Pro-Palestinian demonstrators march in Royce Quad at UCLA on March 11 in protest of ICE’s detainment of Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian activist who led protests at Columbia University last year. Photo by Juliana Yamada / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
David N. Myers
March 13, 2025
Supporters of the arrest and planned deportation of Mahmoud Khalil — the former Columbia University student who was active in pro-Palestine protests — and of President Donald Trump’s administration’s decision to strip $400 million in federal funding from Columbia, say such measures are needed to check rampant antisemitism. Critics — and I am one of them — say these steps mark an ominous turn in the Trump administration’s assault on universities.
But antisemitism on campus is a real problem. It’s time to think of an alternative path for institutions of higher education to follow.
My own university, UCLA, where I have taught for 33 years, has a chance to pursue a different approach. This week, our new chancellor, Julio Frenk, announced an initiative to combat antisemitism on our campus. He’s called for “enhancing relevant training and education, improving the complaint system, assuring enforcement of current and new laws and policies, and cooperating with stakeholders.”
I have no doubt that Frenk, who comes with extraordinary experience in government, public health, and university administration, is sincere. The son and grandson of German-Jewish doctors, Frenk bears within him the painful memory of the complicity of both German universities and the medical establishment in the Nazi extermination project.
As Frenk hones the details of this initiative, he has the opportunity to focus on steps that will truly make all students feel safe, without trampling on their civil liberties.
First, the initiative must define what, in the present moment, counts as antisemitism — a tricky question at a time when many experts disagree on the answer. One possible place to start: the Nexus Campus Guide to Identifying Antisemitism, which resists the impulse to brand all forms of anti-Zionism as antisemitic, while also recognizing that the boundary between the two can be blurred. Such a definition could serve as an anchor for a wide range of training and orientation programs that could reach students, staff, faculty and senior administrators.
Second, universities must survey our communities to gauge the prevalence of antisemitic, anti-Zionist, Islamophobic, and anti-Palestinian attitudes on campus, and the interdependence among them. We dwell in a broader ecosystem of hate — exacerbated every day by social media — in which antisemitism is one, but only one, important aspect. High quality surveys can give us a much clearer picture of what students are facing — and how students of different political perspectives may be experiencing similar threats. This may, in turn, open up the path to new sources of empathy and allyship.
Third, an effective initiative to combat hate on campus, with antisemitism as a focal point, must also acknowledge that anti-Palestinian discrimination is a key, but often-obscured, part of the equation.
One is hard pressed to think of any formulations of support for Palestinian freedom that do not trigger an accusation of antisemitism — not to mention, under Trump, the risk of expulsion, arrest or deportation. It’s absolutely essential that any initiative to combat hate on campus, in today’s world, focus not only on antisemitism, but anti-Palestinian discrimination as well. In this regard, we must push back against Khalil’s detention and forcefully resist any efforts by the federal government — and our own institutions — to arrest or deport students because they engaged in unpopular political speech.
Fourth, we need to do what we do best by educating; in particular, by developing courses on campus that examine the history of Zionism and Palestinian nationalism not in total isolation, but rather as contiguous and overlapping phenomena.
We must create programs where Israeli studies and Palestinian studies are explored in entwined fashion, to reflect the lived experience of people on the ground. Universities have come to reflect a broader societal trend by allowing too much of the balkanized, zero-sum thinking that holds that we can only focus on the history — or, for that matter, well-being — of Jews by vilifying Palestinians, or vice versa.
These steps can help create an environment that is safer and more comfortable for all students on campus, including Jews. They will likely be much more successful than the actions of the Trump administration, which is using its purported fight against antisemitism in order to pursue a classic strategy of authoritarian regimes, and targeting universities precisely because of their openness and tolerance of diversity.
We should not forget what scholars warn us about — that the boundary between philosemitism and antisemitism is a porous one. Nor should we fail to recognize for a moment that the administration’s attack on scientific research, DEI, and yes, “antisemitism” is part of a larger assault on democracy in this country.
The losers will be those who value the rights of the individual, among them free speech, religious freedom and political protest. Leaders of universities must understand that their institutions are on the front lines. They — and we — must rise up as one to defend the core principles of democracy that are under grievous assault. My hope is that UCLA can lead the way.
