Harvard University President Claudine Gay announced the formation of a new antisemitism advisory group at the end of October following widespread outcry over the university’s tone-deaf response to Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre in Israel.
Events on campus both before and after the group's creation show it was greatly needed.
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The first statement of three Gay shared did not condemn Hamas, prompting massive blowback both on campus and from alumni, especially after more than 30 Harvard student groups signed an open letter blaming Israel as "entirely responsible" for the barbaric pogrom.
Meanwhile, students have rallied for Hamas in Harvard Yard, the center of college life. They’ve marked "Keffiyeh Thursdays,” marched through Harvard Square from Harvard Law School to Harvard Kennedy School, and held die-ins at the college and Harvard Business School. Social media channels Harvard students use have also been preoccupied with Oct. 7 and its aftermath.
In the wake of the deadliest attack on Jews since the Holocaust, Harvard’s campus, like so many others, lit up with open Jew hatred. Student activists have acted in public, confident their views are accepted on campus. But the voices of Jewish, pro-Israel students are far less tolerated, if at all, in the university’s culture of "inclusion."
To be an openly pro-Israel undergraduate hasn’t been easy for years now. However, since Oct. 7, it’s become harder.
In a letter to Harvard's Gay, business leader and alumnus Bill Ackman described lessons learned during his recent visit with Harvard’s law and business students, along with undergraduates: “Many Jewish students have also recently become afraid to express their concerns. Many have also felt the need to remove their mezuzahs, yarmulkes, stars of David, and other overt evidence of their religion and heritage on campus and in Cambridge to avoid being exposed to discrimination, bullying, or worse.”
Students told Ackman they “are concerned about the threat of physical violence ... while among other insults, they are forced to sit next to classmates who openly and comfortably post, under their actual names, antisemitic statements and imagery on the student-wide Slack message system with no consequences for their actions.”
Unsurprisingly, Jewish students haven’t been seeking public attention. Still, three undergraduates agreed to share what it’s been like to be Jewish at Harvard since Oct. 7.
Freshman Charlie Covit described Harvard’s campus as “tense.” There are “a lot of students wearing keffiyehs” on campus. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” he said, “but you feel there’s a really big contingent."
“I know there’s been Israeli Apartheid Week in the past, but what’s unprecedented is the size and continuity of it,” Covit said, citing a “constant back-and-forth of articles, statements, and pressure on people to speak out about what different people said. It’s exhausting.” That pace has finally slowed from daily to “a couple times a week throughout the university.”
The Shabbat following Hamas’s massacre, over 1,000 Harvard students and others rallied in front of Harvard College’s main library. In the spot where undergraduates used to read aloud the names of Holocaust victims each spring, Israel was now falsely accused of “genocide.”
Curious, Covit and his friends went to listen. He was disturbed by speakers’ using phrases including “any means necessary” and “we call them liberators.” He also noted an “interesting dichotomy.” Students “trust Hamas” saying Israel bombed a Gazan hospital, a contention later rejected by intelligence assessments, but “when Israelis are killed, it has to be proven beyond a doubt.”
“I came to campus hopeful there’d be more of a chance to speak to people on the other side and see where we agree,” Covit said. “But if there’s a fundamental rejection of Israel as a legitimate state and an unwillingness to condemn Hamas ... how much opportunity is there to come to an agreement, when there’s no acknowledgment of the other side’s legitimacy?”
The campus has been inflamed. One junior involved in Jewish life on campus agreed to answer questions anonymously. Asked to characterize Harvard’s new reality, he emailed, “Quite frankly, it is scary. I’ve never seen antisemitism in the U.S. before in this way. I’ve seen the most disgusting social media posts, some made anonymously. It has gone in just a week from ‘I am pro Palestine’ to ‘Jews control the media’ and ‘antisemitism is fake.’ The rallies hosted by Harvard [Palestine Solidarity Committee] praising Hamas as freedom fighters and resistance against colonialism are no less terrifying — there are students at Harvard who can’t seem to grasp Hamas is a terrorist organization like ISIS.”
October was, the student said, notably worse than May 2021. That was the last time Israel waged war against Hamas and antisemitism simultaneously surged on American college campuses. What’s worse now is “the descriptions of terror. These groups used to say they were peaceful, didn't support terror, etc. Now they accuse the IDF of faking atrocities to excuse Hamas, while calling them freedom fighters who want liberation.”
Jewish students, he said, “were overall happy” when Harvard's president condemned terrorism in her second public statement, even if many wanted Gay to “go further.” Other students, though, took to social media anonymously to “blame the influence of Jewish money” for Gay’s revised comments. This junior approved of the recently announced antisemitism advisory group but would like to see a stronger response to the recent assault on an Israeli student outside Harvard Business School.
There’s been a sea of change on campus, and it hasn’t been strictly political. “I know Jewish students who have lost friends, been followed/chased, and even one person told me he got spat on,” the junior said. “A lot of us are really concerned about the escalating antisemitism here.”
Being an American Jew at Harvard in 2023 isn’t easy. Being Israeli is harder yet. “There is no worse nationality to be at Harvard than Israeli,” said Maya, a sophomore. “The fact I’m Israeli, I think 30% of my class questions my morals and are scared to be associated with me because of social implications.”
Even before Oct. 7, Maya had been called a “murderer” by a student offended by her mandatory service with the Israel Defense Forces. When another prominent, politically oriented student asked numerous Israel-related questions, Maya encouraged her to visit. The student replied, “‘I want to have a political career in the Democratic Party, so I can’t be associated with Israel.’”
Two friends were excluded from student clubs because they were Israeli. A professor asked another Israeli friend to leave class during a student presentation about Israel. Friends of friends have said not to speak to Israelis on campus. And both “pro-Israel” and “Zionist” have been widely used as epithets.
But Oct. 7 turned up the heat. Graduate students canceled discussion sections so students could attend a “Palestinian support rally.” By contrast, two campus vigils mourning Israeli lives lost and praying for hostages’ safe returns were held on Sunday evening.
Maya described a lack of compassion for Jews and Israelis on campus. For example, one Israeli friend lost his close American friend because politics drove that American to ignore his Israeli friend for days after Oct. 7. “It’s sad to lose a friend in a time you need one,” Maya said.
It doesn’t help that Harvard is no longer a community with common facts. Maya has encountered students who rely on random Instagram accounts and Al Jazeera for news, trusting them more than established Western media outlets.
Social media has also helped normalize and amplify existing campus Jew hatred. Two people “shared a post comparing Hamas to Nelson Mandela.” A Harvard Law School student “compared Israel to Nazi Germany.” Reacting to Israelis’ discovering the horrors of Oct. 7, a recent graduate posted, “It’s play time.” Meanwhile, anonymous posts from Harvard students have claimed Jews control the media, argued that “only Jews are supportive of Israel right now,” said to “let them cook,” and employed a beheaded baby emoji.
These sentiments echo across campus. Maya asked, “If you justify the murder of Israeli civilians — I’m an Israeli civilian — what’s stopping you from justifying my murder? I’m not saying any of them would act on it, but your words have — can cause others to act.”
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Maya observed that if the university’s top concern is student safety, “They should say, ‘We don’t support terrorism against any individual.’ ... That’s a clear line they should have drawn. It took them a long while to do that.” She added, “The student handbook says anyone threatening violence against another student or actively hurting another student, there’ll be a disciplinary action. ... There’s rules Harvard created, and I feel like right now they’re not following it.”
Harvard is not following its own rules. It’s clearly also not the same university it was in the late 20th century, when Jews were warmly welcomed. The university has allowed itself to be poisoned by Jew hatred. Reversing that destructive element would be no small undertaking.
Melissa Langsam Braunstein (@slowhoneybee) is an independent writer in metropolitan Washington.
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