DV Journal

The latest TikTok dustup made me realize that the newest iteration of an alphabet generation–I think it’s now up to Z, although given the acronym for sexual minorities and how that expanded beyond LGBT, we could be out of Aramaic characters–are not serious people. They are ignorant of history, preoccupied with irrelevant things like pronouns and however many “spirits” they have, and are just incredibly annoying.

Before I really get into it, a caveat: I am four decades removed from those halcyon years when you don’t need to pay for your rent, your food, your tuition, or the consequences of your actions. I myself was a rather tame young woman who could run for political office without worrying that some scandal of her past would frustrate those efforts. The worst thing I ever did was kick a horse after bucking and throwing me onto the very hard soil of northern Montgomery County. Believe me, Bluebell deserved it.

So perhaps I am not objective when I say that the vast majority of these kids are pampered and pretentious little darlings who play at human rights activism in the same way they used to play with their Barbie dolls: It’s a diversion, more than anything else. And when they are actually presented with a true human rights crisis, they can’t understand why anyone would disagree with their take on the topic.

Which brings me back to TikTok. The intrepid independent journalist Yashar Ali shed light on a bizarre phenomenon that started in the past few days, only weeks after a group of bloodthirsty Palestinian terrorists massacred 1,200 innocent Jews in cold blood. We’ve already seen how some of these Gen Z darlings have screamed out their antisemitism through the streets of large cities, showing solidarity with Hamas when they weren’t ripping down the posters of missing, kidnapped Israeli babies.

We’ve read the letters that they have signed onto, pledging support for the erasure of Israel and the annihilation of its inhabitants “from the river to the sea.” We have even seen them suggest that Israel is lying about how many people were killed and that this was just some psyops to allow it to commit a “genocide” against the Palestinians in Gaza.

But what Yashar Ali uncovered is even worse than these repellent displays of inhumanity. There is now a trend on TikTok of American youth urging their comrades to read Osama Bin Laden’s “Letter to America” because they find it both elucidating and wise. We are talking about the same Bin Laden who orchestrated the massacre of 3,000 Americans on 9/11. It is true that most of these kids were either infants or weren’t even born when the Twin Towers came down almost a quarter century ago.

But that is absolutely irrelevant. I was born exactly 20 years, minus three days after Pearl Harbor, and I understand everything that happened, every aspect of the attack by Japan, every reason why we were pulled into World War II, and even why it was necessary to drop the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I know all of this because I studied history, a history that is apparently no longer taught in some schools.

These children, who find value in Bin Laden’s words, would be laughable if this weren’t such a horrific commentary on the quality of those who will lead us into the future. They absorb the hateful rhetoric of an Islamist who despised the United States because it somehow validates their hatred of Israel, their innate antisemitism, and their disgust with their native land.

And instead of understanding that Bin Laden would have strangled the breath out of anyone who actually used “pronouns” and raised that increasingly mottled rainbow flag, they think he has lessons to teach and accomplishments to emulate.

To say that I am disgusted with these children is an understatement. I passed “bemusement” a long time ago, well before 1,200 Jews were assassinated simply because of who they were. I mocked the trans activists who whimpered and whined about the cruelty of a world that didn’t understand their viscous form of “gender fluidity.” I laughed.

But I’m not laughing now. I am repelled and disgusted, and I truly hope that him/his and she/her figure out what the hell is going on before they find themselves on the wrong side of a genocide.

At a recent congressional hearing on antisemitism at elite U.S. colleges, terrorism expert Dr. Jonathan Schanzer called the University of Pennsylvania “probably the worst campus I’ve seen.”

In response to questions from U.S. Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Bucks), Schanzer said, “It is embarrassing to me, as a son of Philadelphia and as a Jew, to see this happening. It is unbelievable that it’s happening in America, for that matter.”

And now the U.S. Department of Education Office of Civil Rights (OCR) is opening an investigation into the University of Pennsylvania’s handling of antisemitic and Islamophobic occurrences on its campus.

Jewish organizations were worried by UPenn’s decision to welcome the Palestine Writes Festival just before Yom Kippur and near a building where Jewish students were going to pray. Among the speakers at the Palestine Writes Festival was noted antisemite Roger Waters of Pink Floyd fame.

The Hillel building was then vandalized by a person yelling antisemitic slurs.

In the wake of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Hamas terrorists, the situation has gotten worse, Schanzer said.

“You have a speaker at Penn against the occupation, a rally praising Hamas for a job well done on 10/7. We have at Penn’s AEPi house, someone scribbled the message ‘Jews are Nazis.’ The Hillel was broken into. The Chabad was vandalized. A swastika was drawn on an academic building. We’re watching protests where they’re calling for Palestine from the river to the sea. This is calling for the destruction of the State of Israel. They’re calling for an intifada, a violent uprising. There’s a vigil and a walkout to honor the Palestinian martyrs, those who are killed fighting against Israel. And then, finally, a faculty Senate statement was published that was really, I think, the end message was that the university should not cave to Jewish donors who are demanding change. This is unbelievable that it’s taking place at Penn. It’s unbelievable that it’s taking place in America, and it’s just a microcosm of what we’re watching across the country.”

Several prominent donors withdrew their funding from the university, and alumni wrote letters protesting the university’s lack of action to stop the antisemitic hate speech.

On Nov. 1, Penn President Liz Magill announced a task force to work on the problem, with increased security and education. She said steps would be taken to stop antisemitism.

On Nov.  8, holographic images with antisemitic slurs were projected on Penn buildings. Last week, signs appeared on benches around the Penn campus, similar to the signs with Israeli hostages, except the pictures were of cows.

Steve Silverman, a spokesman for Penn, sent this statement: “We have received the letter from the Department of Education and look forward to cooperating fully with the department. The university is taking clear and comprehensive action to prevent, address, and respond to antisemitism, with an action plan anchored in the National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism. President Magill has made clear antisemitism is vile and pernicious and has no place at Penn;  the university will continue to vigilantly combat antisemitism and all forms of hate.”

Penn is one of several universities around the country that the OCR is investigating for antisemitism, including Cornell University and Columbia University, after receiving complaints about alleged incidents of antisemitism and Islamophobia.

The investigations include five antisemitism cases and two Islamophobia cases.

As blowback from the Israeli/Hamas war continues to affect the U.S. some elected officials revealed their thoughts on social media, leading to controversy. State Sen. Nikil Saval (D-Philadelphia) protested with pro-Palestinian groups at 30th Street Station recently. And one of Saval’s staffers posted anti-Israel, pro-Hamas messages to social media.

Now a Colonial School Board member and a newly elected but unsworn Upper Dublin School Board member have both been called out for alleged antisemitic incidents.

After she said in a Facebook post that the Israeli Defense Force was a terrorist group and that their campaign against Hamas was genocide, Colonial School District residents were outraged. School Board Member Jamina Clay Ph.D. submitted her resignation and the board heard comments from an outraged public at a Thursday night meeting.

Although she has resigned from her elected suburban post, Clay remains an assistant superintendent in the Philadelphia School District, which released a statement saying that while they disagree with her comments, she has a First Amendment right to speak.

Clay posted an apology to Facebook: “Because of the pain that my post has caused, I have resigned from my seat on the Colonial School Board effective immediately. I understand that the district needs to heal from the painful words that I chose, and it is best to do that in my absence. The board is prepared to move forward and I hope that with me no longer occupying the seat, the community is able to do so as well…I apologize for the post that I made and I hope to learn from this situation. I will continue to pray for peace in the Middle East.”

The  board will vote on whether to accept Clay’s resignation next month.

The district issued a statement, that said in part, “Colonial School District prides itself on cultivating a sense of belonging. All our schools work hard each year to maintain their designations as No Place for Hate Schools as part of our partnership with the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), and take part in many other initiatives and programs meant to encourage equity, inclusion, and belonging. We condemn all forms of hatred and violence and remind all that we have counseling services available for anyone who may be struggling.”

“The work to cultivate a sense of belonging in our schools is ever-evolving and never truly complete. We continue this work in a spirit of kindness, empathy, and in the hopes of moving our district forward in a positive direction,” the sdistrict said.

Jamina Clay Ph.D.

A change.org petition with more than 2,00 signatures has been launched about Tricia Ebarvia, a newly elected Upper Dublin School Board member who ran as a Democrat.

Ebarvia posted to Facebook promoting a seminar that purports to teach the history of Israel and the Palestinians but is filled with inaccurate and antisemitic tropes. Among them are descriptions of Israel as a colonial power and references to  “ongoing genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians.”

Community members then launched  a change.org petition with more than 1,500 signatures, asking her to refuse to be sworn in and apologize to the Upper Dublin community.

Ebarvia’s post, made shortly after her election, encouraged Upper Dublin residents, students, and teachers to participate in the webinar entitled “Getting to the Root: Sharing Stories and Humanizing Palestine-Part 1”.

One of the speakers on the webinar (who Ebarvia follows on Instagram) is Sawsan Jaber. Jaber recently posted a message on X (formerly Twitter) referring to President Joseph Biden as “Genocide Joe.”

In another X post, Jaber, a teacher in the Chicago area, wrote, “Teaching Palestine is dismantling single story narratives that serve the purpose of justifying genocide and displacement funded by our American $$. You can’t be a social justice advocate and not advocate for Palestinians.”

The petition says, “In the Upper Dublin School District, we have a relatively large number of Jewish students, parents, teachers, staff, and administration members. The District is also home to a number of Israelis. The language identified in the webinar’s description and Ms. Ebarvia’s close association with those who are supporting the same is very concerning. The language is not only inaccurate and extremely hurtful to Jewish and Israeli people, but her associates’ comments about the United States should be distressing to all Americans.”

Jaclyn Ackerman signed the petition and wrote, “We thought we lived in this bubble called Upper Dublin, and this bubble is no longer a bubble. After seeing what has been going on in Jewish communities throughout the world, we need to stand up and not be silent in the face of ignorance. Never again is now!”

Another person who signed, Ryan Levinson, wrote, “It is absolutely disgusting that this is happening in UD–a place that has been very welcoming to Jews since I was born. I graduated from UD in 2019 and could not be more disappointed. It is sad knowing that an Upper Dublin school board member is stupid enough to fall for the propaganda and lies being pushed out by Hamas.”

“Ms. Ebarvia’s social media activities demonstrate a complete lack of judgment with and, worse, has essentially endorsed antisemitic propaganda that has no place in our community,” the petition states. It asks that Ebarvia not take the oath of office and apologize to the community.

Otherwise, it suggests her removal from the board will be sought.

Ebarvia, who works as a diversity, equity, and inclusion administrator at the Greene Street Friends School in Philadelphia, did not respond to requests for comment.

Upper Dublin School Board President Jeff Wallack released this statement: “It is not the Board’s position to comment on election matters or statements made by, or about, a community member recently elected to the Board, but not yet sworn in and seated. It is the Board’s position to comment that the mission of the School District is to provide the best educational opportunities and support to and for all students.  The Board and the District oppose anything contrary to that mission, including acts of hatred, bullying, and intolerance such as, without limitation, terrorism, antisemitism, and religious or cultural discrimination or intolerance of any type against members of any community.”

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Dave McCormick is calling out incumbent Sen. Bob Casey (D) over his past support for the Iran deal and his silence on new cash the Biden administration is allowing to go to the Islamist republic.

During a podcast interview with DVJournal, McCormick reiterated his support for Israel and its military response to the Hamas terrorist attack launched from Gaza.

“The attack on Israel was evil in its purest form, absolute barbarism,” said McCormick, who served in the U.S. Army’s 82nd Airborne Division during the Gulf War.

“And it’s been a test, really,” he said. “And that test, well, many have failed the test with moral ambiguity. You see that with college presidents (and) with some members of Congress. I think even Sen. Casey has been very weak on this compared to, ironically, Sen. (John) Fetterman, who has taken a much stronger stance.”

“So it’s really important that we stand tall with both the moral clarity of what happened and our support for Israel. And so we must support Israel. We support it with the intelligence, with military capability it needs, but also with moral clarity.

“In one form or another, there needs to be a path to support for Israel. And that support can’t be held up for any reason,” said McCormick.

He also assailed the ongoing protests and antisemitic incidents on college campuses around the country, including in the Delaware Valley.

“I think what’s happened on our college campuses since the horrific attack on Israel, the barbarism, (is) an eye-opener,” said McCormick. “I mean, it has been an absolute eye-opener. Because it’s been explicit antisemitism. But more than that, it’s been a reflection of the fact that American institutions of higher education, the Ivy Leagues in particular, but generally speaking, have lost their way.”

He added, “The lack of moral clarity on the difference between right and wrong, the difference between merit and not merit. The difference between America and the exceptional contribution it’s made to the world, the uniqueness of America, with all its faults, which is still undeniably the greatest country in the history of the world in terms of bringing people out of poverty.

“The lack of clarity on that, the hijacking of all that’s great about our country, I mean we saw it all. It’s not just the antisemitism. Of course, the antisemitism is horrific and indefensible. But it’s part of a broader thing where all the basic assumptions about what made our country and our society the greatest in the world are under siege,” said McCormick.

“And so I hope that this terrible turn of events, we can have some good happen,” said McCormick. “Which is, you see a lot of people, people in the finance community, people in general, a lot of Jewish Americans pulling back and saying, ‘Oh my Lord, I want no affiliation with what I’m seeing. Those are not my people.’ And I think this is showing a huge division within the Democratic party…

“What person who is a clear-thinking person could look at those people protesting and chanting ‘Death to Israel’ and say, ‘Those are the people that are in my party.’ So, this is hopefully an inflection point of a recalibration of our institutions of higher education. I’d like to see some people get fired, to be honest with you.”

Asked if that includes University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill, who has been criticized as slow to act as antisemitic incidents on campus mounted, McCormick replied, “Of course. Anybody who showed in this moment of crisis that they couldn’t step up and be clear about good and bad, evil versus not evil, I think is not qualified to lead.”

The Philly Palestine Coalition is calling for a boycott of ‘Zionist’ owned businesses in the Philadelphia area. In particular, the anti-Israel organization is targeting restaurants owned by Steven Starr because a spokesperson posted a message supporting Israel after the Oct. 7 terrorist attack.

The Coalition’s Instagram post targeting the Starr Restaurants mistakenly attributed a statement by a business associate of Steven Starr to the restaurant company’s spokesperson.

“This attack is not just against Israel but against all Jewish people,” it said. “Hamas is an enemy of Christians, Hindus, minorities, LGBTQ, atheists, people of color, and anyone who differs from their extremist idealist ideology that all Jews must die. We all have skin in the game and must show our support for Israel.”

However, a spokesperson for Starr Restaurants did condemn the attack: “The horrific acts carried out by Hamas against the Israeli and all Jewish people are indefensible and barbaric.”

In response, the Philly Palestine Coalition urged supporters to boycott the Starr restaurants and offered a list.

“Supporting BDS [Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions] as a personal practice is both an easy and effective way to support Palestinian Resistance, no matter where you are in the world,” the group wrote. “We are working on compiling a comprehensive list of Palestinian-owned and anti-Zionist aligned establishments in a matter that also ensures safety for business owners.”

The Coalition has also been leading protest marches in the city, including one on Oct. 8 in which participants appeared to celebrate the massacre.

“What happened yesterday was freedom fighters fighting for freedom,” one speaker said. Another added, “I salute Hamas for a job well done!”

Hams has been designated a terrorist organization by the United States government.

Michael Balaban, president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Philadelphia, and Jason Holtzman, director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, issued a statement responding to the targeting of the restaurants.

“The Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia condemns the Philly Palestine Coalition’s antisemitic campaign encouraging the boycott of ‘Zionist’ owned businesses in the Philadelphia area. This tactic does not in any way support Palestinians – it only serves to intimidate, isolate, and scapegoat Israeli and Jewish businesses.

Targeting businesses solely because of their Israeli and Jewish ownership is blatant antisemitism and only further contributes to the alarming levels of hate against Jews nationwide. No business should be villainized for rightfully condemning Hamas, a designated terrorist organization, whose purpose is to kill Israelis and Jews with no regard for Palestinian life.”

Barri Miller with the Jewish Business Network Philadelphia said, “I’ve seen a lot of posts about the boycott. It’s horrible.”

“I think all the Jewish community, after seeing that post, is reposting that on social media and saying that we need, as a community, to support those restaurants, for sure.”

She said her family is making reservations.

A spokesperson for the Starr restaurants did not respond to requests for comment.

A leader of the Philly Palestine Coalition is Philadelphia writer Nicki Kattoura, who is also involved with the Institute for Palestine Studies and the Resist Foundation. He was also a participant in the controversial Palestine Writes Literature Festival at the University of Pennsylvania, held on the eve of Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. Several antisemitic incidents occurred on the Penn campus afterward, leading donors, alumni, and students to demand that Penn President Liz Magill take a stronger stance against antisemitism.

On Wednesday, the university announced a plan to counter “hate” that includes Islamophobia. She noted the first Jewish student at Penn was Moses Levy in 1772, who later became the first Jewish trustee.

Penn will work to improve safety and security, engagement, and education, she said. She acknowledged the recent antisemitic incidents on campus.

“We recognize it is our collective responsibility as a community to stand clearly and strongly against antisemitism in all its odious forms. Penn has work to do,” Magill said. An Antisemitism Task Force was also formed.

FBI Director Christopher Wray testified Tuesday to the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, saying Jews make up 2.4 percent of the population but are the victims of about 60 percent of all religious-based hated crimes.

“We also cannot and do not discount the possibility that Hamas or another foreign terrorist organization may exploit the current conflict to conduct attacks here on our own soil,” Wray said.

University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill is once again facing criticism for her slow response to antisemitism on campus.

Michael Balaban, president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, and Jason Holtzman, director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, sent an open letter to Magill asking her to respond after antisemitic graffiti was found on Oct. 20 at Penn’s Alpha Epsilon Pi (AEPi) chapter house, which is known as a Jewish fraternity.

The graffiti read: “The Jews R Nazis.”

“The University of Pennsylvania’s swift condemnation of this graffiti is needed to show Jewish students that you are committed to ensuring their safety and well-being, especially at a time when it is being threatened nationwide,” the Jewish leaders wrote.

M. Elizabeth “Liz” Magill, president of the University of Pennsylvania.

“While we understand that the University’s Division of Public Safety is still investigating the incident as ’a potential hate crime,’ the wording used is irrefutably antisemitic and therefore deeply painful for Jewish students and their allies to witness.”

“A recent Hillel International survey reported that since the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel, 56 percent of Jewish students feel scared on campus, and 1 in 4 report that there has been an act of antisemitic violence or hate on their campus in the last 10 days,” they added.

There have been pro-Hamas demonstrations, including one where a Jewish student was injured, Holtzman said.

“Faculty at Penn have participated in those rallies and promoted them in their classrooms,” said Holtzman. “And that’s unacceptable behavior, too. And I think President Magill needs to show leadership and make it clear that Penn will not tolerate rallies that promote jihad and where Jewish students get assaulted, and Jewish students are told to go back to Berlin, to go back to Poland…That type of rhetoric is unacceptable for a campus or anywhere in our society.”

And, they noted, “The Secure Community Network (SCN) has reported an alarming uptick in antisemitic incidents concentrated on college campuses since Oct. 7. SCN received 94 antisemitic incident reports on college campuses, representing 15 percent of the total 614 antisemitic incidents logged across the country during the month of October.”

“We appreciate your commitment to better supporting Jewish students on Penn’s campus following the Palestine Writes Festival held on campus in September. However, as the university continues to consider its policies to effectively combat antisemitism on campus, we remind you how critical timeliness and consistency are to setting the precedent that antisemitism and hate have no place at Penn. Penn’s statement on this matter is necessary to ensure that Jewish students understand that they have your protection and support on campus,” the letter said.

As of Monday evening, Magill had yet to respond to the federation. And a Penn spokesperson did not reply to DVJournal.

Holtzman told DVJournal he has heard from Penn, Temple, and Drexel students who are afraid on those campuses.

Students have “expressed the real feeling of being under threat and not feeling safe on campus,” said Holtzman. They “are not comfortable speaking Hebrew on campus. They’re not comfortable wearing a Star of David on campus.”

And other students have also stopped wearing the hijab or veil, he said.

“Penn Hillel is horrified by the recent uptick in antisemitism on campuses – including Penn – and in many spaces around the country and world,” said Rabbi Gabe Greenberg, executive director of Penn Hillel. “We will continue to work closely with university leadership to ensure they understand the severity of this issue and that they act upon it to ensure that Jewish students feel safe and secure on campus. We are also in close contact with the students of AEPi so that we understand their needs and can help amplify their voice to the administration.”

When asked if he thought this would be “the new normal,” Holtzman said he hoped it is not a permanent situation.

“But I think it’s very clear that there’s been a great deal of antisemitism existing in our society, in our city for a long time,” said Holtzman. “And it doesn’t take much for people to show the worst of themselves.”

“The truth is that Israel is responding to a terrorist group that invaded their sovereign borders and massacred people, tortured people, raped and kidnapped people,” Holtzman continued. “And Israel is forced to respond to those actions on behalf of Hamas. We saw within less than 24 hours after the attack occurred on Oct. 7, there were protests and rallies already taking place throughout Philadelphia and on and off campus.

“So we know that the people who hold these deeply problematic and bigoted views are here. And it doesn’t take much for them to act.”

Holtzman added, “We have a lot of work to do in terms of education. Israel is not fighting against the Palestinian people, against the Muslim people. Israel is fighting a war against the radical terrorist groups, and had Hamas not done what they did on Oct. 7, there would be no war.”

In Israel, 300,000 people are now homeless, he added.

The Palestine Writes Literature Festival—featuring well-known anti-Israeli activists like rocker Roger Waters and cable news personality Marc Lamont Hill — kicked off on Friday at the University of Pennsylvania.

On Thursday, someone vandalized the campus Hillel and yelled antisemitic “obscenities,” according to reports.

In a statement, the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia said it has joined with the Anti-Defamation League’s Philadelphia chapter, which has been “privately urging University of Pennsylvania officials to publicly condemn the Palestine Writes festival since the middle of August.”

According to the Federation, “The conference includes multiple presenters with a history of spreading inflammatory rhetoric and antisemitism that go against the fundamental principles of academic integrity and respectful discourse. The impact of these narratives will create a hostile environment for Jewish students on campus, especially on the eve of the Yom Kippur holiday.”

Despite repeated requests from Jewish organizations and concerned students, however, Penn President Elizabeth Magill has declined to take any action regarding the festival.

As first reported by Jewish Insider, Penn President Elizabeth Magill cited “academic freedom” in her response to the Anti-Defamation League and declined to take any action. She also said the university is taking steps to support the Jewish community and combat antisemitism.

That did not satisfy critics, like a group of attorneys from the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law who wrote to Magill accusing her of a double standard on hate speech.

“It is apparent that the Festival has been ‘hijacked’ by controversial figures who espouse antisemitic rhetoric and call for the destruction of Israel,” they wrote. “Although Penn has faced mounting calls to take action against the antisemitism on full display at the Festival, your administration has refused to [act].”

They contrast that to UPenn’s willingness to “take action against speakers who traffic in hate against other minorities.”

Roger Waters

Among the scheduled participants in the festival are Waters, who has compared Israel to the Third Reich and recently wore a Nazi-style uniform while performing onstage in Berlin; Randa Abdel-Fattah, an Australian writer who recently called Israel “a demonic, sick project,” and  Marc Lamont Hill, a Temple University professor who was fired from CNN in 2018 for calling for a free Palestine “from the river to the sea” — a phrase many view as a call for the destruction of the Jewish state.

Jason Holtzman, director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, said the atmosphere on campus has inspired at least one act of violence.

“The Palestine Writes Festival has already emboldened antisemitism on Penn’s campus. Yesterday morning, a perpetrator ran into the Penn’s Hillel building, spewing antisemitic tropes and vandalizing the Hillel lobby,” Holtzman said. “The perpetrator has since been arrested. With student safety paramount, we encourage anyone on campus to report any incidents to the University of Pennsylvania police officials.”

ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt tweeted: “Yesterday the State of PA issued a Cease & Desist Letter to the organizers of the #PalestineWrites festival for their unauthorized use of a state logo, falsely claiming sponsorship. No surprise. Thanks to @GovernorShapiro for your swift action and courageous leadership.”

According to a report from Rabbi Gabe Greenberg, executive director of Penn Hillel, “At 6:55 a.m. (Thursday), before the building was formally opened, a member of the Penn Hillel community opened the door to come in for morning prayer services. As the door was opened, an unknown member of the Penn community ran into the building. He stayed for less than a minute, and while he was in the building, he knocked over several pieces of furniture while shouting antisemitic obscenities about Jewish people.

“Our staff chased him out of the building, where he was quickly apprehended by Penn Police. Penn Police had previously noted his presence as he had been knocking over trash cans on Walnut Street and acting erratically before entering our building,” Greenberg said.

No students saw the incident, and no one was hurt.

University spokesman Ron Ozio released a statement saying Penn Police “intercepted the individual at Steinhardt Hall (Hillel), where the individual was making offensive statements and overturning furniture.

“Penn Police determined the individual was experiencing a crisis and safely removed the individual and transported the individual for further evaluation.”

Officials noted another antisemitic incident had also occurred. At the Weitzman School of Design a group of students found a swastika painted on the wall of a painting spray booth. Penn administrators released this statement. 

Greenberg said the incident was not a random attack.

“This person did not accidentally choose to enter our building. He did not accidentally choose to shout antisemitic slogans. He chose our building. He chose to do so just three days before Yom Kippur. He chose to do so one day before a number of speakers are coming to campus who have histories of making antisemitic and hate-filled statements against Jews. This was not a coincidence.”

But Penn Hillel will not stop serving Jewish students.

“This past year, 3,000 undergraduate students stepped through our doors to attend classes, celebrate holidays, eat together, attend one of our many different prayer services, learn about Israel and its people, and experience all the joys of Jewish life that our vibrant campus community has to offer,” he said.

Hillel plans to hold a large Shabbat Together gathering as the three-day Palestine Writes Festival begins.

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Jewish leaders are asking the University of Pennsylvania to distance itself from a campus festival scheduled to overlap with Yom Kippur featuring speakers who espouse anti-Israel and antisemitic rhetoric.

With antisemitic incidents rising and Jewish students reporting bullying and discrimination on college campuses, Jewish students and organizations are raising concerns about the Palestine Writes Literature Festival.

In a statement, the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia said it has joined with the Anti-Defamation League’s Philadelphia chapter in “privately urging University of Pennsylvania officials to publicly condemn the Palestine Writes festival since the middle of August.

“The conference includes multiple presenters with a history of spreading inflammatory rhetoric and antisemitism that go against the fundamental principles of academic integrity and respectful discourse. The impact of these narratives will create a hostile environment for Jewish students on campus, especially on the eve of the Yom Kippur holiday,” it added.

Among the scheduled speakers is Roger Waters of Pink Floyd fame, an outspoken supporter of the “Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions” movement who has compared Israel to the Nazi Germany. Earlier this year, the U.S. State Department said Waters has “a long track record of using antisemitic tropes.” And it said a concert he gave recently in Germany “contained imagery that is deeply offensive to Jewish people and minimized the Holocaust.”

Also among the speakers is Noura Erakat, a Rutgers University professor who called Zionism a “bedfellow” to Nazism.

The news site Jewish Insider, which first reported on the controversy, said the festival would also include Marc Lamont Hill, who was fired from CNN after using the phrase “free Palestine from the river to the sea,” often viewed as a call for the destruction of Israel and the Jews who live there.

A group of Jewish students wrote a letter to Penn administrators about the festival, claiming the “co-sponsorship and partnership by four Penn departments make us, as students who take classes in those departments and are Jewish, feel less welcome, safe, and accepted, given the inclusion of these speakers.”

They added, “This event is at a particularly sensitive time for our community as it takes place right as Yom Kippur, the holiest day in Judaism, begins. On this day, Jewish students will be walking to services in Houston Hall, observing the holiday, and be noticeably Jewish and vulnerable on campus.”

Penn sent DVJournal a statement from President M. Elizabeth Magill, Provost John J. Jackson Jr., and Steven J. Fluharty, dean of the School of Arts and Sciences: “The Palestine Writes Literature Festival, a multi-day event featuring Palestinian writers, filmmakers, and artists, will take place on the University of Pennsylvania’s campus later this month. This public event is not organized by the university. As is routine in universities, individual faculty, departments and centers, and student organizations are engaged as sponsors, speakers, and volunteers at this conference intended to highlight the importance and cultural impact of Palestinian writers and artists.

“While the festival will feature more than 100 speakers, many have raised deep concerns about several speakers who have a documented and troubling history of engaging in antisemitism by speaking and acting in ways that denigrate Jewish people. We unequivocally — and emphatically — condemn antisemitism as antithetical to our institutional values.

“As a university, we also fiercely support the free exchange of ideas as central to our educational mission. This includes the expression of views that are controversial and even those that are incompatible with our institutional values,” he said.

Rav Shai Cherry, the chief rabbi at Congregation Adath Jeshurun in Elkins Park, said Susan Abulhawa, the executive director of Palestine Writes Literature Festival, “is using the old playbook. She does her cause no service by promoting speakers who seek the elimination of the one Jewish state in the world.”

“The Palestinians need to trade in their old playbook and stop condemning their own people to a life filled with indignities. Palestinians deserve better leadership. Alas, they are not getting it from those who seek to deny Jewish Israelis of what they seek for themselves—dignity, security, and peace,” Cherry said.

Rabbi Lance Sussman, author of the new book, “Portrait of an American Rabbi,” called it “a classic scenario where an outside group uses a university as a venue to give itself legitimacy and then have the university provide a defense in the name of freedom of inquiry.”

“However, a truly literary festival does belong on campus. I think Penn erred by scheduling the event on Yom Kippur and having the festival so physically close to Jewish worship services. Jewish pro-Israel students are thereby effectively blocked from protesting because of the holiday. It’s hard to reconcile the school’s claim of nobility of purpose with its (hopefully) logistical naivete.”

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Full disclosure: Like Whoopi, my mother’s maiden name was Goldberg. For all I know, we’re related.

I am saddened by the latest round of hate directed against Whoopi. I suppose if you’re putting yourself in the public eye, you should expect that every word you utter will be turned and turned again to detect even the slightest defect. Such scrutiny is even more reasonable when you are co-hosting a show in which sharing your view on contemporary issues is the focus.

Ms. Goldberg did not rise to fame for her political punditry. She did not pursue advanced degrees or engage in scholarly research. She’s funny. She’s an actress. I imagine such talents were front and center when she was invited to sit on a television set and opine about current events. Should we really expect nuance from a comedienne?

Last January, Whoopi spoke about the origins of the Holocaust being rooted not in race but in inhumanity. My credentials include advanced degrees and scholarly research. I spent years teaching university students about the Holocaust — entire semester courses where we discussed the roots, the process, and the consequences of the Shoah, the Hebrew term for the catastrophe that resulted in the murder of two-thirds of European Jewry, six million Jews, from 1940-1945. Whoopi was not wrong, and she is certainly not guilty of being an anti-Semite.

Anti-Judaism got the gussied-up name of anti-Semitism in 1879 by a German journalist who wanted to make Jew hatred sound less crass. Semites are not a race; Semitic languages, like Hebrew and Arabic, are spoken in North Africa and the Near East. By the Nazis’ definition, some of the most prominent Jew haters these days are Semites—Arabs. Does it make any sense at all to call some Semites anti-Semites? Modern scholars have discarded the hyphen in anti-Semitism to make the point that the term doesn’t mean what it was intended to convey.

When Whoopi said the Holocaust wasn’t about race, she was imprecise. For the Nazis, it was certainly about race. But, as Whoopi pointed out recently, why are we accepting the Nazis’ definitions and explanations? What, after all, is race?  For more than 30 years, scientists have been telling us race isn’t a scientific term. To use the jargon of social scientists, race is a “social construct.”

I remember this cover of Time Magazine (11/18/93) shining a light on the fuzzy borders of race. As I have come to learn, before World War II, Americans did not consider the Goldbergs, my mom’s family, to be White. After World War II, Americans had a change of view.  Or, at least, some did. That’s what Whoopi was talking about—perception.

Most Americans would ascribe whiteness to me.  I am of Ashkenazi descent—my grandparents were all born in Ukraine. Other American Jews, as well as roughly half of Israeli Jews, would not have whiteness ascribed to them, but they still would have been murdered by the Nazis and their legions of antisemitic sympathizers (including many Ukrainians). It may come as a surprise to Americans that by the early 1950s, the majority of Israelis had fled from countries in North Africa and the Middle East, spoke Arabic, and could fairly be described as Arab Jews.

One of the fascinating discoveries of the past decade was made by Sara Lipton.  In her book, “Dark Mirror: The Medieval Origins of Anti-Jewish Iconography,” she shows Jews were not depicted as looking any differently than their countrymen in medieval art until the 14th century. That’s why Jews had to wear identifying hats in earlier artistic depictions—so that Christians would know who was the Jew. The Spaniards, in their pursuit of “pure blood,” were instrumental in creating racial antisemitism by prohibiting descendants of Jews who had converted to Catholicism from holding political office. Given the anti-Hispanic sentiment among some Americans, it is ironic that the earliest racist legislation in Europe can be traced to 15th-century Spain.

There is no shortage of Jew haters. But to lump Whoopi Goldberg in that toxic mix is wrong headed and mean spirited. It’s also a distraction from those who truly are a threat to the Jewish community.

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On the eve of the Jewish holiday of Purim, the Greater Philadelphia chapter of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) released a 27-page report on incidents of antisemitism involving public officials and institutions in 2021.

Purim—a holiday commemorating Queen Esther saving the Jews in ancient Persia from a government official’s plot to kill them — is the perfect time to highlight the problem.

“We wanted to show people how bad it is,” said Steve Feldman, executive director of the Greater Philadelphia ZOA. “It’s not just minor nuisances. It’s pretty bad.”

The Delaware Valley Journal previously reported about two of the incidents. In one, anti-Israel content was posted on the website of the Free Library of Philadelphia, including a video of a library employee telling children “Zionism looks a lot like racism.”  Although the library’s director promised to end those antisemitic programs, they continued, the report said.

In another major incident, Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney issued an official proclamation in support of a pro-Palestinian Liberation Organization event on the first day of Hanukkah. The Israeli consulate in New York sent Kenney a letter asking him not to attend.

Other elected officials attended that Nov. 29 event, including three members of the city council, two state representatives, and one state senator—all Democrats, except one council member who belongs to the Working Families Party.

Kenney “did not include any Palestinian Jews in the event…It was the Jewish people who lived in the land in pre-state Israel for generations who were commonly known as ‘the Palestinians’…Through its actions, Kenney and the city erased this history, as well—even though there are Palestinian-Jews living in our region today,” the report said.

Also, Kenney and the other officials spoke in front of Palestinian Liberation Organization flags, even though the PLO has murdered and maimed thousands of Jews and hundreds of Americans.

Other incidents in the new report include the School District of Philadelphia allowing a student organization, the Muslim Students Association, with a decidedly anti-Israel/anti-Jewish record to have chapters in two high schools, Northeast and William W. Bodine. It also works closely with a cultural organization that has erased Israel from its maps of the Middle East and takes anti-Israel/anti-Zionist positions. The Black Lives Matter organization is a regular influence within the school system, according to the ZOA.  And BLM demonstrators have vandalized synagogues and Jewish-owned businesses, the report said.

A statement from the Philadelphia School District said, “The School District of Philadelphia is a culturally rich district with a diverse population of students and families. In our statement on anti-racism, we believe in, and will continue to cultivate, a system that addresses all forms of inequity. The School District of Philadelphia is committed to providing safe, healthy, inclusive environments that are free from all forms of discrimination and foster learning

“The school district recognizes that the discussion of certain topics can be highly charged. The district also recognizes that such discussions can help students learn to identify important issues, explore fully and fairly all sides of an issue, weigh carefully the values and factors involved, and develop skills for formulating and evaluating positions.​ ​However, such discussions should always be free of coercion or bias. The district further has a policy for investigating allegations of bias and discrimination, neither of which have any place in our schools.”

Also, a city-sponsored soccer tournament, the Unity Cup, designates “Palestine” as a country on a city website, although it is not a nation, the report noted.

And a city agency that helps newly-released prison inmates displayed on its website a Marxist organization’s article which attacked the Jewish state in an anti-Zionist screed laced with false allegations about Jews. After ZOA objected, the article was removed.

A city-owned Israeli flag was set ablaze, and the incident was recorded on video. One of the vandals was apprehended but was released without being charged. The Israeli flag has been vandalized two other times, in 2018 and 2016, the report said.

The report calls on the city to take steps to remedy and “counter Jew-hatred,” including at the library. It also calls for Kenney and other officials who took part in the pro-PLO event to apologize.

“Today, every synagogue, Jewish school, and Jewish community center must have sophisticated security systems to protect people, and most and perhaps all have armed security guards at all times or when there is an event or worship service. Jews have been murdered in synagogues, in Jewish businesses, and at holiday celebrations, and recently a rabbi and two congregants were held hostage in a synagogue.”

“There is no telling who in the community-at-large could be triggered by false accusations about the Jewish state and the Jewish people,” the report said.

A spokesperson for the City of Philadelphia did not respond to requests for comment.

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