BOOK REVIEW: Young Zionist Voices
The battle against anti-Semitism in higher education is far from over, but Jews are no longer content to simply stand by and be spat upon–or worse.
Young radicals trashed campuses in 2024 as part of their campaign against the Jewish state. For months, the nation’s colleges and universities saw day to day life disrupted by the anti-Israel activists who harassed and attacked Jewish students, spread anti-Semitic propaganda, glorified terrorism, and assaulted police officers.
Now, the recently published Young Zionist Voices presents the views of those on the other side of the campus divide: Jewish students and alumni steadfastly opposing the anti-Semitic “Campus Tentifada” and “classic schoolyard bully dynamics,” as Eylon Levy, a former spokesperson for the Israeli government, states in the Foreword to the book.
The book gathers a collection of essays from these “Gen Zionists,” as Levy terms them. As American-Israeli writer and Young Zionist Voices editor David Hazony writes in the Introduction, the book is meant to “give this emerging young leadership a voice.” These young voices share the feeling that “now is a time to fight. . . Zionism for them is no longer just a political-activist position; it is a central pillar of the Jewish future.”
The young Jewish activists featured in the book are not a monolith. They represent voices from across the political and religious spectrums within Judaism, and, as Hazony points out, many of the essays “contradict each other” in certain points. Yet their differences bring into focus what unites them: a strong Jewish identity, a burning love of Israel, and a desire to stand up to anti-Semitic bullies, all part of a mission that transcends their political and theological disagreements.
A common theme across the stories in the collection is how pervasive and virulent anti-Semitism is on campuses. Shabbos Kestenbaum, the Harvard University student who sued his school for its atmosphere of unchecked anti-Semitism, draws parallels between the current campus climate and Kristallnacht–the massive 1938 Nazi pogrom that murdered Jews and burned their businesses, homes, and synagogues to the ground.
Kestenbaum warns that the anti-Semitism in higher education is “how a Kristallnacht begins.” He writes:
“In my time at Harvard, swastikas were drawn in undergraduate dorms, a Jewish student was spat on, an Israeli student was asked to leave class because her nationality made classmates ‘uncomfortable,’ another Israeli was assaulted at the business school, a staff member taunted me with a machete and challenged me to debate the Jewish involvement in the 9/11 terrorist attacks, our hostage posters were defaced almost daily, and professors published antisemitic cartoons without facing discipline.”
Kestenbaum ends, however, with an optimistic note, claiming that his lawsuit shows that “Jewry is willing to defend itself,” and adding that more than 150 other Jewish students have also sued their schools where anti-Semitism ran rampant. Kestenbaum concludes that “[f]or the first time, Jewish students are unabashedly stating their values under oath and holding their institutions accountable.”
Harvard is not the only arena in this fight, however. Anti-Semitism has infected many other institutions, especially in the Ivy League.
Sahar Tartak, a Yale University undergraduate, shares Kestenbaum’s view of anti-Semitism. She believes that “among our classmates were the Nazis of today. . . . They want to see our family in flames–the same flames that produced Jewish ashes in Poland, ashes used to fertilize the fields.” Tartak believes that Jews should be aware of this evil–and that it should motivate them to reconnect with their Jewish roots instead of finding their ultimate refuge in other cultures.
Maya Platek, an Israel-born student at Columbia, writes that anti-semitism has “been so normalized, and morally justified, that the world is accepting this as a legitimate viewpoint.” Though opposition of the Israeli government does not immediately make someone an anti-Semitie, she points that often “criticism of the Israeli government and the ideology of Zionism serves as a convenient scapegoat for the hatred that runs deep around the world.”
Platek highlights the anti-Semitism she faced, including having a classmate telling her that Platek’s “being murdered by a terrorist would be a form of justice.”
She points out that “[w]hether it’s just Israelis or Zionists being depicted as animals on posters, they’re still the Nazi-era tropes that were once used to exterminate one-third of our people.”
Adela Cojab, a Zionist activist and New York University graduate, shows how Jews can stand up to the bigotry, harassment, and attacks they face on college campuses. Cojab filed the “first-ever Title VI Complaint against NYU”--prompting President Donald Trump to take action to include Judaism under Title VI protections.
Though New York University served as a hub of anti-Semitism–the university leadership even honored the notorious Students for Justice in Palestine–Cojab believes that Jewish students should not flee anti-Semitic colleges and universities.
Instead, Cojab believes that Jewish students should take courage from Israel’s existence as an “anchor for Jewish strength and identity” and choose to “stay and fight” instead of surrendering to the campus mobs.
The screaming anti-Semitic activists might seem like they have no influence. But Talia Bodner, a student who is part of a joint program between Columbia University and Jewish Theological Seminary, warns that, “if we don’t act now,” the anti-Semite students of today could become the leaders of tomorrow, with terrifying consequences.
A common refrain heard from many anti-Israel activists is that Israelis are “settler-colonialists.” They deny Jews’ historic connection to Eretz Yisrael–the land of Israel–by portraying Zionists as imperialists coming from abroad to dispossess indigenous natives.
A University of Michigan Diversity, Equity, and inclusion (DEI) staffer named Rachel Dawson, for example, was recently fired after it was discovered she allegedly made comments that Jews–whom she apparently called “wealthy and privileged” people who “control” the university–have “no genetic DNA that would connect them to the land of Israel.”
But Bella Ingber, a New York University Psychology student, would beg to differ.
Ingber states that Zionism and Judaism are inextricably connected. She mentions a trip to Israel in which she visited Biblical sites: “It seemed that no matter where I walked, where I looked, where I stood, the Jewish historical presence–both physical and spiritual–was there, irrefutable, supported by centuries of evidence.”
[RELATED: New report details ‘alarming’ rise in anti-Semitism on campuses]
After facing intense anti-Semitism at her school, visiting Israel meant she was “finally able to breathe” without worrying about anti-Semitic harassment. She sees Israel as the “manifestation of a two-thousand year longing of an indigenous people to return home.”
Julia Steinberg, a senior at Stanford University, also feels the same connection to the land.
Like Ingber, when she visited Israel and saw the Western Wall, one of the holiest sites for the Jewish faith, she felt a “sense of place and permanence and strength that I had never felt before.”
“The Jewish spirit is imbued within that land,” Steinberg writes.
Eyal Yakoby, a University of Pennsylvania alumnus and incoming Massachusetts Institute of Technology student, also raises concerns about anti-Semitism and Diversity, Equity, and inclusion (DEI), an ideology that he sees as “fueling” anti-Semitism. As seen through the lens of DEI, Jews are part of the “oppressor class” and are “immune to prejudice or injustice.” Those who are fighting for the Palestinians, however, are advocating for the “oppressed”--and thus, DEI tells us, are not guilty for their disruptive and harassing actions.
But vilifying Jews in this way is no different from pre-World War II German anti-Semitism, which also cast Jews as part of an oppressor elite.
“Rather than teaching virtue, many of our professors teach DEI, while neglecting antisemitism and dismissing Jewish concerns,” he concludes.
The writers of Young Zionist Voices paint a bleak picture, albeit one tinged with optimism. Yes, anti-Semitism is bad, pervasive, and ugly -and it is being legitimized. The battle against anti-Semitism in higher education is far from over, but Jews are no longer content to simply stand by and be spat upon–or worse. As the New Year begins, no one can be sure if 2025 will see anti-Semitic campus protests on the same scale as 2024. But one thing is certain: The future of Zionism is in the hands of a motivated and passionate new generation that is ready to fight back.
Editorials and op-eds reflect the opinion of the authors and not necessarily that of Campus Reform or the Leadership Institute.
