RUTHFULLY YOURS

The media lied about President Trump’s executive order against anti-Semitism. It lied about it because it wanted to gaslight American Jews into opposing a measure meant to fight campus anti-Semitism. And here, from NYU, is the reality of what that hatred looks like.

When I first started at NYU, I was excited to go to a school that championed diversity and inclusion — until that diversity and inclusion applied to everyone except my community. After years of overt protests, boycotts, and direct aggression toward Jewish students from NYU’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), the university honored the organization with the President’s Service Award for “outstanding contribution to NYU life.”

What did SJP do to “earn” this prize? They organized a 53-group boycott against Realize Israel, a non-political student organization, depicting assault rifles on flyers calling for a revolt. Further, at the 2018 Rave in the Park in which NYU students celebrated Israel Independence Day, one SJP member burned an Israeli flag and another physically assaulted a Jewish student; both students were arrested.

Throughout the year, I spoke with eight administrators from multiple NYU departments — the Office of Student Affairs; Center for Student Life; Office of Student Conduct and Community Standards; and even the Office of Public Safety — about rising hostility against the Jewish community on campus. My concerns were brushed off, and after the arrests, I was asked not to draw attention to the issue.

The presidential award solidified the university’s stance: violent acts against students on the basis of their views are not only tolerated, but celebrated, and the concerns of Jewish students are not to be taken seriously.

When I sued NYU for campus anti-Semitism, college leaders shrugged. It took the US president to do something about it.

Although my legal complaint argued that NYU’s reaction — or lack thereof — to its Jewish community’s plight already violated Title VI, religion was not a protected class under civil rights law — at least until this week. President Trump’s new executive order not only changes that reality, but corrects a longtime gross injustice against Jewish students. The order expands Title VI’s existing protections to explicitly include discrimination against Jews.

Standing with President Trump on stage allowed me the opportunity to elevate the voices of Jewish students nationwide

This is the basic reality of what the executive order did. It protected the civil rights of Jewish students. And we’re talking about people who are being violently assaulted on campuses.

Now, ideally, everyone’s civil rights on campus should be protected. And, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos has been tackling some of those areas. The David Horowitz Freedom Center has championed the academic bill of rights. In this case there was an easy fix to an existing law (one that I’m not necessarily fond of, but it’s not going to disappear tomorrow) that would inhibit intersectional bullying by politically correct thugs.

And the media, led by the New York Times deliberately misrepresented it.

This is what the executive order was meant to do. This is what it’s doing.