Fighting Anti-Semitism At Harvard

Frustrated by Arab anti-Semitism? Upset by people’s insensitivity toward Jewish concerns? Think you’re powerless to influence your school or community? Think again.

A group of Harvard students spoke out against hate speech in the Middle East and, thanks to the support of the community, achieved results. I helped organize the group and our efforts resulted in shutting down an Arab League think tank that distributes hate speech against Americans and Jews.

It all started last year when I was a student at the Harvard Divinity School. In December, I helped organize a panel on the rise of global anti-Semitism. One panelist, Dr. Charles Jacobs, president of the David Project, stunned me by citing the pervasive, Nazi-like imagery and calumnies directed against Jews that are spread throughout the entire Islamic world, funded by oil money from the Persian Gulf. I was surprised not only by the extent of the hate education but also by how little the usually well-informed people at the Harvard Divinity School knew about the issue of hate speech in the Middle East.

Most shocking, however, was what Dr. Jacobs explained next: the Harvard Divinity School itself was complicit in the problem by accepting money from a purveyor of hatred in the Middle East.

The Harvard Divinity School — my school — had accepted a $2.5 million endowment from Sheik Zayed, ruler of the United Arab Emirates. Zayed funds a UAE think tank of the Arab League called the Zayed Center that disseminates anti-Semitism and anti-Americanism throughout the Islamic world. The center published a book claiming that the American government masterminded the Sept. 11 attacks. It also hosted notorious Holocaust deniers and featured a lecture by a Saudi professor who claimed that Jews use gentile blood for holiday pastries. The Los Angeles Times quoted the center director as saying the “Jews are the enemies of all nations.”

I knew I had to take action. Just as Harvard would refuse funds from a Ku Klux Klan financier, the university should also reject the hate money of the sheik.

Soon after the talk, a group of students and I founded Students for an Ethical Divinity School and petitioned Dean William Graham of the divinity school to live up to the university’s ethical standards and return Zayed’s gift. The dean told us he would “study the issue.” I tried to imagine him making this comment if we were African Americans, gays or women defamed by a donor.

Three months later, after an aggressive media campaign brought the issue to the mainstream media and exposed Harvard’s connection to the center, and after thousands signed a Web-based petition, the president of the United Arab Emirates shut down the Zayed Center. Harvard responded cautiously, announcing that the university was pleased that Zayed had taken action and that the university would delay for a year making a final decision regarding whether to accept the money.

State Department spokeswoman Jo-Anne Prokopowicz expressed satisfaction that Zayed had shut down a center that “espouse[d] intolerant views, including questionable programs and publications containing anti-American and anti-Semitic content.”

There are several important lessons here. The first is that hate funded by Arab leaders or anyone else can and must be countered. This is a victory for people of conscience of all faiths and backgrounds. We should never ignore, rationalize or underestimate hate speech.

The second lesson is that many people shrink from these battles. It’s sad and a little frightening to experience the indifference toward Jewish concerns and Jewish students that so many Harvard professors and the dean of the divinity school exhibited. Equally frustrating and disappointing is to see the reluctance of some Jewish professors and students to speak out against the institutional insensitivity of the Harvard Divinity School.

Ultimately, a willingness to stand up and speak up can make a difference. We won the battle through persistent campaigning, good research and community support. We thoroughly researched the Zayed Center’s Web site and downloaded the hate speech before the center got wind of our efforts and began deleting it from their site. We learned more about Zayed Center publications with help from MEMRI (www.memri.org), an organization that translates Arabic press into English. Both the Anti-Defamation League and The Simon Wiesenthal Center helped us gather important documents.

We received the most instrumental support from the David Project, the on-the-ground campus activists in Boston. It was also comforting to have the support of more than 8,000 people who signed my on-line petition at a time when leading Arab apologists like James Zogby began a smear campaign against my effort.

It is unfortunate that the responsibility to wage a campaign against the Zayed Center’s hate speech should have fallen on a small group of divinity school students, but it did. American moral leaders and human rights groups should live up to their own standards. There can be no free pass for incitement of hatred and genocide. Hatred is a weapon of mass destruction.

A few weeks ago, Sheik Zayed explained that once it came to his attention that the center had “engaged in a discourse that starkly contradicted the principles of interfaith tolerance, directives were issued for the immediate closure of the center.”

Zayed’s statement is encouraging, and I hope that other Arab leaders will follow his example and understand that demonizing Americans and Jews is unacceptable and intolerable. Arab leaders who want to earn prestige points in the West by donating to universities like Harvard now know that they must promote peace, not hate, at home.

As a result of our success, I have seen greater willingness among Jews on campuses and in communities to participate in campaigns against anti-Semitism. I am heartened by the courage of others to stand up for what’s right. n

Rachel Fish after graduating from Harvard, joined the New York City office of the David Project(www.davidproject.org). The David Project is working to support students on campus to promote a fair and honest understanding of Middle East conflict.

Aww man! Enough of the fundraiser posts!!!

Only YOU can make fundraiser posts go away. Please contribute!

So it seems to me that you have set a precedent which could be used by the gay lobby to shut down support from Christian groups that fund pro-family, anti-gay agenda issues at Harvard. Aren't these "hate speech" censorship laws ( sometimes called rules of conduct at universities) predominately used by leftists to silence debate and enforce political correctness? I'm not sure what sort of victory you think you've gained here, since future applications of this decision will most likely be used to enforce PC sensitivities that are inimical to conservative causes.

That's a good point. I hadn't thought about it that way. Would have made more sense, with that in mind, for Harvard to do better due diligence and simply refuse such grants on their face.

Of course, with "you have set a precedent ..." and "victory you think you've gained here", you've given me a lot more credit than I deserve. My role here is limited to copying and pasting the article into a thread!

Harvard is viciously racist towards white Euros, not Jews. They have several departments dedicated to vomiting genocidal hatred on their victims, most notably the W. E. B. Du Bois Institute for Afro-American Research and its own little Julius Streicher, Noel Ignatiev When it comes to combatting racism at Harvard this woman's complaints are way down the list. (The linked article is a nice little tonic during the hubbub over Rush Limbaugh's football remarks. Is Harvard embarrassed? No. Dr. Ignatiev is showcased in the current issue of Harvard Magazine. Getting rid of whiteness is not controversial at Harvard, because it is the business of American universities [and American education in general].)

http://www.adl.org/Anti_semitism/zayed_center.asp

“ADL Backgrounder: The Zayed Center”
Updated: September 15, 2003

http://www.adl.org/PresRele/ASInt_13/4335_13.htm

“ADL Welcomes UAE Decision to Shut Down Anti-Semitic Think Tank”

PRESS RELEASE SNIPPET: “New York, NY, August 18, 2003 …The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today welcomed reports that a major purveyor of anti-Semitism in the Arab world is being shut down by the government of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The Zayed Center for Coordination and Follow Up, based in Abu Dhabi, provides a platform for extremist speakers to promote virulently anti-Jewish and anti-Israel views, while also hosting lectures by Western heads of state and diplomats. The Center is named for the President of the UAE, Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan, and was established in 1999 as the official think tank of the Arab League.”

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