July 20, 2011 by Steve Kuperberg

While most college campuses become lovely, sleepy places during the summer months, savvy campus Israel supporters, in the words of the poet, have miles to go before they sleep. Training programs, summer Israel trips, pro-Israel internships, conferences and seminars fill the summer calendar. And it’s a good thing, because a unique campus Israel advocacy opportunity awaits as campuses come back to life in just a few short weeks.

Of course, most readers of this column neither live under rocks nor miss major news relating to Israel’s standing in the world. Therefore, it is not news to our readers that the Palestinian Authority has ignored repeated requests from Israelis, the United States, and the international community to renew direct negotiations and has instead threatened for months to unilaterally seek an expression of approval from the United Nations General Assembly for independent Palestinian statehood. While the contours of that purported approval are yet to be determined—as of the time of this writing, negotiations to attempt to forestall a UN effort have appeared to break down—one message resonates: the Palestinian leadership still prefers public grandstanding and reconciliation with the terrorist group Hamas to direct negotiations with Israelis in order to reach peace. In the meantime, as the Palestinian leadership stalls, events in the region and around the globe continue to unfold in unpredictable ways, with the threat of renewed violence over frustration at a lack of progress never far from the surface in the increasingly turbulent Middle East.

While the international community attempts to address these concerns, the network of campus Israel supporters offers a unique opportunity to share with their campuses and with the larger world their own message: namely, that it’s time to be real about what partnership for peace between Palestinians and Israelis really means.

Israelis and the Israel supporters on campus overwhelmingly believe in direct negotiations between responsible Israeli and Palestinian partners as the best way to reach a peaceful end to the conflict. No less than the past five prime ministers of Israel, including Prime Minister Netanyahu himself, have called for such direct negotiations—but the Palestinian leadership has dithered, dallied, and delayed over the past two and a half years to return to such direct talks. Instead, they have sought to include in a unity government the terrorist group Hamas, which itself refuses to recognize Israel’s right to exist, renounce violence, or abide by past agreements to which the Palestinian leadership has committed itself—minimum expectations that the international community had consistently required before Hamas could be included in serious dialogue.

One could easily see parallels in this misguided direction toward extremism and posturing among campus Israel detractors, too. Campus quad theatrics and inflammatory, hate-spewing speakers do nothing to advance the campus community’s mission of bringing thoughtful insight to the world. Campus discussions should generate light, not heat.

This fall, the campus Israel network should call on the support of their campus communities and express their support for the parties to be real. To borrow the phrase from Yitzhak Rabin: enough with pointless grandstanding; enough with dallying with terror. It’s time for the parties to be real partners for peace, reject terror and unilateral actions, and return to the table. That message can and should come loud and clear from the campus community because it is precisely the type of real, meaningful dialogue that the campus itself promotes. Only through that type of real conversation between responsible partners can we resolve the toughest issues that have defied easy solutions for so long.

The campus community knows the right path, and by its example, it’s time to show it. Grandstanding? Terrorist groups?

Be real.