What elite colleges will lose if Orthodox Jews go elsewhere.
As weather across the United States warms, concern springs eternal that universities will once again draw national attention for all the wrong reasons. Last year, milder temperatures brought unsanctioned encampments full of students (and faculty) demonstrating against Israel. Administrators tolerating Zionist-free zones predictably invited lawsuits, which have progressed considerably in recent months. One innovative lawsuit, brought by Jewish students at UCLA, argues that such exclusionary zones violated Jewish students’ First Amendment rights because they discriminated against many Jews’ closely held belief that Judaism requires support for Israel’s existence. In a scathing rebuke of UCLA’s handling of the situation, the judge overseeing the case denied UCLA’s motion to dismiss the complaint, calling the state of affairs on campus “unimaginable” and “abhorrent.”
Merits of this lawsuit and similar ones on other campuses aside, the story told by the UCLA plaintiffs suggests that Jewish students—particularly religiously observant Orthodox Jews—may start reconsidering their traditional academic destinations.
Continue reading the entire piece here at The Dispatch (paywall)
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Tal Fortgang is an adjunct fellow at the Manhattan Institute. He was a 2023 Sapir Fellow.
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