Penn and other US colleges have simmered with tension over the Israel-Hamas war. Students have clashed at protests, and university administrators have faced criticism for their responses.
‘We sought to bear comfort to our brothers and sisters in Israel and to more fully absorb the depth of this trauma’
Presidents from MIT, Harvard, and UPenn testified following a Department of Education investigation into rising antisemitic incidents since the Hamas terror attack on Israel.
Like many interactions during the hearing, the vast distance between non-campus and campus, between “town and gown,” was clear. Ideological diversity is simply not a campus value.
Swift and widespread outrage followed the hearing, leading to the resignation of Penn’s president and placing pressure on the other two leaders.
University of Pennsylvania president Liz Magill declined to state clearly that calls for the genocide of Jews violated school rules. On Saturday, she stepped down.
When it comes to protecting marginalized students on campus, it seems some groups are "more equal than others," the author writes.
Colleges and universities across the US have an opportunity and responsibility to take bold action and reassert strong commitments to safe communities for their Jewish students.
The entire Palestine Writes festival is just a front to spread antisemitic hate.
An intruder at UPenn's Hillel smashed a table and podium, flipped over a table in the lobby, and yelled antisemitic slurs in an attack on the Jewish student center.
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