Cornell Cut Classes by a Pro-Palestinian Professor After an Israeli Student’s Discrimination Complaint
Dr. Eric Cheyfitz, who has taught at Cornell for more than two decades, claims the university is attempting to silence him as part of a broader crackdown on pro-Palestinian activism.
People walk through the Cornell University campus.
(Matt Burkhartt / Getty) This story was produced for StudentNation, a program of the Nation Fund for Independent Journalism, which is dedicated to highlighting the best of student journalism. For more StudentNation, check out our archive or learn more about the program here. StudentNation is made possible through generous funding from The Puffin Foundation. If you’re a student and you have an article idea, please send pitches and questions to pitches@thenationfund.org.Dr. Eric Cheyfitz, a professor of American studies at Cornell, said the university has canceled the two classes he was set to teach this semester. It comes as the provost is recommending that he be suspended for two semesters without pay on the grounds that he violated federal antidiscrimination laws, The Nation has learned.
Cheyfitz’s lawyer, Luna Droubi, said it’s the latest turn in months of investigations—carried out by different university bodies—into whether Cheyfitz, 84, told a graduate student last semester to drop a class he was teaching about Gaza because the student is Israeli. Cheyfitz, who is Jewish and whose daughter and grandchildren live in Israel, denies the allegation.
The class, titled “Gaza, Indigeneity, Resistance,” had come under fire from politicians, activists, alumni, and even Cornell’s president, who criticized the course description as “radical” and “biased” in a leaked e-mail last year.
Cheyfitz—who is tenured and holds an endowed chair as the Ernest I. White Professor of American Studies and Humane Letters—is an outspoken advocate for Palestinians and has taught at Cornell for more than two decades. Cheyfitz claimed that the university is attempting to silence him as part of a broader crackdown on pro-Palestinian activism. “It’s pretty clear at this point that this is an attempt to get rid of me and the kind of material I teach, particularly material I taught on Gaza,” Cheyfitz said.
“The seriousness of this faculty member’s admitted actions while performing his teaching responsibilities warranted reassignment until Cornell can complete the disciplinary process,” wrote university spokesperson Rebecca Valli in a statement.
Early last semester, Droubi said, students began approaching Cheyfitz with complaints that a graduate student in the “Gaza, Indigeneity, Resistance” class appeared to be recording them, possibly to “gather their names and comments” and intimidate them. “We believe that a student came to the course for the sole reason of surveilling and potentially harming students in the class,” Droubi said. “That ended up proving itself to be true because multiple students came forward and shared their concerns with Professor Cheyfitz.” Cheyfitz said one Palestinian student quit the class after telling him she felt upset and frightened.
According to Cheyfitz, the graduate student often steered conversations away from the assigned readings—which at that point mostly focused on definitions of genocide and international law on Indigenous rights—to defend Israel’s conduct in the war in Gaza and argue with others in the class. “He clearly had not done the readings,” Cheyfitz said. “It was disruptive.”
Cheyfitz said he met with the graduate student in late January and spoke to him about concerns from his classmates. During the conversation, he asked the graduate student to drop the course, and by the next class, he did, Cheyfitz said. The graduate student, Oren Renard, a PhD candidate in computer science whose identity was confirmed by other students in the class, previously served in Israel’s elite military surveillance agency, Unit 8200, according to his LinkedIn profile.
The student recorded the conversation the two had and later used the audio as evidence in a discrimination complaint against Cheyfitz. Cheyfitz said he hadn’t been told he was being recorded.
“For personal safety reasons, I would really appreciate that nothing about the incident be published,” Renard replied to an e-mail requesting an interview. “Beyond the incident itself, I am very concerned about the risks of having my identity disclosed online.” Renard, who hasn’t been investigated or charged by the university with wrongdoing, didn’t answer a list of questions, including a request to share the recording.
It’s unclear exactly what Cheyfitz told Renard. Droubi argued that any reference to Israel during the exchange was made in the context of political views, not identity.
Cornell’s Office of Institutional Equity and Title IX—which has since been relaunched as the Cornell Office of Civil Rights—reviewed the case in April. Cheyfitz claims that the office didn’t recommend discipline but did find him “responsible” for the discrimination charge. Katie King, associate vice president of the Cornell Office of Civil Rights, didn’t respond to requests for comment.
According to Cheyfitz, the office referred the matter to the dean of Cornell’s College of Arts and Sciences, Peter John Loewen, who recommended to the provost that Cheyfitz be suspended for two semesters without pay. Loewen declined to comment.
Cheyfitz appealed the case to the Faculty Senate’s Committee on Academic Freedom and Professional Status of the Faculty. In June, the six-person panel, which is tasked with investigating matters of academic freedom, found unanimously that there was insufficient evidence to back up Renard’s discrimination claim, according to a committee report obtained by The Nation.
After interviewing Cheyfitz and Renard and reviewing evidence, including a transcript of Renard’s audio recording and three letters from students in the class who had expressed concerns about Renard, the Faculty Senate panel wrote in its report that sanctions that had been recommended by Loewen were “no longer warranted.”
A committee member, who reviewed the transcript of the exchange between Cheyfitz and Renard and spoke on the condition of anonymity because the proceedings are confidential, said Cheyfitz had brought up Renard’s views in a way that was “ambiguous” and “not particularly coherent.” The committee member said “there wasn’t clear evidence” of discrimination because it was not apparent whether Cheyfitz had intended to comment on Renard’s pro-Israel opinions or his identity as an Israeli.
Cheyfitz and Droubi argued that should have been the end of the disciplinary process. According to Cornell policy, the dean “must accept the Committee’s findings of fact and conclusions.” But Droubi said Loewen overruled the committee’s decision by forwarding the charge to provost Kavita Bala.
Bala, in turn, opened her own investigation.
In an August 8 letter to Cheyfitz, Bala wrote that the Faculty Senate committee had reached “a conclusion that is entirely inconsistent with the undisputed facts and governing external legal standards,” making it “imperative that those findings be set aside,” according to a letter obtained by The Nation that an American Association of University Professors official sent president Michael Kotlikoff and other Cornell leaders earlier this month. The AAUP is a Washington, DC–based nonprofit that advocates for academic freedom.
About a week before the start of classes in August, Cheyfitz said, the university canceled his courses—some of the last he’d planned on teaching before retirement. The two classes—“Contemporary Native American Fiction” and “Thinking from a Different Place: Indigenous Philosophies”—have been removed from Cornell’s online class roster.
Bala concluded that Cheyfitz violated federal anti-discrimination laws and “fell far short of the university’s expectations for faculty interaction with students,” wrote Valli, the university spokesperson. Bala is recommending “significant disciplinary action,” Valli added. “That recommendation will be considered by a faculty panel which will then make its recommendation to the president.”
According to the AAUP letter, Bala wrote in her August letter to Cheyfitz that a two-semester unpaid suspension was “fully warranted”—the same punishment that Cheyfitz said Loewen had earlier recommended.
Bala didn’t respond to requests for comment. When asked, Valli declined to provide specific examples of alleged misconduct by Cheyfitz.
In its letter, the AAUP argued that the cancellation of Cheyfitz’s classes is effectively a punishment before a final judgment has been rendered, even if Cornell says it will reassign him to other work outside of the classroom in the meantime. “We are also deeply concerned that the administration’s action against Professor Cheyfitz has occurred in the context of external political pressure and escalated demands nationwide that higher education institutions restrict what can be said or expressed on campus, especially in relation to the war in Gaza,” the AAUP letter added.
Cheyfitz said the university has taken extraordinary steps to pursue the discrimination case against him, even after the Faculty Senate committee dismissed the charge. “In a court of law, this would be double jeopardy,” Cheyfitz said.
Valli, however, wrote that Cornell is following the rules and “has a responsibility to ensure it satisfies its legal obligations under applicable civil rights laws, which includes complying with appropriate legal standards, beyond internal faculty-managed procedures.”
Cheyfitz and Droubi said Kotlikoff—who will have the final say—can’t be impartial, citing his own criticism of Cheyfitz’s Gaza course at the center of the case.
In November 2024, a law professor leaked an e-mail exchange he had with Kotlikoff to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. In it, Kotlikoff sharply criticized the course on Gaza that Cheyfitz was scheduled to teach in the spring, writing that he was disappointed that it was being offered. He wrote that the course description presented “a radical, factually inaccurate, and biased view of the formation of the State of Israel and the ongoing conflict.”
Kotlikoff said he was unable to comment on a pending disciplinary case and has previously said his remarks were intended to remain private.
In Cheyfitz and Droubi’s view, the case cuts to the heart of academic freedom, particularly at a time when the Trump administration has stripped funding from some elite colleges over allegations they let antisemitism, anti-Israel prejudice, and liberal bias go unchecked on campus. The New York Times has reported that talks between Cornell and the White House to restore hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding have stalled in recent weeks.
“I think the university was going to find a way to silence him for teaching this [Gaza] course,” Droubi said.