Trump silencing pro-Palestine protesters isn't about protecting Jews; it's about money

I'm a democratic socialist and a Jew, which is why I oppose Trump silencing Israel's critics

Criticizing Israel isn’t antisemitic. Similarly, supporting the Palestinians does not equate with supporting Hamas.

These statements should require no further elaboration. On October 7, 2023, the terrorist group Hamas launched a deadly attack on innocent civilians, murdering more than 1,200 people, kidnapping 240 others — including one recently-released victim, Edan Alexander — and committing acts of sexual violence. In response, Israel — which has maintained a vicious apartheid government over the Palestinians since the mid-20th century — retaliated with a genocidal military campaign. So far the Israeli government has killed at least 50,000 Palestinians in Gaza, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently called for the mass displacement of the more than 2 million remaining Gaza residents.

It is in this context that Axios reported on Thursday that President Donald Trump is reviewing the visas of the pro-Palestinian protesters arrested Wednesday at Columbia University. Secretary of State Marco Rubio repeatedly rationalizes this by arguing that the protesters are pro-Hamas. People who actually attend these protests verify that the vast majority of participants are peaceful and do not subscribe to Hamas’ hateful beliefs. They are appalled by the mass suffering caused by Israel’s relentless military campaign, as well as the oppressive policies that triggered the October 7th attack in the first place.

Yet at the end of the day, the Trump administration isn’t persecuting Israel’s critics because they sincerely care about stopping antisemitism. If that was the case, they would criticize Trump when he claims American Jews who criticize Israel (including many of the college protesters… and myself) are “disloyal.” They would call him out when he uses antisemitic code language to target liberal Jewish donors like George Soros. They would not cozy up to Holocaust deniers.

The true motive behind Trump’s actions can best be explained by a video called “Israel as a Modern Settler Colonial State.” Dr. Richard Wolff, an Amherst economist and democratic socialist who like me is both ethnically Jewish and critical of Israel, breaks down the inner dynamics of what is really happening here.

“The American Empire is now over,” Wolff explains. “Israel is a model for the United States. What is it? It's trying to hold on to a colonial situation.” Wolff describes Israel as “an example of settler colonialism,” analogous to the situations that used to prevail in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and South Africa.

“And what happened to all of them? Whoops!” Wolff added. “Israel is the arguably one of the last remaining colonial settler colonialisms where the fight is still going on between the settlers and the people they displaced.”

It is not difficult to see, from this vantage point, why the Trump administration would be militantly pro-Israel. Regardless of Trump’s prejudices against Jews, he sees in Zionism an overtly racist and nationalist ideology that echoes his own. With well-financed Zionist lobbying groups like AIPAC and Zionist donors like Miriam Adelson donating millions to Trump’s campaign, the capitalism fueling Trump’s motives becomes financial as well as philosophical.

In other words: Being anti-Israel does not make you antisemitic. To be effectively anti-Israel, however, you must be an anticapitalist. The stakes of failing to get to the root of the genocide in Israel will, as Wolff pointed out in a Democracy at Work video, be devastating.

Professor Wolff Addresses the Israel/Gaza Situation on October 27, 2023

"The struggle between Israel and the Palestinians goes back at least to the middle of the previous century," Wolff said. "There have been tensions, wars, conflicts, one after another for many, many years. What that proves is that an agreement, a working out of differences, has not been achieved. The efforts of those who tried were not successful. Honesty requires admitting that, and now we see every day the horrors of having kicked that problem down the road, having made agreements that weren't real, that weren't sustainable, that weren't wanted by one side or the other, or often both."

He added, "The horror has to stop."

Back Seat Socialism

Column by Matthew Rozsa who is a professional journalist for more than 13 years. Currently he is writing a book for Beacon Press, "Neurosocialism," which argues that autistic people like the author struggle under capitalism, and explains how neurosocialism - the distinct anticapitalist perspective one develops by living as a neurodiverse individual - can be an important organizing principle for the left.

Twitter (X) @MatthewWRozsa