NYU President: I Wouldn’t Have Given SJP an Award

New York University (NYU) President Andrew Hamilton wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed Monday that he would not have given the President’s Service Award to the university’s Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapter.

NYU SJP received the award, which is given to clubs that positively contribute to the campus community at large, on April 17. Hamilton did not attend the ceremony.

On April 21, Susan Shapiro, an NYU writing professor, wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed that SJP receiving the award as well as the assault of a pro-Israel student during a Yom Ha’atzmut rave in April 2018 were examples of anti-Semitism becoming pervasive at NYU.

Hamilton’s Monday op-ed was a response to Shapiro’s, article that he would not have given the award to SJP because their “behavior has been divisive.” The award selection process typically involves “a committee of volunteer staffers and a student” selecting 150 clubs and individuals to receive the award, Hamilton wrote.

The NYU president declared in his op-ed that the university “has compiled a long, strong record of support for the Jewish community, a record that surely must count for more than a single student award.” i

Adela Cojab, the NYU student spearheading a legal complaint filed against the university earlier in the month, told the Journal in a Facebook message, “I appreciate the sentiment of President Hamilton’s article, but much of the damage has already been done. The university has not been transparent about their actions, leaving myself and my community to feel unsafe and unsupported— made evident by the fact that his article was written in response to an alumnus op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, not in response to students directly aggrieved.”

She added, “I wish it didn’t take public attention plus a lawsuit for the President to come forward, and as graduation draws closer, I can only hope the university takes meaningful steps to build a campus climate centered on mutual respect and communal values.”

Judea Pearl, chancellor professor of computer science at UCLA and Daniel Pearl Foundation president who asked NYU to rescind his 2013 Distinguished Alumnus Award, told the Journal in an email, “What the NYU campus needs to hear from Hamilton’s office is a morally-motivated defense of Zionist and Israeli students, not well-meaning yet generic support of the Jewish community. Since Zionism is central to the identity of so many students at NYU, anti-Zionism should be treated like any other identity-maligning form of racism, e.g., Islamophobia, homophobia, xenophobia or white  supremacy; though protected by free speech, they are morally deplored by shapers of campus norms.

Pearl added, “Asserting publicly the moral imperative of Israel’s existence (read: Zionism) is the key to maintaining respectful campus climate.  No Jewish student can feel safe on a campus surrendered to a racist slander machine.”