University Presidents’ Congressional Hearing On Antisemitism Prioritized Muslim Community

The December 5, 2023 Congressional hearing about antisemitism on college campuses was about a very serious and obvious dynamic: Jew-hatred. It was right there in the title, and was called for in response to widespread attacks against Jews on college campuses.

Three university presidents attended: from Harvard, University of Pennsylvania and MIT. Elizabeth Magill of UofP resigned shortly after the hearing after smugly responding to the question of whether calling for the genocide of Jews was against university policy that “it’s a context-dependent decision.” Claudine Gay of Harvard also resigned for a different reason even though she offered a similar response; she stepped down because of allegations of plagiarism.

*Claudine Gay of Harvard, Elizabeth Magill of UofP, Pamela Nadell of American University and Sally Kornbluth of MIT*

The “context” comment was defended by university-backers as whether such calls for genocide were directed at individuals or were severely harassing to step beyond the bounds of free speech. However, the opening comments of each university president reveals a very different context orientation.

Gay shared in her opening comments that she appreciated the need for the hearing “on the critical topic of antisemitism,” as the world had seen a dramatic spike in antisemitism after the brutal Hamas massacre, including at Harvard. She then added “At the same time, I know members of the Arab and Muslim communities are also hurting. During these past months, the world, our nation and our campuses have seen a rise of incidents of Islamophobia.”

Why were these statements about Muslims inserted into a hearing about Jew-hatred?

She was not alone.

Magill spoke and about Hamas’s October 7 massacre and the targeting of Jewish businesses near the school. She added “we are seeing a rise in our society in harassment, intimidation and threats toward individuals based on their identity as Muslim, Palestinian or Arab.” Again, why did a university president’s prepared opening remarks discuss hatred for some non-Jews – particular non-Jews – when the hearing was on Jew-hatred?

Pamela Nadell, a professor of Jewish history at American University then addressed the panel. She concluded her remarks “I urge congress to do everything in its power to support the national strategy [against antisemitism] and also the forthcoming national strategy to counter Islamophobia.”

The trend was clear. One needn’t have listened to MIT’s president’s opening remarks.

Sally Kornbluth of MIT talked about new initiatives launched to fight hate on campus. “In addition to fighting antisemitism, it will address Islamophobia, also on the rise and also underreported. MIT will take on both. Not lumped together but with equal energy and in parallel.”

Every one of the speakers could not focus on the dedicated topic of Jew-hatred in scripted remarks to a congressional hearing about antisemitism at their institutions, and each mentioned “Islamophobia.” Racism persists at the schools but went unmentioned. Slurs against the LGBT community on campuses continue but were not called out.

Palestinians, Muslims and Arabs were specifically highlighted because the October 7 massacre was committed by Islamic extremists in the Palestinian Arab community. The “context” for university presidents was how to handle Jew-hatred on their campuses from a campus community which approved of and celebrated the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust.

It was as though the heads of American universities would have called out Germanophobia during World War II when discussing Jew-hatred emanating from German students and Nazi-supporters on campus.

It was a sad spectacle in American history but at least members of congress still cared enough about Jews to call for such hearing.

That is not the case on the world stage, where the United Nations’ adoption of Palestinians as permanent wards ensures that the global body always takes their side and only finds fault with Israel. The U.N.’s International Court of Justice (ICJ) will now narrowly focus on Israel’s actions in Gaza and provide no “context” that Israel is responding to Hamas’s massacre of civilians and threats to repeat the attacks “again and again,” whose soldiers hide like cowards beneath their families.

University presidents and the United Nations are telling all of us clearly that there are reasons people hate Jews before, after and while they are slaughtered. And most importantly, those antisemitic grievances should confine Jewish activities and constrict sympathy for Jewish suffering.