So it was easy for them to be brainwashed by Hamas.
Indeed.
I have a slightly different but connected take.
I worked in NYC for a LONG time. Mrs DoodleBob and I homeschooled the kids. I generally met and knew all sorts of people - different races, religions, etc. So did the kids. We had familiarity with these folks, and respect for them. As such, we didn’t have a caricature-like stereotype of Jewish, Muslim, Indian, Chinese, etc. people - i.e., I don’t think everyone Jewish is like Seinfeld or Indians are like Apu on the Simpsons. Parenthetically, some of the biggest defenders of Israel in North Jersey were Protestants.
Deplorables may be white, on balance, and Christian, on balance, but we are not isolationists like leftists. We work for a living, go to Church, and meet a wide swath of humanity in our travels. We probably even have a good laugh about stereotypes with our black, Jewish, and _____ friends. We aren’t perfect, but we are empirically-based.
However, Leftists tend to not mingle. They stay in their cloistered enclaves. They’ve shown outright disdain and hostility for anyone who is against their groupthink.
Many Jewish folks who slant leftists are either non-denominational or lapsed. They don’t IDENTIFY as “Jewish.”
https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2021/05/11/u-s-jews-political-views/
I suspect most of these radicals on campus NEVER met someone who was Jewish AND religious. Their cloistered parents sent them to cloistered schools and then curated cloistered friends in their salons. They may have met Jewish people but they weren’t religious or identified with their heritage. Religion is sophistry (unless it’s the Church of Leftism), Israel is apartheid, and MAGA is bigotry…and they never met any of these outgroup members.
I would also suggest, that divorce plays a bigly part in this mess. Mom and Dad demonstrate that marriage is a legal contract that can be dissolved instead of a lifetime commitment for better and worse. Therefore, we should act stunned when little Johnny and Mary, with their family annihilated, see Antifa as a fun lifestyle choice.
But I digress.
These leftist kids have been raised by tribalism at school and home. They see anyone not like them as ignorant baboons at best or, on balance, threats to their tribe. Bluntly, they Jewish people who ARE religious or pro-Israel as The Enemy.
In the final calculus, leftists tend to dehumanize people who are unlike them. They did it for years with Republicans, then Tea Party people, then “MAGA Republicans.” Now, getting their orders from leftism that Hamas is good, and having never met religious Jewish people or Israelis, their tribal impulse is to see them as subhuman.
And history hath shewn how that ends.
Sorry…need more coffee…
Therefore, we should NOT act stunned when little Johnny and Mary, with their family annihilated, see Antifa as a fun lifestyle choice.
And…
Bluntly, they SEE Jewish people who ARE religious or pro-Israel as The Enemy.