Opinion

It’s all about the Jews

OPINION PIECE BY ROBERT FESTENSTEIN

As a community we are very fortunate. We are protected by the state both by way of legislation through the Equality Act and in practical terms by the Government in general and largely the police in particular. Physical attacks against Jews or Jewish buildings are treated seriously and investigated accordingly. In other words, there is no tolerance for this sort of conduct.

Sadly, this does not apply to attacks on Israel or Zionism. Here the Israel haters are allowed to run amok. Whether it is on social media or on the streets, anything said about Israel is fair game. Apartheid, genocide, organ harvesting are regularly claimed as being practised by Israel and Israelis yet for reasons passing understanding, largely nothing is being done.

The IHRA definition captures all of the above lies so why are so many institutions unprepared to take any action. In particular we are at that time of year where Jewish students are deliberately targeted by the odious campus campaign known as Israeli apartheid week. Every year there are reports of deliberate intimidation of Jewish students and every year the universities wring their hands and say there is nothing they can do.

The excuses run far and wide including ‘the campaign is on the student union property so out of our jurisdiction’, ‘it’s about Israel not Jews so it doesn’t count as discrimination’ and perhaps the best (or worst depending on your point of view) is ‘we dont want to interfere with free speech’. Seriously? What utter nonsense. There is no doubt that if the Jewish society wanted to put on an event entitled ‘Palestinian Terror Week’ the uproar from the student bodies would ensure that the universities would find a reason to stop it happening.

It really is one rule for the Jews and another for everyone else. The result of all this is that Jewish students have voted with their feet as far as universities are concerned. Whereas 10 years ago the Manchester universities had between them about 1,000 Jewish students, the numbers now are a fraction of that, due largely to the attacks on Jews thinly disguised as anti-Israel criticism. The word ‘Jewniversities’ has entered our vocabulary as meaning those ‘safe’ institutions where Jews will not be expected to work and live in a hostile and intimidating environment.

It should not be left to the students to deal with this issue but oddly that is what has been happening. The standard approach has been that this is a student issue and so should be left to the Jewish student organisations - namely the Union of Jewish Students - to deal with this. So what is the answer? It is pretty simple really. Everyone needs to get involved, not just the students. There needs to be an awareness amongst the general Jewish community that the attacks on campus against Israel is everyone’s problem.

Israel Apartheid week is a well funded well organised campaign, and even though it might not be as universal as it once was. It still represents a hate campaign aimed at Jews, and aimed at instilling lies into the minds of non-Jewish students so they will carry forward that hate with them after they finish their degrees.

The mechanisms to complain are there, and we should be using them. Amnesty International is a charity so we should make representations to the charity commission. Universities are allowing Jew-hate to flourish so again, representations should be made to the Equalities and Human Rights Commission. These are just starting points, the key here is for all of us to understand that relying on a couple of communal organisations is not going to achieve what is needed, which is the eradication of Israel Apartheid week and the removal of charitable status from Amnesty International.

These issues affect us all, and we all need to get involved. Now.

The word ‘Jewniversities’ has entered our vocabulary as meaning those ‘safe’ institutions where Jews will not be expected to work and live in

a hostile and intimidating environment.HALF PAGE ADVERT JAN 2020:Layout 1 09/01/2020 16:04 Page 1

Robert Festenstein is a practising solicitor and has been the principal of his Salford based firm for over 20 years. He has fought BDS motions to the Court of Appeal and is President of the Zionist Central Council in Manchester which serves to protect and defend the democratic State of Israel.

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