Shine the Light on the Anti-Semitism in New York City

Alongside Anti-Semitism, ‘Occupy Judaism’

In a testament to the myopic quality of Jewish liberalism, a parallel movement known as Occupy Judaism (OJ) has sprung up amidst the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) protests in New York City and around the country. “We’re going global with this,” said Daniel Sieradski, a New York Jewish activist who took a lead role in organizing a Yom Kippur service close to the Occupy Wall Street protests. The myopia? Sieradski, along with his followers, is apparently oblivious to the historic reality that anti-capitalist movements have always had an element of anti-Semitism attached to them.

Hating Israel at New York University

The recent call by NYU’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) for TIAA-CREF to divest holdings in targeted companies doing business in Israel is part of a troubling trend that exposes dangerous radicalism on campuses disguised as efforts at achieving social justice. In 2010, for instance, student-led groups at both UC San Diego and UC Berkeley introduced initiatives to demonize Israel once again in the court of world opinion. One effort, disingenuously named “UCSD Divest for Peace,” was aimed at divesting university funds from U.S. companies which benefit Israel and which take a “non-neutral financial stance in the occupation of Palestinian territories.” The Berkeley initiative, endorsed by 41 student groups in March 2010 and cynically named “A Bill In Support of UC Divestment From [Israeli] War Crimes,” was promoted by a broader anti-Israel effort named the “U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.”