Opposition to the sand-glassing of Gaza by Israel is not encouragement of harassment. Nor am I aware of any substantial number of students encouraging the harassment of Jewish students. A shocking number of student groups claimed something akin to "Israel brought [this attack] upon itself," which, while somewhere between tone deaf and despicable is also not encouraging harassment.
On the other hand, you do have legitimate harassment of the people who made these statements. [1]
A shocking number of students openly support Hamas and like to chant "from the river to the sea ..." and that just at the surface level. If you look at say UCLA things are far more grim than posting "tone deaf" msgs.
You are conflating use of the phrase "from the river to the sea..." with support for Hamas. The phrase has been used in many ways, and depending on the context, could have different meanings:
Benjamin Netanyahu himself was using a map that espoused a "river to the sea" vision of Israel at the UN. [1] A different version "between the Sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty" was a founding ideological tenet of Israel's Likud party (which Netanyahu represents), though it has subsequently been dropped. [2][3]
The "river to the sea" slogan is deeply poisoned and has been used by every conceivable bad actor, from west bank settlers and supporters of a "Greater Israel" to Hezbollah, and all points between. It is reasonable for people hearing that slogan to assume the worst.
That doesn't mean people who use it are per se antisemitic (or per se Kahanist). But it does obligate its users to explain themselves, and when you're explaining you're losing. Everybody would be better off abandoning those words.
>It is reasonable for people hearing that slogan to assume the worst.
Hard disagree. I do not think it reasonable to assume that an American college student chanting "from the river to the sea" is advocating for Jewish genocide. I think a more reasonable interpretation would be one of anti-Israeli excess in their response to the attacks of October 7. To quote from source [3] above:
"'The phrase ‘Palestine will be free from the river to the sea’ suggests a vision of the future without a Jewish state, but it does not answer the question of what the role of Jews would be,' said Peter Beinart, a professor at the City University of New York. He added that the meaning of the phrase, however, 'depends on the context.'
'If it’s coming from an armed Hamas member, then yes, I would feel threatened,' said Professor Beinart, who is Jewish. 'If it is coming from someone who I know has a vision of equality and mutual liberation, then no, I would not feel threatened.'"
Assuming the worst ignores the context of who is saying it.
>That doesn't mean people who use it are per se antisemitic (or per se Kahanist).
100% agree.
>Everybody would be better off abandoning those words.
It would certainly make these discussions and protests less inflamed!
On the contrary, I think a great many pro-Palestine activists are inadvertently advocating for exactly that; that the chant, to them, implies that the Levant be restored to the control of non-Jewish Palestinians, and that Jewish interlopers lose that control. It's part of a very common perspective on Palestine that suggests Jewish Israelis are ethnically white European "settler colonists", which is false.
If you believe that Jewish Israelis could, in the worst case, just go back to Poland, then the "river to the sea" stuff seems more benign than it actually is.
As is so often the case, the effect of those words on the listener is important; if not as important as the intent of the speaker, it is at least worth consideration --- especially when, as in this case, the people saying it are literally advocating for an ethnic cleansing of their own, one they don't realize might also be a step towards genocide.
All this just back to my point that the "river to the sea" stuff is poisonous. If you're a slogan that both Hamas and the Kahanists use, something has gone terribly wrong.
The fact that your and my interpretation of the modal meaning of "from the river to the sea" when chanted by American college students is so divergent points to the problem with "assuming the worst."
I agree that the phrase is poisonous, but I don't ascribe genocidal intent to the hypothetical modal speaker of it without knowing exactly who that speaker is. Consider it from a Bayesian standpoint: even if you test positive for a rare condition, the likelihood is overwhelming that the positive is a result of test error, and not actually having the underlying condition. Supporting genocide is exceedingly rare, thus is it not likely that someone who uses the phrase "from the river to the sea" should have the worst assumed about them. Perhaps your prior belief is different, and you think that support for genocide is common?
I think I have two things to contribute to this thread:
1. The observation, after going and looking it up a week ago, that the slogan is associated with not just Hezbollah and Hamas but also the Kahanists.
2. The observation that people of good will have and continue to a "decolonization" narrative that posits the dispossession of Israeli Jewish people as a kind of restorative justice, based on the terribly broken premise that Israeli Jewish people are all descendants of settler colonists. They largely are not that, and advocacy for blanket dispossession for those people can reasonably be seen as genocidal. Israelis are not moving back to Yemen.
You can hard disagree, but there are polls showing pretty wide spread support for specifically Hamas among students especially at elite UCs. The goals of Hamas are articulated pretty clearly so as comforting as it is to pretend they don't mean it in the bad way a very decent percentage literally do mean it. If you honestly believe they don't mean it do a fun experiment stand with say flag of Israel on UC Berkley or UC LA campus and than with flag of Hamas or Isis see the reaction you get. Or not even Israel flag just US flag.
>There are polls showing support specifically for Hamas not for Palestinian liberation cause among students.
to
>there are polls showing pretty wide spread support for specifically Hamas among students especially at elite UCs.
Cite some evidence. I have found one poll that addresses the question of Hamas support among college students, and it does not support your claims at all. Furthermore, it was an online survey, which typically suffer from pretty poor methodology and selection bias, so I think the poll itself[1] should be ignored, despite the fact that it undermines your argument. The relevant question and response (n=609):
>How much do you sympathize with…
>Israeli civilians: A lot (49%) A little (23%) Not sure (16%) Not Much (9%) Not at all (4%)
>Palestinian civilians: A lot (65%) A little (17%) Not sure (13%) Not Much (3%) Not at all (2%)
>Israeli government: A lot (9%) A little (17%) Not sure (27%) Not Much (22%) Not at all (24%)
>Hamas: A lot (9%) A little (13%) Not sure (36%) Not Much (13%) Not at all (29%)
This does not show "wide spread support" for Hamas. It shows less support for Hamas than for the Israeli government. The overwhelming majority are against Hamas, by a roughly 3-to-1 margin. It's hard to even claim that this is a representative sample, due to its online nature.
You just posted it. 22% is widespread. If we are talking about people chanting slogan at a rally the 25% that support Israeli government obviously did not take part in it. So of those chanting it at a rally at the very least 30% literally mean it and up to half mostly mean it. It's also not far fetched that the more militant you are the more likely you to attend a rally in the first place. So those numbers get skewed higher. There is obvious correlation between how far left you and how likely you are to support Hamas. So in a place like UC Berkley support obviously scewes higher. But even if we ignore the scew if some university had student body where 9% supported KKK a lot and 13% supported it somewhat. And they had regular rallies with racist chants I would hope that this would be considered problematic by you and too wide spread to ignore.
Netanyahhu is student or professor at elite US university? There are jewish students marching with Israeli flags chanting "from the river to the sea Isreal will be free" on campuses? Would equivalent behavior be allowed toward any other group on campus?
I guess you and I see different things: I see people protesting Israel's response to Hamas' attacks of October 7th. You seem to see harassment of Jewish students. I don't think we will ever close that gap.
So in your opinion "From the river to the sea ..." is just a protest slogan ? There are polls showing support specifically for Hamas not for Palestinian liberation cause among students. It's very high. The Hamas goals are articulated very clearly. It's comforting to pretend it's just to support Palestinian cause but it's def not just that.
On the other hand, you do have legitimate harassment of the people who made these statements. [1]
[1] https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2023/11/19/doxxing-truck-targ...