Charles Asher Small is a scholar of renown whose academic achievements span prestigious institutions worldwide. Over his long career, Small has been associated with Oxford University, Yale University, Stanford University, Tel Aviv University, Ben Gurion University, the Universite de Montreal, and McGill University. He has written or edited numerous books and academic papers. Along the way, he founded the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP) and proudly notes that he is a Montreal boy.
Small went to McGill, earned a B.A., and then went on to accomplish great things, with ISGAP being one of his most significant contributions. While many organizations fight antisemitism and prejudice, Small's ISGAP has achieved important milestones that others have not. Recently, for example, ISGAP revealed that several prestigious American universities were secretly receiving millions of dollars under the table from the Hamas-friendly regime in Qatar, which is against U.S. law.
Revelations Lead to Consequences
When Small revealed this fact, there were significant consequences, including the closure of engineering programs that appeared to be aiding and abetting the development of nuclear weapons technology. Furthermore, Qatar-funded antisemitism at Ivy League universities was finally exposed for all to see.
This week, Small was in Toronto to meet with Canadian friends and supporters. While happy to be back home, he shared troubling facts. 'The Jewish community of the diaspora,' he says, 'and people who care about democratic principles: we've all been sleeping through a revolution. The revolution has been taking place right under our noses – in our institutions, in our schools, in our universities, in the media. And we've accepted it.'
He pauses and explains that the revolution started many years ago and can be summed up as Holocaust inversion. Jews are now being openly depicted as the new Nazis, with Palestinians as their victims. 'Years later, this is exactly the discourse in the best universities in the Western world. If Israel is a Nazi state, if the Jewish community represents a Nazi state – an occupying state, an apartheid state – well, then from a liberal human rights perspective, you are obligated to dismantle the entity. To wipe Israel off the map.'
Extreme Leftists and Extreme Islamists Seize the Narrative
An unholy alliance of antisemites, Marxist zealots, extreme Arab nationalists, along with a smattering of Jew-hating Western NGOs, non-profits, and charities, presently controls the discourse. This 'odd alliance of extreme leftists with extreme Islamists,' as Small calls it, has seized the narrative and is winning. The main focus for Small and ISGAP is antisemitism within the corridors of academe. At places like New York's Columbia University, he says, antisemitism is not only happening openly but has arguably been part of the curriculum.
'These professors at Columbia University, one of the best universities in the Western world,' he says, shaking his head, 'these professors are masters of literature, masters of thought. They teach your children and your grandchildren. And these masters of intellectual thought are arguing that the resistance is justified by any means. So Hamas, who wants to destroy democracy, massacre Jews, subjugate women, kill gay people? They were right to use violence.'
Pogroms of the Nazis Began in Classrooms
ISGAP's work and Small's efforts are crucial because they have been shining a spotlight on the intellectual foundations of Jew hatred. This is relevant, Small says, because history teaches that the pogroms of the Nazis had their beginnings in classrooms. That is where the mass murder of the Holocaust was first conceived and baptized. One way to defeat the return of this intellectualized antisemitism, Small suggests, is to follow the money. The engine of global hate is powered by money more than anything else.
Small has a team of 27 researchers working to trace the financial flows. Canadians help make up that team, and they plan to soon release three reports detailing how Canadian charities and others have been permitted to promote and fund extremism and terrorism by the federal government. The target is not just Jews and the Jewish state, Small says, but also those who do not subscribe to the terroristic principles of the Muslim Brotherhood – agnostic Jews, liberal-minded Muslims, and Christians alike.
'It's an assault on our Canadian democratic values, and who we are as a country,' Small concludes. 'It's an assault on what it means to be a citizen in this great democratic country. It's an assault on our democracy itself.' He points toward the future and adds, 'Remember: the Muslim Brotherhood is using antisemitism to fragment and weaken this country, to destroy it. That's their strategic goal. And, as Professor Elie Wiesel always taught us, antisemitism may begin with the Jewish people but it never ends with the Jewish people.'
