A White House spokesman blasted top university presidents Wednesday over their reluctance to penalize or condemn students, faculty and staff who have taken part in antisemitic demonstrations following the Hamas terror group’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel — but there was no immediate comment from President Biden.
During a heated House hearing Tuesday, lawmakers grilled the presidents of Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology about their handling of antisemitism on campus.
Harvard president Dr. Claudine Gay drew particular flack after she sidestepped questions about whether calling for an “intifada” breached the Ivy League school’s code of conduct.
“It’s unbelievable that this needs to be said: calls for genocide are monstrous and antithetical to everything we represent as a country,” Andrew Bates, White House senior communications adviser and deputy press secretary, said in a statement.
“Any statements that advocate for the systematic murder of Jews are dangerous and revolting — and we should all stand firmly against them, on the side of human dignity and the most basic values that unite us as Americans.”
The White House did not immediately respond to inquiries about whether Americans would hear directly on the subject from Biden, who has repeatedly twinned condemnation of antisemitism with statements against Islamophobia since the jihadist atrocity that killed approximately 1,200 people — including 33 Americans.
House GOP Conference Chair Elise Stefanik (R-NY), a Harvard alumna, led the questioning of Gay, who took over as the university’s president in July.
At one point, Stefanik drilled down on whether language like “There is only one solution, intifada revolution” and “Globalize the intifada” — both heard during protests at Harvard — complied with the code of conduct.
Stefanik explained that “’intifada’ in the context of the Israeli-Arab conflict is indeed a call for violent armed resistance against the state of Israel, including violence against civilians and the genocide of Jews.”
“That type of hateful speech is personally abhorrent to me,” Gay replied, repeatedly evading the question. “It is at odds with the values of Harvard.”
She stressed that Harvard is committed to “free expression and give a wide berth to free expression, even of views that are objectionable.”
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By the end of the exchange, Stefanik demanded Gay’s resignation.
University of Pennsylvania president Liz McGill also faced blowback during an exchange with Stefanik when the congresswoman asked whether “calling for the genocide of Jews, does that constitute bullying or harassment.”
“If it is directed and severe, pervasive, it is harassment,” McGill replied. “It is a context-dependent decision.”
On Wednesday, Harvard tried to clean up Gay’s mess by issuing a statement on X attributed to the university president.
“There are some who have confused a right to free expression with the idea that Harvard will condone calls for violence against Jewish students,” she said. “Let me be clear: Calls for violence or genocide against the Jewish community, or any religious or ethnic group are vile, they have no place at Harvard, and those who threaten our Jewish students will be held to account.”
That only served to further enrage Stefanik, who responded: “Let me be clear. No one is confused about this desperate attempt at cleaning up your pathetic antisemitic answers yesterday. You cannot undo the moral depravity and shame. And everyone in the world knows it.”
“It’s long past time for … Claudine Gay to resign,” Stefanik added in another tweet. “She needs to be fired.”
Prior to Tuesday’s hearing, Republicans highlighted the experiences of four Jewish students from those institutions who recounted harrowing problems on campus.
Nationally, antisemitic hate crimes have exploded since the attack, surging 214% in New York City alone during October.