Wearing a Palestinian keffiyeh on top of her robe, MIT class president Megha Vemuri centered her commencement address on attacks against Israel, saying that Israel was trying to “wipe Palestine off the face of the earth” and that MIT was complicit in Israel’s genocidal goals.

Pro-Israel and Jewish student activist Shabbos Kestenbaum recently posted a video of his 2024 Harvard commencement ceremony in which speaker after speaker discussed the war in Gaza and Palestine. The scenes in the video show a group of graduates in academic regalia, some holding signs and chanting.

The background features the Harvard Divinity School building. A student read from If I Must Die by Refaat Alareer, a Palestinian writer, poet, translator, university professor, and activist from Gaza. Another student featured in the video, Hannah Eliasson, advocated for Harvard to divest from Israel. 

New York University was forced to deny student-actor Logan Rozos his diploma after he lied about the speech his peers selected him to deliver at his graduation ceremony and violated the commitment he made to comply with NYU’s rules by expressing his personal and one-sided political views that were an attack on Israel. 

Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Simon Wiesenthal Center expressed concern over the anti-Israel rhetoric of these speeches: “When commencement speakers use their platform to vilify Israel with inflammatory language, it fosters an environment of hostility that targets Jewish students.”

A PRO-PALESTINIAN demonstration takes place at Columbia University, in New York City, last October, marking the first anniversary of the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023. (credit: Mike Segar/Reuters)
A PRO-PALESTINIAN demonstration takes place at Columbia University, in New York City, last October, marking the first anniversary of the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023. (credit: Mike Segar/Reuters)

Reasons not to be concerned over anti-Israel expressions on campuses

In a similar expression of concern, William Daroff, CEO of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, said, “These speeches often cloak antisemitism as anti-Zionism, creating a chilling effect for Jewish graduates who feel singled out and unsafe.”

While the language, vitriol, and dishonesty found in these speeches are disturbing and create hostile environments on many campuses, they don’t necessarily foreshadow a drop in support by Americans for Israel now or in the future.

This concern has been expressed by a few Jewish leaders, including former president Joe Biden’s special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism, Deborah Lipstadt, who said, “Anti-Israel sentiment on campuses, when it crosses into vilification, not only alienates Jewish students but also risks normalizing a narrative that could erode America’s longstanding support for Israel.”

THERE ARE multiple reasons anti-Israel college protests, encampments, and graduation speeches shouldn’t concern the pro-Israel community as harbingers of future erosion of American support for Israel.

First, only a statistically insignificant amount of university student presidents, valedictorians, and student-selected speakers become American leaders. In fact, the only examples I could find were president Richard Nixon, elected student body president at Whittier College, and former senator and secretary of state Hillary Clinton, class president at Wellesley College. 

A second reason not to be concerned over anti-Israel expressions on American college campuses is that data demonstrate that American college students, whether attending university in the 1990s or during this war in Gaza, consistently poll as anti-Israel. The same data show that as they evolve into the workforce and off the college campus, American students become more supportive of Israel.

This isn’t just an anecdotal observation; the polling data on American support of Israel over the past forty years has been consistent. A recent Harvard/Harris poll showed 77% of Americans support Israel over Hamas in the Gaza conflict. 

The disturbing images of the anti-Israel and pro-Hamas/Palestinian college encampments were revealed to be fake when the participants were shown to be mostly non-students and hired “protesters.”

The Wall Street Journal reported that at Columbia University, of the 112 people arrested at Hamilton Hall, 32 were not affiliated with the university, suggesting a significant non-student presence. At the University of California, Los Angeles, many of those arrested during the encampment clearance were not students, based on police and university statements. These same numbers were true of Washington University in St. Louis, Northeastern, and NYU. 

It is important to note that as “crowded” as these encampments looked, with tents, flags, and police officers, most encampments were never populated by more than a few hundred people. The overwhelming number of students, including campuses of 50,000 students or more, either ignored the encampments because the issue didn’t interest them, disagreed with the pro-Hamas/Palestinian support being shown, or found the encampments an unjustified disruption to their studies and lives. 

DENNIS ROSS, a former US Middle East envoy, quoted in a New York Times opinion piece on evolving perceptions of the Israel-Palestine conflict, once expressed that the intensity of campus activism can drown out complex discussions about Israel. After college, exposure to real-world contexts, like Israel’s role in regional stability, often leads to a more sympathetic view.

Expressing a similar opinion, Ruth Wisse, a retired Harvard professor of Yiddish literature and commentator on Jewish affairs, articulated that the academic environment sometimes penalizes pro-Israel sentiment through social or intellectual ostracism. After college, individuals are freer to explore Israel’s historical and geopolitical context without fear of academic repercussions.

It has been observed by many that pro-Hamas/Palestinian supporters and apologists are less supporters of Palestinians than anti-establishment agitators attempting to rebel against the mainstream American support of Israel. When anti-establishment students leave the college campus and are responsible for financially supporting themselves, they quickly become contributing members of the American establishment.

Condoleezza Rice, a former US secretary of state, once said that college students often embrace idealistic views shaped by campus activism. As they enter the workforce, exposure to practical realities tends to moderate their perspectives on issues like economic policy and governance.

This explains the phenomenon of university students generally becoming more conservative and less contentious. This also explains the rarity of successful people joining in the college encampments or marching in the middle of the workday against Israel. The phenomenon of university students evolving from anti-establishment positions to more mainstream American viewpoints extends far beyond Israel to issues such as the economy, immigration, and the environment.

As these students mature, become more nuanced thinkers, and update their beliefs to conform to traditional American ones, they recognize the many shared values America and Israel enjoy.

The recognition of America and Israel’s shared values translates into political support for Israel in all aspects of American life, from Wall Street to Main Street and from Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol. American support of Israel is strong, and with God’s help, it will remain strong for centuries to come. 

The writer is a Zionist educator at institutions around the world. He recently published his book Zionism Today.