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Will Progressives confront left-wing antisemitism?
By Will Marshall
Founder and President of the Progressive Policy Institute
for The Hill
The torrent of antisemitism let loose by student protests against the war in Gaza is a national embarrassment, but it reflects especially badly on leaders of America’s elite colleges and the intersectional left.
Two Ivy League presidents, University of Pennsylvania’s Liz Magill and Harvard’s Claudine Gay, resigned from their jobs after a December congressional hearing during which they couldn’t give a straight answer when asked whether advocating genocide of Jews violates their university’s code of conduct.
Alas, this salutary rebuke to moral cowardice looks more like the exception than the rule. The Anti-Defamation League reports an upsurge in campus assaults and harassment targeting Jews. A plurality of Jewish college students say they don’t feel physically safe on campus.
Students at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard have filed legal complaints alleging that school leaders have failed to protect Jewish students, professors and centers from hostile anti-Israel protesters.
As many college administrators wilt before this latest affront to the liberal values they should be defending, the campaign to villainize Israel is seeping down to high schools and even middle schools.
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