Patricia Heaton leads fightback campaign against antisemitism on college campuses: 'Have to stand up'
Actress Patricia Heaton couldn't believe her eyes when she saw Hamas body camera footage, flaunting the terror group's attacks against Israel on social media last October 7.
After students across U.S. college campuses erupted in protest, Heaton decided to take matters into her own hands to fight back.
"I couldn't believe it, and I was outraged," the "Everybody Loves Raymond" star told Fox News on Monday.
"I looked around for everyone else who was going to be outraged… and it was very silent, so my partner and I created the October 7th Coalition or O7C to help Christians activate, to be as visibly and vocally supportive of Israel, the Jewish people, and fight antisemitism"
Jewish Americans have been subjected to antisemitism in various ways, with incidents of Jewish-owned businesses being vandalized with Nazi symbols, protesters blocking some Jewish students from entering class and now even some Jewish students seeing their mezuzah – a piece of parchment containing a prayer that is commonly fixed to a door frame – disappear from their dorms.
Harvard student Sarah Silverman described her experience in an op-ed published in The Harvard Crimson earlier this month, writing in part, "I bounded out of my Thayer dorm, toothbrush and toothpaste in hand, when I noticed something was missing. In the place where my mezuzah — a Jewish ritual object traditionally placed on doorposts — had been so tightly secured, only a bit of sticky adhesive I had used to hang it remained."
The mezuzah was later discovered across the hallway, two doors down from Silverman, and tucked into a wall.
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"I am left to speculate whether this was a targeted act. Worst of all, I’m left wondering whether someone on my floor — or even someone I had just met — hated my identity so much that they felt compelled to frighten me," she continued later in the piece.
Stories like Silverman's inspired Heaton and O7C to raise awareness with the #Myzuzah/Yourzuzah campaign, which encourages participants to record and post a video of themselves putting up a mezuzah and using the hashtag #myzuzahyourzuzah.
"We have to stand up for the Jewish people… so that's what we've been working on," she said.