When it comes to restoring academic quality and combating antisemitism, Harvard’s actions continue to defy its lofty promises. Consider just the most recent example: the appointment of Shaul Magid as a “Professor of Modern Jewish Studies in Residence” at Harvard Divinity School.
According to Harvard, the faculty search review committee, composed of Terrence Johnson, Ann Braude, and Charles Stang, “lauded Magid’s scholarship, mentorship, and commitment to intellectual diversity. His appointment, they noted, will be pivotal in enriching Harvard’s strengths in Jewish studies.”
One must wonder whether Johnson, Braude, and Stang bothered to review Magid’s history. Consider just one recent remark by Magid at a two-day conference on “Non-Zionist Jewish Traditions” at Brown University:
“Are we doing this as disinterested scholars? My answer would be no. We are here because we are most interested scholars. Most of us come here because we agree that, with all that has been accomplished, something has gone very wrong with the Jews today.”
He continued: “Nationalism poisoned the well of Jewish nature.”
So, too, did those other “interested scholars” with whom Magid proudly surrounded himself. Another, Omer Bartov, echoed Magid’s “poisoned well” remark, declaring “a poison has been distilled into the veins of the country [of Israel], and slowly but surely it proceeds toward savagery.” Adi Ophir declared that Jews must openly reject support of Israel or “they are complicit.” Beshara Doumani declared “Israel…has become the North Star of the rise of fascism all over the world,” and that Zionism is “a child of antisemitism.” Another academic, Ariella Azoulay, known for particularly outlandish antisemitic rants, claimed Europe “invented us as Jews” and that there is “an evangelical settler colonial death drive implanted in Jews’ hearts.”
Not one participant challenged the conference speakers’ absurdly antisemitic rhetoric.
This is “intellectual diversity” and “enrichment,” according to Harvard Divinity School.
Just last month, in an attempt to ward off government intervention, Harvard University President Alan Garber promised that he understood the “importance of ending antisemitism” and “embrac[ing] a multiplicity of viewpoints rather than focusing on narrow orthodoxies.”
Well aware of the “chilling…contemporary antisemitism” that has overtaken Harvard Divinity School, Garber has made similar claims before.
The evidence is mounting that Harvard’s leadership simply cannot match its words with action.