Presence being felt

With regard to “Jewish students take the moral high ground at the University of Cape Town” (Comment & Features, March 28), the university recently made headlines on account of the UCT Palestine Solidarity Forum’s erecting in the center of the campus a large wall on which was painted the slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” as part of its Israel Apartheid Week activities.

Similar activities were conducted at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, where pictures of Anne Frank, inappropriately adorned with a Muslim scarf, were displayed, accompanied by anti-Israel graffiti.

All this is part of a ploy to denigrate Israel and promote antisemitism, but the negative and hate-filled intentions do not stop there.

These institutions of higher education were, in the past, great universities, producing significant academics, scholars, scientists, doctors and Nobel Prize winners. Today, their hijacking by groups such as the UCT Palestine Solidarity Forum has caused a downgrading of their importance both in South Africa and internationally.

Comfort can be taken from the fact that members of the South African Union of Jewish Students (SAUJS) are standing up to make their presence felt and combating activities such as the above. Kol hakavod to them.