Just as Israel has alleged that Hamas fighters shelter in Gaza’s homes, hospitals and schools, militants could now apparently be coming to a school near you. Amid the swell of anti-genocide protest at campuses across the US, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations Gilad Erdan declared to the General Assembly in May, ‘we always knew that Hamas hides in schools, we just didn’t realize that it is not only schools in Gaza – it is also Harvard, Columbia and many “elite” universities’. Erdan chastised the assembly for ‘collaborating’ with protesters and ‘encouraging their racism and antisemitism’.

While the US, like many other nations, has recorded a spike in reports of both antisemitism and Islamophobia since 7 October, the violent repression of protests by police has made clear the lack of interest in either listening to or protecting Jewish voices speaking out against the genocide. The rough-handling and arrest of the 65-year-old Head of Jewish Studies, Professor Annelise Orleck, at a protest at New Hampshire’s Dartmouth College provided a stark case in point.