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Cancel or condemn? Jewish groups decrying UPenn’s ‘Palestine Writes’ festival are split on ideal response.
(JTA) – A number of Jewish organizations have condemned an upcoming conference on Palestinian culture, taking place at the University of Pennsylvania, that includes speakers accused of antisemitism. But the groups decrying the conference disagree about what the school should do about it.
The biggest name speaking at the “Palestine Writes” festival taking place next weekend, from Friday, Sept. 22 to the afternoon of Sunday, Sept. 24, is that of Roger Waters, the former Pink Floyd frontman who uses Holocaust imagery to bash Israel during his concerts. Other speakers at the conference, the Jewish organizations say, have used language that condones or encourages Israel’s destruction.
Jewish organizational responses have ranged from a call on the university to condemn the conference — which it did last week, albeit in terms that critics called inadequate — to a demand that the university shut the conference down or face legal consequences.
The disparate response point to a divide within the pro-Israel ecosystem over how universities should handle anti-Israel and arguably antisemitic speech on campus. While both sides of the discussion abhor such statements, one cohort of activists believes that federal law requires the university to quash the offensive speech, while the other says the dictates of academic freedom demand that even repugnant speech be allowed, though they say it should be condemned.
Miriam Elman, executive director of the Academic Engagement Network, which works to counter antisemitic and anti-Israel activity on campus, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that her group would not demand the conference be canceled “unless there is a case of imminent threat, or bodily harm.” She added, “Our system of academic freedom and campus free expression is that: Offensive speech? Meet it with better speech.”
That approach contrasts with the demand issued by the Zionist Organization of America, which has urged its activists to tell the university to cancel the conference. If the university fails to do so, a recent ZOA action alert said, the right-wing pro-Israel group “may have a moral obligation to file a complaint under Title VI if this conference takes place.” Title VI refers to a section of the Civil Rights Act that bars discrimination in any institution that receives federal funds. Although the University of Pennsylvania is a private university, it receives federal research grants.
Palestine Writes has organized the annual festival since 2020, saying on its website that its founding was “born from the pervasive exclusion from or tokenization of Palestinian voices in mainstream literary institutions.”
Susan Abulhawa, the executive director of “Palestine Writes,” said in an email that most of the festival was about Palestinians, and not Israel, but that naturally there would be expressions of criticism of the country.
“We have a glorious and rich heritage that is either being erased or appropriated by a 20th-century colonial enterprise that has worked overtime to denigrate us where they cannot fully erase us,” she told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “It’s disappointing, though unsurprising, that the university could not muster the courage to defend an indigenous people’s moral and necessary struggle against Israeli colonial fascism.”
A festival spokesperson clarified that the event ends several hours before the beginning of the Jewish High Holiday of Yom Kippur, which starts on the evening of Sept. 24. The conference ends at 1 p.m.
Josh Gottheimer, a Jewish New Jersey Democratic congressman and Penn graduate, said in a letter to the university leadership that the university should at least disinvite Waters as well as Marc Lamont Hill, a Temple University professor and commentator fired from CNN in 2018 for calling for a free Palestine ”from the river to the sea” — a phrase many interpret as calling for the elimination of Israel. Hill said at the time that he was unaware of the phrase’s origins and that he was calling for a single binational Israeli-Palestinian state.
Abraham Foxman, the ADL’s former national director, told JTA that the event should trigger an inquiry by the Biden administration as part of its new plan to combat antisemitism. He also said Jewish alumni should organize to stop donating to the university. “The time has come for alumni to be more active,” he said, not just at Penn but on other campuses that have accommodated vehement critics of Israel.
After complaints from Jewish groups, the university made a statement acknowledging that the conference includes “several speakers who have a documented and troubling history of engaging in antisemitism by speaking and acting in ways that denigrate Jewish people. We unequivocally — and emphatically — condemn antisemitism as antithetical to our institutional values.”
Elman’s group and the Anti-Defamation League each told JTA that they hoped the university’s condemnation would be more robust.
For Jewish and pro-Israel groups criticizing the conference, the most objectionable speaker is Waters, who is scheduled to speak on a Friday evening panel about the costs incurred by those who speak out on behalf of Palestinians. Rogers has used Holocaust imagery to criticize Israel, a practice watchdogs have called antisemitic because it trivializes the Holocaust and implies that Jews are now perpetrating its horrors on another people.
A number of other speakers have also been singled out by pro-Israel groups for their praise for members of designated terrorist groups or because they have used incendiary language to implicate all Israelis, not just their government’s policies.
The university’s statement, which was signed by Penn President Elizabeth Magill and two other senior officials, noted that the festival is not organized by the university, although a number of university-affiliated entities — such as the Wolf Humanities Center — are cosponsors.
“As a university, we also fiercely support the free exchange of ideas as central to our educational mission,” the statement said. “This includes the expression of views that are controversial and even those that are incompatible with our institutional values.”
Some critics said that Penn’s leadership had a duty to condemn university-affiliated cosponsors of the conference.
“Universities can definitely express disappointment, chagrin, dismay in faculty choices,” Elman said. “They can say ‘this is terrible judgment.’”
Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, said in an email to JTA, “Supporting academic freedom and the free exchange of ideas on campus, which ADL joins Penn in supporting, does not abdicate Penn leadership from taking a position.”
According to Jewish Insider, the ADL, along with the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, led a weeks-long effort to get the university to make a statement. The ADL recently released an analysis showing a sharp uptick in what it called “anti-Israel events” on college campuses.
“If Penn truly wants to show real support for the Jewish community, it must stop equivocating and start speaking out and taking action to stand with the Jewish community in an unequivocal, unambiguous manner,” Greenblatt said. The Jewish federation did not return a request for comment.
Elman and ZOA both noted a difference in the treatment the university has accorded the festival and a Jewish law professor, Amy Wax, who has made incendiary comments about Black and Asian students on the campus. Wax is embroiled in disciplinary hearings, which has spurred criticism of Penn by free speech advocates.
The university’s caution with “Palestine Speaks” may stem in part from a reluctance to wade into another battle over academic freedom. The controversy comes as Wax has invited a white supremacist, Jared Taylor, to campus for a second time. His presence at a 2021 event at Penn stirred protests. The Philadelphia Inquirer quoted students who believe Wax invited Taylor in order to portray the university as an institution that represses free expression.
Michal Cotler-Wunsch, who this week was named as Israel’s envoy to combat antisemitism, told JTA that the university’s commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion demanded a tougher response.
“Held in a DEI campus reality proclaiming commitment to provide and ensure equal access, safety and security to all students and faculty members, [the conference] must be measured with the same yardstick as any other group, recognizing that double standards in the application of any principle or rule undermines it,” she said.
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The post Cancel or condemn? Jewish groups decrying UPenn’s ‘Palestine Writes’ festival are split on ideal response. appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Syria’s Sharaa Says Talks With Israel Could Yield Results ‘In Coming Days’
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa speaks at the opening ceremony of the 62nd Damascus International Fair, the first edition held since the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime, in Damascus, Syria, Aug. 27, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi
Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa said on Wednesday that ongoing negotiations with Israel to reach a security pact could lead to results “in the coming days.”
He told reporters in Damascus the security pact was a “necessity” and that it would need to respect Syria’s airspace and territorial unity and be monitored by the United Nations.
Syria and Israel are in talks to reach an agreement that Damascus hopes will secure a halt to Israeli airstrikes and the withdrawal of Israeli troops who have pushed into southern Syria.
Reuters reported this week that Washington was pressuring Syria to reach a deal before world leaders gather next week for the UN General Assembly in New York.
But Sharaa, in a briefing with journalists including Reuters ahead of his expected trip to New York to attend the meeting, denied the US was putting any pressure on Syria and said instead that it was playing a mediating role.
He said Israel had carried out more than 1,000 strikes on Syria and conducted more than 400 ground incursions since Dec. 8, when the rebel offensive he led toppled former Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad.
Sharaa said Israel’s actions were contradicting the stated American policy of a stable and unified Syria, which he said was “very dangerous.”
He said Damascus was seeking a deal similar to a 1974 disengagement agreement between Israel and Syria that created a demilitarized zone between the two countries.
He said Syria sought the withdrawal of Israeli troops but that Israel wanted to remain at strategic locations it seized after Dec. 8, including Mount Hermon. Israeli ministers have publicly said Israel intends to keep control of the sites.
He said if the security pact succeeds, other agreements could be reached. He did not provide details, but said a peace agreement or normalization deal like the US-mediated Abraham Accords, under which several Muslim-majority countries agreed to normalize diplomatic ties with Israel, was not currently on the table.
He also said it was too early to discuss the fate of the Golan Heights because it was “a big deal.”
Reuters reported this week that Israel had ruled out handing back the zone, which Donald Trump unilaterally recognized as Israeli during his first term as US president.
“It’s a difficult case – you have negotiations between a Damascene and a Jew,” Sharaa told reporters, smiling.
SECURITY PACT DERAILED IN JULY
Sharaa also said Syria and Israel had been just “four to five days” away from reaching the basis of a security pact in July, but that developments in the southern province of Sweida had derailed those discussions.
Syrian troops were deployed to Sweida in July to quell fighting between Druze armed factions and Bedouin fighters. But the violence worsened, with Syrian forces accused of execution-style killings and Israel striking southern Syria, the defense ministry in Damascus and near the presidential palace.
Sharaa on Wednesday described the strikes near the presidential palace as “not a message, but a declaration of war,” and said Syria had still refrained from responding militarily to preserve the negotiations.
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Anti-Israel Activists Gear Up to ‘Flood’ UN General Assembly
US Capitol Police and NYPD officers clash with anti-Israel demonstrators, on the day Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses a joint meeting of Congress, on Capitol Hill, in Washington, DC, July 24, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Umit Bektas
Anti-Israel groups are planning a wave of raucous protests in New York City during the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) over the next several days, prompting concerns that the demonstrations could descend into antisemitic rhetoric and intimidation.
A coalition of anti-Israel activists is organizing the protests in and around UN headquarters to coincide with speeches from Middle Eastern leaders and appearances by US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The demonstrations are expected to draw large crowds and feature prominent pro-Palestinian voices, some of whom have been criticized for trafficking in antisemitic tropes, in addition to calling for the destruction of Israe.
Organizers of the demonstrations have promoted the coordinated events on social media as an opportunity to pressure world leaders to hold Israel accountable for its military campaign against Hamas in Gaza, with some messaging framed in sharply hostile terms.
On Sunday, for example, activists shouted at Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon.
“Zionism is terrorism. All you guys are terrorists committing ethnic cleansing and genocide in Gaza and Palestine. Shame on you, Zionist animals,” they shouted.
BREAKING: PRO-PALESTINE PROTESTORS CONFRONT “ISRAELI” AMBASSADOR DANNY DANON AT THE UNITED NATIONS
1/5 pic.twitter.com/4G1VYEMGzV
— Within Our Lifetime (@WOLPalestine) September 14, 2025
The Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM), warned on its website that the scale and tone of the planned demonstrations risk crossing the line from political protest into hate speech, arguing that anti-Israel activists are attempting to hijack the UN gathering to spread antisemitism and delegitimize the Jewish state’s right to exist.
Outside the UN last week, masked protesters belonging to the activist group INDECLINE kicked a realistic replica of Netanyahu’s decapitated head as though it were a soccer ball.
US activist group plays soccer with Bibi’s mock decapitated HEAD right outside NYC UN HQ
Peep shot at 00:40
Footage posted by INDECLINE collective just as UN General Assembly about to kick off
‘Following the game, ball was donated to Palestinian Genocide Museum’ pic.twitter.com/TQ84sgZhKr
— RT (@RT_com) September 9, 2025
Within Our Lifetime (WOL), a radical anti-Israel activist group, has vowed to “flood” the UNGA on behalf of the pro-Palestine movement.
WOL, one of the most prolific anti-Israel activist groups, came under immense fire after it organized a protest against an exhibition to honor the victims of the Oct. 7 massacre at the Nova Music Festival in southern Israel. During the event, the group chanted “resistance is justified when people are occupied!” and “Israel, go to hell!”
“We will be there to confront them with the truth: Their silence and inaction enable genocide. The world cannot continue as if Gaza does not exist,” WOL said of its planned demonstrations in New York. “This is the time to make our voices impossible to ignore. Come to New York by any means necessary, to stand, to march, to demand the UN act and end the siege.”
Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM), two other anti-Israel organizations that have helped organize widespread demonstrations against the Jewish state during the war in Gaza, also announced they are planning a march from Times Square to the UN headquarters on Friday.
“The time is now for each and every UN member state to uphold their duty under international law: sanction Israel and end the genocide,” the groups said in a statement.
JVP, an organization that purports to fight for “Palestinian liberation,” has positioned itself as a staunch adversary of the Jewish state. The group argued in a 2021 booklet that Jews should not write Hebrew liturgy because hearing the language would be “deeply traumatizing” to Palestinians. JVP has repeatedly defended the Oct. 7 massacre of roughly 1,200 people in southern Israel by Hamas as a justified “resistance.” Chapters of the organization have urged other self-described “progressives” to throw their support behind Hamas and other terrorist groups against Israel
Similarly, PYM, another radical anti-Israel group, has repeatedly defended terrorism and violence against the Jewish state. PYM has organized many anti-Israel protests in the two years following the Oct. 7 attacks in the Jewish state. Recently, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK) called for a federal investigation into the organization after Aisha Nizar, one of the group’s leaders, urged supporters to sabotage the US supply chain for the F-35 fighter jet, one of the most advanced US military assets and a critical component of Israel’s defense.
The UN General Assembly has historically been a flashpoint for heated debate over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Previous gatherings have seen dueling demonstrations outside the Manhattan venue, with pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian groups both seeking to influence the international spotlight.
While warning about the demonstrations, CAM noted it recently launched a new mobile app, Report It, that allows users worldwide to quickly and securely report antisemitic incidents in real time.
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Nina Davidson Presses Universities to Back Words With Action as Jewish Students Return to Campus Amid Antisemitism Crisis
Nina Davidson on The Algemeiner’s ‘J100’ podcast. Photo: Screenshot
Philanthropist Nina Davidson, who served on the board of Barnard College, has called on universities to pair tough rhetoric on combatting antisemitism with enforcement as Jewish students returned to campuses for the new academic year.
“Years ago, The Algemeiner had published a list ranking the most antisemitic colleges in the country. And number one was Columbia,” Davidson recalled on a recent episode of The Algemeiner‘s “J100” podcast. “As a board member and as someone who was representing the institution, it really upset me … At the board meeting, I brought it up and I said, ‘What are we going to do about this?’”
Host David Cohen, chief executive officer of The Algemeiner, explained he had revisited Davidson’s remarks while she was being honored for her work at The Algemeiner‘s 8th annual J100 gala, held in October 2021, noting their continued relevance.
“It could have been the same speech in 2025,” he said, underscoring how longstanding concerns about campus antisemitism, while having intensified in the aftermath of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, are not new.
Davidson argued that universities already possess the tools to protect students – codes of conduct, time-place-manner rules, and consequences for threats or targeted harassment – but too often fail to apply them evenly. “Statements are not enough,” she said, arguing that institutions need to enforce their rules and set a precedent that there will be consequences for individuals who refuse to follow them.
She also said that stakeholders – alumni, parents, and donors – are reassessing their relationships with schools that, in their view, have not safeguarded Jewish students. While supportive of open debate, Davidson distinguished between protest and intimidation, calling for leadership that protects expression while ensuring campus safety.
The episode surveyed specific pressure points that administrators will face this fall: repeat anti-Israel encampments, disruptions of Jewish programming, and the challenge of distinguishing political speech from conduct that violates university rules. “Unless schools draw those lines now,” Davidson warned, “they’ll be scrambling once the next crisis hits.”
Cohen closed by framing the discussion as a test of institutional credibility, asking whether universities will “turn policy into protection” in real time. Davidson agreed, pointing to students who “need to know the rules aren’t just on paper.”
The full conversation is available on The Algemeiner’s “J100” podcast.