A recent anti-Israel demonstration at the University of California’s Irvine campus, where students repeatedly disrupted remarks by Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, prompted B’nai B’rith International President Dennis W. Glick and Executive Vice President Daniel S. Mariaschin to write a letter to the university’s chancellor expressing, “deep dismay at the severe and persistent anti-Semitic harassment experienced by Jewish students at the University of California.”

Moreover, last April, when a swastika was discovered painted on the Alpha Epsilon Pi house, a fraternity at the University of Florida with a strong Jewish presence, the Anti-Defamation League released a statement condemning the incident.

Growing concern about anti-Semitism on college campuses is causing Jewish organizations to closely monitor the situation.

“It’s disheartening to see that a fraternity was tarnished with anti-Semitic hate and the negative impact it will have not only upon its Jewish members, but the entire University of Florida campus,” Andrew Rosenkranz, ADL Florida regional director, based inBoca Raton, noted.

The ADL has been monitoring anti-Semitism and anti-Israel/Zionist rhetoric on college campuses for decades, Rosenkranz said in a telephone interview.

“Most of these protests are not about the Israeli government, or pro-Palestinian [concern], but [are] anti-Semitism,” he said. “College campuses have been a tradition of liberal ideas. We see a lot of Israel-bashing coming from the extreme left.”

A March 2 meeting sponsored by the Greater Miami Jewish Federation’s Jewish Community Relations Council at Federation’s Miami campus, underscored the concern.

The program on “The New Anti-Semitism and the End of Civil Discourse,” included talk by Regina Zelonker, JCRC chair; Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi, president of The Israel Project; Samuel Edelman, Ph.D, executive director for Scholars for Peace in the Middle East; Deputy Consul General Paul Hirschson, Consulate General of Israel to Florida and Puerto Rico, and ADL’s Andrew Rosenkranz.

“The ultimate goal is to help people put the anti-Semitism that we hear about on college campuses into context so that [people] don’t feel that’s the only thing that’s happening in college campuses,” Zelonker said. Another goal, she noted, is to “help students and people who are affiliated with students deal with it, and learn that our reality is not defined only by what we hear about in the newspapers.”

Edelman said his organization represents 30,000 pro-Israel university academics, and added that 55,000 academics have signed the organization’s petition to stop anti-Israel boycotts.

“We’re a very significant player on universities and are very much involved in stopping the anti-Israel boycott initiatives and divestures initiatives,” he said. “Not one [boycott] has succeeded because of our efforts, so we’re like the preventative medicine and the ones who are quietly out there on college campuses every time there’s another attempt to boycott.”

Mizrahi told those gathered that the situation on campuses is more a rise of anti-Israel activities and not anti-Israel sentiment.

“The problem is that there are anti-Israel people who are agitating on the campuses and who are creating major problems for Israel, so it’s not that everybody on campus hates Israel and Jews, she noted. “You have a very loud, very active, very well-organized anti-Israel opposition – which is a minority – that is causing very significant problems like what happened to [Israeli] Ambassador Michael Oren.”

Brian Siegal, director for the American Jewish Committee’s Greater Miami and Broward Office, attended the meeting to learn what program presenters and attending professors had to say.

“I wanted to hear what’s happening on the ground from their perspective,” he said, “and I wanted to get a sense of what other Jewish organizations are doing to help address this issue and get a perspective on it.”

However, Carrie Hanson, a senior at University of Miami and an intern for its Hillel chapter, who attended the event, said she’s surprise by the concern.

“I go to a school where it’s very comfortable to be pro-Israel,” she said. “I’m never worried for my safety. I don’t deal with anti-Israel sentiments. We have moderate Arabs and Muslims at the University of Miami.”