They could not assault public sensibilities and expect to build a robust political movement out of doing that.
In the early morning of Thursday, California time, the police moved in and cleared the pro-Hamas encampment at University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA). There was barely any drama in this possibly watershed event. Instead of a traditional baton charge, the police simply crowded in and dragged out the militants one by one, cuffing them with zip ties and ripping off their masks. The matching tents and abundant encampment supplies were hauled away as trash.
The encampment at Columbia University in New York was similarly dismantled a day earlier. The smaller encampments in other US colleges are bound to be broken up soon, ending this strange episode where activists sided with terrorists, converted to Islam en masse and desecrated academic buildings.
American public opinion was deeply offended by activists tearing down the US flag and flying the Palestinian flag in its place. In one university, fraternity men rallied to protect the American flag at the main flagstaff on campus.
Bizarre as this spate of campus protest actions may be, they provided grist for the contending parties in a vital election year. The Republicans praised the police action while roundly condemning the pro-terrorist and anti-semitic tone of the protests.
The Republican Party positions itself as the party of law and order. It draws a lot of its electoral support from voters who do not hold university degrees. Donald Trump, presumptive nominee of the Republican Party, collected political points from this episode. Ironically, the American Left made this possible.
Joe Biden and the Democratic Party lost political points in this episode. The American president was stymied all through the past week. The Democratic Party attracts support from Americans with college degrees. The left wing of the party supported the protests. The so-called “progressive” Democrats echoed the accusation of the militants that Israel was conducting “genocide” against the people of Gaza.
In the looming presidential rematch, Biden has been losing young voters in droves. Much as he has scandalized his people and the world, Trump has been performing rather well in the surveys of late.
When he did finally address the protests after the UCLA encampment was dismantled, Biden delivered a tortured statement. He reaffirmed free speech within the bounds of law, warned against rising antisemitism and restated US support for Israel. It was a statement that pleased no one.
Biden had distinguished himself through his long political career as a man of moderation and pragmatism. In a highly polarized condition, that has made him unattractive to all the hysterical fringe groups across the ideological spectrum.
In Ukraine, the Biden administration kept pressuring the Ukrainians to desist from attacking targets in Russia. Biden hesitated sending longer range weaponry that could be used to destroy Russian military capacity within their own borders. When Ukraine attacked Russian facilities using their own drones, Biden officials pleaded with Kyiv not to attack Russian oil refineries for fear this might force up the price of oil further.
In the case of Israel, the Biden administration opposed comprehensive military action in Gaza aimed at completely destroying Hamas. Biden was constantly pressuring Tel Aviv to desist from operating in densely populated areas – even if these densely populated areas sheltered Hamas fighting units.
This a losing proposition, public relations-wise. It made the US appear a vacillating ally. It did not help free the hostages even as it exasperated Israeli nationalists.
Notwithstanding his constant badgering of Tel Aviv to minimize collateral damage to civilians in Gaza, Biden was condemned at home for his handling of the situation. He disappointed both his constituents as well as his allies abroad.
The Biden administration’s flip-flopping in Ukraine and Gaza has been cited by allies everywhere as indications of US unreliability. In Manila, critics of the Marcos administration’s foreign policy tilt towards the US claim it is wrong to rely more heavily on an unreliable treaty ally. They forget to mention, however, that the Philippines really has no other strategic choice if we want to ward off China’s bullying in our seas.
At any rate, the spate of pro-Hamas activities on US campuses will likely dissipate as fast as it came. Its inherent antisemitism and its proclivity towards tyrannical regimes abroad clashes with American values. The boorishness of the activists, their insistence on concealing their faces and their hostility towards journalists seeking to document the movement’s providence turned the public off.
What is left of the political Left in the US, combatants in the culture wars polarizing American society, invested heavily in the pro-Hamas demonstrations. The defeat of these protest actions, their failure to generate spontaneous public support, will be a defeat for the political Left. The conservatives will see to that.
The prominence of LGBTQ groups in these protest actions that extolled regimes brutally repressing LGBTQ individuals in their own societies underscore the anachronisms that haunt left-wing causes in most parts of the world. The left-wing groups, such as Antifa, labor under the weight of these anachronisms. They are forced to endorse political positions that clash with their core values.
Back here in Manila, the left-wing groups commandeered pro-labor marches and led them to the inevitable anti-American protests in front of the US embassy. The unauthorized march, like the encampments in US campuses, were efficiently dispersed.