Being Jewish on campus amid Trump's campaign against antisemitism: ‘tremendous heartache'

Los Angeles Times

a day ago

Protesters were chanting slogans Alyssa Wallack had never heard at USC, shouting so loudly that she thought demonstrators were inside the lecture hall where she was attending class.
'Globalize the intifada!' she recalled hearing.
'From the river to the sea...,' they yelled.
It was Oct. 17, 2023 — 10 days after Hamas launched a terrorist attack against Israel that killed about 1,200 people and took hundreds as hostages.
Wallack, who is Jewish, said she had to 'escape.'
'I freaked out, and I ran out of class and started sobbing,' said Wallack, 23, who served as student board president of USC Chabad. 'It felt like everyone was against me, which I know is not so accurate. But I just remember sitting in my class, not able to learn. ...Were some of the people who I thought were my friends part of these protests, chanting things that were not only offensive but also antisemitic?'
In the months ahead, Wallack said, she didn't feel safe on campus. She wasn't alone. Other Jewish students at the University of Southern California said that after the Hamas attack — and the war it triggered — they, too, felt unsafe amid pro-Palestinian protests. At UCLA, where a large encampment sparked a violent confrontation that led to dozens of arrests, Jewish students expressed similar sentiments.
As the academic year draws to a close — USC's commencement was last month, UCLA's is in mid-June — The Times interviewed 12 Jewish students and professors at the universities who reflected on their campus experiences since Oct. 7.
They wrestled with two questions: Did you feel safer this school year? And did Donald Trump's campaign against antisemitism have anything to do with it?
The complexity of their answers was, for some, rooted in Trump's aggressive move in a Jan. 29 executive order 'to combat the explosion of antisemitism on our campuses' and 'investigate and punish anti-Jewish racism in leftist, anti-American colleges and universities.' His actions — coming amid a surge in violence targeting American Jews, from Colorado to Washington D.C. — have included attempts to deport college students who've espoused pro-Palestinian views.
Trump's offensive — aimed at mainly elite universities, which he claims have enabled antisemitism — has roiled academia, with billions of dollars of federal funds threatened or withheld. USC and UCLA are among the schools under investigation by a Department of Justice 'task force to combat antisemitism.'
Yet, some students and professors said Trump is using antisemitism as a cudgel to achieve his political objectives and exert his influence over higher education. A few doubted the president's sincerity and questioned whether his tactics would, in the long run, leave American Jews better off.
David N. Myers, a professor of Jewish history at UCLA, said that slashing federal funding for universities because of their response to campus antisemitism points to the 'very cynical and completely misguided nature of this campaign.'
'It's not about antisemitism,' he said. 'It's about enfeebling and dismantling the university, in which Jews actually have a very huge stake. ...I think many, many, many people or groups will suffer, including Jews.'
Following the start of pro-Palestinian demonstrations last year, both USC and the University of California implemented new, stricter protest rules or began enforcing existing ones, such as their bans on encampments. At UCLA, protesters cannot wear masks or block paths, and demonstration areas are restricted. USC, a private university, has closed campus gates and requires identification to enter.
A relatively calm academic year at UCLA and USC followed.
Yet jarring recollections endure.
UCLA junior Gal Cohavy, 20, recalled two encounters last spring: One friend was physically threatened, and another struck in the head with a water bottle. Other actions were, he said, alarming: 'Walking around campus with a kippah on, I saw a swastika.'
Cohavy began carrying pepper spray.
Many Jews have taken issue with Israel's war in Gaza and the country's treatment of Palestinians, and protested the Jewish state's actions alongside like-minded activists. Some have also spoken out against Islamophobia, and pointed out that Trump has taken no action in response to reported increases in anti-Muslim harassment or discrimination.
Myers said he didn't feel unsafe last year — what he felt was uncomfortable. That's because he believed it was necessary to condemn both the Oct. 7 attack and 'the excess of Israel's response in Gaza.'
'There is a distinct feeling for me of not fitting into either of the two most prominent camps,' he said. 'I felt some sense of aloneness.'
Asked if he still felt that way, Myers paused.
'Yeah, to some extent.'
Nearly all of the Jewish people interviewed for this story expressed pro-Israel views, to varying degrees. Although most said they felt safer this year, nearly every discussion was laced with caveats — a reflection, perhaps, of how personal the issue has become. And traumatic.
'It wasn't just unsafe — it was traumatizing,' said USC professor Hagit Arieli-Chai, who teaches modern Hebrew. Encountering protesters and their anti-Israel signs and slogans last spring, she said, forced her to confront 'hatred ... in unequivocal ways.' Arieli-Chai, who said one of her cousins was killed in the Oct. 7 attack, tried to avoid campus, going there only to teach.
Some said they attributed an improved sense of campus safety to tightened university protest polices, or other factors — and not Trump. Others praised the president. And yet another group said it's hard to pinpoint reasons.
'It strikes me as a false claim to knowledge for anyone other than a trained sociologist who's done a serious survey ... to say it's because of' one factor or another, said David Nimmer, a professor from practice at UCLA School of Law.
Some who credited Trump for an improved campus climate expressed a sense of discomfort, worrying about billions of dollars in potential funding cuts across higher education and an illiberal stifling of speech, among other issues.
'I am not the slightest supporter of the Trump administration,' said Nimmer. But, 'to the extent that anyone comes in and diminishes ... antisemitism, that is a step in the right direction.'
A few questioned the sincerity of Trump's support of the Jewish people.
'Now we're being used to justify, I would say, frankly, illegal actions [in] the case of the administration,' said Dylan Julia Cooper, 22, who graduated from USC in May. 'We are being used for his own goal of ... taking out anybody who disagrees with him.'
Yoav Gillath, 22, who also just graduated from USC, said he 'wanted to believe' that the president's goal was fighting antisemitism — but wasn't sure how to interpret the administration's actions.
'I wish they were more transparent with exactly why they're making the decisions that they are about various universities,' said Gillath, 22.
UCLA senior Bella Brannon said she is troubled by Trump administration funding cuts to 'life-saving research.' But she said, overall, 'Jewish students are happy to see some sort of action taken.'
'For far too long, nobody was even upholding the rules and policies that were in place — not to mention the law,' she said of universities' response to antisemitism. 'It's absolutely no surprise that the government is taking action.'
One word came up in several interviews: 'angst.'
'I have a tremendous amount of angst every day,' Nimmer said. 'I am ... someone who is devoted to democracy. And yet I feel that the duly elected leader in the United States and the duly elected leader in Israel are both tearing down the very structures on which the countries are founded. And it's causing me tremendous heartache every day.'
The mix of dread and relief reflected in some comments also appeared in the nonpartisan American Jewish Committee's recent open letter that praised a federal task force on antisemitism but warned about the effect of deep cuts at universities.
'We are concerned that ... lifesaving scientific research and other critical fields that have little connection to the areas where antisemitism has manifested may be harmed by arbitrary, across the board cuts to grants and research contracts,' the letter said.
Last spring, Westwood was suffused with rage. The encampment erected by pro-Palestinian activists became a global news story in May after a melee instigated by pro-Israel counterdemonstrators erupted. UCLA's inability to stop it sparked intense criticism.
The violence, among the university's darkest chapters, brought change.
Those interviewed noted a turning point: Julio Frenk — whose German Jewish father fled Nazi Germany in the 1930s — becoming chancellor on Jan. 1. The university has also overhauled security and hired LAPD veteran Steve Lurie to lead the new Office of Campus Safety.
Noting the 'pain and fear' that antisemitism had brought on campus, Frenk said, 'UCLA is unwavering in its commitment to building a campus community in which Jewish students — and all members of our community — feel safe, respected and welcome.'
Senior Mia Toubian, 20, who is news editor of Ha'Am, UCLA's student-run Jewish newsmagazine, praised Frenk for banning Students for Justice in Palestine as a campus organization in March following a protest the group held in front of a UC regent's house that was vandalized. 'It's gotten a little bit better,' said Toubian, 20, who added that she feels 'relatively' safer now, but 'objectively still not completely safe.'
Brannon, the magazine's editor in chief, recalled how she was followed home after covering a protest last spring. 'I got really, really scared,' she said.
Once, she was spat at while walking to class. But Brannon, 22, feels less safe now. That's partly because, she said, the 'fringe of the fringe' have continued to demonstrate with few repercussions.
She noted a recent incident that illustrated how — even with UCLA's tighter rules — ruptures still occur. In March, pro-Palestinian demonstrators blocked access to a campus building, draping it with a banner that equated UCLA police and the Israeli military with the Ku Klux Klan. They evaded law enforcement.
'I'm worried that without sanction, it is getting more unsafe for Jewish students,' Brannon said.
Lurie said that when police approached the building to arrest those blocking the entrance, they 'ran and kind of scattered.' The protesters' faces were covered, he said, making it impossible to identify them via recordings.
But some at UCLA said the changes have been dramatic — for the better.
Sharon Nazarian, founder of the Younes & Soraya Nazarian Center for Israel Studies at UCLA, noted a peaceful UCLA Hillel vigil and walk through campus to mark the first anniversary of the Hamas attack would have been 'unfathomable the previous academic year.'
'That,' she said, 'is a sea change for me.'
A few USC students praised university leadership for protecting Jewish students.
Ben Sheyman, 22, grew up in San Francisco, but his life as a Jew was partly shaped by his immigrant parents' experience in their home countries: Ukraine and Belarus — places where Jews were persecuted. When his family came to the U.S., it was supposed to be different.
'Here, you are as American as anybody else,' said Sheyman, who graduated this spring. But walking to class in the 2023-24 school year, Sheyman would see signs with slogans like 'End Zionism.' It was, he said, 'really unsettling.'
Still, Sheyman felt unsafe just once, when a crowd of masked protesters held items emblazoned with 'Nazi symbols,' he said. The tighter security changed things for the better, he said.
Cooper also felt safer in recent months, but related an upsetting run-in. She wears a Star of David necklace, and once, in the months after the Oct. 7 attack, a passerby hurled an extremely offensive Jewish slur at her as she walked near campus.
She praised administrators' decision to close the campus gates, even if she has some reservations. 'Whether it's politically correct or not, I do feel safer,' she said.
USC said in a statement that it 'continues to publicly and unequivocally denounce antisemitism in all its forms and has taken strong actions to protect all of our students ... from illegal discrimination of any kind.' It also touted the 'enhanced security protocols' and the launch of new mandatory seminars 'devoted specifically to free expression and civic discourse.'
For some at USC, though, the fractures in their lives — the loss of friendships, the alienation from peers or professors — linger. People like Wallack.
Her time at USC after the Oct. 7 attack was discombobulating. She left her sorority because she felt it did not voice sufficient support for Israel, and moved home.
'I don't really feel like I found my people at USC as a result of Oct. 7,' she said.
Sitting in the shade at the USC Village in early May, Wallack touched her Star of David necklace and explained that she would not attend graduation ceremonies.
Instead, Wallack departed for Israel. A business fellowship awaited.