Israel-Hamas war poses ‘difficult free speech moment’ on campuses

Many Jewish students and their allies, some of whom have family and friends in Israel, called for a bold reckoning and strong condemnation in the wake of the incident. Hamas militants attackstormed into nearby Israeli towns from the blockaded Gaza corridor, Killing and kidnapping civilians and soldiers.

Meanwhile, some Muslim students have joined allies in calling for recognition of decades of suffering by Palestinians in Gaza and condemning Israel’s response. Israel imposes total blockade on Gaza following Hamas attack; air raid Buildings and homes were razed to the ground, killing civilians and forced hundreds of thousands of Evacuate.

On many campuses, these students agree on one thing: Their universities are increasingly taking neutral stances but not doing enough to support them.

University officials are already under pressure to allow Conservative views on campus, has been working hard to safeguard free speech and open debate.but conflict presented serious challenges.

“This is an extremely difficult free speech moment on campus, with passionate, deep-seated, difficult views on both sides,” said Alex Morey, director of the Campus Rights Initiative at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, which advises universities to try to maintain Institutional neutrality.

“We want to create an ideal climate for debate and discussion on campus, and the only way we can do that is by withdrawing from debate,” Morey said.

Yet remaining neutral is not always easy. For students whose conflicts are deeply personal, they want their administration to recognize how they were affected by traumatic events and use their position to denounce what they perceive to be moral wrongs.

Universities across the country issued statements about the war. Many have faced criticism for not doing enough to condemn Hamas’ attacks, or for failing to condemn the deaths of civilians in Gaza, or for ignoring the region’s context and history. As of Saturday, the death toll in Gaza exceeded 2,200, with more than 1,300 on the Israeli side, many of them civilians, and about 1,500 Hamas militants killed in the fighting, according to authorities.

Stanford University is one of them, and it has moved more toward neutrality as events have unfolded.

On Monday, California school officials said they were “deeply saddened and shocked by the death and human suffering” in Israel and Gaza and wanted “thoughtful opportunities to share knowledge” on campus. In response, dozens of faculty signed a letter demanding “unequivocal condemnation” of Hamas’ attacks.

On Wednesday, Stanford University released an “update” explaining its neutral stance. Faculty and students “should not expect frequent comments from us in the future,” college officials said.

The letter from interim President Richard Salle and Provost Jeanne Martinez did mention an incident in which an instructor reportedly provoked Jewish students in an undergraduate class, asking them to stand in the corner and telling the room This is what Israel does to the Palestinians. The lecturer also reportedly called an Israeli student a colonizer.

Saller and Martinez said the incident was under investigation and the instructor had been fired. “Academic freedom does not allow identity-based attacks against students,” they said.

At Columbia University, where the campus was closed Thursday as a safety measure, hundreds of people attended pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian rallies. Some students were angry that the university president’s statement did not go far enough to acknowledge the Palestinian deaths.

“Obviously we are all against violence, but we just demand that Palestinian lives be recognized as well,” said Nadia Ali, who demonstrated with hundreds of her peers. Many were dressed in the green, red and black colors of the Palestinian flag and wore medical masks.

On the Manhattan campus’s main lawn, demonstrators wearing blue and white Israeli flags performed prayers and sang circles.

One demonstrator, Yola Ashkenazie, said some Jewish students felt unsafe: “The rise of anti-Semitism on our campus is abhorrent.”

A day earlier, a 19-year-old woman was accused of assaulting a student following a dispute over a poster bearing the names and photos of Hamas hostages.

At Yale University, one night the words “Free Palestine” were written in chalk around the campus. The next night, some students put up posters of Israelis being held hostage with the words “Kidnapped.”

American studies professor Zareena Grewal also sparked controversy with a social media post, writing after Hamas attacks: “Settlers are not civilians. It’s not that hard.” A petition circulated demanding expel her; Grewal did not respond to a request for comment.

The university said in a statement that it was “committed to free speech” and that Grewal’s comments on the personal account “represented her own views.”

Sophomore Ertan Israel, 21, said the response was inadequate.

“Just seeing this, and Yale taking no action, does feel like a betrayal, even though they have been making supportive statements,” Jewish Israel said.

Talking about politics on campuses with diverse populations inevitably becomes sensitive, said Hussam Ayloush, executive director of the California chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

But Eloush said if the university chooses to issue an official statement, “then do it from an ethical perspective.”

“Don’t be selective about which lives are worth more than others. Every innocent life matters. Do it accurately so we’re not just commenting on the actions, but we’re commenting on…the actions “The root cause,” he said, referring to Israel’s treatment of Palestinians during the decades-long conflict.

Some of the most high-profile recent controversies have occurred at Harvard University, where the Palestinian Solidarity Council student group issued a statement that held Israel “fully responsible for all the violence that is taking place” and was co-signed by dozens of other student organizations . The announcement resulted in at least one student’s job offer being rescinded.

The conservative group Accuracy in Media then arranged for a billboard truck to drive around campus displaying the faces of students associated with the group. It called them “Harvard’s leading anti-Semites.”

Former Harvard president Lawrence Summers, who is Jewish, criticized the university’s leadership for being “neutral at best against the terror of the Jewish state of Israel.”

“In nearly 50 years of joining @Harvard, I have never been more disillusioned and alienated than I am today,” Summers said on X (formerly Twitter).

A day later, Harvard University President Claudine Gay denounced “the horrific atrocities committed by Hamas” and said that while students have a right to speak out, “not one student group — not even 30 student groups — represent Harvard The university or its leadership speaks.”

Summers later this week joined the university’s Hillel student group in opposing what he said was an effort to “smear” signatories of the anti-Israel statement.

“Such intimidation is counterproductive to the education our campuses need during this difficult time,” Harvard Hillel said.

Amy Spitalnick, leader of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs and president of Tufts University’s Hillel student body, said the conflict in the Middle East has been contentious on campus for decades, but this time it feels more volatile and polarization. in 2008.

When she was a student, “there were disagreements, but they were constructive.” Today, like American politics, Israel’s war with Hamas has become a divisive “us versus them,” she said. question.

“It should not be difficult to support the rights and dignity of Palestinians … while still condemning what Hamas is doing to Israeli civilians,” Spitalnik said. “The fact that some people refuse to do so is a heartbreaking, unmasked moment for many in the Jewish community who expected more.”

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Chris Megerian and Collin Binkley are from Washington.

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