On December 11, US President Donald Trump signed the Executive Order on Combating Anti-Semitism in a move to safeguard Jews from discrimination on university campuses
The Anti-Defamation League reportedly recorded 201 anti-Semitic incidents on campuses in 2018 and identifying these atrocities was a much-needed and widely demanded move from the White House–but is this particular order the right way forward?
The order calls upon Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, which allows for the federal government to withhold funds from universities and colleges that are deemed to be incapable of protecting people based on their colour, race, or nationality. The inclusion of Jews as a group under Title VI gives credence to the acknowledgement of Judaism as moving beyond a religious identity to become a racial and national identity.
There is an inherent complication of including Jews as a racial and national identity under a Civil Rights Act. On one hand, many Jews consider themselves to be a distinct race and nationality due to how they were treated historically. But, on the other hand, there has been a longstanding sensitivity among American Jews for being treated as foreigners or foreign supporters in their own homeland.
Through the decades and across the political spectrum, American Presidents have always considered their position on Israel as something of fundamental importance to American Jews. But, Trump has, time and again, equated the Jewish identity as being an Israeli one by propagating the idea that his pro-Israel policies directly serve the interests of American Jews.
In an April speech to the Republican Jewish Coalition in Las Vegas, the President even referred to Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu as “your” Prime Minister. Statements like these have drawn stark criticism from Jewish communities as they perpetrate an anti-Semitic stereotype of Jews being guilty of dual loyalty to the US and Israel.
According to Halie Soifer, Executive Director of the Jewish Democratic Council of America, Trump has constantly been anti-Semitic and rallied his campaigns around these tropes. Soifer points out certain instances of this–in a 2015 address to a group of Jewish Republicans, Trump said, “you're not going to support me because I don't want your money." His 2016 campaign ad was also condemned by the Anti-Defamation League and other Jewish groups for its anti-Semitic imagery.
In this regard, the new order seems to codify the dual loyalty stereotype, ignoring the significant history of Jewish tradition and identity that precedes the State of Israel and the lived experiences of American Jews who have fought hard to be recognized as fully white and fully American. It also puts Jewish identity at risk as it highlights it as nationally and racially distinct at a time when white nationalists are echoing the same worldview to carry out heinous crimes against Jews.
Further, Trump has incorporated the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA)’s definition of anti-Semitism. Under this definition, any support for self-determination that is against the self-determination of Jews–like supporting the self-determination of Palestinians–is considered to be anti-Semitic. It also adds that “criticism of Israel similar to that levelled against any other cannot be regarded as anti-Semitic”; groups like the American Civil Liberties Union have opposed this on grounds of it being too vague and broad.
The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) activist movement, which is aimed at pressuring the Israeli administration to change its policies towards Palestine, has widespread support on American campuses. The new order threatens it by quashing students’ freedom of expression in protesting the current Israeli regime. The Anti-Semitism Awareness Act, which was introduced in 2016, also stalled in Congress since it was deemed to be threatening to academic environments and an impediment to critical thought and discussion, mandating the support of political positions that must be openly debated.
Yousef Munayyer, Executive Director of the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, says “... many Israeli apartheid apologists, Trump included, are looking to silence a debate they know they can’t win.” Even Rabbi Daniel G Zemel who leads a Reform congregation in Washington said, “This is deeply objectionable, going back centuries in anti-Semitic thinking.”
As a businessman, Trump’s personal financial disclosures have revealed a conflict of interest in his support for Israel, where he is involved in different capacities with four Israel-based beverage companies bearing the Trump name, apart from investing heavily in other businesses. This is perhaps why he has such a firm stance against the BDS movement.
By codifying an assumption that Jews are naturally bound with the Biblical nation of Israel and considering this nation to be synonymous with the present Israeli State, the Trump administration has turned Judaism and Jewish identity into a monolith. This is a move to appease the orthodox and the evangelicals–a significant chunk of Trump’s voter base–who have been demanding a Biblical approach to foreign policy. These groups have also come out in support of the order, lauding the President for his efforts.
In October 2018, the Jewish Electorate Institute conducted a poll which found that around 74% Jewish Americans intended to vote for the Democrats in the 2018 midterms. According to exit polls, 79% Jews voted for Democrats in November–an 8% increase since 2016. What is more interesting is that 68% of Jewish voters identified themselves as Democrats in the same poll. This new move cannot be delineated from Trump’s efforts to poach this voter base.
In just one term, Trump has also managed to reverse decades of US foreign policy by recognizing Israeli settlements in Golan Heights as legitimate, withdrawing American support for the two-state solution to the Palestinian conflict after meeting with Netanyahu, and recognizing Jerusalem as the “true capital” of Israel by shifting the American embassy there. He has also insinuated that withdrawing from the nuclear deal with Iran was done in the interest of Israel.
The order also coincides perfectly with Israel’s own far-right politics that have been endorsed by Trump through his support for Netanyahu. It directly supports Israel’s 2018 Nation-State Law, which asserts “Jewish settlement as a national value” and considers the right to national self-determination as one that is only unique to the Jewish populace. This has rendered people of Palestinian origin–who make up for almost 20% of the Israeli demography–as second-class citizens. It also explicitly destroys the basis for an independent Palestinian state and rules out any possible shared governance between Israelis and Palestinians.
Hence, the adoption of the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism and the ability of this order to censor pro-Palestine advocacy on US campuses is a firm political statement by the Trump administration to bolster the crackdown on pro-Palestinian groups on American campuses. It is difficult to view the order as separate from foreign policy and Trump’s personal vested interests in Israel.
Earlier this year, The US Department of Education (DoE) ordered the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University to reform their joint Middle Eastern Studies program, accusing the current curriculum being too “biased”. A federal complaint has already been filed against Columbia University under the basis of the order, on the allegations that a professor endorsed Hamas on campus. Many other students have also come out with their experiences of being marginalized at Columbia due to their Jewish identity. It would be unfair to say that the order has been unsuccessful in bringing to light the unspoken and rampant anti-Semitism on campuses.
But it can also pave the way for the DoE to suppress campus groups and cut programs that teach alternate perspectives and scholarship that does not conform to new American foreign and domestic policy. While it is important that faculty on campuses be sensitive in their approach, there is also a dire need for critical thought and discourse in universities that break from administrative agenda. Rather than imposing financial sanctions on universities that force censorship, there should be a heavier check on the pedagogy being used to disseminate sensitive information and conduct healthy debates on campuses. Internal complaints committees that specifically deal with this issue can be set up as well.
Complaints from Jewish students have mostly centred around hostile treatment from peers and faculty that equate their religious identity with the actions of the State of Israel. Has an order that intrinsically stems from the same belief really been made in their interest?
Reference List
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Butler, J. (2019). Trump Elevates an Anti-Semitic Slur Into Law. Retrieved 26 December 2019, from https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/12/21/trump-elevates-an-anti-semitic-slur-into-law/?fbclid=IwAR3ClCepm8ph04uz07TiOmbvEsFPQ6vuYatFq-nRlxy6NiimPdHRUEHvk0A
Dias, E., Haberman, M., & Durston, E. (2019). Trump’s Order to Combat Anti-Semitism Divides Its Audience: American Jews. Retrieved 26 December 2019, from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/12/us/politics/trump-anti-semitism-jews.html
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Soifer, H. (2019, Mar 22). Trump's weaponization of anti-semitism. Baltimore Jewish Times, 367, 10-11. Retrieved from https://www-lib-uwo-ca.proxy1.lib.uwo.ca/cgi-bin/ezpauthn.cgi?url=http://search.proquest.com.proxy1.lib.uwo.ca/docview/2208612186?accountid=15115
The Oval Office. (2019). Executive Order on Combating Anti-Semitism. Washington, DC: The White House.
Tuchman, S., & Klein, M. (2019). Trump’s EO against campus antisemitism should be applauded, not disparage. Retrieved 26 December 2019, from https://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Trumps-EO-against-campus-antisemitism-should-be-applauded-not-disparaged-611753
Wisse, R. (2019). Opinion | Why Trump’s Protection Leaves Jews Confused. Retrieved 26 December 2019, from https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-trumps-protection-leaves-jews-confused-11577045388
Zank, M. (2019). POV: Trump’s Executive Order Aimed at Protecting Jews Will Have a “Chilling Effect” on Freedom of Speech at Colleges. Retrieved 26 December 2019, from https://www.bu.edu/articles/2019/pov-trumps-executive-order-aimed-at-protecting-jews-will-have-a-chilling-effect-on-freedom-of-speech-at-colleges/
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