It was supposed to be over. The rockets had stopped; diplomats were congratulating one another, and the word “ceasefire” echoed across newsfeeds like a promise of calm. But that night in downtown Toronto, when the Jewish community was attacked once again, that illusion shattered.
A private gathering hosted by Students Supporting Israel (SSI) and featuring veterans of the Israel Defense Forces turned violent when a masked mob stormed the event. Glass exploded, guests were attacked, one speaker was beaten, and several were hospitalized.
Police made arrests, but the damage was done, and the truth is now seen; the event was another sign that campus activism has gone global, with the same chants and messages appearing in cities far from where they began.
Another example strikes at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. Students Supporting Israel hosted an event featuring a former IDF soldier. Outside, protesters gathered waving flags, banging pots and pans, and chanting “No terrorists on campus.” Flyers had circulated in advance, calling on students to “make noise” and “stand with Palestine.”
The scene turned chaotic as a small but loud, keffiyeh-clad group disrupted the event until campus police intervened, escorting the protesters away and even confiscating a spoon used as part of the clamor.
What we once called “student protest” has metastasized into something darker: a transnational movement that has learned to outlast wars, borders, and even peace.
Supported by professors
Across North America, pro-Palestinian groups have remained active, aggressive, and unrelenting long after the guns went quiet. At UCLA, “solidarity encampments” descended into chaos. At Stanford, demonstrators barricaded themselves inside the university president’s office, refusing to leave until police forced them out.At Columbia University, dozens of students were arrested for occupying Butler Library in yet another show of defiance.
It’s a pattern of hostility that grows inside universities, pushed by ideology and supported by professors. Networks like Faculty for Justice in Palestine and campus chapters of Columbia University Apartheid Divest have learned to weaponize their credibility, turning classrooms into recruitment grounds.
So, even after the ceasefire, CUAD didn’t call for healing or diplomacy. It doubled down, tweeting defiantly: “Our task is to build an anti-Imperialist student movement no matter who is in power.” That’s the rhetoric of revolution. And this dynamic was developed in American campuses with the faculty support.
In April 2024, Northwestern students erected a pro-Palestinian encampment on Deering Meadow. It began as a protest, but by October 2024, the school was disciplining students for staging a walk-out on the first anniversary of Hamas’s massacre. Then came Washington’s attention. In April 2025, the US House committee investigating campus antisemitism demanded records from Northwestern’s law clinic for its role in defending protest organizers.
Dr. Alithia Zamantakis, a Northwestern professor, became a symbol of how far things have gone. She mixed activism with her academic role, was arrested during protests, and later praised Hamas leaders as “martyrs.” She is one of the professors who turned her position as an educator into a platform for extremism.
Ivy League hate
Another example is Harvard, where protest did not fade – it entrenched. We saw hundreds camping in Harvard Yard. By May, the school’s commencement was interrupted when graduates walked out chanting “Free, Free Palestine” after the administration barred 13 activists from receiving diplomas. A year later, a university task force reported that Jewish students continued to face harassment and intimidation, evidence that the hostility had become systemic.
At Harvard, Dr. Karameh Kuemmerle, a neurologist, shows how professional titles can be used for politics. As co-founder of Doctors Against Genocide, she has shared claims that echo Hamas talking points, accusing Israel of “targeting hospitals” and calling its actions “genocide.” Her group’s posts often mirror sources known for spreading pro-Hamas messages. This position is also reflected in her teaching.
Finally, at UPenn, activism hardened into defiance. The Gaza Solidarity Encampment of April 2024 consumed the college for weeks. By May 2025, disciplinary hearings and suspensions continued long after the tents came down.
Among its loudest defenders is Prof. Sukaina Hirji, a philosopher whose activism has blurred the boundary between academic inquiry and agitation. As a leader of Penn Faculty for Justice in Palestine, Hirji helped sustain the encampment, hosted “teach-ins” defending civil disobedience, and minimized the intimidation that Jewish students described daily. On social media, she echoed calls to “dismantle Zionism” and demanded leniency for arrested protesters.
Her advocacy extended to workshops like “Resistance and Oppression” and public signatures endorsing PACBI, the academic boycott movement criticized for institutional discrimination. Through such acts, Hirji transformed her department into a forum for activism, proof that radical ideology has found intellectual cover within the halls of learning.
The war continues
What began as campus protest has become a permanent infrastructure of confrontation. From Zamantakis’s “martyrs” at Northwestern to Kuemmerle’s “genocide” campaign at Harvard and Hirji’s ideological workshops at Penn, the through-line is unmistakable: a generation of academics using the privileges of scholarship to normalize hostility, justify violence, and erode safety in the name of liberation.
The ceasefire may have silenced the rockets, but on American campuses, and beyond the US – and now, even in Toronto – the war continues. Not with missiles, but with words, classrooms, and influence. And until universities are willing to draw the line between free expression and open incitement, they will remain the staging grounds for the next wave of extremism.
The writer is spokesperson for Protect Our Campus.