Jewish students form safety escorts at Colorado school to defend against potential anti-Semitic violence
The ‘Jews for DU’ group said it will work to keep Jewish students safe on campus.
‘We don’t feel protected by campus security, so our goal is to come together and sort of be that safety and security for each other and step up and keep ourselves safe,’ said a representative.
Jewish students at a Colorado school have created a special group to provide protection against potential anti-Semitic violence.
“Jews for DU” was formed at Denver University because “there’s a huge frustration among a lot of us Jewish students and we feel a bit abandoned by the administration. We don’t feel protected by campus security, so our goal is to come together and sort of be that safety and security for each other and step up and keep ourselves safe,” according to a representative from the group.
The purpose of the organization is to also give Jewish students safety escorts to ensure they do not have to walk through campus alone in potentially unsafe conditions, and members of the group will have pepper spray as a safety measure.
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DU is not the only Colorado school that found itself embroiled in what some see as rising anti-Semitism.
Anti-Israel activists set up a tent encampment on April 25 on the Auraria Campus, which is shared by the Community College of Denver, Metropolitan State University of Denver, and University of Colorado Denver.
The protest, which involved hundreds of demonstrators, saw students chanting messages such as “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” – which the Anti-Defamation League has said is an anti-Semitic slogan used by “supporters of terrorist organizations such as Hamas.”
University officials pointed out potential public health issues with the encampment, with one spokesperson saying: “Human waste on or around the quad has been observed as a result of poorly maintained, temporary bathroom facilities that the protesters have illegally placed on the quad.”
The spokesperson also noted that the camp featured a growing “homeless population on the quad, amongst the protesters.”
The anti-Israel activists eventually ended their protest on May 18. The university wrote: “We hope this will end more than three weeks of unauthorized occupation that has increasingly escalated into dangerous activities, taken significant time, resources, and dialogue with student protesters to resolve, and has pulled us away from our academic mission and goals.”
Jewish students have cited concerns about anti-Semitism and safety in numerous other schools as well.
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On May 20, Jewish students sued Northwestern University for not taking effective action to defend Jews during anti-Israel protests.
On May 13, Jewish students at Haverford College in Pennsylvania sued the school for “maintaining — and even supporting — a hostile environment for Jews.” Their lawsuit claimed they faced “pervasive stigmatization, harassment, and bullying campaigns,” and alleged that one Jewish student said they heard others on campus claim that “Jews exaggerate the Holocaust.”
Campus Reform has contacted the University of Denver for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.