Harvard Faculty for Israel aims to strengthen ties with Israeli universities amid pro-Palestinian demonstrations
Hundreds of faculty members at Harvard University have joined a new group to support pro-Israel and Jewish students on campus following months of tumultuous pro-Palestinian demonstrations.
Called Harvard Faculty for Israel, it was announced last week by Harvard Medical School Professor Matthew Meyerson and Harvard Law School Professor Jesse Fried.
The group aims to help facilitate exchanges between Harvard and Israel, support Israeli students and scholars, and serve as a resource for the embattled Israeli campus community, according to its website.
In an op-ed for the Harvard Crimson, Fried and Meyerson argued that Israeli students face increased hostility and exclusion at Harvard, particularly following the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks by Hamas.
The authors cited incidents including the disruption of an Israeli professor’s lecture, a professor asking an Israeli student to leave a classroom, and findings from an external law firm’s findings that an instructor discriminated against Israeli students.
Fried and Meyerson also wrote that Israeli students have told them they are “routinely excluded from student organizations and social activities, and that some of their peers literally turn their backs on them.”
“The message is clear: Zionists are not welcome,” the professors wrote.
The new group joins the “Harvard pro-Israel community” formed in April. It urged Harvard President Alan Garber to impose “significant consequences” on disruptive pro-Palestinian protesters, the Harvard Crimson reported.
The new pro-Israeli faculty group includes members from all nine of Harvard’s faculties, many of whom are affiliated with Harvard Medical School, the Harvard Crimson reported.
There are more than 430 faculty members who have joined, according to the Crimson, which added the group is preparing to counter growing calls for the university to sever ties with Israeli-linked academic institutions.
The new initiative comes after an opposing group, Harvard Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine, was formed in January.
On its website, the group states it urges the school to “withdraw investments from the State of Israel and all companies that sustain Israeli apartheid” and boycott “Israeli academic institutions that support apartheid and colonial occupation.”
Harvard suspended five students for participating in pro-Palestinian encampment protests but reversed its decision after faculty pressure in July, as previously reported by The College Fix.
An anti-Israel student group at Harvard University, Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine, condemned the recent appointment of the school’s new vice president and general counsel, Jennifer O’Connor. The group criticized her past roles at the U.S. Defense Department and defense contractor Northrop Grumman, which sold weapons to Israel, The Fix previously reported.
The group displayed a banner reading, “War Criminals Not Welcome Here,” alongside O’Connor’s name.
JUST IN: Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine, or HOOP, ramps up its agitation outside the building where university leaders are meeting today.
Video: Harvard HOOP IG pic.twitter.com/sTWHT7ZJzW
— The College Fix (@CollegeFix) September 6, 2024
HOOP ramped up its agitation by protesting outside the building where university leaders were meeting last week.
Protesters yelled, “Say it clear. Say it loud. Gaza, you make us proud.”
MORE: Harvard application now asks students about difficult conversations
IMAGE: SteveSanchezPhotos/Shutterstock
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