Anti-Semitism is known as a form of prejudice towards people who are Jewish or of Jewish heritage and descent. There has been a rise of hostility due to the Israel and Palestine conflict and the issues that it has presented. In today’s societies college campuses have taken sides leading to Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia against both staff and students. With the increase of reported assault cases in the last year, reported assaults has increased almost 26 percent, which is a major and concerning issue. Colleges and universities like Northwestern, Washington, Stanford and even Columbia have had protests, threats and anti-semitism present on their campuses. There have been many investigations over the last year to protect their students, staff and faculty from hate.
In Washington, they conducted their own investigation by Chairwoman Virginia Ann Foxx to show the public how over the last year how the “leader” of the hate groups are fully responsible for the violations and danger to the public safety of the Jewish community. She is very adamant in the fact that the executive branch needs to step in to help enforce laws to protect the safety of others and the college learning environment. The mod of Jewish hate groups have been ruling “elite” universities but that is only what the media and public see but what is still not covered is way worse. The Jewish community has been doing an exceptional job on not caving and allowing the harassment and hate to affect their way of life and their views on their heritage and community.
The University of California Berkley had a major issue present itself in March 2024 with violent riots and anti-Israel activists assaulting Jewish students. The process of shattering windows, riots, and forcing an Israeli speaker to lecture to the student Jewish population. A survey was conducted during October which sampled 132 students at UC Berkeley. The results concluded that 85 percent of students who are Jewish feel like the administration has not fully addressed the issues regarding the hate present on campus. Another 75.6 percent feel like they can not express their true religion and heritage on campus due to the violence. Even Ivy Leagues like Columbia have a crisis with hate on their campus. A large event was on Oct.7, 2023, on campus a former Columbia undergrad student attacked and beat an Israeli student while shouting racial statements at them during the weekday. Columbia student Eden Yadger spoke out in an investigation about what had been happening on campus and shared personal impressions of the Jewish hate.
‘“It is impossible to exist as a Jewish student at Columbia without running face first into antisemitism every single day,” Yadger said. Jew-hatred is so deeply embedded into campus culture, that it has become casual and palatable among students and faculty and neglected by administrators.”’ Yadger said.
Knowing every day you have to worry about an altercation or an issue regarding violence or verbal harassment is mentally and physically tolling. In Antioch Community High School the presence of minority hate is not as prevalent as on certain college campuses, but it would be naive to say there is no hate. Not being educated is different from showing a form of prejudice, it is okay not to know everything about a certain topic but what is not okay is to make a large and societal issue more present in your community. From an outside perspective on minority hate, a student who sees minority hate in our school but is not a minority himself shares what it looks like in our school. Senior Charles Signa has seen very racist logos and artifacts at our school and other schools in local areas when traveling.
“As it does not affect my true day-to-day life I still see it happening and it is hard for anyone to see so much hate and toxicity in their school community and world,” Singa said. “The world is full of so much hate towards minorities it is sickening to see.”
There will never truly be a true end or fix to minority hate or even Jewish hate but there can be ways to prevent the extent of how serious it gets and the violence that comes out of it. Minority hate and prejudice will never fully be solved but reporting and stepping in will help the problem.