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One of the most alarming developments of recent months is the realisation that not only is antisemitism on the rise, but that young people in the West think that it’s somehow or other justified.

Unfortunately, one doesn’t have to look far to understand why this is happening. The Western education system is increasingly being hijacked by political activists. For example, James Morrow recently wrote in The Daily Telegraph:

Parents have described themselves as “disheartened” by an attempt by a group of activist teachers to promote a one-sided view of the Israel-Hamas conflict in classrooms.

The group, calling itself Teachers 4 Palestine, has through its social media accounts accused Israel of “genocide” online while encouraging teachers to “light up our schools for Palestine”.

The group not only encourages students to skip school for a planned unauthorised protest on Friday, but also tells teachers to “wear Khaffiyehs”, “Palestine badges” and “make Palestine visible in our schools” by, for example, taking group photos with pro-Palestine signs.

Indoctrinated

Consistent with the tactics of Hamas, pro-Palestinian protestors are using children as human shields to defend their actions. Note how children were present at the recent unauthorised rally in Port Botany, while at the same time blaming the police for their “thuggery” at upholding the law.

In a far-reaching interview with John Anderson — the former deputy prime minister of Australia — distinguished historian and author Niall Ferguson makes the following cogent observation:

I think the strange thing about all of this is the generational divide that’s opened up. It’s very remarkable if you look at polling in the United States, Britain or Continental Europe, that older people strongly sympathise with Israel and younger people strongly sympathise with the Palestinians. In fact, the youngest group surveyed — 18 to 24 in the US and in the UK — is strongly anti-Israel, and pro-Palestinian.

And that’s why when you look at the protests that you see in support of the Palestinians, they are very youthful when you look closely. And I think there’s a very good reason for this, and it’s an extremely important point which some of us have been making for years. It’s that the universities — and to an extent the schools too — have been systematically infiltrated by propagandists in favour of Islamism and anti-Zionism.

And we are now reaping the harvest of allowing the infiltration of higher education by radical leftists and Islamists. That’s the best explanation I think for this generational divide. It’s not just that the passage of time has dampened public sympathy for Israel. I think it’s something much more sinister than that.

Strange Collusion

Ferguson argues that the new current generation of leftists is different to their classic liberal forebears, and that there is even a “strange unholy alliance” between Islamists and radical leftists who are both completely obsessed with identity politics. As Ferguson explains:

I think what has happened is there has been an unwitting, leftwards lurch. Liberals of the 1968 era, the anti-Vietnam types, thought when they saw the radicals of the next generation that they were seeing of themselves. Ah yes, to be young and radical again. And they appointed people who were far to the left of those anti-Vietnam liberals.

And one obvious distinction is, those anti-Vietnam liberals were at least in favour of free speech. But the new generation of leftists are not liberal at all. They’re totally against free speech. Nor are they secular. They’re highly susceptible to the Islamist arguments, which is remarkable when you consider some of the other things that they believe.

They passionately believe in LGBTIQ+ rights. They passionately believe that there are fifty-five genders… this is what is so bizarre about this coalition which has formed. It’s a strange unholy alliance between Islamists and radical leftists, completely obsessed with identity politics.

So obsessed with identity politics that they don’t recognise that the Palestinians are not just another minority like the transgender rights activists, but are really part of a globalist movement which is profoundly hostile to all the things that they care about, particularly when it comes to gender.

It’s a very strange — and I think unintended — consequence of the penchant liberal professors have to hire people further to the left of themselves.

This also goes a long way to explaining why so many young people are questioning whether Osama Bin Laden’s actions on September 11, 2001, were, in fact, justified. It’s because their whole lens for viewing the world is that of oppressors and victims. Of those who have power and those who do not.

This powerful — but also poisonous — philosophical paradigm is why the younger generation today is coming to a profoundly different position regarding Palestine. What should be condemned is now celebrated. What should be denounced is now defended. And the reason why that is so is because that is how they’ve been taught to think.

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Originally published in The Spectator Australia.