And so it ends. The double-standards, rhetoric and indoctrination that characterises the alliance between radical student Leftist groups and extremist Islamists have pushed Manchester University to the brink of totalitarianism.

Last week, the Manchester University Islamic Society and Action Palestine played host to Azzam Tamimi, decried by Dr. Denis MacShane MP as a ‘preacher of hate’. He was one in a long list of Israel haters at the Palestine Conference. A supporter of Hamas and proponent of terror, this man is doing the rounds on university campuses nationwide. Two days ago he appeared in a veritable who’s who of Israel-haters at Queen Mary, University of London. In the esteemed Oxford Union last week, the Deputy Foreign Minister of Israel was verbally (and nearly physically) assaulted. At every rally and in every hall, Tamimi roars ‘I hate Zionists’.

Let us be quite clear: Zionism is a legitimate political ideology to hold. It is a liberal-democratic ideology, it is the belief that the Jewish nation, like every other nation, has the right to national self-determination. Israel, falsely vilified as an ‘Apartheid’ state, a racist state, is a legitimate member of the international community, with a progressive and vibrant civil society.

And yet, Zionism and the Jewish state have become toxic. Uniquely, the Hard Left harbours a resentment so deeply ingrained, so virulent and so violent that Jewish students are increasingly contacting the Union of Jewish Students and the Community Service Trust to convey their fear and – at times – panic. No other ethnic group faces such consistent denigration.

The Hard Left and the Islamic Society in Manchester today began enforcing an illegitimate boycott of the Jewish State in the Manchester University Students’ Union. The Deputy Ambassador has been invited by the Politics Society of Manchester to speak on Thursday. Despite passing all of the rigorous freedom of speech checks and all the democratic institutions of the University and Union, the “Unholy Alliance” is enforcing its ideological totalitarianism on the UK. Utilising a spurious argument that the Student Union’s ‘solidarity’ with the global Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) movement permits them to enforce a boycott of anything Israeli, they are acting Ultra vires. And the Manchester University Students’ Union Executive is NOT calling them out on this lie.

Last year, amidst the Left’s incessant misinformation during Operation Cast Lead, the Students’ Union affiliated with the BDS movement. Radical students are now using this affiliation to claim that they can institute a ‘No Platform’ policy against any representative of the Israeli Government. One wonders where this tyranny will end: will any expression of support for Israel be No Platform-ed? A mass demonstration, likely to be highly intrusive and physical, is expected tomorrow by Action Palestine and the affiliated organisations.

Let us not forget that it was the very same members of Action Palestine and the Islamic Society who so artfully defended their invitation of the terrorist-endorsing Tamimi last week. We are witnessing disconcertingly deceitful tactics being employed: using arguments of Freedom of Speech on the one hand and yet with the other enforcing ideological absolutism on anyone who dares challenge their falsehoods. Whilst these advocates of extremist absolutism are free to do as they will, defenders of liberal democracy seem to be amputating themselves at every opportunity: apologetic for their high ideals, self-loathing and now seemingly self-harming.

In 1923, the ‘philosophical godfather of Nazism’, Carl Schmitt, wrote in ‘The Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy’ that democracies will fail, because their adherents “suspend decisive [ideological] battle through endless discussion”. Meanwhile, Liberty’s enemies will utilise our weaknesses against us.

Banning the Jewish state is a significant shift in the ideological battle being waged within the student movement. This event is the culmination of years of silence from those who should have spoken out in favour of the only democracy in the Middle East.

Ideological totalitarianism is here: the abyss lays before us. Now is the time to speak out and bring us back from the edge.