Israel divides Harvard campus. ‘You support terrorists’

Dozens of students sit on the gray tiles in front of the Harvard Science Center, bundled up in thick coats, hats, scarves and wearing face masks and sunglasses. They hold A4 sheets in their hands or in front of their faces. On it are written the names, often with ages, of some of the thousands of Palestinians who died during the war in Gaza last month.

A girl and a boy with a keffiyeh, a Palestinian scarf, around their shoulders, stand up and read the names. Four security guards in yellow vests walk around the protest. Would-be lawyers are also keeping an eye on the group. People walk past them, occasionally curious, to their lecture or lunch.

Just as the banner reading ‘Stop the Genocide in Gaza’ is unfurled, a young man stops and starts shouting at the demonstrators. “Bunch of hypocrites! What do you know about genocide? Nothing at all!” He holds the straps of his backpack tightly with his fists next to his chest. A small lion cuddly toy sticks out of the bag.

“Fuck off, leave us alone,” responds one of the demonstrators. A woman in running clothes intervenes and tries to calm the agitated man. “Calm. We are all devastated,” she says. “You support terrorists. I lost twenty friends on October 7th. My family… What genocide are we going to talk about?” he snaps, before walking away.

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Incidents on campuses

Since Hamas’s unprecedented terror attack and Israel’s devastating reprisals, emotions and tensions have run high on and around American college campuses. At New York University, a man was arrested for beating a Jewish woman at a pro-Israel rally. At Stanford, California, an Arab student was hit by a man who had previously spouted Islamophobia. Classes have been canceled at Cornell, in New York state, due to anti-Semitic threats. Students from those ethnic groups experience a strong sense of insecurity, as do activists.

In addition to fear of physical danger, there is mainly anger and uncertainty about what can and cannot be said. What solidarity with Palestinians and criticism of Israel are acceptable in the public debate? Where is the line between criticism of Israel and anti-Semitism? Who decides that? And what could the repercussions be?

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Wind chill

At Harvard, the protests are largely silent, yet that is where the biggest riot occurred. More than thirty activist student clubs published a statement on October 8 in which they “hold Israel fully responsible for all the violence.” After an immediate uproar, they added a few days later that they “strongly disapprove of violence against civilians.”

Demonstrated towards the end of the pro-Palestinian protest a small group to support Israel.

A generation of students who do not necessarily see the state of Israel as a just consequence of the persecution of Jews in Europe, but as a colonial aggressor; who has no memory of 9/11, but climbed the barricades for Black Lives Matter, is colliding at full speed with the limits of what others find acceptable when it comes to Israel. And while heated student debates about major and minor injustices in the world used to have no major consequences, those who speak out are now publicly pilloried for life.

That is why none of the eight students involved give it NRC gave permission to print their names. They do not even want their nationality, origin or field of study to be mentioned. University employees do not want to talk about the issue at all and refer to statements that “hate has no place on this campus”.

“The fact that all attention is now focused on us, instead of on the genocide in Gaza, is characteristic of the emotional temperature of these kinds of debates in the US,” says one of the international seniors who co-wrote the controversial statement. He regularly publishes these with fellow activists, for example to call on the university to boycott Israeli products. “Then we also get trolls after us, but we have never experienced a reaction like this.”

Right-wing media pages and Canary Mission, a site that registers anyone they consider anti-Israel, published all the names they could find of members of the thirty or so activist organizations that had signed them. Their email addresses were flooded with hate mail, they received threats and websites were created in their names, which would be the first to be found by people who Googled them. It is said that internships were canceled and people were fired because of the statement.

It was not just anonymous keyboard warriors who targeted the students, but prominent defenders of Israel. Former Harvard President and ex-Treasury Secretary Larry Summers rubbed his current successor Claudine Gay Harvard’s lack of action appears “at best neutral toward acts of terrorism” against Israel. Hedge fund billionaire Bill Ackman Gay threatened an exodus of financiers if she didn’t take harder action. Gay is the only black head of an Ivy League university. She was appointed in July, partly because of its “inclusivity”.

Ackman also called for the names of all students involved to announce. It is unclear whether he had any motive for this other than to deprive them of their career opportunities and discourage others from speaking out in favor of Palestine.

“Pure McCarthyism,” says one involved student. “Then everything went off.” As an absolute low point, almost a week after the pro-Palestinian statement, a truck drove around campus with the text ‘Harvard’s Leading Anti-Semites’ and photos and names of the pro-Palestinian students on it. Also those who had withdrawn their names from the statement or had unintentionally been included. “We have friends who no longer dare to leave campus or even leave their bedroom,” says an activist. She herself only comes to the name protest with her face behind a mask, glasses and hat, so as not to be recognized in photos and videos. Her keffiyeh she no longer wears them.

Humanity

Among Jewish students, at least 10 percent of Harvard’s student population, there is a similar feeling about wearing a yarmulke or Jewish symbols. They also feel insufficiently recognized by the university board. A Jewish mathematics student attributes this to “a lack of historical awareness and knowledge of the Holocaust.” “I notice that it is thought that Jews, as a successful minority, are a group that no longer needs protection. That people no longer care if they are anti-Semitic.”

Meanwhile, pro-Palestinian youth feel that freedom of expression does not apply to them or to this subject. The university has now set up a task force to investigate the doxing of students. In addition, an advisory group has been set up to combat anti-Semitism.

Despite the disagreement about guilt and justice in Israel and Palestine, and about who at Harvard is more a victim of circumstances, there is also understanding for each other’s situation. “I understand that people cannot tolerate the images from Gaza,” says the Jewish mathematics student. “I also do not support Israeli policy.”

“We have never wanted to justify killing. We just wanted to put what happened on October 7 in the context of oppression,” said a pro-Palestine activist. “The fact is that both camps are dealing with heartbreak: lamenting losses and grappling with existential questions. We have Jewish people who are suffering because of this in college and on sports teams. We see each other’s humanity.”