People watching NBA playoff games on Tuesday night will view a new ad purchased by Robert Kraft’s Foundation to Combat Antisemitism telling them, “Don’t bring hate to the protest.”
“Scream until you’re red in the face. But don’t scream at the Jewish kid walking to class,” the 30-second ad states, featuring photos from protests since October 7th. “Draw a line in the sand, but don’t draw a swastika.”
The ad comes as antisemitism surges in America, particularly on college campuses where students protesting the Israel-Hamas war have, in some instances, harassed and physically assaulted Jewish students and faculty.
Kraft, the billionaire businessman who owns the New England Patriots and graduated from Columbia University, the epicenter of the wave of pro-Palestine protests on campuses, recently suggested that he could withhold donating to the university “until corrective action is taken.”
The ad is part of a new campaign he launched through his foundation to combat “Jewish hate and all hate,” according to a statement he made last week.
“Political issues should be debated – peaceful protests are a part of that. But there cannot be hate speech or intimidation,” Tara Levine, president of Kraft’s foundation said in a statement to CNN. “Our ad shows when protests create dialogue, but also when they cross the line into hate.”
Kraft similarly purchased a Super Bowl ad this year to highlight antisemitism, however, the ad did not focus specifically on campus protests.
University administrators have been in hot water over their responses to encampments on campuses. University of Chicago’s president Paul Alivastos was the latest to authorize police to clear an encampment on Tuesday. Such actions have received considerable backlash over concerns of free speech suppression.
But administrators have said the protests have disrupted life on campus, threatened students’ security and broke school rules.
Ahead of the ad airing Tuesday night, President Joe Biden is set to deliver an address in Washington for the Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Days of Remembrance ceremony.
In the speech, he will address the long history of antisemitism and issue what one senior administration official familiar with the remarks described as a “call to action” on combatting antisemitism.
The campus protests, however, will not be a major section of the president’s remarks. Biden addressed campus turmoil last week after Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall was broken into as students and outside agitators barricaded themselves inside.
“Vandalism, trespassing, breaking windows, shutting down campuses, forcing the cancelation of classes and graduation – none of this is a peaceful protest,” the president said last week.
As university administrators continue to grapple with ongoing protests on campus, and some have chosen to call local law enforcement to clear encampments.
Charlotte Mecklenburg and University of North Carolina Charlotte campus police on Tuesday morning swept the small encampment that had been in place at UNC Charlotte’s campus since late-April and one person was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest, according to the university.
Police also began clearing a protest encampment at the University of Chicago Tuesday morning. As the operation continued, police cordoned off the main entrance to the quad as protesters chanted. All of the protesters left without incident police made no arrests, the university said.
“Safety concerns have mounted over the last few days, and the risks were increasing too rapidly for the status quo to hold,” said university president Paul Alivisatos in a statement Tuesday. “This morning, the University intervened to end the encampment.”
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