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On the campus of Columbia University in New York last week, students were confronted by a mock "apartheid wall," set up as part of the international "Israeli Apartheid Week."

Seeking to challenge what they considered the spurious accusations comparing Israel to apartheid-era South Africa, a group of pro-Israel students on campus reached out to StandWithUs, an organization that focuses on confronting anti-Israel bias on college campuses. The organization then provided the students with pamphlets to distribute to curious passersby that presented a different narrative.

"We're teaching people about the reality on the ground and how this campaign against Israel is disinformative," Dani Klein, the East Coast campus coordinator of StandWithUs, told The Jewish State, adding that such unsubstantiated accusations only get people to point fingers without engaging one another.

"There is no dialogue that gets created when you make these accusations about apartheid," he said.

Israeli Apartheid Week, launched in 2005, is an annual two-week (March 1-14) coordinated series of events held in cities and campuses throughout the world that, according to its Web site, seeks to "educate people about the nature of Israel as an apartheid system and to build Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaigns as part of a growing global BDS movement."

Events conducted under the auspices of Israeli Apartheid Week range from speakers to guerilla tactics like mock Israeli checkpoints or, as in the case of Columbia, "apartheid walls."

Rabbi Esther Reed, associate director for Jewish Campus Life at Rutgers University, said that she was not aware of any anti-Israel activities taking place on campus as part of Israeli Apartheid Week. "While we do a whole variety of pro-Israel activities all the time including this week, there's no need to do a concentrated, reactive organized thing," Reed said. "We're being just as pro-active and pro-Israel as we are all the time."

At Princeton University, where the pro-Palestinian group has planned an event as part of this week's demonstrations, the Hillel there determined not to respond directly.

"We made a decision not to draw attention by counter-protesting," Rabbi Julie Roth, executive director of the Princeton Center for Jewish Life, told The Jewish State. "But instead focus our attention on Israel Week later this semester."

To combat what he sees as the falsehoods disseminated in these events, Klein said that his organization has shipped more than 20,000 information packets to communities around the world, which are also available online. One of these pocket-sized pamphlets, "Middle East Apartheid Today," examines the government-sanctioned ethnic, religious, gender, and sexual orientation discrimination that occurs in many Muslim and Arab countries today. Another contrasts former Apartheid South Africa with contemporary Israel in order to demonstrate how the two states are not comparable.

"Our organization is known to deal with these issues by creating material and resources for students to use," Klein said.

StandWithUs also sponsors what it calls "Idea Soldiers," former Israeli soldiers who tour the country speaking to audiences about their experiences fighting for Israel, whether in the Second Lebanon War in 2006 or Operation Cast Lead in Gaza in 2008. On March 6, one of these soldiers is slated to speak at Rutgers Hillel.

"They are talking about their personal experiences both protecting their homes and maintaining the human rights for Palestinians and the Lebanese, respectively," Klein said.

StandWithUs is hardly alone, since groups ranging from The David Project, the Anti-Defamation League, and CAMERA to J Street and the liberal Zionist group Ameinu have joined in condemning Israeli Apartheid Week and providing resources for pro-Israel students to challenge the demonstrations over the next two weeks.

The David Project, for example, is also providing assistance to students at various campuses throughout North America about how to respond to anti-Israel demonstrations in a way that is most appropriate for their respective school.

The organization is also sponsoring "Israel Peace Week," a coordinated effort to counter the anti-Israel initiatives with ones that educate students about Israeli society and achievements.

Ari Applbaum, spokesman for The David Project, said that his organization is encouraging pro-Israel students not to shy away from engaging the demonstrators by attending their events and asking "tough questions" during speakers' Q&A sections.

"We believe, at The David Project, that at the end of the day that if you don't refute the accusations, leave them untouched, then they become truth for students and in public opinion," Applbaum said.

Klein said that such a coordinated week of anti-Israel demonstrations is potentially dangerous to the pro-Israel cause, but added that these protesters often discredit themselves with their own over-the-top radicalism. However, these events, he said, could prove more dangerous if not confronted.

"It's important for students on campus who promote Israel to be motivated to combat these claims and not think that other people are going to stand up," he said.