New Jersey Jewish leaders are expected to launch a vast effort at counter-programming in response to a planned pro-Palestinian conference to be held at Rutgers University in the fall.

"What is most crucial is the Jewish community must give the strongest support possible for Hillel and the other Jewish organizations at Rutgers as they put out the strongest possible message in favor of Israel," said the regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, Shai Goldstein. "That is our first priority."

Andrew Getraer, executive director of Rutgers Hillel, said it is time to start planning actions against an organization "that espouses this kind of hate and violence against Israel."

Such counter-programming became a priority July 17 after Gov. James E. McGreevey announced that he will support Rutgers in its decision to allow the Third National Student Conference on the Palestine Solidarity Movement to take place at the Douglass College Center from Oct. 10 to 12.

Jewish groups and others say the student organization sponsoring the conference, New Jersey  Solidarity, promotes the destruction of Israel and supports suicide bombing and should not have been allowed to host a conference on a state-supported site.

The governor announced his decision after meeting with Rutgers President Richard L. McCormick at the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark.

"It's been a difficult issue for him," McGreevey spokesperson Kathleen Ellis said in a telephone interview. "Basically, what he's saying is that although his position on Israel and his relationship with the Jewish community are well-known and strong, and though he might find the views of this particular group to be abhorrent, he recognizes the right of every group in America to express its views Ñ unless they pose some kind of threat to security or espouse violence. We just don't have the right to pick and choose who speaks."

At the same time, Ellis added, McCormick assured the governor that the university would be vigilant about security matters throughout the conference.

Jewish groups have questioned whether principles of academic freedom apply to a group they see as promoting Israel's destruction and attacks on Jews.

The Community Relations Committee of United Jewish Communities of MetroWest NJ released a statement earlier this week saying it was "dismayed" that the conference will be taking place at the state university, and urged that the university "acknowledge ... the extremist nature of the sponsors."

On July 11, McCormick upheld the group's right to meet as "intrinsic to Rutgers' own mission ... the free exchange of ideas and discourse on a variety of issues, including those that are controversial."

After a July 11 phone conversation with McCormick, Goldstein told NJ Jewish News he had concerns about NJ Solidarity's possible deviance from university rules for student groups' sponsorship of on-campus events.

"At this point the application process has not been completed" and "we expect the university to continue to monitor the application process, especially in the area of non-discrimination policy," said Goldstein.

At the time, Goldstein suggested that such irregularities could disqualify NJ Solidarity from being able to procure meeting space. "These are questions which the university must engage with due diligence."

But Charlotte Kates, a second year Rutgers Law School student who is education chair of NJ Solidarity, called possible nondiscrimination violations a "non-issue."

"We recognize the campus policy of nondiscrimination. We do not discriminate," she told NJJN. "We will let anyone in who wishes to attend."

But, Goldstein noted, "there is a presumption that they can hold such a conference even with the vilest rhetoric that critics expect will be aimed against Israel – All of these issues have to be evaluated in the context of the First Amendment."

What especially troubles opponents of the conference are two parts of the NJ Solidarity mission statement that appears on its Web site. One is. "We are opposed to the existence of the apartheid colonial settler state of Israel, as it is based on the racist ideology of Zionism and is an expression of colonialism and imperialism."

Another sentence in the mission statement has also been interpreted as support for suicide bombings: "We unconditionally support Palestinians' human right to resist occupation and oppression by any means necessary," it reads. Kates has continually refused to disavow the notion that such words endorse bombing attacks on noncombatant Israelis.

Kates said the role of a "solidarity organization" such as hers is to bring disparate groups together for a conference on Palestine liberation movements.

"NJ Solidarity is an organization that is hosting a conference with a broad spectrum of organizations, and because we are a solidarity organization it is not our place to criticize the tactics of the Palestinian movement. We want to serve peace and justice. Our guiding principle is nonviolence."

Jerry Lavi, a Rutgers College alumnus who plans to attend the conference, is a member of Central Jersey Jews Against the Occupation. He expects the gathering to reflect a broad spectrum of views on the Palestinian struggle, including ones similar to his own that he began forming as a teenager. Lavi said he grew up in an observant Conservative Jewish home on Long Island and celebrated his bar mitzva in Israel.

"As part of a nonviolent organization, I oppose suicide bombing as well as the killing of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. We don't want any place in the world unsafe for anyone."

But to MetroWest CRC chair Stephen M. Flatow, a West Orange resident whose daughter Alisa was killed in a bus bombing in Gaza eight years ago, "Solidarity is nothing more than an anti-Semitic organization hiding behind the rubric of anti-Zionism. Their rhetoric is violently anti-Semitic, which it masks as anti-Israeli."

Not so, insisted Kates.

"The conference has absolutely nothing to do with anti-Judaism. Our mission statement says we condemn racism in all forms, and that includes anti-Semitism."

The organizer said she is pleased that Jewish groups and speakers, including some from Israel, have been invited to appear on the program.

"Judaism has an excellent name as a culture with a strong commitment to social justice. It is unfair to make this conference about being against Judaism. We are against Zionism," said Kates.

Abe Greenhouse, a political science major and Jewish studies minor at a branch of Rutgers called University College, is a member of Central Jersey Jews Against the Occupation who says his activism evolved out of "my grandparents' activism as socialists and labor Zionists."

He is adamant that the conference denounces anti-Semitism.

"Part of the job of the pro-Palestinian movement is to be clear that we are not anti-Semitic. We view anti-Semitism as every bit as disgusting as anti-Palestinianism and anti-Arabism. It is precisely because of our history as Jews that we feel compelled to speak up when we see any group mistreated. If we saw evidence of anti-Semitism – as opposed to the allegations made by the provocative rhetoric of our opponents – we would certainly denounce it. We are not afraid to call a spade a spade."

Flatow, however, said he is "afraid people will come to the conference and be persuaded to give money to groups that fund Hamas and Islamic Jihad."

Even in announcing the university's intent to allow the conference, Rutgers president McCormick said in a statement that he finds some elements of the group's mission "abhorrent," notably "its opposition to Israel's right to exist" and its support of "Palestinians' human right to resist occupation and oppression by any means necessary.'"

His statement encouraged "students and others who do not agree with NJ Solidarity to express their own opinions in a public and constructive manner."

Getraer said Hillel would begin on day one of the fall semester "to promote our message as loudly and forcefully as possible – to educate students with the truth about Israel."

Because the weekend of the conference occurs during the holiday of Sukkot, "we expect a major celebration" and the support of those in the Hindu and Christian communities who also support Israel, Getraer said.

"Our focus is not going to be on pro-Palestinians groups," said Getraer. "It is going to be on an educational celebration of Israel."

But before either event takes place, Getraer said he is "concerned about a virulent environment" that could permeate the campus once classes resume in September, and how 5,000 Jewish undergraduates might react to "anti-Israeli propaganda" in their midst.

Beverly Barton agrees. She is a West Orange resident and an assistant professor of surgery at the University of Medicine and Dentistry in Newark whose 18-year-old daughter, Rachel, will become a freshman at Cook College on the Rutgers campus in September.

To Barton, declaring "Israel has no right to exist" constitutes "hate speech that is not protected by the First Amendment. We pay our tax dollars to support a state university that is failing in its mission to act in loco parentis to ensure the safety of our children."

She is urging Jewish Rutgers graduates to withhold contributions from the alumni association and "give to UJA instead."

"If this were an anti-black conference, or a rally that advocated gay bashing, the university would not permit it.

"When my daughter saw how upset I was, she said, 'Don't worry, Mom. We'll hold a counter-rally.' But I am more interested in holding the administration responsible. I don't think it is accurate to call it a fair exchange of ideas. It is a hate rally."

Goldstein of the ADL said he is concerned about the safety of Jewish students when the conference takes place.

"We don't want to see them ostracized," said Goldstein. "We have 100 percent confidence in the Rutgers campus police. They have done a superb job in the past.

Goldstein said he was especially troubled by a banner that was hung inside a campus building last year by NJ Solidarity supporters. It read, "From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will Be Free," a slogan for those who support a Palestinian state whose borders includes present-day Israel. To Goldstein, that message "advocated genocide against the Jews of Israel."

He acknowledged such a flag is constitutionally protected free speech.

Efforts to prevent Rutgers from offering space for the conference troubled Frank Askin, a professor of constitutional law at Rutgers Law School in Newark. "That sounds like a heckler's veto to me – allowing hecklers to prevent a speech from taking place," he said. "It is totally an issue of free speech and assembly, and the Jewish community should recognize everyone's right to free speech and association. As long as it is just speech we have no choice but to allow it, provided there is no imminent threat to public safety. Police will be assigned to prevent that from happening. In this case, to argue imminent danger would be a stretch."

The university's Regulations and Procedures Manual has no specific rules for granting or denying meeting space to campus groups.

But the regulations do state that the "educational process is predicated upon the free exchange of ideas and this policy shall not be interpreted to prohibit free expression protected by the First Amendment." Regulations also state that one can be expelled for "any willful act, which disrupts or obstructs an academic class or lecture."

Other rules prohibit harassment, intimidation, and "creating an intimidating or hostile environment."

According to Rutgers spokeswoman Pam Orel, the Douglass College Center, several miles away from the Hillel building and the main Rutgers campus, "has allowed registered student groups to use its facilities in the past. It has granted space to controversial programs in the past, and its policy to grant space is not based on controversy or content."

Robert Wiener can be reached at .

Marilyn Silverstein contributed to this report.