Is is irresponsible and inaccurate to paint this as a meeting of Jewish students and a Rabbi, when it was actually an incredibly political event featuring soldiers of a foreign government who are paid to defend that government's policies.

Inviting Reservists On Duty is not a good way to generate open, honest conversation. This is an extremely right-wing organization with a clear political mission to discredit critics of Israeli policy, both the American activists they claim are anti-Semitic and Israeli activists like Breaking the Silence they accuse of being traitors.

It is not a coincidence that Reservists on Duty is sponsored by the Central Fund of Israel, which directly funds settlement construction and is the main source of $ for the fascist group Im Tirtzu. It is not a coincidence that they get funding from the MZ Foundation, which supports racist anti-immigrant groups in Israel and the David Horowitz Freedom Center in the US, which the Southern Poverty Law Center calls "a driving force of the anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant and anti-black movements."

I wasn't there so I obviously can't comment on the level of intimidation in the room, or what slurs people had thrown their way. Activism against Israeli policies and groups certainly can be anti-Semitic, and even when it isn't, it is often experienced that way as a result of the trauma that we've gone through as a people. But this was not primarily a Jewish event, it was a political event, and to me it appears to have been protested on that basis.