StandWithUs

Go on offensive: Levy

Pro-Israel activist Eylon Levy speaks with an audience member before his Oct. 30 talk at Schara Tzedeck, which was presented by StandWithUs Canada. (photo by Pat Johnson)

The terrorists who perpetrated the Oct. 7 attacks were products of schools paid for in part by the Canadian government, according to Eylon Levy, a former Israeli government spokesperson who addressed an audience at Schara Tzedeck Synagogue last week.

“The Oct. 7 terrorists all went to Canadian-funded schools,” he said. “That is outrageous. It’s disgusting. You need to hold [the Canadian government] accountable and say there are consequences.”

Most schools in Gaza are run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which is funded by UN member-states, including Canada.

Levy spoke here Oct. 30 as part of a cross-Canada tour sponsored by StandWithUs Canada, a pro-Israel educational organization focused on campuses.

Levy said Israel’s recent announcement that it was banning UNRWA from operating in Israel was the right move because the agency exists to perpetuate the Palestinian refugee problem, not resolve it, to keep the Israeli-Arab conflict alive, to indoctrinate Palestinian children and to provide the financial safety net terrorists need to engage in violent attacks like Oct. 7.

Israel has been widely condemned for the imminent ban, which came after Israel repeatedly informed the UN that UNRWA’s staff includes known terrorists, some of whose names were provided to the UN by Israel.

“They just don’t care,” Levy said of the UN’s response that terrorists are on their payroll. “Now they claim UNRWA is irreplaceable. Well, you should have thought about that when Israel gave you the evidence that it is riddled with terrorism and you chose to deny that it was a problem.”

According to Israeli authorities, 12 UNRWA staff members actively participated in the Oct. 7 attacks, with allegations that more than 30 additional UNRWA workers were involved in activities such as facilitating hostage-taking and looting. Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant has alleged that, of the 13,000 UNRWA employees in Gaza, at least 12% are affiliated with Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror groups.

In conversation with Michael Sachs, Western regional director for Friends of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, Levy said many people are inverting right and wrong when it comes to the Israel-Hamas war and they are trying to sway young people especially.

“The world is trying to tell them that the cause of their generation, the great cause of this century, is the fight for Palestine, which means the destruction of the state of Israel,” Levy said.

Contesting these messages is tough, he said, especially when the agencies that represent the moral high-ground are on the wrong side.

Levy recalled a debate he had against broadcaster Mehdi Hasan.

“I knew he was going to come on the stage and say, ‘Well, the UN agrees with me, Oxfam agrees with me, Save the Children agrees with me, Red Cross agrees with me. How is it possible the whole world is wrong and you are right?’” Levy said. “That’s Jewish history: the courage to look around and say, ‘You’re all crazy. This isn’t right.’”

Levy noted that UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres issued a statement on social media mourning the death of Muhammad Abu Atawi, who was killed by the Israel Defence Forces.

Atawi was an employee of UNRWA but, according to Israel, he was also a Hamas terrorist who led the attack on the bomb shelter near the Nova music festival, in which Hersh Goldberg-Polin and others were sheltering.

“This is a leader I’m supposed to take seriously?” Levy asked. “The Red Cross that hasn’t lifted a finger to try to save the hostages is an organization that I am meant to take seriously? The NGOs that wouldn’t even shed crocodile tears on Oct. 7, that never tried to do any sort of campaign for the hostages, they are the ones I am meant to take seriously?”

Young people and other activists in the West who insist they are anti-Zionist and not antisemitic are deluding themselves, Levy suggested.

“You are expressing a hatred and a prejudice against the same people,” he said. “The fact that they believe that they hate the same people that their grandparents hated but it’s a complete coincidence shows a tragic lack of self-awareness.”

Getting the pro-Israel message out is especially challenging on social media, said Levy, but Jews and their allies can’t give up the battle.

Social media is problematic at the best of times – even when it is not a platform controlled by the Chinese regime, as TikTok is – because it maximizes engagement by provoking outrage and amplifies the most extreme viewpoints.

“We’re not going to win the social media battle,” he said. “But we can’t afford not to fight it.”

If the only thing that people see on social media are anti-Israel messages, what conclusion will people come to? he asked.

“But what if their friend, the person they know is a good, decent person, stands up and presents a contrary view?” said Levy. “Then at least you’ve made that person think this is complicated and there’s a case to be made on the other side. So, it requires all of us to be there, to fight the fight, to be as loud and vocal and produce as much stuff as possible.”

That battle of ideas also needs to be taken offline, he said.

It is further complicated, he added, because the Israeli government has effectively given up communicating to the world.

Levy, who was born in England to Israeli parents and made aliyah as a lone soldier, was effectively conscripted to serve as an English-language spokesperson at the beginning of the war. He was fired after a social media spat with Britain’s then-foreign secretary David Cameron. Levy cofounded the Israeli Citizen Spokespersons’ Office, which tries to fill the information gap he said the Israeli government has left.

Pro-Israel voices in the West need to change tack, according to Levy. Rather than being on the defensive and explaining Israel’s actions, Canadians and others should be calling out governments and NGOs.

“Other people owe us answers,” he said. “UNRWA owes us answers. The Red Cross owes us answers. The UN owes us answers. I think we have to go on the offensive and demand those answers from other people instead of constantly trying to defend ourselves and say, ‘I can explain.’”

Levy dismisses calls for a ceasefire. The war needs to end in the defeat of Hamas – and it’s all over but the surrender, he argued.

“Hamas has lost,” he said. “It’s game over.”

But Hamas needs the world to help it understand that fact.

“The problem is, when international actors step in to demand a ceasefire, as opposed to Hamas’s surrender, they tell Hamas to keep fighting,” he said. With Hamas on its knees, “It’s outrageous that some countries are trying to get it back up on its feet.”

Hezbollah has also been largely eliminated, according to Levy.

“All of its top leadership are dead,” he said. “The infrastructure along the border has been destroyed.”

Iran, of course, remains unbowed, even in the face of the damage Israel has inflicted on its proxies.

Levy said one outcome from the current crisis is that Jewish communities have come together. In Israel, individuals instantly mobilized on Oct. 7 to do whatever they could and, in the diaspora, Jews have united as they rarely have before.

“That sense of responsibility, that sense of solidarity, being there for each other and having each other’s backs, I find incredibly inspiring,” he said. “That awakening of responsibility and self-reliance and leadership in Jewish communities around the world has been an inspiration to people in Israel.”

Jesse Primerano, executive director of StandWithUs Canada, which brought Levy to Vancouver, said his group has 106 interns and fellows on campuses across Canada this year – an increase over past years and a happy surprise for Primerano. He was afraid for the organization’s programs this year, he said, concerned that they wouldn’t be able to recruit students to stand for Israel on campuses. The opposite happened.

“Numbers skyrocketed,” he said. “The truth is that they are not scared. They are empowered. They are emboldened … and they are so brave and ready to stand up.”

SWU has also hired more staff across Canada, including a full-time position in Vancouver funded by the Diamond Foundation.

Three students from Vancouver-area campuses who are part of the SWU Emerson Fellowship program spoke to the audience, drawing ovations.

Pride in being “just a Jew”

There is an age-old question that frequently nags at us along our journey of life: “Who am I?” I’ve struggled with it, and perhaps you have as well. When you ask yourself “Who am I?” you probably start by listing superficial things about yourself. In my case, I’m from Argentina, I play music, and people say I have a great sense of humour. Even though I always knew who I was on the surface, a deeper layer eluded me. There is still more to learn about myself.

When I was young, well, younger than now, I constantly pressed my father with the similar question that was scrambling in my head: “Who are we?” I was trying to find a simple way to get my answer, to avoid spending my own time navigating the question so I could do something (seemingly) more productive, like playing video games. I figured that, by asking my dad, I may very well be who he is, given I’m his son, an extension of him, in many ways. But, every time, my father would reply in the same cryptic way and always with a smile on his face: “Son, we are Jews.”

I was never quite able to comprehend why he couldn’t just give me a plain answer, rather than that infuriating, puzzling and annoying explanation. I was not going to give up and, with my insistent character, I continued asking. I posed the question from different angles, wanting him to elaborate, but he would just say, “Uriel, it’s simple. We are Jews. You and I are solely Jews.”

When my dad couldn’t satisfy my curiosity, I turned to my school’s rabbi, Rabbi Stephen Berger. When I asked Rabbi Berger, his answer was just as confusing and mysterious. He kindly stated that he could not provide me with the answers I sought; I had to embark on this road of self-discovery myself, with the help of my loved ones. Then, about halfway through the year, he introduced me to StandWithUs Canada, an organization that would help me better understand who I was by putting me in touch with other Jewish teenagers from around the world.

I now realize why I couldn’t access a fast-food solution to a philosophical question. I finally found the answer I’d been seeking.

Last August, as I joined 190 of my peers from high schools throughout the United States and Canada at the StandWithUs conference in Los Angeles, I found myself on a path leading to enlightenment that has reshaped my understanding of Jewish identity. The sessions were informative and interesting, but it was when we reached the segment focusing on what Jews were before the dark chapters of persecution during the Holocaust – they were highly contributing members of society, and more – that everything started to click.

A single statement truly hit home: Jews have been forcibly expelled from about 109 countries throughout history. It was a stark reminder that, regardless of our accomplishments and contributions, we would always be seen as “Just a Jew.” It became clear that the essence of being Jewish transcended any specific occupation or societal role. We are a resilient and diverse community with a history of triumphs and tragedies.

This knowledge instilled a sense of pride in my identity, not as a limitation but as a source of strength and unity. Thanks to StandWithUs Canada, I learned that, at the end of the day, embracing who we are, with all our complexities and contributions, is a powerful testament to the enduring spirit of the Jewish people. I felt a sense of pride but a pride that could be taken away from me at any moment. This is when I decided to become a more invested member of the community by being on the board of NCSY, the Orthodox Union’s youth group.

Talking to politicians and people who can truly make a difference became an essential component of my advocacy. I understood how dialogue and education could change people’s perspectives.

My aim in sharing the history of the Jewish expulsions and the resilient spirit of our community is to raise awareness and foster understanding. My tool against bigotry and ignorance is teaching. I am committed, every day, to teaching people about the rich history of the Jewish people.

Uriel Presman Chikiar is in Grade 12 at King David High School and is a board member of NCSY.

StandWithUs Canada course

Hussein Mansour Aboubakr (PR photo)

After an almost three-year hiatus due to the pandemic, StandWithUs Canada is again holding events. On May 15, StandWithUs Canada and the Diamond Foundation are presenting the crash course Antisemitism and Anti-Zionism Today: What to Expect on Campus.

The course is a chance for high school (grades 11 and 12) and first-year university students to attend interactive sessions, hear from speakers, meet like-minded students and enjoy a free kosher dinner. Students who register and attend can also receive community service hours and a gift card.

Speakers include Penina Edery, high school director, StandWithUs Canada, and Aviv Attia, StandWithUs educator and Israeli speaker. Special guest speaker Hussein Mansour Aboubakr was a dissident imprisoned in his home of Cairo, Egypt, for the crime of wanting to learn more about the country and the people he was raised to hate – Israel and Jews. One of the course sessions will be Aboubakr speaking about his journey. Other sessions will include a panel of students speaking about their experiences with antisemitism and anti-Zionism in high school and university.

The Diamond Foundation is sponsoring this crash course to reach out to Vancouver high school students and their families, to help them learn the skills, get the knowledge and find out about the resources available to support Israel and fight antisemitism. Also involved in presenting the event with StandWithUs Canada are Camp Hatikvah, Masa Israel Journey, King David High School and the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver.

The May 15 crash course will take place at KDHS from 4 to 8 p.m. Registration is required to attend. Students can register at forms.gle/hPncontVmAC4Jfor6.

– Courtesy StandWithUs Canada

Lichtmann interns with StandWithUs

Maya Lichtmann (photo from Connect Model United Nations Vancouver)

Maya Lichtmann was selected in May as a Canadian high school intern for StandWithUs, an international organization that educates about Israel and fights antisemitism. She was chosen for the program after participating in a StandWithUs event at King David High School.

Lichtmann, a Grade 12 student at J.N. Burnett Secondary School in Richmond, attended a conference in August at the American Jewish University in Los Angeles with about 100 other high school interns, including about a dozen Canadians. She will join all high school and college interns in January at the same location.

As part of the internship, she recently delivered an educational program to two History 12 classes at her school. She covered the history of the Jewish people, how they came to Europe, the rise of Nazism, the Holocaust, the creation of the state of Israel and the rise of anti-Zionism. While she uses resources offered by StandWithUs, her presentations are developed independently.

“A lot of the presentations that StandWithUs have are catered toward Jewish audiences, because a lot of the kids who are doing the internship go to private Jewish schools,” she said. Because she goes to a public school, and one where a majority of students are of Asian heritage, she developed the presentations for audiences with limited knowledge of the topic. She received entirely positive feedback from a “100% non-Jewish audience,” she said.

Lichtmann plans to make a presentation about LGBTQ+ rights in Israel to her school’s gay-straight alliance, and one about Israel’s role in the international community at her Model United Nations Club, which she led as president last year. She will also be delivering a presentation at a student-run TEDx event.

“I’m very passionate about Israel,” she said. “It’s one of the key factors in fighting international antisemitism because I believe that unity and acceptance of Jewish people has been a struggle for the past 1,900 years, as the Jewish people were throughout the Diaspora, and I hope to continue to help Jewish people feel more accepted within society.”

She added: “My grandfather was in a concentration camp, Bergen-Belsen. We were forced to relocate after the Holocaust, so my family moved to Israel and my father was born in Israel and then immigrated to Canada. But my ties and connection to Israel are obviously still very strong.”

Lichtmann also is on her school’s student council, president of the school’s Women in Leadership Club, youth representative on the board of directors at the Thompson Community Centre in Richmond, and premier-elect of the Richmond-Delta Youth Parliament. She coaches cheerleading and tutors international students in English.

Lichtmann is a daughter of Mandy and Eyal Lichtmann and big sister to Noa and Liel.

First Israel on Campus event

Yael Steinberg, left, and Zina Rakhamilova at Israel on Campus’ first event of the year at the University of British Columbia. (photo by Zach Sagorin)

“Often Jewish students on university campuses struggle to express any kind of pro-Israel sentiment. They are intimidated to do so and they don’t have the tools to articulate or engage in productive conversations,” said Ariella Karmel, president of Israel on Campus (IOC) at the University of British Columbia.

Karmel spoke to the Independent after the closing of the IOC’s first event of the year, called Israel Unlimited: Exploring Israel at UBC. Held on Oct. 29, its purpose was to teach effective communication skills and ways to address anti-Israel bias. It was led at Hillel BC by Zina Rakhamilova, StandWithUs Canadian campus coordinator, and Yael Steinberg, Hasbara Fellowships’ West Coast director.

“IOC is a student-run group … relating to Israeli culture, media, food, and we are also a pro-Israel group,” explained Karmel to the approximately 25 attendees. She said the club gives “a platform to engage with Israel” and is a resource for students who want to learn more about Israel.

With the exception of BDS (boycott, divestment and sanction) last year, Steinberg said anti-Israel propaganda on campus is minimal. However, she said, “When situations go down in Israel it becomes a lot more stressful on campus for those Jewish students, who somehow are held accountable for every action the state of Israel might possibly have ever done.… By virtue of Israel being the Jewish state, being a Jewish student means that you are the representative for that.”

Screened at the event was the film Crossing the Line, which, Steinberg explained, “is about when anti-Israel propaganda gets out of hand and crosses into the realm of antisemitism, which even though you may not see huge amounts of it at UBC … this can spring up in a moment’s notice.”

The short film emphasized hasbara (public relations), efforts to spread positive information about Israel, to stand up for Judaism and Israel: “A Jewish person not secure enough in their Jewish identity and [who] doesn’t know enough about Judaism, about Zionism, about Israel is going to be much more exposed, much more vulnerable.”

Rakhamilova warned, “Just because your campus climate is quiet for the most part, apathetic, doesn’t mean necessarily you shouldn’t do any sort of Israel engagement or Israel education because universities … across the country are dealing with BDS and are dealing with anti-Israel activity…. You are not immune to that kind of stuff…. It means you need to find a way to showcase a positive association with Israel.”

Rakhamilova suggested holding events on topics such as Magen David Adom or Israeli humanitarian aid, as a means of “nipping” anti-Israel activity “in the bud before it hits campus,” and “not only being reactive.”

“There are situations when people are allowed to be legitimately critical about Israel,” she stressed, “but there is a distinction between being fair about Israel and when it becomes antisemitic.”

The line between the two can be measured, she said, by the three Ds: demonization, delegitimization and double standard. “That’s how you can pinpoint when this is no longer legitimate criticism of Israel.”

As an example, Rakhamilova offered a chant from the Students for Justice in Palestine: “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” – this is delegitimization, she explained, as it is “indicating from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, so that entire land is Palestine and not Israel.

So, claiming [that] the Jewish people, unique among all national or ethnic groups, have no claim to sovereignty.”

Rakhamilova described the BDS movement as encompassing all three Ds, noting particularly its emphasis only on Israel, and ignoring any other body bringing harm to the Palestinians, as well as ignoring all of the contextual information. “And a lot of the imagery can be looked at to be demonizing towards Israel,” she said.

“What are the real issues? Occupation, excessive force, racism?” Steinberg asked. In addressing any of these issues, she said, “Each anti-Israel message has a corollary pro-Israel message.” Regarding excessive force, for example, “the Israeli government sent the IDF in with foot soldiers to Gaza to eradicate different terrorist cells when they could have sent the air force and turned Gaza into a parking lot because Israel values human life so much and they were trying to protect civilian casualties.”

Rakhamilova gave another example: the assertion that Israel is an apartheid state. “Apartheid is a system of racial subjugation to benefit one race over the other,” she said. “Does that happen in Israel? Do Arab Israelis have the same human rights as Jews in Israel? … Arab Israelis have equal rights in Israel.” She recommended including the message: “Until the Palestinians can accept the right for a Jewish state to exist, peace will be elusive. Peace can only come through mutual recognition and respect.”

In response to a question about how pro-Israel students should handle Jewish students who support BDS in the name of social justice and human rights, Rakhamilova said, “Just because you are Jewish doesn’t mean what you are saying is any less antisemitic,” and whether the criticisms are antisemitic or not can be gauged using the three Ds.

A member of the Jewish Defence League (JDL) asked how to respond to an event such as the one held by the Progressive Jewish Alliance, who hosted Israeli conscientious objector Yonatan Shapira on campus on Nov. 3. Some 125 people attended that event, including about eight protesters.

Rakhamilova began to respond, “When you come in and you look like you are demonstrating against someone’s right to speak….”

“We are demonstrating against their spreading antisemitism and anti-Israel propaganda on campus,” interrupted the JDL member, adding, “We are just giving a positive message.”

Steinberg suggested “not giving the event more publicity,” to which the JDL member countered, “We need to address it.”

Steinberg responded, “When we spoke about going rogue against the Jewish community….” The JDL member interrupted again, saying, “Ignoring it will not make it go away.”

Steinberg said, “By virtue of being a minority, one represents the whole and that’s unfortunate, and it sucks, and that’s racist, and it’s awful, but that’s the way this works. We have no choice but to work together … to figure out the best way to handle anti-Israel activity on campus.”

When asked for alternatives to demonstration, Steinberg suggested writing an op-ed after the fact, “so you can control the messaging,” working with the administration, or sending students to take notes of what has been said to use in the future.

Rakhamilova noted that Hillel or the IOC could take action. “They never do,” contended the JDL member.

The event wrapped up soon afterward. Karmel described it as having been “really productive” and “helpful in improving” the ability of students to effectively communicate pro-Israel sentiments.

Zach Sagorin is a Vancouver freelance writer.