In the run-up to the presidential election and afterward, the United States has experienced disturbing outbreaks of anti-Semitism, including a spate of incidents on more than 100 college campuses, where white supremacists have been distributing anti-Semitic fliers and openly recruiting adherents. Some human rights and Jewish activists say President Trump has emboldened right-wing hostility toward Jews, but others say such charges are unjustified. Defining anti-Semitism is controversial. Members of Congress and state legislators want to codify a definition that would include opposition to Israel's existence. But pro-Palestinian and civil liberties groups say that would violate free-speech rights. A similar debate is playing out in Europe, where some countries have seen a rise in deadly attacks on Jews in recent years, often by radicalized Muslims, such as the 2015 terrorist attack on a kosher grocery in Paris. Paradoxically, growing anti-Muslim attitudes in countries experiencing an influx of refugees have also spurred more prejudice against Jews — the target of history's longest hatred.

American students, many of whom display a shocking degree of ignorance about the Holocaust, will not find much trustworthy and objective information about anti-Semitism from touted academic databases such as the CQ Researcher . The alleged "in-depth" report on anti-Semitism dated May 12, 2017 is filled with statements about President Trump, white supremacy, and right-wing hostility. Thus, the report asserts:

At no time does the article speak of the ugliness of such campus groups like Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) who deliberately incite anti-Semitic acts on universities. This might assist a student in understanding the nature of anti-Semitism.

Far too many of the Muslims coming into America and Europe hold profoundly anti-Semitic ideas, which too often result in violence against Jews. They have been taught to hate Jews, plain and simple. Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar are two prime examples of the vicious anti-Semitism. That they are in positions of authority only emboldens other anti-Semites — no paradox there. Jews are exiting France because of the upsurge in Muslim immigration, and Sweden is experiencing violence as never seen before.

Consider that this CQ Researcher piece cites the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) as credible sources. How would a student attempting to do genuine research realize that both groups have less than reliable pedigrees. Thus:

What makes the Southern Poverty Law Center particularly odious is its habit of taking legitimate conservatives and jumbling them with genuine hate groups (the Klan, Aryan Nation, skinheads, etc.), to make it appear that there's a logical relationship between say opposing affirmative action and lynching, or demands for an end to government services for illegal aliens and attacks on dark-skinned immigrants.

Furthermore, in October 2016, SPLC published a report titled "Field Guide to Anti-Muslim Extremists." Some of the profiles included Ann Corcoran, Steven Emerson, Brigitte Gabriel, Frank Gaffney, Pamela Geller, John Guandolo, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, David Horowitz, Ryan Mauro, Robert Muise, Daniel Pipes, Walid Shoebat, Robert Spencer, and David Yerushalmi. Yet:

Each of these individuals seeks, in writings and speeches that are firmly rooted in factual information, to inform the American public about the beliefs, values, agendas, and activities of Islamic jihadists, and about the potential consequences of widespread Muslim immigration to the United States. But SPLC — rather than simply asserting that the arguments or conclusions of these authors are flawed in some way — instead smears them as wild-eyed Islamophobes who, as in the case of Gaffney, are 'gripped' by paranoid fantasies about Muslims destroying the West from within.

Concerning the Anti-Defamation League, it has now morphed into a leftwing pressure group. In fact, "Jonathan Greenblatt's tenure at the ADL has seen the organization endorse lefty anti-Semitism again and again. It's taken money from Pierre Omidyar, a leading funder of alt-left anti-Semitism and has celebrated Soros while selling out Israel."

The CQ article touches upon the BDS movement, anti-Zionism, and hatred of Israel with such left-wing tenets as:

Liz Jackson, a staff attorney at Palestine Legal, a group that litigates on behalf of Americans advocating for Palestinian rights, says she does not see opposition to Israel's existence as anti-Semitic. She does not believe in a separate state for Jews, she says, even though she is Jewish. "Jews have to be safe everywhere in the world; not in just one country," she says. "You can't have a democratic society which privileges one religious group above another; anti-Jewish hatred has nothing to do with that." The question of whether Israel should exist is a legitimate political argument, says Naomi Wayne, an Executive Committee member of the London-based Jews for Justice for Palestinians. "Was Israel founded in compliance with international law?" In England, a similar debate is raging over the Conservative government's adoption of the State Department definition of anti-Semitism. Jewish groups supporting Palestinian rights say it could chill speech.

Yet the article does not point out that these so-called Jewish groups have no problem with the chilling and ultimate curbing of free speech by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC).

Furthermore, using people who claim to be Jewish amplifies the imprimatur of approval of their odious comments. Having been regularly brainwashed in his humanities and history classes, the student cannot comprehend this vile left-wing connection.

The CQ article states, "[T]he French government reported a 61 percent plunge in all forms of anti-Semitism last year, which [was] largely attributed to increased security after recent terrorist attacks." That incidents are reduced because of increased security does not mean that anti-Semitism is less. Then the article asserts that "contrary to claims from right-wing groups, newly arrived Muslim immigrants have not been responsible for rising anti-Semitic incidents, such as a 16 percent uptick in Berlin[.] ... 'The perpetrators continue to be the radical circles of the previous Muslim immigrants' including European-born children of Muslim immigrants, and the extreme right[.]'" Is this not a distinction without a difference concerning the Muslims?

As Bruce Bawer aptly explains, "the exclusive attribution of anti-Semitism to the far-right is ridiculous, as is the distinction between "anti-Israeli" and "anti-Semitic." But this kind of wordplay on the part of German officialdom is not surprising. Such fiddling with semantics and statistics in order to avoid pointing the figure at Muslims is thoroughly consistent with the current practice by both the German government and media of downplaying the extent of Muslim sexual assaults and other crimes[.]"

Finally, there is a section in the CQ article titled "Has President Trump spurred anti-Semitism in the U.S." Talk about a loaded question. Bob Esham responds that while Trump is not anti-Semitic, he is "someone who out of ignorance, instinct or connivance has used and given cover to anti-Semites. The evidence for that is strong and unforgivable." The other writer, David E. Bernstein, writes that "Americans ... should always be vigilant about anti-Semitism. But anti-Semitism didn't disappear during the Obama years, and it hasn't suddenly become a crisis under Trump." Faint praise, indeed, and totally ignoring the personal connections between Obama and known anti-Semites.

The average American student has never learned what the Koran says about Jews or seen the Palestinian indoctrination that teaches Muslim children to become martyrs and kill Jews. He has barely read how Christians and Jews are under constant attack by people who use Islam as their guidepost.

By now, the uninformed student who is already marinating in radical left-wing ideas spouted by too many of his professors will certainly be hard pressed to delineate the veiled anti-Semitism and left-wing influence. Yet he will dutifully cite this article for his Works Cited page.

It is abundantly clear that a left-wing miasma permeates everything in higher education.

Eileen can be reached at middlemarch18@gmail.com.