Campus Watch January 4, 2024

Report: Barack Obama Urged Harvard to Keep Claudine Gay as President

Former President Barack Obama is believed to have privately urged Harvard University to keep Claudine Gay as their president as she faces criticism for her congressional testimony on antisemitism as well as plagiarism allegations.

Jewish Insider (JI) reported on Dec. 21 that an anonymous source told them, “It sounded like people were being asked to close ranks to keep the broader administration stable — including its composition.” Obama graduated from Harvard Law in 1991.

A university spokesperson told the Journal that Gay wasn’t available for comment. Obama’s office also did not respond to JI’s request for comment.

Ami Horowitz Exposes SFSU Students’ Support to Kill Jews

Filmmaker Ami Horowitz released his latest video on Dec. 21 showing several students at San Francisco State University (SFSU) expressing support — and even offering money — for killing Jews.

The video, which is being distributed through Prager University, shows a compilation of Horowitz approaching students on campus and asking them if they want to donate “money for arms and weapons against the Jews” worldwide. “We want to fund operations against soft targets, schools, hospitals, Jewish cafes,” he can be seen saying to students. To another student Horowitz says: “All we have is rockets and suicide bombers, that kind of thing.” Several students, while Horowitz’s team filmed them from hidden cameras nearby, agreed to Horowitz’s faux fundraising pitch. Some students offered to provide dollar amounts such as $5, $15, $20 and even $30, though Horowitz told the Journal that no money was actually exchanged. One student said he couldn’t provide money but offered to help spread the message.

Horowitz concludes the video by saying: “The rhetoric in demonizing Jews we have seen globally has led to this. Twenty-eight out of 35 people I engaged in conversation with expressed support for what I was doing. And 17 out of 35 — nearly 50% of the people I spoke with — offered me money to kill Jews.”

StandWithUs Urges Yale to Take Action Against Prof Who Celebrated Oct. 7 Massacre

StandWithUs sent a letter to Yale University on Dec. 19 urging the university to take action against a professor who celebrated the October 7 massacre on social media.

The letter, authored by StandWithUs CEO and Co-Founder Roz Rothstein, SWU Saidoff Legal Department Director Yael Lerman and Center for Combating Antisemitism Director Carly Gammill, stated that they are “dismayed” that Yale Associate Professor of American Studies, Ethnicity, Race & Migration and Religious Studies Zareena Grewal “posted a photo of Israel’s southern border being broken into during the attacks and wrote in support of ‘Palestinian Resistance fighters’ who murdered, raped, mutilated and kidnapped Israelis and others on Oct. 7.” Rothstein, Lerman and Gammill added that “Grewal insisted that Hamas had ‘EVERY RIGHT’ to launch their attack because she believes that “Israel is a ‘violent, genocidal, settler state.’” Some of Grewal’s other posts highlighted by StandWithUs include the associate professor stating on Oct. 7 that “settlers are not civilians” and “retweeting a video about the October 7th attacks with the caption, ‘It’s been such an extraordinary day!’” 

StandWithUs called on the university to investigate Grewal and remove her from class during the investigation, and then “impose immediate consequences” if the investigation concludes that Grewal violated university policy.

Report: University of Minnesota Considering Prof Who Denied Hamas Rapes on Oct. 7 for DEI Position

The University of Minnesota is reportedly considering a professor who denied that Hamas committed rapes during the Oct. 7 massacre to be the associate dean of the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) office in the College of Liberal Arts.

Jewish Insider (JI) reported that the professor, Sima Shakhsari, said in Dec. 14 testimony to the university review panel that she hasn’t seen evidence proving that Hamas raped Israeli women during the massacre and that “men of color in the U.S. have been demonized and have been falsely accused of rape. Exactly because of racism …  And I think that is also this force that is repeated in the context of Israel and Palestine, because Arab men have been demonized and have been marked as monstrous people who are rapists and for violence.”

The university declined to comment to JI on if they’re considering Shakhsari for the position. Shakhsari also did not respond to JI’s request for comment.

Austrian Business School Ends Relationship With Harvard and Sends “Support for the Jewish Student Community at Harvard”

The Lauder Business School in Vienna, Austria announced that they are ending their relationship with Harvard University due to recent events.

The Jerusalem Post reported on Dec. 26 that the school’s rector, Julius Dem, said in a press release, “Since 2014, our partnership with Professor Michael Porter at Harvard University represented a significant aspect of our international engagements. However, given the recent incidents, we are announcing our withdrawal from the Harvard network and are expressing our unwavering support for the Jewish student community at Harvard.”