My father, Jack Meltzer arrived in America in 1899 from Belarus seeking the American Dream. He became successful. His only regret was he was too young to serve in WWI and too old to serve in WWII. Songs like “Yankee Doodle Dandy,” “It’s a Grand Old Flag” and “Over There” brought him to tears. He supported American policy in Vietnam, together with all American policies. I was participating in the student protests against the Vietnam War happening at SUNY New Paltz in 1968. To convince my father his position was wrong, I sent pictures of napalmed children to his place of business on West 46th street in Manhattan. The hubris!
In an era when Margaret Mead stated, “There never has been and never will be a generation gap as massive as this one,” our protests against the Vietnam War were also in opposition to our parents’ values, the military-industrial complex, materialism, the generalized un-hipness of “straight” people.
My young student who is a member of Jews For Peace, wears a keffiyeh scarf. She comes from a left-leaning family. A difference between now and then is she enjoys complete support for her political activism from her mother and father. If the parents of the Columbia protestors object, it could be on financial grounds. Tuition at Columbia costs $65,340, housing $16,800, books and personal expenses estimated at $3,742 each year. The loss of money invested in their children’s education, if they are expelled, plus the cost of re-entering college to complete a degree, as well as the fees required to fight the charges of third-degree burglary, criminal mischief and trespassing, all ask the questions, “Was is worth it? What will the civil disobedience accomplish?”
The protests against the Vietnam War, according to some theorists, prolonged the conflict and got Nixon elected. The current demonstrations could likely help Donald Trump get elected.
The Columbia protests will not achieve their goal of divestment. Among other demands, the student protestors want Columbia to end their Global Outreach program in Israel. The university has programs in Amman, Beijing, Mumbai, Nairobi, Tunis, Athens, Rio and Santiago, as well as Tel Aviv where ten percent of the student attendees are Arabs. All these students have a right to pursue their education. Demands to prevent them from going to school are an infringement on their rights.
A major difference between the protests of the 1960’s and now is that other students not involved in the activism, by far currently the majority on campuses, did not have their education jeopardized. Now, students uninvolved with the protests have lost access to in-person classes and campus libraries. The possibility of cancelled or postponed commencement ceremonies, also safe passage throughout the campus, especially for Jewish and Israeli students, has been compromised. In the Vietnam protests, students were not fighting with each other. The protests in the 60’s involved a far larger percentage of students, along with a smaller number who were unaffiliated with the demonstrations.
There have been pro-Palestinian anti-Israel protests for decades. Why now has this long problematic issue received so much attention? There were other wars similar to the Vietnam War before and since. Why did the Vietnam War conflict get so much student outcry? In both cases, these wars received tremendous media coverage. Vietnam was the first “televised” war. Body bags returning to the USA from Vietnam could be seen on the news. The New York Times published pictures of the daily dead. So many young men. Some as young at 18. What a wake-up call!
Dozens of news outlets, some maybe dubious, Facebook, Instagram and TicTok, also eyewitness accounts and videos can be viewed livestream from the region. This much information happening in real time was never available before.
During the Vietnam era, because of the draft, in addition to recruitment for the military happening right on campus, students’ lives were directly threatened by the conflict. They could be drafted, go to Vietnam. They could die.
Those of us who are puzzled by the anti-semitic rhetoric, the anger, passion and surety of the pro-Palestinian demonstrators who are not personally imperiled, are trying to understand the power of their commitment and willingness to take personal risks. People are shocked when protestors cheer for Hamas, a terrorist organization, while minimizing or ignoring the atrocities of October 7. In some isolated cases, even calling for the October 7 attacks to happen again.
The question is asked, “Is this energized by anti-semitism?”
Many Jewish students are protesting too. The protesters say, “No!” Nevertheless,
anti-semitism, like racism, is often deeply rooted and unconscious. Before the war, a global resurgence of hatred aimed at all Jews became ubiquitous. Is there a connection? Fareed Zakaria commented last night on CNN that hate speech on campus is protected when its calling for the death of Jews, but would not be tolerated if it were white supremacists on campus speaking against blacks, Hispanics and immigrants.
After the encampment at SUNY New Paltz, which was quickly disbanded by police, another difference since in the 1960’s police coming on campus was avoided. I asked a student two questions, “What do the demonstrators mean when they chant from the river to the sea?” His reply was, “I am not exactly sure, but I think it means all Jews have to leave and give the land back to the Palestinians.”
Question: “What is the name of the river and the sea?
Reply: “The Mediterranean Sea, but I do not know the name of the river.”
Another critical difference between the protests of the 1960’s and now is the exceptional amount of attention placed on teach-ins, the sharing of history books, lectures by professors, public debate, discussion in classes and at social gatherings during the ’60s.
Too often since October 7, I have heard people question whether the students have put the effort into learning the mind-boggling complex history of the region. Nevertheless, at this moment destruction and carnage are happening to innocent Palestinians. If there is a ground invasion in Rafah, the number of dead will be unconscionable. In light of that, we are all pro-Palestinian. Hatred and killing on all sides must stop. How? A question asked forever. When will there be an answer?
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