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in Response to The Harvard Crimson's Endorsement of BDS Against Israel.

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Harvard Faculty Statement in Response to The Crimson Editorial Board’s Endorsement of BDS

As members of the faculty of Harvard University, we are dismayed by The Crimson Editorial Board’s enthusiastic endorsement of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel. While we may not agree with every point in this statement, and there are many diverse perspectives among us on issues of Israeli policy, the boundaries of academic freedom, and the role of universities as political actors, we are united in our opposition to BDS and The Crimson stance.   

We are deeply concerned about the long-term impact of this recent staff editorial on the morale and well-being of Jewish and Zionist students at Harvard, some of whom have already reported that they have become alienated from the newspaper on account of the inhospitable culture that prevails there.

We extend our full support to these students who may now be feeling marginalized and demoralized. We also express our steadfast commitment to Harvard’s ties with Israel, a country that is home to some of the world’s best universities. Our research and teaching missions benefit from these educational exchanges, and we encourage Harvard to grow them further.

While acknowledging the right of those within our campus community to endorse and advocate for BDS, we stand firmly opposed to this movement. In addition to calling for a wholesale boycott of Israeli academia, BDS compromises educational goals by turning the complex and intractable Israeli-Palestinian conflict into a caricature that singles out only one side for blame with a false binary of oppressor versus oppressed.

We believe that many well-meaning people with no hate in their hearts, including those at Harvard, gravitate to this movement believing that it offers a means for advancing Palestinian rights and peace in the Middle East. But the reality is that BDS merely coarsens the discourse on campus and contributes to antisemitism. In seeking to delegitimize Israel through diplomatic, economic, academic, and cultural isolation, and by opposing the very notions of Jewish peoplehood and self-determination, BDS is disrespectful of Jews, the vast majority of whom view an attachment to Israel as central to their faith identity. 

Contrary to the Crimson editorial, and despite its claim to be a movement for social justice, BDS does not advocate for coexistence, peace building toward a two-state solution, or even dialogue with Israel’s supporters on our campus. BDS negates the importance of Israel for Jewish continuity and as a refuge and safe haven for Jews who need one. It excludes Israel’s remarkable achievements as a post-colonial nation after independence, ignores the country’s relative successes in integrating waves of multi-ethnic and multi-racial communities, and neglects Israel’s own efforts at peace. Because of the movement’s rigid policy of “anti-normalization,” BDS casts Israel as uniquely malevolent among nations, with any and all attempts at mutual understanding to be resisted.

We are saddened and disheartened that both the Crimson and the Harvard College Palestine Solidarity Committee (PSC), to which the Editorial Board gave full-throated support in its editorial, are creating spaces on campus where Jewish and Zionist students are targeted and made to feel unwelcome. In its “Wall of Resistance” art installation at Harvard Yard, callously displayed over the Passover holiday, the PSC equated Zionism with “racism” and “white supremacy.” Such language is shameful and has no place at Harvard. We call out this rhetoric for what it is: anti-Jewish hate speech that is antithetical to the values of any academic institution.

Zionism— the right of the Jewish people to a homeland and self-determination—is a millennia-old tradition, with deep roots in Jewish history and religious practice. It is also a more recent political response to the utter failure to produce freedom and safety for Jews living in most places in the world. To treat Zionism as an illegitimate and oppressive movement, as BDS does, is to ignore history and to deny empathy, respect, and dignity to Jews.

We at Harvard have a responsibility to recognize the complexity of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to acknowledge the lived experiences, traumas, hopes and dreams of all peoples impacted by it. The mission of our great university is to rigorously interrogate and debate complex problems. We are at our best when we consider and evaluate competing perspectives, focus on facts, acknowledge nuances, and avoid simplistic, monocausal explanations.

Proposing disengagement from Israel, in rhetoric that harshly characterizes the Jewish national project, has consequences here at Harvard too. At a moment when antisemitic incidents, often including violence, have reached an all-time high, it is more important than ever for us to model a respectful and inclusive learning environment.

We urge the Crimson Editorial Board to reach out to Jewish peers so that they can begin to repair the damage caused by writing such a divisive staff editorial, adding insult to injury by thoughtlessly publishing it the day after Yom HaShoah—Holocaust Remembrance Day.

We encourage Crimson’s editors to take advantage of the many resources and educational opportunities that Harvard has to offer for learning more deeply about Jewish identity and Israel, the diversity of the Jewish experience, and the multifaceted nature of contemporary antisemitism, including how it manifests on campus.

We also hope that the students who report and write for Harvard’s treasured and beloved Crimson, the oldest continuously published campus daily in the United States, will turn to us for more information and insight into the issues and concerns that we have raised in this statement. Our doors are always open.

Initial signatories serve on the Advisory Board of the Academic Engagement Network:  

Gabriella Blum, Rita E. Hauser Professor of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law, Harvard Law School

Jesse Fried, Dane Professor of Law, Harvard Law School

Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor, Department of Psychology

Lawrence H. Summers, Charles W. Eliot University Professor and President Emeritus

Additional signatories:  

Martin Abrahamson, Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Michael Agus, Professor of Pediatrics, Harvard Medical School

Eva Ascarza, Associate Professor, Marketing, Harvard Business School

Oren Bar-Gill, Professor, Harvard Law School

Terry Bard, Lecturer on Pastoral Counseling in the Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School

Lucian Bebchuk, James Barr Ames Professor of Law, Economics, and Finance, Harvard Law School

Carolyn Becker, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Jennifer Bellon, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Herbert Birnbaum, Assistant Professor, Harvard School of Dental Medicine

Ron Blankstein, Professor, Harvard Medical School

Ilana Braun, Assistant Professor , Harvard Medical School

Stephen Brown, Associate Professor, Radiology, Harvard Medical School

Joan Brugge, Professor, Harvard Medical School

Raphael Bueno, Professor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School

Harold Bursztajn, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Jeffrey Bussgang, Senior Lecturer, Harvard Business School

Elliot Chaikof, Professor and Chair, Beth Israel Deaconesses Medical Center, Harvard Medical School

Shaye Cohen, Nathan LIttauer Professor of Hebrew Literature and Philosophy, Harvard University

Amy Comander, Instructor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Jason Comander, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

David Cutler, Otto Eckstein Professor of Applied Economics, Harvard University

Kirk Daffner, Professor, Harvard Medical School

Leemore Dafny, Bruce V. Rauner Professor, Harvard Business School and Harvard Kennedy School

George Demetri, Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Alan Dershowitz, Professor Emeritus, Harvard Law School

Bruce Donoff, Past Dean and Professor of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery and Distinguished University Professor of Service, Harvard School of Dental Medicine

Carol Ehrlich, Senior Physician-Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Mark Feinberg, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Joshua Finkel, Instructor of Anesthesia, Harvard Medical School

Krisztina Fischer, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Shira Fischer, Instructor, Harvard Medical School

David Fisher, Professor and Chair, Dermatology, Harvard Medical School

Naomi Fisher, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Gary Fleisher, Egan Family Foundation Professor, Harvard Medical School

Jeffrey Flier, Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor and former Dean of Harvard Medical School, Harvard Medical School

Steven Flier, Assistant Clinical Professor, Harvard Medical School

Dinah Foer, Instructor, Harvard Medical School

Bernard Friedland, Associate Professor, Harvard School of Dental Medicine

Dave Friedman, Lecturer, Harvard Law School

Elizabeth Gaufberg, Associate Professor, Medicine and Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School

Jeffrey Gelfand, Professor, Harvard Medical School

Daniel Gilbert, Edgar Pierce Professor of Psychology, Harvard University

Jordan Glicksman, Lecturer, Otolaryngology, Harvard Medical School

Joel Goldberg, Assistant Professor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School

Hilary Goldberg, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Samuel Goldhaber, Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Paul Gompers, Eugene Holman Professor, Harvard Business School

Robert Graham, Associate Professor, Anesthesia, Critical Care and Pain Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Jerry Green, John Leverett Professor in the University, Harvard Business School

Shane Greenstein, Professor, Harvard Business School

Robin Greenwood, Professor, Harvard Business School

Steven Grinspoon, Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Jerome Groopman, Recanati Professor, Harvard Medical School

Richard Grossman, Visiting Scholar, Harvard University

Daphne Haas-Kogan, Professor and Chair, Harvard Medical School

Rachel Haims, Instructor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Jeffrey Hamburger, Kuno Francke Professor of German Art & Culture, Harvard University

Mark Hammer, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Anat Hanono, Instructor, Harvard Medical School

Mark J. Hauser, Instructor, Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School

Elhanan Helpman, Galen L. Stone Professor on International Trade, Harvard University

Yael Hoffman Sage, Instructor, Harvard Medical School

Jacob Holzer, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School

Charles Homer, Associate Clinical Professor, Harvard Medical School

Margo Hudson, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Esther Israel, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Elliot Israel, Professor, Harvard Medical School

Ayelet Israeli, Marvin Bower Associate Professor, Harvard Business School

Barbara Kahn, George Minot Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

C Ronald Kahn, Mary K Iacocca Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Benjamin Kann, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Robert Kaplan, Professor, Harvard Business School

Louis Kaplow, Professor, Harvard Law School

Daniel Katz, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Aubrey Katz, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Elizabeth Keenan, Assistant Professor, Harvard Business School

Steven Kelman, Weatherhead Professor of Public Management, Harvard Kennedy School

Louise King, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Isaac Kohane, Professor, Harvard Medical School

Daniel Kohane, Professor, Harvard Medical School

Joshua Korzenik, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Paul Kosmin, Philip J. King Professor of Ancient History, Harvard University

Baruch Krauss, MALE, Harvard Medical School

Joshua Krieger, Assistant Professor of Mangement, Harvard Business School

Abraham Lebenthal, Instructor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School

Meryl LeBoff, Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Jonathan Leeman, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Jon Levenson, Albert A. List Professor of Jewish Studies, Harvard Divinity School

Cheryl Levin, Lecturer, Harvard Medical School

David Levine, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Nomi Levy-Carrick, Vice Chair, Clinical Programs, Harvard Medical School

Avi Loeb, Frank B. Baird Jr. Professor of Science, Harvard University

Dan Lusthaus, Research Associate, Harvard University

Bertha Madras, Professor of Psychobiology, Harvard Medical School

Harvey Mamon, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Asaf Maoz, Clinical Fellow / Postdoctoral Fellow, Medical Oncology, Harvard Medical School

Eleftheria Maratos-Flier, Professor Emerita, Harvard Medical School

Karen Marcus, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Joshua Margolis, Professor, Harvard Business School

Gad Marshall, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Ralph Metson, Professor HMS, Harvard Medical School

Dror Michaelson, Donald Kaufman Chair in Medical Oncology, Harvard Medical School

Thomas Michel, Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Robert Mnookin, Williston Professor of Law, Harvard Law School

Eric Nelson, Robert M. Beren Professor of Government, Harvard University

Elisa New, Powell M. Cabot Professor of American Literature, Harvard University

Michael O'Leary, Professor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School

Walter O’Donnell, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Darren Orbach, Associate Professor, Radiology, Harvard Medical School

Gary Orren, V.O. Key, Jr. Professor of Politics and Leadership, Harvard Kennedy School

Itai Pashtan, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Jorge Plutzky, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Jack Nusan Porter, Associate, Harvard University

Jacob Pourati, Lecturer, Harvard School of Dental Medicine

Mark Poznansky, Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Marilyn Price, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Rosemary Reiss, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Harold Rosen, Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

David Rosenberg, Professor of Law, Emeritus, Harvard Law School

Richard Ruback, Baker Foundation Professor, Harvard Business School

James Russell, Mashtots Professor of Armenian Studies, Emeritus, Harvard University 

Raffaella Sadun, Professor, Harvard Business School

Suzanne Salamon, Assistant Professor in Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Adrian Salic, Professor of Cell Biology, Harvard Medical School

Anthony Samir, Assistant Professor, Service Chief, Harvard Medical School

Daniel Schacter, William R. Kenan Jr. Professor, Harvard University

Jeffrey Schnipper, Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Thomas Schwarz, Professor, Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School

Eric Secemsky, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Arthur Segel, Baker Foundation Professor of Management Practice & Poorvu Family Professor of Management Practice, Harvard Business School

Steven Shavell, Samuel R. Rosenthal Professor of Law and Economics, Harvard Law School

David Shaywitz, Lecturer, Harvard Medical School

Marc Shell, Irving Babbitt Jr. Professor of Comparative Literature, Harvard University

Ron Shiloh, Instructor, Harvard Medical School

David Sloane, Instructor, Harvard Medical School

Wake Smith, Senior Fellow, Harvard Kennedy School

Martin Solomon, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School

Michael Stein, Visiting Professor, Harvard Law School

Matthew Stephenson, Eli Goldston Professor of Law, Harvard Law School

David Stern, Harry Starr Professor of Classical Hebrew and Jewish Literature, Harvard University

Isaac E. Stillman, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School

Jacob Taylor, Instructor, Harvard Medical School

James Tulsky, Professor, Harvard Medical School

Brian Wainger, Associate Professor, Anesthesia, Critical Care & Pain Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Mark Weinfeld, Instructor, Harvard Medical School

Sharon Weinstein, Assistant Professor, Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School

Ruth R. Wisse, Martin Peretz Professor of Yiddish Literature, Emerita, Harvard University

Jonathan Yudelman, Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard University

Ben Yudkoff, Medical Director, Harvard Medical School

Richard Zeckhauser, Ramsey Professor of Political Economy, Harvard Kennedy School

Mark Zeidel, Herrman Blumgart Professor of Medicine, Physician in Chief and Chair, Department of Medicine, Harvard Medical School