I’ve watched campus life shift over my degree

My first day of university was full of trepidation. Growing up in a Jewish community, I had heard many stories about antisemitism on campus — lecturers silencing Jewish voices and students verbally abusing their Jewish peers. 

I was prepared for anything. But nothing happened. Campus life was quiet, and nobody seemed to care about the Middle East. I walked around wearing my kippah and a chamtzah necklace, openly discussing my religion and trips to Israel. I made friends and actively participated in campus life. I felt safe. The stories I’d heard growing up felt like outdated warnings. 

As a second-year student and secretary of AUJS at Macquarie University (AUJS MQ), I began to feel tensions around being a religious Jew on campus. 

At the student hub, I would talk with friends about Jewish holidays. Once, before class, I explained Purim by drawing stick figures with crowns on a whiteboard already filled with sketches. After class, I returned to find my drawings erased. A friend told me someone had wiped them off, saying they made people uncomfortable. My stick figures were stains to them. It was the first time I sensed my identity clashing with campus life. 

That year, I witnessed my first anti-Israel rally in the central courtyard. Protesters chanted about the IDF killing children and called for the eradication of the only Jewish state, shouting “from the river to the sea”. There was no separation between criticism of Israel and hatred toward Jews. 

Leaving campus that day, I took off my kippah and hid my necklace under my shirt — for the first time.