Pro-Hamas protestors on university campuses often display a profound ignorance of history and a propensity for conspiracy theories, such as that Jews are not indigenous to the land or even from the Middle East, and thus must be colonizers. Even more unsettling is how many are quick to repeat the terrorist mantra, “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free!” According to Berkeley professor Ron Hassner, when polled, a disturbingly high percentage of students lack even basic knowledge about what this genocidal cry means. They don’t know which river, which sea, or what the cry implies for Jews living between them. 

In response, First Things’ Rusty Reno wrote that “[these] words come to mind: ‘Ignorance, when it is voluntary, is criminal; and he may be properly charged with evil who refused to learn how he might prevent it.’ All the more so when the ignorant take up chants that call for the annihilation of a nation.”