RSS
‘Catastrophe for Jewish Students’: Historic Body of University Professors Approves Academic Boycotts
The 373rd Commencement Exercises at Harvard University, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, US, May 23, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Brian Snyder
The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) has issued a statement in support of academic boycotts, a seismic decision which reverses decades of policy and clears the way for scholar activists to escalate their efforts to purge the university of Zionism and educational partnerships with Israel.
“We … recognize that the committee’s position opposing academic boycotts has been controversial, contested, and used to compromise academic freedom,” the organization said in a statement issued on Monday. “When faculty members choose to support academic boycotts, they can legitimately seek to protect and advance the academic freedom and fundamental rights of colleagues and students who are living and working under circumstances that violate that freedom and one or more of those rights. In such contexts, academic boycotts are not in themselves violations of academic freedom; rather they can be considered legitimate tactical responses to conditions that are fundamentally incompatible with the mission of higher education.”
Coming amid a bitter debate about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on college campuses and Israel’s war to eradicate Hamas from the Gaza Strip, the statement does not mention the Jewish State specifically. However, its countenancing the anti-Israel boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement — whose proponents believe that expelling Zionism from major cultural institutions is a first step toward Israel’s destruction — is clear, higher education watchdog AMCHA Initiative said on Monday.
“The AAUP’s decision to green-light academic BDS and reverse a decades-long policy opposing it is not just a catastrophe for Jewish student and faculty, but for the future of higher education in America,” it said. “By giving license to an academic boycott that encourages faculty to replace genuine scholarship with political activism whose express goal is to destroy the Jewish state and rid US campuses of Zionism and Zionists, the organization that has been setting the standards on academic freedom since 1915 just made a mockery of every single one of its own standards and is unleashing a tsunami of academic antisemitism that will echo the darkest chapters of Jewish history.”
Another higher education group, Faculty Against Antisemitism Movement (FAAM) described the AAUP’s decision as “wrong,” arguing that “academic boycotts contradict core principles of our higher education system — open inquiry, unfettered intellectual exchange, and academic freedom. And they are a core tactic of the BDS movement.”
Founded in 1915 by John Dewey and Arthur Oncken Lovejoy, the AAUP comprises over 370,000 members from higher education institutions across the US. Once regarded as a guardrail preventing the politicization of higher education, it has in recent years been disparaged — by nonprofits such as the National Association of Scholars (NAS), for example — for allegedly becoming a partisan advocacy group for the far left.
Following Hamas’ massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, two and a half weeks passed before the AAUP commented on the ensuing conflict between Israel and Hamas, and when it did, the group said nothing about the Palestinian terrorist group’s atrocities, instead discussing the importance of academic freedom. At the time, dozens of professors were denounced for cheering Hamas’ violence and encouraging extreme anti-Zionist demonstrations in which masses of students and faculty called for the elimination of the Jewish state “from the river to the sea,” which is widely considered a call for genocide.
On Tuesday, Peter Wood, author and president of the National Association of Scholars, told The Algemeiner that it was once “indisputably true” that the AAUP was a “leading champion of academic freedom.” However, he added, with its latest statement the organization “finally crossed the line into outright political action — action that reversed one of the AAUP’s long-standing commitments to academic freedom in favor of academic coercion.”
He continued, “The AAUP’s ‘Statement on Academic Boycotts’ should be seen as another benchmark in the progress of academic antisemitism. The AAUP appears to be ready to abandon more than a hundred years of advocating for principled neutrality among faculty to lurch into support for academic boycotts. It is, however, a sly statement and employs finesse to advance its dubious cause … The campus is a special place, set aside for free intellectual inquiry, and in no way suited to the dynamics of mass conformity. By opening the door to academic boycotts, the AAUP undermines academic freedom. And by opening that door right now, it offers cover to the antisemites who are using BDS as one of their covers for their campaign to destroy Israel.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post ‘Catastrophe for Jewish Students’: Historic Body of University Professors Approves Academic Boycotts first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Rubio Heads to Israel Amid Tensions Among US Middle East Allies
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks to members of the media, before departing for Israel at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, US, September 13, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Nathan Howard/Pool
US President Donald Trump’s top diplomat, Marco Rubio headed to Israel on Saturday, amid tensions with fellow US allies in the Middle East over Israel’s strike on Hamas leaders in Qatar and expansion of settlements in the West Bank.
Speaking to reporters before departure, Rubio reiterated that the US and President Donald Trump were not happy about the strikes.
Rubio said the US relationship with Israel would not be affected, but that he would discuss with the Israelis how the strike would affect Trump’s desire to secure the return of all the hostages held by Hamas, get rid of the terrorists and end the Gaza war.
“What’s happened, has happened,” he said. “We’re gonna meet with them. We’re gonna talk about what the future holds,” he said.
“There are still 48 hostages that deserve to be released immediately, all at once. And there is still the hard work ahead once this ends, of rebuilding Gaza in a way that provides people the quality of life that they all want.”
Rubio said it had yet to be determined who would do that, who would pay for it and who would be in charge of the process.
After Israel, Rubio is due to join Trump’s planned visit to Britain next week.
Hamas still holds 48 hostages, and Qatar has been one of the mediators, along with the US, trying to secure a ceasefire deal that would include the captives’ release.
On Tuesday, Israel attempted to kill the political leaders of Hamas with an airstrike on Doha. US officials described it as a unilateral escalation that did not serve American or Israeli interests.
The strike on the territory of a close US ally sparked broad condemnation from other Arab states and derailed ceasefire and hostage talks brokered by Qatar.
On Friday, Rubio met with Qatar’s Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani at the White House, underscoring competing interests in the region that Rubio will seek to balance on his trip. Later that day, US President Donald Trump held dinner with the prime minister in New York.
Rubio’s trip comes ahead of high-level meetings at the United Nations in New York later this month. Countries including France and Britain are expected to recognize Palestinian statehood, a move opposed by Israel.
Washington says such recognition would bolster Hamas and Rubio has suggested the move could spur the annexation of the West Bank sought by hardline members of the Israeli government.
ON Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed an agreement to push ahead with a settlement expansion plan that would cut across West Bank land that the Palestinians seek for a state. Last week, the United Arab Emirates warned that this would cross a red line and undermine the U.S.-brokered Abraham Accords that normalized UAE-Israel relations in 2020.
RSS
Netanyahu Posts Message Appearing to Confirm Hamas Leaders Survived Doha Strike
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a Plenum session of the Knesset, Israel’s Parliament, in Jerusalem, June 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – In a statement posted to social media on Saturday evening, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the Qatar-based leadership of Hamas, reiterating that the jihadist group had to regard for the lives of Gazans and represented an obstacle to ending the war and releasing the Israelis it held hostage.
The wording of Netanyahu’s message appeared to confirm that the strike targeting the Hamas leaders in Doha was not crowned with success.
“The Hamas terrorists chiefs living in Qatar don’t care about the people in Gaza,” wrote Netanyahu. “They blocked all ceasefire attempts in order to endlessly drag out the war.” He added that “Getting rid of them would rid the main obstacle to releasing all our hostages and ending the war.”
Israel is yet to officially comment on the result of the strike, which has incurred widespread international criticism.
RSS
Trump Hosts Qatari Prime Minister After Israeli Attack in Doha
Qatar’s Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani attends an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council, following an Israeli attack on Hamas leaders in Doha, Qatar, at UN headquarters in New York City, US, Sept. 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz
US President Donald Trump held dinner with the Qatari prime minister in New York on Friday, days after US ally Israel attacked Hamas leaders in Doha.
Israel attempted to kill the political leaders of Hamas with an attack in Qatar on Tuesday, a strike that risked derailing US-backed efforts to broker a truce in Gaza and end the nearly two-year-old conflict. The attack was widely condemned in the Middle East and beyond as an act that could escalate tensions in a region already on edge.
Trump expressed annoyance about the strike in a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and sought to assure the Qataris that such attacks would not happen again.
Trump and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani were joined by a top Trump adviser, US special envoy Steve Witkoff.
“Great dinner with POTUS. Just ended,” Qatar’s deputy chief of mission, Hamah Al-Muftah, said on X.
The White House confirmed the dinner had taken place but offered no details.
The session followed an hour-long meeting that al-Thani had at the White House on Friday with Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
A source briefed on the meeting said they discussed Qatar’s future as a mediator in the region and defense cooperation in the wake of the Israeli strikes against Hamas in Doha.
Trump said he was unhappy with Israel’s strike, which he described as a unilateral action that did not advance US or Israeli interests.
Washington counts Qatar as a strong Gulf ally. Qatar has been a main mediator in long-running negotiations for a ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas in Gaza, for the release of Israeli hostages held in Gaza and for a post-conflict plan for the territory.
Al-Thani blamed Israel on Tuesday for trying to sabotage chances for peace but said Qatar would not be deterred from its role as mediator.