Impact of the Israel-Palestine crisis on McMaster students

As the 2023/2024 academic year comes to an end, McMaster's Arab, Israeli, Jewish, Muslim and Palestinian students share how the ongoing crisis has impacted their year

cw: discussion of ongoing Israel-Palestine crisis, including descriptions of violence and reference and mentions of genocide, anti-semitism, Islamophobia, anti-Israeli and anti-Palestinian sentiments

All interviewees were anonymized.

On Oct. 7, the militant group Hamas launched a widespread attack on Israel, targeting civilians. The immense violence and grief that has followed has had a pronounced impact on members of the McMaster University community, in particular Arab, Israeli, Jewish, Muslim and Palestinian individuals.

The Silhouette spoke with four McMaster undergraduate students on how their year has been impacted, and continues to be impacted, by the ongoing crisis. All interviewees were anonymized for safety reasons. 

Defining the crisis

Canadian news publications, such as the CBC, have facilitated discussion about the importance of language choice in characterizing the ongoing Israel-Palestine crisis, and many have settled on "crisis" as the main descriptor.

In their November statement, the McMaster Students Union characterized it as "ongoing violence in the Middle East". Interviewees were asked to describe how they have been characterizing the crisis in their own words and what language they think is important to use.

Student A is a Palestinian Muslim student in their fourth year. When presented with this question, Student A provided the following definition:

“It's genocide, apartheid, occupation, oppression, concentration camp, extermination camp, and then nothing less than absolute inhumane brutality,” said Student A. 

Student B is a Israeli Jewish fourth-year student. In their answer, Student B commented on the phrasing of the question itself, bringing forth discussion about the importance of specific and direct language over the safety of neutrality. 

“It does a poor job as its an insinuation, right? It attempts to walk around the issue, not realizing that when you say the "ongoing violence in the Middle East", it refers to every single country in the Middle East right now that has violence. It's disrespectful for each conflict in particular,” said Student B. 

Student C, a second-year Muslim student, shared a similar sentiment on the importance of specific and direct language. 

“I think if I had to put it down to a sentence or two, what is happening within Palestine - because I think it's important for us to mention the place and not just broadly reference the Middle East -  it is a continuation of what the country has faced for decades, if not centuries, which is a systematic displacement and killing of its people,” said Student C. 

Along with discussion about the weight and importance of language, Student B also explained how conversations like these pertaining to the crisis highlight the privilege we possess being external from the ongoing war and violence that civilians are facing. 

“Whether you call it "crisis" or you call it "war" or you call it "conflict" . . . end of the day, you can call it whatever you want, we know what we're experiencing. The people who care about [the language] the most are not the people who are the most affected. They are the politicians and they are the people in the West who speak out about the conflict but are not in it. When you're in it, you don't care what it's being called. End of the day, you have bombs raining down on you,” said Student B. 

Impact on student life and personal life

Student D, a Jewish second-year student, commented on how since October 2023 they have struggled to remain mentally present in their academics. 

“I can't pay attention to school. That's not the first thing that's on my mind … The impact on my focus has been significant, but I'm keeping up,” said Student D. 

This sentiment was echoed across the board by all other interviewees.

“It's been completely detrimental. Nothing is of urgency to me. Deadlines are not urgent. Midterms are not urgent. Finals are not urgent. The only urgent thing is trying my best to save the people in Gaza in whatever capacity I have,” said Student A.

Student A described feeling a disconnect between their physical presence in Canada and their mental and emotional presence in Gaza. 

“There's a huge disconnect between what is happening in Gaza and this campus. It feels like you are truly in a different world, like your mind, your emotions, your heart, everything is in Gaza and then you're physically here and then you physically have the responsibilities you have to do as a student,” said Student A. 

These feelings of disconnect were also described by Student B when they described their struggles with remaining mentally present in school. 

“It almost seems like this performative check mark of just completing the semester, like being physically here but not being present,” said Student B. 

Student C discussed it is difficult to talk about how their academic year has been impacted with the knowledge that the academic year simply ended for many students in Israel and Palestine after Oct. 7. Student C described how they quickly began immersing themselves in social media posts of those documenting their experiences living in Gaza. 

“I think for some people [engaging with the crisis] can lead to apathy very quickly and can make them want to disconnect very quickly and turn away and return to their normal life. But for many others, it's a cognitive dissonance of having to sit in classrooms and think about how classrooms like those don't exist at a large scale anymore because they've been bombed or destroyed,” said Student C. 

Facing Discrimination

Student D described feelings of isolation and tension between some of their non-Jewish peers following Oct. 7 and the subsequent responses from communities. 

“It was difficult to maintain those connections when, in the days after Oct. 7, like Oct. 8, Oct. 9,  people are talking about acts of liberation, posting it on their social media and that's not my experience of how things are going down during those days ... For my own mental health and also for the sake of my family and friends in Israel, I can't tolerate people saying that,” said Student D. 

Student A recalled their community facing a similar vein of racism at other points in recent history, explaining the deep rooted and sinister nature of this bigotry. 

“I know from people who are involved in other organizations that have called any Palestinian work to be conflated with terrorism, which is very derogatory. It's sending us back to post-9/11 terrorism and racism and how everything Muslims were doing was conflated with terrorism,” said Student A.

Since October, Student A along with many other students have worn a keffiyeh to campus in solidarity with Palestine. Student A described how they and their peers were met with judgment and discriminatory behaviour from other McMaster community members for wearing the keffiyeh. 

“It's definitely easier to wear the keffiyeh now than it was in October, but there are still instances of racism, anti-Palestinian racism specifically, because anti-Palestinian racism is not against Palestinians only, it's against anyone who aligns themselves with that,” Student A.

Thoughts on McMaster’s advocacy efforts

The interviewees were asked to comment on any support or resources they received from McMaster and if they feel the university’s actions have been enough to support affected students and staff. Student C stated that they feel McMaster has not done enough in their words or actions to support students. 

“To some extent, I understand a university can only offer so much and say so much because of the politics of it all. But I think I'm still disappointed. I don't know that I felt great about the resources at Mac or the supports at Mac. I think they exist but it takes the students reaching out and pushing and recognizing and demanding for them to be made clear to us,” said Student C.

Student D echoed this sentiment, stating that they felt disappointed in the university’s response. 

“I would say generally, I felt disappointed by just the lack of empathy across McMaster as a whole. I understand it's complicated, but there's not been a lot of empathy. Not a lot of compassion,” said Student D. 

Student D elaborated on this point, expressing that they wished McMaster would be more active in curbing extreme or violent speech being voiced by groups or organizations being welcomed onto campus. 

“I think it doesn't just harm Jewish students, it harms all students who are involved in this conflict. It makes us more susceptible to radicalization and to hating each other, which is not the right way forward. I think McMaster could have taken more steps to prevent those kinds of developments and I think they could have taken more steps to maybe provide more mental health resources,” said Student D. 

Student B commented on the generally neutral stance the university has taken in their statements and actions. Student B explained that they don’t mind this neutrality as they feel the university is not equipped to properly handle sensitive and complex discourse around anti-semitism, Islamophobia and the crisis in general. 

“There's other places to have this discourse with individuals who are either self-proclaimed experts or people who actually know how to narrate such discourse . . . As someone with a vested interest in this conflict who does engage in discourse about it, I don't think [the administration] knows how to navigate it properly enough for that. By acknowledging that limitation, they did what a lot of people can't do,” said Student B.

As for the resources provided by the university, Student B explained that they didn’t end up seeking out campus or university resources and that their network of close friends and peers served as the greatest support. 

“I think my peers helped me. My friends, whether they're Jewish or not, [by] just being there. Even for a second, just being friends regardless of what's happening,” said Student B. 

Student A expressed disappointment in McMaster’s neutrality, citing their equity, diversity and inclusion policies as an important but unused framework for understanding the crisis. 

“It's always echoing in our ears. It's haunting so many people on campus. I wish McMaster could have been actually thorough with their values, because we always talk about EDI, systemic change and equity and inclusion . . . but then when it comes to applying it in real life context, as to being truly anti-oppressive or truly being inclusive or equitable, they failed,” said Student A. 

Reflections and going forward 

As the 2023/2024 academic year comes to a close, the interviewees were asked to reflect on their engagement with the Israel-Palestine crisis and what they’d like to see from academic spaces going forward. 

Student C talked about how they wished more university initiatives were followed through with to bridge Jewish and Israeli communities with Palestinian and Muslim communities on campus. 

“There are ways to bring together these vastly different yet similar communities through a more neutral middle party. It should be the university holding something. And I know there's discussions about that happening, and I'm involved in some of those, but that should have been happening earlier. It should have been discussed earlier,” said Student C.

Student B shared sentiments about the importance of facilitating meaningful conversation and connecting with communities external to your own who have been affected by the crisis. 

“I'm trying to engage with the people in my [Jewish] community that have been affected, whether tangentially or directly, but also trying to open up my perspectives to other people who are either not as invested in this conflict or who are pro-Palestinian, which are not viewpoints that I would be exposed to in Israel as much . . . it's been a way to keep me accountable as well. And that's a form of social justice in and of itself, I think. Just not letting yourself get stuck in an echo chamber, but actually voicing your ideals and beliefs in front of someone who might not agree with them makes you reflect on them a bit differently,” said Student B.

This is an ongoing story. For more information on accessing mental health and support resources, visit the newly formed McMaster community support resource page.