoken supporter of the Zionist project in Palestine.”
The anti-Zionist purge of Shapiro took on distinctly antisemitic undertones. As Democrat activist and commentator Van Jones said on CNN: “But you also have anti-Semitism that has gotten marbled into this party…. How much of what just happened is caving in to some of these darker parts in the party?”
Shapiro tried to walk back his pro-Israel position, but it came across as groveling. To try to appease the baying mob, Shapiro did what many Jewish students on campuses feel compelled to do, to run from their deeply held beliefs.
But it was too late. Tim Walz, the far-left Governor of Minnesota, was substituted for Shapiro on the ticket in a last-minute decision. DSA claimed credit, and anti-Israel Democrats were ecstatic.
Democrats turning away from picking Shapiro is a green light to the anti-Zionist campus organizers. Groups like Students for Justice in Palestine are already building their fall campaigns and conducting training to drive Zionists off campus. The success in stopping Shapiro will encourage such efforts in every nook and cranny of campus life.
Democrats just gave anti-Zionists a win. It will be like blood in the water in a campus pool infested with anti-Israel sharks.
This fall, when Jewish pro-Israel students get to campus, expect them to face a tidal wave of hatred and violence. We can call it the Shapiro Effect.
[Featured Image: Columbia University]
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