Jonathan Feingold writes:

President Trump recently issued an executive order that purports to combat antisemitism by directing civil and criminal action against foreign students who participated in last year’s campus protests.

A related fact sheet, under the heading “Deport Hamas Sympathizers and Revoke Student Visas,” issues the following warning: “To all the resident aliens who joined in the pro-jihadist protests, we put you on notice: Come 2025, we will find you, and we will deport you.”

For more than a year, Republican leaders have defamed anti-war protesters as “antisemitic mobs.” Trump is sticking to the script. Why wouldn’t he? Feigned concern about antisemitism has offered Republicans a perfect tool to sow division and discredit the voices most likely to protest Trump’s assault on American democracy.

Unfortunately, some of our most powerful universities — ostensible defenders of democracy — are making the Republicans’ bad-faith talking points look like good-faith concerns.

Roughly a week before Trump turned on foreign students, Harvard settled two antisemitism lawsuits. Harvard agreed to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism. Human rights organizations have long criticized the this definition because it conflates antisemitism with legitimate criticism of Israel. Experts highlight the organization’s examples of antisemitism, which include: “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor.”

Even Kenneth Stern, who drafted the definition, cautions against adopting the definition because “right-wing Jewish groups … decided to weaponize it” on university campuses. [Continue reading…]