At the start of the academic year, Liel Leibovitz has some advice for college students facing the increasing hostility toward Israel. Among his suggestions is to “attack whenever you can”:
No matter what your major, you might have heard that old adage about the best defense being a good offense. . . . Much of the pro-Israel activism on college campuses these days [is defensive]. If the BDSers are staging a public event, [the logic goes], let us do the same, and if the college walk is blocked by pro-Palestinian activists, their shirts stained with fake blood, staging a theatrical “die-in” to protest some alleged Israeli atrocity or other, let us make sure we’re there on the sidelines to present the other side, a well-reasoned pamphlet at hand. I’m not belittling these tactics. There’s evidence to suggest that they might be working. . . .
But, whenever you can, which ought to be often, you must attack. When Iran continues to rev up its execution rate, for example, it may be time for a die-in of our own, or, at the very least, for a demand that any student organization critical of the Jewish state but silent about the Islamic Republic explain its tacit support for this abysmal violation of human rights. Insist that pro-Palestinian groups only deserve that distinction if they commemorate the scores of Palestinians starved and slain by the Assad regime every day.
Read more on Tablet: http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-life-and-religion/193111/how-to-fight-anti-israel-haters