People (and I include myself in that group) like things to be simple. Thankfully, the situation regarding Ukraine is simple. Ukraine is a recognized sovereign country and Russia had agreed to respect and protect its borders, and then Russia invaded Ukraine with more than 100,000 troops. Simple. Russia is wrong, and Ukraine is right.

Unfortunately, the situation between Israel and Palestine (or is it Israel and the Palestinians, or is it Israel and Hamas?) is much more complicated, and the rights and wrongs are much murkier. This is the reason that I haven’t written about the student protests until now. I am not sure what to say.

What I do know is that the participants of the protest groups are not monolithic.

Some would like to see Israel disappear and the Jews disappear (from the region or completely) with the disappearance of the state.

Some would like to see Israel simply stop occupying Gaza and the West Bank.

Some would simply like a ceasefire.

Some would like to see one state containing Jews and Arabs.

But they all know that they cannot force any of those things to happen. So they become more and more frustrated. They decide to narrow their goals, even as they keep their vocabulary broad. They focus on the universities against whom they are protesting. The universities should not support Israel (or should not support Israel’s war, depending on whom you ask). They should divest! If they divest, the companies from whom they are divesting will struggle. How will they stop struggling? They will themselves diversify from Israel.

Or they concentrate on the United States government. Any American can do that, of course. They concentrate on the money which the U.S. gives Israel, and especially the money that Israel uses to support its military.

But there is no subtlety here. There can’t be. Subtlety is too complex.

So supporters of Israel are caught in the crossfire. And because subtlety is too complex, all supporters of Israel are caught. Even those who are against the Gaza war.

And Jews are caught in the crossfire. That’s because most Jews are supporters of Israel, whether or not they support this particular war, the occupation in general, or the current Israeli government. Subtlety is too complex, so unless a Jew declares himself in solidarity with the protests, Jews are caught in the crossfire.

And the more Jews speak out against the protests, the more they become targets. And for sure, protests look for targets.

But does this mean that the protestors are (as a whole) antisemitic (obviously some are)? I don’t think so, unless you identify being Jewish with support of Israel. Israel likes to think of itself as the homeland of the Jews – this is one of the ways it garners support from the diaspora. Jews have a right of return to Israel. It can be hard to separate the two, to be sure. It, again, is complex.

And, of course, the protestors want their protests to be successful. You try to achieve success in any way you can. Is it more like to exceed of you attack Jews as well as the state of Israel? Perhaps it is. At least that is what protest leaders bank on.

And protestors can’t go halfway. They can’t acknowledge anything good about Israel, or bad about Hamas or other Arab leadership. They can’t talk about release of the hostages. Much too complex.

And, yes, there is the question of leaders and followers. Followers follow leaders; they always do. And followers usually take what leaders say very seriously. Typically, followers take what leaders say much more seriously than leaders themselves. The leaders are tacticians, the followers are the true believers.

I am not sure how much sense any of it makes.

But you see why I haven’t written about this yet. I don’t want to be knee-jerk; I want to be nuanced. But I do crave simplicity.

But what about simply fighting fire with fire? I hear that all the time – but can you tell me any time when that has been successful? When there is a real fire……do you fight it with fire?

(You will note that I have not even hinted at what I believe are the appropriate actions for a university to take. I bet you know why.)