Protests against the War in Gaza have roiled across American campuses since April and only seem to be gaining momentum. Why, when surveys reflect that the Gaza war ranks very low, some 2%, as an issue of concern to Americans, have the protests spread like wildfires?  Apart from comparisons with previous student protests there have been a paucity of explanations for the phenomenon.

Looking back at the student protests against the war in Vietnam in the nineteen sixties or against the Apartheid regime in the seventies, they reflected a youthful idealism strongly opposed to war and to racism. America had been sucked into a war in Vietnam after the French were defeated in the battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954 and which had been raging ever since and seemed interminable.

It exerted an ever increasing toll on the lives of young Americans against a resolute enemy that rightfully created the conditions for young Americans to raise questions about the sagacity of continuing the war. These student protests became the bellwether for the wider society to question American participation in the Vietnam war and eventually led to America pulling out in 1975 with the fall of Saigon.

The fight against racism gained momentum after the Second World War when many previously colonised countries started to demand their independence. In the United States the Civil Rights Movement gained prominence from 1954 and continued into the Nineteen seventies, when students and broader society started to focus on the abominations of Apartheid.

When the fight against Apartheid became embroiled in the Cold War, the Soviet Union and its allies in the Non-Aligned Movement tended to take a leadership role. It was mainly through The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) founded in 1960 that mainly Black students became involved in the Civil Rights Movement in America.

However, it was mainly on College campuses in European Capitals that the anti-Apartheid movement spread and coalesced with the Stop Apartheid sports teams from participating in international sports events. Therefore, because of the involvement of many state actors and a plethora of many NGO’S the role of students in the struggle against racism was more nuanced.

To understand current events, I believe we need to understand how the American youth view American society and their place within it, particularly as it is an election year.

A Harvard Institute of Politics poll found that after a record youth turnout in the 2020 elections, fewer young Americans between the ages 18 to 29 years plan to vote in 2024 “in part due to widespread dissatisfaction with both President Joe Biden and his likely challenger former President Donald Trump”.  There is a clear generational dissonance between the youth and the octogenarian leadership.

“From a lack of trust in leaders on a variety of critical issues such as climate change, gun violence, and the war in the Middle East, to worries about the economy and AI, young people’s concerns young people’s concerns come through loud and clear” in the poll. With Trump, the likely Presidential incumbent in denial about climate change, gun violence and supportive of many of the world’s dictators including Putin, the youth feel alienated and discordant from the establishment.

These dissimilar feelings between the economic establishment and the concerns of the youth contribute to a sense of alienation amongst the youth. Whilst the economy is ostensibly flourishing the concerns of the youth like the high cost of living, high rentals, high inflation, homelessness and inequality appear to have fallen between the cracks and are not being addressed. In contrast, the youth see vast amounts of funds being doled out to countries involved in conflict such as the Ukraine and Israel, that they feel could be better used to address local issues and consequently raise their ire at the choices the establishment make.

So whilst the nexus between the youth and the establishment is fertile for “an intifada” why has it coalesced around the Israel/Palestine conflict, and more particularly in mass support for the Palestinian cause? “In a recent Quinnipiac poll, Americans voters overall sympathize with Israelis over Palestinians by a margin of 54-24. But among voters under 35, the numbers are nearly the reverse of that, with young voters more sympathetic to Palestinians by 52-29 margin”.

This poll again reinforces the generational dissonance and sets the scene for a revolt against the establishment and university students are usually the group at the vanguard of societal change.

It is not difficult to see why there has arisen tension between what the youth view as unquestioned support for Israel which has been a cornerstone of American foreign policy and has enjoyed bipartisan support. The youth are exposed to fifty times more negative social media posts which portray Israel in negative light.

The preponderance of media focusses on the Middle East conflict and keeps a daily tally on the loss of Palestinian lives. In no other conflict is the magnifying glass focussed to nearly the same extent as on the suffering and dislocation of the Palestinian people. The Palestinians are viewed as the ultimate victims and the youth can easily identify with them as the underdogs with whom they can identify.

In this portrayal as “underdog” the students’ zeal to tie themselves to an anti-establishment mast, they are prepared to overlook the defects of the Palestinians and their cause. This idealistic view is purged of the barbarity of Hamas because the revolt is against the side supported by the “establishment”, and they feel no empathy for the suffering of the Israelis. In their naiveté they also seem to be prepared to forego hard earned Western values such as their right to protest and even overlook the anti-gay, misogynous and bigoted religious views.

Adding fuel to the fire is the sheer amount of financing to American universities flowing from countries hostile to Israel. According to the United States Education department the following countries are the main sources of funds since 2012;

- Qatar $3,281, 809,223

-  Saudi Arabia $1,454,621,859

- UAE $635,818,317

- Kuwait $338,726,100

Since 2018 the Democratic Party has been infiltrated by “The Squad” a group of (initially) nine democratic members of the House of Representatives with radical pro-Palestinian views which have grown to become a pressure point on the policies of President Biden. They, together with the students have called for the cessation of arms supplies to Israel and the cutting off of links to any companies that supply arms to Israel. Their anti-establishment views have found fertile ground amongst the youth and have received widespread coverage at Universities.

Unlike previous causes that students have embraced, they may yet rue the day they have blindly supported the Palestinian cause, particularly the Hamas language and imagery. It does the students cause no merit, to pursue the demise and destruction of a sovereign nation and people, namely Israel and the Jews. It does the students cause an injustice to identify with a fascist, genocidal and religiously fanatical movement, namely Hamas. In their eagerness to adopt an anti-establishment stance they are undermining the very freedoms that the establishment offers them.