By Ron Meyer,  Young America's Foundation

As an alternative to Palestinian Awareness Week at UCLA, UCLA’s Young Americans for Freedom chapter sponsored an event with Bruins for Israel featuring two Israel Defense Force soldiers from the group Stand with Us.

The goal of the event—which included a long question and answer session—was to start a productive two-sided dialogue on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But the so-called “Students for Justice in Palestine” (SJP) wanted no part of the dialogue.

Dozens of SJP members came to the event, not with the intention of having a healthy debate, but with the intention of disrupting any presentation that promoted opinions different than their own.

Minutes into the soldiers presentations, the SJP students stood up in unison and walked out, despite the speakers pleading with them to stay and engage in dialogue.  

One of the speakers even said, “we’d also like to take your questions,” as the SJP students began to walk out. Clearly, this group didn’t like the idea of an open discussion.

Here’s the video:  

Instead of respecting the soldiers who were speaking from their own personal experiences and waiting to ask questions, SJP abandoned dialogue and demonstrated their ideological intolerance.

Young Americans for Freedom, a project of Young America’s Foundation, encourages real ideological tolerance on campus. Oftentimes, leftists groups on campus like SJP preach tolerance and proclaim they want peace. When asked to tolerate alternative views, they interrupt and protest the free speech of others, refusing to engage in a dialogue aimed at finding peace.

Thanks to the foresight of the Founding Fathers, America is the best place in the world for vivacious debate on big issues. Students should take this opportunity and cherish it.