Hotspots of Antisemitism and Anti-Israel Sentiment on US Campuses | Seite 13

Hotspots of antisemitism and anti-Israel sentiment on US campuses

Anti-Israel Sentiment on Campus
Our examination of the campus climate for
Jewish students begins by looking at the
different ways anti-Israel sentiment is
experienced. Our 2015 survey found that
more than one quarter (27%) of Jewish
undergraduates felt that hostility toward Israel
was a “fairly” or “very” big problem on their
campus. The overall rate, however, masks the
substantial differences among campuses in
perceptions of hostility toward Israel. These
variations are the focus of the present study.
Hostile Environment Toward Israel
To understand differences in perception
across campuses, Jewish students were asked
to what extent they agreed that there was a
hostile environment toward Israel at their
school. Overall, 34% of respondents agreed at
least “somewhat” that there was a hostile
environment toward Israel on their campus.
But the range was extremely large, with as few
as 3% to over 70% of students at a given
campus agreeing that there was a hostile
environment toward Israel on their campus
(Figure 1, page 8). At one extreme are schools
including Northwestern, Texas, CUNYBrooklyn, the other UC campuses, and BU,
where at least 60% of respondents agreed at
least “somewhat” that there was a hostile
environment toward Israel on their campus.
At the other extreme, fewer than 10% of
respondents at Tulane, Syracuse, or Miami
expressed any agreement that there was a
hostile environment toward Israel on their
campus.
Exposure to Hostile Remarks Toward Israel
To understand the prevalence of exposure to
anti-Israel sentiment on campus, students
were asked whether, during their time at their
school, they had ever heard hostile remarks
toward Israel either from students, faculty, or
their school’s administration. Most of the
hostile remarks toward Israel originated with

fellow students—overall, 43% reported
hearing hostile remarks about Israel from
fellow students and 15% reported hearing
such remarks from professors or the
administration at their school. As was the case
with general perceptions of hostility, there are
significant differences between schools in the
degree to which respondents have heard
hostile remarks about Israel, and these
differences are especially large with respect to
remarks from faculty and the administration
(Figure 2, page 9). In particular, at CUNYBrooklyn, Illinois, UCSB, other UC schools,
Northwestern, UMass, UCLA, and Texas
more than one in five Jewish students
reported having heard hostile remarks toward
Israel from faculty or the administration at
their school. In contrast, at UCF, Syracuse,
and U of Miami, fewer than 5% of
respondents reported hearing such remarks
from faculty or administrators.

Being Blamed for the Actions of the Israeli
Government
The line between anti-Israel sentiment and
antisemitism can be blurred, at times, when
criticism of Israel is directed at Jewish
students. To understand the extent to which
Jewish students are directly targeted on issues
related to Israel, respondents were asked how
often, if at all, they have ever been blamed for
Israel’s actions because they are Jewish (Figure
3, page 10). Overall, 12% of respondents
reported that they were blamed for the actions
of the Israeli government at least
“occasionally.” There were significant
differences between schools both in terms of
prevalence of ever being blamed and in the
frequency of the occurrences. Many of the
schools perceived as having a hostile
environment towards Israel—such as
Northwestern, Texas, CUNY-Brooklyn, and
schools in the UC system—also had high
percentages of students report being blamed
for Israel’s actions because they were Jewish.

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