In Zionist Academia there is No Room for Dissent
Lior Sternfeld 03/20/2024
By Sonia Bolous and Lior Sternfeld | –
State College, Pa. (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – In a statement from March 12, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem announced the suspension of Professor Nadera Shalhoub Kevorkian, an internationally renowned Palestinian scholar and a faculty member in the Law School and School of Social Work. The drastic and unprecedented move came after Shalhoub talked in an extended podcast interview about the October 7 horrors and the ensuing devastating war and mass killings in Gaza. Two sentences that were taken out of context dominated the public conversation. First, “And of course, they will use any lie. They started with babies, they continued with rape, they will continue with million other lies every day with another story.” Second, “Only by abolishing Zionism, we can continue. This is what I see.” The public outrage, of course, ignored her comments, conveying sympathy to the victims of October 7. In fact, she said, “My reaction to the stories on October 7th was horrified…I will never allow anybody to touch a baby, to kidnap a child, to rape a woman”, adding, “all our lives, we fought for the dignity, for life, for the wholeness of a human and not the opposite.”
In its statement, the Hebrew University rejected “all of the distorted the statements of Professor Kevorkian”. Emphasizing that the University “is proud of being an Israeli, public, and Zionist institution. As in the past, the heads of the university repeated their call for Professor Kevorkian to find another academic home that suits her position. In this stage, and in order to maintain a safe climate on campus for the benefit of our male and female students, the university decided to suspend her from teaching.”
But what does it mean when a central institution of higher learning defines itself as Zionist? What does it mean for the non-Zionist or anti-Zionist faculty and students? What does it mean for the Palestinian national minority of seventeen percent that has been victimized by Zionism for years that this institution is Zionist and that any attempt to criticize this ideology faces the strongest possible reaction in the university toolbox? To be clear, Jewish professors have been able to criticize Zionism openly. As a state ideology, it is fair or even necessary to question the value and substance of this ideology. Few Jewish professors–to date– faced suspension or demands to find a new academic home for their critique of Zionisim. At the same time, faculty members at the Hebrew University who have been publicly defending war crimes and cheering on genocidal acts faced no disciplinary actions.
Just recently, the International Court of Justice ruled that the allegations that Israel is violating the Genocide Convention are plausible. Too often, the commission of international crimes is made possible through aggressive attempts to silence dissent and punish dissenters. The suspension of Professor Shalhoub by the Hebrew University is only one example of the relentless efforts on the part of Israeli institutions to silence dissent, making the university itself complicit in the atrocities that are being committed in Gaza. The witch hunt against Professor Shalhoub did not start with the decision to suspend her. In fact, it reached unprecedented levels months ago after she signed and circulated a petition accusing Israel of committing genocide. The publication of an official letter by the university accusing her of incitement and sedition not only contravened basic tenets of academic liberty, but it also put her life in real danger, given the rising violence of extreme right-wing activists against Palestinians. If this could be done to an internationally renowned scholar, we can only imagine how easy it would be to intimidate and target junior Palestinian scholars and students.
Needless to say, the establishment of the state of Israel and the ensuing Palestinian Nakba were marked with attempts to destroy the Palestinian cultural and intellectual life to disorient Palestinians who remained in their homeland. The crackdown on Palestinian academics and Palestinian students in Israeli universities is a continuation of this policy, and it aims at thwarting any attempt on the part of the Palestinian citizens to fight for their national collective rights. Using such coercive measures against the Palestinian intellectual community could have a devastating impact on the Palestinian citizens as a whole, who are already deprived of their right to self-determination under the Nation-State Law.
These disciplining attempts are prevalent in all public spaces. About the same time as the Hebrew University issued its statement, the Israeli Football Association announced it was going to put Bnei Sakhnin (the senior Palestinian football club in the Israeli premier league) in a disciplinary process because its fans cheered loudly during the playing of the national anthem, therefore, not honoring it. This, too, joins the effort to suppress and limit Palestinian voices.
Israel has long imposed a regime of racial supremacy on Palestinians, the last months have proved that it is willing to escalate in its resort to coercive measures to maintain this regime and to eliminate any meaningful opposition to it. When leading academic institutions become the arm of the state in enforcing such policies, the international academic community should respond promptly and loudly.
Sonia Bolous is an Associate Professor of international human rights law at Nebrija University and the Co-editor of Palestine/Israel Review
Lior Sternfeld is an Associate Professor of History and Jewish Studies at Penn State University and the Associate Editor of Palestine/Israel Review