Shabbos Kestenbaum
The Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, when more than 1,200 people were butchered and 251 taken hostage, has led to a corresponding explosion of antisemitic incidents across the world. This has resulted in a 344% surge in the United States in the past five years, with an additional 5% increase in 2024, totaling nearly 9,400 reported incidents. On university campuses, the picture is even grimmer. Some 18% of all incidents took place at colleges, which saw an increase of 541% in antisemitic attacks during the 2023-24 academic year. Ivy League schools have been among the most notorious offenders.
After months of non-compliance and waffling academic leadership, the Trump White House froze more than $6 billion of funding to some of the most offending institutions as a means of instituting policy reforms largely around antisemitism. Some universities acquiesced, while others chose to fight: To date, only $1.1 billion has been restored.
Immediately after Oct. 7, Harvard University demonstrated that its moral compass had reversed poles. The day of the attack, before the bodies were counted and as blood was still soaking into the sand, the Harvard Undergraduate Palestine Solidarity Committee and 33 student organization co-signers issued a statement blaming Israel entirely for the Hamas attacks. Students took to social media and campus spaces to celebrate the atrocities, and Harvard looked on passively, even as acts of intimidation escalated.
Not long after, Harvard’s moral fecklessness went viral. When now-disgraced former Harvard president Claudine Gay took the stand at a congressional hearing to testify that chanting for the genocide of Jews is acceptable “depending on the context,” the school’s failure to protect its Jewish students became a kitchen table topic. Hence, it is unsurprising that Harvard alone has had $2.2 billion in federal research grants and funding frozen for its noncompliance with civil-rights law protecting Jewish and Israeli students.
Instead of adhering to the Trump administration’s demands, Harvard opted to file a federal lawsuit to reinstate the funds. Litigation continues, and programs are anticipated to take years to recover, especially in the sciences, following layoffs and shutdowns. Harvard, once the jewel of American learning, has become a case study of failed leadership and poor decision-making.
Northwestern was just as compromised during this era of normalized bigotry. On Oct. 23, 2023, an antisemitic fake newspaper was distributed by pro-Hamas demonstrators on campus. Not long after, a Jewish student published a column about the harm in the phrase “from the river to the sea” and was publicly ridiculed in a banner hung above the library. In addition, mezuzahs — sacred Jewish ritual items placed on doorposts of homes, and in this case, dormitories — were torn down in November 2023, an anti-Israel divestment resolution was enacted by the student government in April 2024, and there were several cases of antisemitic vandalism.
Like Harvard, Northwestern also displayed a categorical failure of leadership. First to resign was provost Kathleen Hagarty, who appeased encampment representatives by making a deal with them to boycott Israeli products. President Michael Schill followed suit and stepped down after he struck a deal with the agitators. The subsequent Deering Meadow Agreement allowed destructive protests to continue, required the university to intercede on behalf of rioters who had job offers rescinded, and organized exclusive housing for Muslim, Middle Eastern and North African students (but not Jews or Israelis, despite themselves being indigenous to the Middle East). It also mandated the hiring of Palestinian professors — one of whom, Mkhaimar Abusada, serves on the board of a Palestinian “rights” organization, the Independent Commission for Human Rights, that has publicly praised and met with the leadership of the designated terrorist organization Hamas.
After a federal investigation found Northwestern to be in non-compliance, $790 million in federal funding was frozen. Its interim president, Henry Bienen, worked to arrange a deal with the Trump Administration to secure the funding, opting not to engage in a costly and time-consuming legal battle. Northwestern agreed to pay $75 million to the U.S. government in non-donor funding, and the abhorrent Deering Meadow Agreement was reversed.
The impacts of Northwestern’s decision to restore order have extended beyond the restoration of critical research initiatives. Recently, as many as 16 agitators at the university are at risk of having their student status revoked for refusing to attend a mandatory antisemitism training. When their radically anti-Israel student group attempted to sue Northwestern, the case was dismissed.
Meanwhile, Harvard recently offered a teaching job to a student who faces assault charges for attacking an Israeli student during a protest. While Northwestern has taken real steps to clean up its act, Harvard continues to sully its reputation rather than admit its gross failure to protect its Jewish and Israeli students.
Harvard’s current president, Alan Garber, recently issued an apology following the release of twin internal reports of rampant anti-Jewish prejudice on campus, though its urgency was deliberately softened with the simultaneous publication of a report on “anti-Muslim, anti-Arab, and anti-Palestinian bias.”
A lack of accountability at America’s top institutions of higher education has very damaging consequences. It is time for Harvard to correct its errors and follow Northwestern’s path — not only for the sake of its own reputation and future, but for the safety and civil rights of its most vulnerable students.
Shabbos Kestenbaum is an alumnus of Harvard University, a political commentator at PragerU and a Jewish student activist.
