{"id":139229,"date":"2023-12-18T15:42:47","date_gmt":"2023-12-18T20:42:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/?p=139229"},"modified":"2023-12-18T15:42:47","modified_gmt":"2023-12-18T20:42:47","slug":"rabbi-harvard-tells-jews-to-hide-menorah-nights-during-hanukkah","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/rabbi-harvard-tells-jews-to-hide-menorah-nights-during-hanukkah\/","title":{"rendered":"Rabbi: Harvard tells Jews to \u2018hide\u2019 menorah nights during Hanukkah"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><strong>&#8216;Jew hate and antisemitism is thriving on this campus&#8217;<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>Harvard told Jewish leaders to pack up their menorah every night during Hanukkah, fearing the display could be vandalized and the crime would make the school look bad, a Jewish chaplain at the university said last week.<\/p>\n<p>Rabbi Hirschy Zarchi, who leads the Jewish student organization Harvard Chabad, spoke about issues with the display Dec. 13 as the sun set behind the menorah, according to a YouTube <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=arXWd7e2PVI\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">video<\/a> of his speech.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOn our campus in the shadow of Widener Library, we in the Jewish community are instructed, \u2018We\u2019ll let you have the menorah, you made your point, OK. Pack it up. Don\u2019t leave it out overnight because there will be criminal activity, we fear, and it won\u2019t look good,\u2019\u201d Zarchi said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt pains me to have to say sadly, that Jew hate and antisemitism is thriving on this campus,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>On other campuses, Jewish students and leaders have said much the same after seeing a swastika and hearing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/jewish-students-face-swastika-intifada-calls-amid-hanukkah-celebrations\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">calls of \u201cintifada\u201d<\/a> during Hanukkah this year, which took place Dec. 7 to 15.<\/p>\n<p>At Harvard, Zarchi said the Jewish community gathered every night to light the menorah. And every night, he said they had to take down the display because of university leaders\u2019 fears about vandalism.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-conversation=\"none\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Some excerpts from Rabbi Zarchi\u2019s remarks. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/sDNj8jA3Jx\">pic.twitter.com\/sDNj8jA3Jx<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Harvard Chabad (@HarvardChabad) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/HarvardChabad\/status\/1735340492076794213?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">December 14, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><br \/>\nThe rabbi said he longs for the day when Harvard \u201cnot only has our back, not only allows us to put up a menorah but doesn\u2019t force us to hide it at night.\u201d And when university leaders hear \u201chateful calls to the death of Jews, you don\u2019t walk by and say nothing, you speak,\u201d Zarchi said.<\/p>\n<p>He said a Jewish student recently shared how he looks in the mirror every morning before leaving home to make sure nothing gives away the fact that he is a Jew.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat\u2019s the reality of the Jewish community at Harvard today,\u201d Zarchi said. \u201cWe have to pack up the menorah when we\u2019re done. Some students feel they have to remove anything about their physical appearance that suggests they\u2019re a target.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou know when change is going to happen on this campus? When we don\u2019t have to pack up the menorah,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>Still, Zarchi said the nightly gatherings around the menorah gave him hope because Jews still believe in coming together to celebrate and work for a better tomorrow.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe menorah stands as a symbol and a message of triumph, of freedom over oppression, of spirit over matter, and of light over darkness,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>In a similar incident, New York University administrators were accused of denying Jewish students \u201ctheir annual Hanukkah lighting on Kimmel steps\u201d last week, according to a flier circulating on campus, the <em>New York Post<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2023\/12\/14\/news\/harvard-forces-jewish-student-group-to-hide-menorah-at-night-for-fear-of-vandalism-rabbi-says\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>However, a spokesperson told the <em>New York Post<\/em> that the university recently began prohibiting all events at the location, not just the religious celebration.<\/p>\n<p>Since the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack on Israel, Jewish faculty and students have reported a huge rise in antisemitism on U.S. campuses, including messages that \u201cHitler was right,\u201d \u201cgas the Jews,\u201d and \u201cHolocaust 2.0,\u201d <em>The College Fix<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/nyu-indifference-to-antisemitism-violated-jewish-students-civil-rights-lawsuit\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>MORE: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/poll-twenty-percent-of-college-aged-americans-say-the-holocaust-is-a-myth\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Poll: Twenty percent of college-aged Americans say the Holocaust is a myth<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>IMAGE: Harvard Chabad\/YouTube screenshot<\/p>\n            <div class=\"article-truncate-control\">\n                <button class=\"show-complete-article\">\n                    Read More                <\/button>\n            <\/div>\n\n        ","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8216;Jew hate and antisemitism is thriving on this campus.&#8217;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1334,"featured_media":139239,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1361],"tags":[13706,2737,2387,52275],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/HarvardChabadJewishCenterMenorah.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2Oh4L-AdD","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139229"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1334"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139229"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":139247,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139229\/revisions\/139247"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139239"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thecollegefix.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}