Andrew Tobin writes for the Washington Free Beacon about one expert’s assessment of extreme American campus protests.
Arab-Israeli journalist Yoseph Haddad hates extremists, and the feeling is mutual.
While Haddad was fighting for the Israel Defense Forces in the 2006 Lebanon war, Hezbollah terrorists nearly blew off his right leg with an anti-tank missile. In August, a group of Palestinian men attacked Haddad and his family on an airplane in Dubai. And, last month at an anti-Israel rally outside Columbia University’s main entrance, a protester wearing a keffiyeh and a face covering punched him in the mouth.
“I’m not saying the anti-Israel protesters at American universities are the same as terrorists, but I am saying they are bringing the same extremist mentality from the Middle East,” Haddad, 38, a reporter at Israel’s i24News and a pro-Israel activist, told the Washington Free Beacon. “I know the mentality because I’m an Arab. I know what they mean when they chant for ‘intifada.’”
In a three-hour interview at a Tel Aviv cafe on a Friday afternoon last month, Haddad said the anti-Israel protests that have roiled more than 100 universities across the United States in recent weeks are misunderstood as a feature of American democracy. In fact, according to Haddad, the protests are an anti-democratic import from the Middle East—and should be handled accordingly.
“The anti-Israel and [Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions] activists behind these protests are people who are from the Middle East or whose families are from the Middle East,” said Haddad, who has long been involved in opposing the BDS movement and has given talks at dozens of U.S. universities. “These people fled horrible dictatorships, but instead of embracing democracy and flourishing, they are abusing democracy for their own anti-Israel and anti-America agenda.”
The protesters have occupied university campuses with tent encampments, violently taken over school buildings, clashed with police, bullied Jewish students, and advocated genocidal violence against “Zionists.”
