Harvard’s fighting antisemitism — one dropkick at a time.
A Jewish group at the Ivy League school got a lesson from UFC bruiser Natan Levy on how to battle hateful bullies — after the campus was hit with a wave of anti-Semitism, according to a report.
“There’s a perception that Jews are physically weak. We need strong Jews,” Harvard Chabad President Rabbi Hirschy Zarchi told the Crimson.
The hulking Israeli fighter — who boasts the nickname “Lethal” for his cut-throat mixed martial arts smackdowns — taught the college’s Chabad group a series of rear kicks, jab crosses, and wrist grabs during a self-defense class last week.
“[I] teach people to stand strong, to show confidence, to be proud of who they are, to never be ashamed of who they are and where they came from,” the 32-year-old fighter told the student paper.
His school of hard knocks was also celebration of religious pride, he said.
“The main goal is to make everybody feel safe,” he said. “We want, again, everybody to be confident in their skin.”
Many Jewish students have reported feeling unsafe on the Harvard campus in recent months, including as anti-Israel protests raged in the wake of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack.
Students have also pointed to several recent antisemitic incidents, like a case in which a mezuzah was taken from a freshman’s doorway earlier this month and one centering on anti-Israel posters hung around the school.
Levy, who has an 8-2 record in the UFC, became a poster boy for Jewish toughness last year when a white supremacist troll challenged him to a cage match — and he gave the hate-spewing dimwit an embarrassing beatdown.
The class he taught was part of a free six-part course known as StandStrong, which was founded in 2019 as reports of antisemitism spiked in the US.