The Sarah Lawrence campus. Photo: Wiki Commons.

Sarah Lawrence College, my alma mater, might be delaying or resisting a Congressional request to provide documents concerning antisemitism and the safety of Jewish individuals on campus.

On June 11, the House Committee on Education and the Workforce sent a letter to Sarah Lawrence College “requesting more details about the safety of Jewish students on campus.”

This Congressional committee gave the college a deadline of June 25 to provide these documents. This is the second time the committee has requested documents from the college.

On June 23, Sarah Lawrence College President Cristle Collins Judd sent an email to faculty and staff, writing:

It is important to be aware that processes such as a congressional inquiry take time. As we indicated in our discussions last semester, the “due date(s)” in the Committee’s letters are not hard deadlines, rather they are dates by which our outside counsel – on behalf of the College – engages with the Committee to understand the scope and exact nature of the inquiries.

A committee spokesperson told me, “As is true with school assignments, college admissions, and requests from Congress—a deadline means a deadline. We do expect a response to our requests by the deadline.”

The June 11 letter, written by Rep. Tim Walberg (R-MI) and Rep. Burgess Owens (R-UT), details many concerns about antisemitism and Jewish safety at Sarah Lawrence, including the allegation that some of the college’s faculty have “celebrated violence against Jews in online posts.”

Citing one of my columns in The Algemeiner, the Congressional letter states:

Sarah Lawrence professor, Suzanne Gardinier, applauded the October 7th attack on Israel and denied that Hamas committed mass rape against Israeli women. She retweeted a post claiming that on and after October 7th, “there was no mass rape, it was all atrocity propaganda.”

The committee reiterated “its request for all documents related to disciplinary action taken against students or faculty involved in the November 2024 takeover and occupation of Westlands and the accompanying encampment.”

Westlands is the main administration building on campus and is described as “the heart of the Sarah Lawrence College campus.”

Additional information requested by the committee includes documentation and communications related to “the cancellation of classes by faculty or the modification of course materials in support of the Westlands occupation or encampment,” “social media posts by Sarah Lawrence faculty on platforms celebrating violence against Jews, Israelis, or Zionists, including posts that applaud the October 7th Attack,” “coordinated efforts to pressure students not to register for classes taught by Jewish professors,” and specific information related to bullying and  harassment, and information pertaining to the campus chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine.

The letter states:

Two days after the October 7th terrorist attack, Sarah Lawrence’s Director of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB) [Briana Martin] invited Jewish students to attend a so-called “solidarity with Palestine” event sponsored by SJP, the same group whose members have allegedly harassed Jewish students on Sarah Lawrence’s campus. SJP’s own social media post advertising this event featured an image of a bulldozer on October 7th with the caption, “LONG LIVE PALESTINE.” The DEIB Director’s invitation allegedly caused significant distress to Jewish students as an apparent institutional endorsement of National SJP’s position celebrating the terrorist attack as a “historic win” [citations removed].

Briana Martin continues to appear on Sarah Lawrence’s website as director of DEIB, however, her email address is no longer listed on the site. The other four members of Sarah Lawrence’s diversity team have their email addresses listed on the website.

Just last week, Sarah Lawrence professor Samuel J. Abrams wrote that the college “has become an increasingly hostile place for Zionist and Jewish students, with open calls for violence against Jews becoming disturbingly common.”

According to Abrams, Jewish students and Hillel — “the national Jewish student-facing support organization that is on hundreds of campuses nationwide” — have repeatedly requested space in a new campus building and were denied. Abrams states that Hillel even offered to “pay the costs.”

As I have previously reported, being Jewish on the Sarah Lawrence campus is even hostile for some Jewish students who are not Zionists. A graduate of the college wrote on a social media alumni group, “i’m not a zionist but nevertheless … when i was at SLC someone graffitied a swastika onto my dorm and i had fake eviction notices slipped under my door, just because i celebrated jewish holidays. people threatened me because i went to hillel. it’s tough out there even for jews who 1000% support Palestine [sic].”

It is appalling that Sarah Lawrence College seems to think that Congressional deadlines related to Jewish safety on its campus are flexible or optional. I am ashamed of my alma mater.

Peter Reitzes writes about issues related to antisemitism and Israel.

The post Will Sarah Lawrence Address Congressional Committee in Face of Its Hostile Environment for Jews? first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

A mourner holds an Israeli flag, ahead of the funeral of Israeli soldier Sergeant Maayan Baruch Pearlstein, who was killed amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, in Misgav, Israel, June 25, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Florion Goga

The Israeli military said seven soldiers were killed in a single attack in southern Gaza on Tuesday, the military’s deadliest day in the territory since a ceasefire with Hamas ended in March.

A lieutenant, three staff sergeants, and three sergeants, members of a combat engineering battalion, were killed when an explosive device planted on the armored vehicle they were traveling in ignited a fire, the military said on Wednesday.

The latest deaths are likely to increase public pressure on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reach a ceasefire in Gaza and end the nearly two-year-long war, a move strongly opposed by some members of his right-wing ruling coalition.

Public support for Netanyahu collapsed after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel from Gaza, which exposed Israel to its deadliest security failure.

But his standing has been boosted by his surprise decision to strike Iran — a campaign widely viewed as dealing a significant blow to Israel’s longtime adversary. Iran is also a major backer of Hamas, providing the Palestinian terrorist group with weapons and funding.

Attention has shifted back to Gaza following US President Donald Trump’s announcement of a truce between Israel and Iran that came into effect on Tuesday and continues to hold.

Hamas’s military wing confirmed that it had carried out the deadly attack in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, on Tuesday. It said its fighters had also fired an anti-tank missile at another vehicle that came to help.

The deadliest day for the Israeli military since the war started was in January 2024, when 24 soldiers were killed, 20 of them in a single explosion.

HOSTAGES

The Gaza war has persisted despite mounting domestic and international calls for a ceasefire and to secure the release of the remaining hostages, as coalition members Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich have pressed to keep fighting.

Netanyahu‘s right-wing coalition of secular and religious parties holds a narrow parliamentary majority, meaning the prime minister can ill afford dissent.

The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, which represents the relatives of some captives, this week called on the United States to push for a comprehensive deal that would secure the release of the hostages.

Twenty hostages remain in captivity in Gaza, while Hamas is also holding the bodies of 30 who have died.

Netanyahu has demanded that Hamas, which has ruled Gaza for nearly two decades, release the hostages, relinquish any future role in Gaza, and lay down its weapons in order to end the war.

Hamas has said it would release the hostages if Israel agrees to a permanent ceasefire and withdraws from Gaza. It has refused to discuss disarmament.

The war in Gaza was triggered when Hamas-led terrorists attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing close to 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.

Most of the hostages released so far have been freed through indirect negotiations between Hamas and Israel. Others were rescued during Israeli military operations.

The post Seven Israeli Soldiers Killed in Hamas Attack in Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

November 2023: An Israeli soldier helps to provide incubators to Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza. Photo: Screenshot

While the world is mostly focused on Iran, it’s important to remember the war in Gaza continues. On Sunday, Israeli security forces recovered the bodies of three more hostages — 71-year-old Ofra Keidar, 21-year-old Yonatan Samerano, and 19-year-old Staff Sergeant Shay Levinson. They had been murdered and their bodies held hostage since October 7, 2023 — the day Hamas, Iran’s proxy, launched its war on Israel.

For 625 days, their remains were held as trophies to be traded in a grotesque negotiation tactic. Many struggle to grasp the depravity of using corpses as bargaining chips. But this failure to understand the nature of Israel’s enemies has led to Israel being vilified, even as it defends itself against those sworn to its destruction.

The global narrative shifted with shocking speed away from the atrocities of October 7, 2023, to a focus on what Israel would do in response to the darkest day in its history.

The massacre of 1,200 people and abduction of over 250 became a footnote, while the suffering of Gazan civilians — a significant number of whom either took part in or celebrated the massacre — became the world’s main concern.

Israel found itself fighting not just a regional war on seven fronts, but also an information war in which not a single bullet was fired, yet the potential damage was even greater.

From the outset, as always with wars involving Israel, the first casualty was truth.

On October 17, 2023, headlines screamed of an Israeli airstrike on Gaza’s al-Ahli Baptist Hospital, supposedly killing more than 500 people. The claim came from Hamas’ health ministry, within minutes of the explosion at the site.

This Hamas-produced story was instantly broadcast by media giants like The New York Times and the BBC.

But no one asked how 500 deaths could possibly be confirmed that quickly amidst the chaos of war. It later emerged that the explosion was caused by a misfired Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket that hit the hospital carpark, killing dozens, not hundreds. The media outlets issued corrections, but the lie had already circled the globe.

Nevertheless, that single incident set the tone for what would follow: a readiness to accept at face value the claims of a terror group that just days earlier raped, mutilated, and burned Israeli families alive.

On November 15, 2023, a BBC anchor falsely claimed that Israel was targeting medical teams and Arabic speakers in Gaza. The BBC later apologized — but once again, the damage was done.

In March 2024, Al Jazeera aired a video in which a woman accused the IDF of raping and murdering women at Shifa Hospital. She later admitted she had lied. The video was quietly deleted — but only after the lie went global.

In May of this year, Tom Fletcher, the UN’s chief aid officer, claimed 14,000 babies would be dead within 48 hours without aid. He later admitted it was false, saying that he should have been more “precise” with his language. He later claimed 10,000 aid trucks were waiting to be allowed into Gaza — another lie in which he was not “precise” with his language. Perhaps choosing truth over deception might help him to be more “precise.”

These weren’t innocent mistakes. They were reckless or deliberate lies designed to shape the narrative. Israel stands falsely accused of genocide, of deliberately targeting civilians, of starving Gaza — despite facilitating more than 1.7 million tons of aid since the war began.

Some media commentators have now berated Israel for not providing the exact civilian casualty count, as if any army could do so in an active warzone where terrorists deliberately hide behind civilians, in homes, schools, and hospitals. The British and American armies certainly couldn’t when they operated in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Recently, as the new Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) began operating — bypassing Hamas and corrupt UN aid channels — Israel was accused of firing on hungry Gazans. In fact, video showed Hamas operatives shooting at civilians trying to reach food, resulting in clashes with rival local Palestinian gunmen. A recently released IDF recorded conversation with a Gazan civilian verifies this.

These are just some examples of many, but the problem is when false stories spread — be it fabricated massacres, manipulated death tolls, or bogus claims of Israel targeting civilians — they embed themselves in public consciousness. Retractions, if they come at all, are too little, too late. The lie has already done its job. The truth becomes irrelevant.

No one denies that Israel, like any country, can and does make mistakes during war, as do some soldiers. Yet to refuse to preference the integrity of a democracy fighting for its existence over the savagery and deceptions of a genocidal death cult fighting to destroy that democracy is both foolish and shameful.

Fake news is not a joke — it has real consequences, and as we have seen in Washington D.C., and in Boulder, Colorado, people are dying because of it.

Ofra, Yonatan and Shay, after a period of unbearable pain for their families, will finally be buried in Israel. But what we cannot bury is truth. Because without it, this war — and its lies — will never end.

Justin Amler is a policy analyst at the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC).

The post The War in Gaza Continues: Food, Lies, and Video Tapes first appeared on Algemeiner.com.