By Charli Ernstein
I had the pleasure of witnessing my first pro-Hamas protest head-on on March 18. Instead of watching from the window of my dorm many floors up as I usually do, I was on the ground floor of the Beren campus’s Brookdale Residence Hall for this one, and found myself in the lens of a pro-Hamas protester’s camera, while he was in the lens of mine.
As pro-Hamas protesters walked down 34th Street, a crowd of students assembled in Brookdale’s front lounge and lobby. Security guards blocking the exit told students they could not leave the building for their safety. Immediately, I heard the drums and the chants.
A stream of students rushed into the front lounge to press their faces and phones against the windows to get a closer look at what was going on outside. One of them was me, filming those who actively challenged my existence, along with the existence of Jews all over the world. The desire to video these unhinged pro-Hamas protesters permeated throughout every student in the front lounge who had a camera out.
These people were fulfilling their right of freedom of speech and marching for their cause. How must it have looked as Stern students were caught laughing at and filming these people? Don’t get me wrong – the protesters’ cause is littered with pro-Hamas sentiment and hate against Jews and is not something with which I agree. Still, could the students have handled this better?
We were purposefully drawing negative attention to ourselves. Imagine if it was the other way around.
While filming, I also heard someone come in the front lounge loudly and say that a protester had thrown water on a security guard. I was appalled. How disgusting. Is this really how human beings should treat one another?
Later that evening, leaving Brookdale post-protest, I saw a wet spot outside the entryway very near to where the security guard had been standing, but it did not look like just a splash or stream that came from a cup or bottle. It looked like water that had been poured from above.
Here is the shocker: A friend then told me she saw on multiple WhatsApp statuses that Stern students had thrown water out of their dorm windows to the sidewalk below in an attempt to hit the protesters, but instead they hit their very own security guards. Is that the example we want to give as Jews?
The security guards inside Brookdale repeatedly asked students to disperse from the lobby and front lounge so as not to attract attention from the protesters and make the building or guards outside the door a target. Yet, students continued filming and swarming the lobby to watch the action first-hand. Security had to work much harder than they would have if students had listened to their instructions. The extra pressure and stress we created for those who were working hard to protect us at any cost – even that of water being thrown at them – was not kind, exemplary of gratitude, nor was it respectful.
The way Stern students were acting that day could very well have been classified as a Chilul Hashem.
Jews are G-d’s chosen people, and so to speak, the “honors society” that is held accountable to the higher standards G-d has set for us. The actions that I saw students take that day did not embody that. We could have and should have been better, and most definitely, we should exert ourselves in different, more effective and mature ways.
A Jew standing silently while holding or wearing an Israeli flag or Magen David necklace is a powerful symbol and has a deep sentiment tracing back thousands of years. Even going to daven is a way to fight against the hate. Jews are under a microscope, and we must exert our frustration, sadness and anger in different ways: Do anything that says with pride, honor and dignity “I am a Jew, and G-d is on my side, yet even better – we are on G-d’s side.”
No person, Jew or not, could convince these protesters that they are crazy and on the wrong side of history. What is the value in our small fights even if they will not solve the problem of protests and antisemitism?
Making a Kiddush Hashem in this type of situation is not to stop the protest: It is to stand strong for our people and Hashem and to sanctify His name.
One person understood this message. As captured on my phone camera, a man walking in front of Brookdale wearing a necklace and navy blue hat, on both of which there was a large Magen David, looked toward us, held up a fist and shook it as a sign of strength. He proceeded to pull an Israeli flag out of his backpack, stood on the bench in front of Brookdale and waved his flag. He was silent, yet proud and immensely powerful.
Even though he was only one person in a sea of red, black and green, this one man showed that it is an honor to be on G-d’s team and honor His name. Standing there, he exemplified how more so than any other option, a Kiddush Hashem is most influential and brings the most chizuk (strength) – and for me, it did.