Hold Students, Faculty Accountable for Their Antisemitism

The statement in support of Hamas by over 30 student organizations at Harvard was nothing short of rank antisemitism. Almost as shocking was Harvard's response, or rather what Harvard did not say.

The student letter blamed Israel for the savage murders of over 1,300 innocent men, women and children — from babies to Holocaust survivors who had only one thing in common: being Jewish.

"We ... hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence. ... The apartheid regime is the only one to blame," they wrote. "The coming days will require a firm stand against colonial retaliation. We call on the Harvard community to take action to stop the ongoing annihilation of Palestinians."

And Harvard's response? Two days later, Harvard officially equivocated, with the president releasing a statement expressing "pain and deep concern about the events in Israel and Gaza." "We have no illusion that Harvard alone can readily bridge the widely different views of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict," the president wrote, responding to the students' vitriol.

No one asked Harvard to "bridge the gap." It took until the next day for the new president to condemn Hamas's "terrorist atrocities" while tiptoeing about the rank antisemitism of its students. "Let me also state, on this matter as on others, that while our students have the right to speak for themselves, no student group — not even 30 student groups — speaks for Harvard University or its leadership."

"On this matter as on others"? Is this how Harvard would respond if 30 student groups came together to praise white supremacists who murdered Black babies? Or to praise the police who killed a Black man?

How hard is it to condemn antisemitism in your own house?

Too hard, it appears, not only for Harvard (where I was a tenured professor) but also for many other elite institutions.

Yalies4Palestine stood "in unwavering support of the Palestinian people's right to return to their land and resist over 75 years of colonization. ... Palestinians made history this Saturday morning when they broke down the wall which has imprisoned Gaza for 17 years. ... The resistance is the consequence of the longstanding and ongoing Zionist colonization."

Faculty joined students; one Yale professor tweeted "My heart is in my throat. Prayers for Palestinians. Israeli is a murderous, genocidal settler state and Palestinians have every right to resist through armed struggle." In response, the president of Yale encouraged mutual respect and compassion, underscoring Yale's commitment to "freedom of expression" and adding that the pro-Hamas statements of the professor "represent her own views."

Would Yale treat racism so gently? Police brutality? I think not.

The University of Pennsylvania is facing anger from prominent alumni who rightly fault the administration for not taking a strong stand against terrorism from those who deny Israel's right to exist and brutally murder innocent civilians.

In a letter to the university's president, former Ambassador Jon Huntsman wrote: "The University's silence in the face of reprehensible and historic Hamas evil against the people of Israel (when the only response should be outright condemnation) is a new low. Silence is antisemitism, and antisemitism is hate, the very thing higher ed was built to obviate."

What are these universities so afraid of? Students and faculty have a right to speak out, but they should be held accountable for their words. And they should be condemned by responsible leaders when they preach hate.

It is striking to compare the response of universities to Hamas's brutal slaughter with how quick and united they were to condemn the brutal beating of George Floyd. They all issued statements. Black students demanded action. Universities pledged to take steps against racism in their midst.

Claudine Gay, now Harvard's president, wrote at the time: "For those of us who did not know him, we experience this as another kind of tragedy, as we add yet another name to all those, like Breonna Taylor and Tony McDade, that have come to symbolize the brutality of racist violence in this country."

Yale's president wrote: "I write to you today deeply upset by the killing of George Floyd while he was in the custody of Minneapolis police officers. Mr. Floyd's death follows a pattern of racial injustice that has become too familiar in our country and that amounts to a national emergency."

Penn's president wrote: "We are outraged and saddened about his tragic death and the deaths of countless other people who suffer similar injustices. To our Black students, staff, and faculty, we want you to know that we see you, we support you, and we stand with you."

Why is it so difficult to say the same thing when over 1,000 Jews are killed in cold blood by a racist terrorist organization, which is what Hamas is? There are not two sides to this argument.