On August 13, Minouche Shafik resigned as president of Columbia University. Along with Claudine Gay of Harvard and Liz Magill of the University of Pennsylvania, Shafik is the third president of an Ivy League (elite) university to step down since the outbreak of righteous campus protests against the U.S.-Israeli genocidal slaughter in Gaza. Like them, she appeared before and ultimately caved in to a fascist-led Congressional inquisition demanding that university administrators either clamp down more viciously on these protests—or face the consequences.
These threats have included wider Congressional investigations (six committees of the House of Representatives have indicated they would be doing so), potential legal prosecution, withholding of federal research grants and other government financial support for universities, targeting of professors speaking out against the genocide... and the orchestrated ouster of these presidents.
The Bogus Charge That Anti-Zionism Is the Same as Anti-Semitism
These fascists—along with rabid, big-donor Zionists who have brought lawsuits against universities—have been moving to limit, suppress, and outlaw pro-Palestinian protest. They have been doing this under the mantle of “combating anti-Semitism.”
The charge of anti-Semitism (hatred and persecution of Jews) has been the ideological sword used to discredit and punish protest against the genocide in Gaza. It's gone so far that this past May the House of Representatives passed a bill, with support from many Democrats, that broadened the definition of anti-Semitism to include “targeting of the state of Israel, conceived as a Jewish collectivity.” In other words, any opposition to the political idea that the historic country of Palestine should be reserved specifically for Jewish people is now falsely equated with demonizing and hating Jews as a people.
As an example of where this is heading at the level of teaching, take note of what is happening in Florida. Florida is already a “pacesetter” for banning and removing books from libraries and public schools. Now, the Florida state university system recently ordered its 12 universities to “keyword search” syllabuses and course descriptions for “anti-Israel bias.” Exposing students to the ugly historical truth of Israel would be designated as “bias.”
This is fascist thought control.
The equation of opposition to Israel, of anti-Zionism, with anti-Semitism is utterly wrong. As Bob Avakian has explained:
Overwhelmingly, with regard to those protesting against the genocide being perpetrated by Israel, this is based on the actions of Israel, not on hatred for Jews. And it is entirely possible, and definitely right, to oppose the state of Israel overall—based not on hatred of Jews, but on the actual Zionist/Jewish supremacist nature of Israel and how this has involved a whole history of atrocities against the Palestinian people.
Shafik’s Forced Resignation Is a Victory for the Fascists, NOT the People
Columbia University President Shafik testifying before the House Committee, April 17, 2024. Photo: AP
Columbia President Minouche Shafik appeared before the Congressional committee investigating campus protest in April. She groveled shamelessly before MAGA-fascist congresswoman Elise Stefanik and others spearheading this inquisition. Shafik promised punitive action against outspoken faculty (some of whom were named).
And while Shafik was in Washington giving her testimony, she did something that no Columbia president has done since 1968. Shafik called the NYC Police Department onto campus, to clear out the student encampment in the main quad of the university. A week later, Shafik again summoned the NYPD—who marched Gestapo-like, with zip ties and riot shields, into a campus building to violently disband a student occupation. Many faculty condemned these actions; and several Columbia faculty assemblies and professional bodies passed resolutions of no-confidence in Shafik.
Given this “track record,” some in the protest movement, both among students and faculty have cheered Shafik’s resignation. But Minouche Shafik's forced exit is NOT a concession to student protest, or in any way a signal that the right to protest will now be more vigorously protected. Far from it!
Minouche Shafik's resignation was an expression of two things: her inability, on the one hand, to satisfy the fascists who are calling for evermore savage repression; and, on the other, her inability to maintain a credible facade of upholding free speech and the right to protest.
Going into the new school year, the fascist bullies are escalating their bullying. Elise Stefanik, who grilled the presidents of Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania, and Columbia, gloated, “THREE DOWN, so many to go.”
This is an intensifying contradiction for liberal university administrators as the new academic year begins... as the U.S.-backed genocide in Gaza continues... and with a generation of student activists declaring its intention to continue this righteous protest. University officials are resolving this contradiction—of satisfying fascist demands and seeming to uphold the right to expression—with MORE NAKED AND SWEEPING REPRESSIVE CONTROLS ON STUDENTS AND FACULTY.
Massive New Restrictions on Campus Protest Put in Place
This summer U.S. college administrations have been massively revising rules to further control and restrict student activism and political expression. This is being done in the hope, according to an August 15 Associated Press analysis, of “containing [anti-Gaza] war demonstrations.” Keep in mind that during the 2023-24 academic year, 3,000 students were arrested in the protests against the U.S.-Israeli war on Gaza. Many students have faced other kinds of reprisals and disciplinary actions, and potential fallout on their academic and professional careers.
Here are some of the new repressive measures that have been recently put in place at many universities across the country, especially those where protests against the genocide in Gaza had a galvanizing effect on discourse and campus life:
- Banning of tent encampments (a powerful form of protest this past year).
- Limiting the duration of demonstrations, requiring seven-day-in-advance notice of protest, and restricting protests to designated areas and certain times.
- Limiting, or forbidding, the use of bullhorns; bans on chalking, booths, and flashing lights and signs.
- Restricting campus access only to those with university affiliation and identification.
- Columbia has installed a “security” fence around the quad and is now weighing a proposal to give campus security the power to arrest students and others on the spot.
- University of Pennsylvania (UPenn) has introduced a prohibition on camping and banned any speech that “advocates violence.” This would bar advocacy of armed struggle to put an end to the apartheid state of Israel. Even though such speech is protected by the Constitution, as long as it does not entail an "imminent" danger of violence, UPenn is able to get away with this restriction because it is a private institution.
This is a major leap in control and punishment on campuses. And you don't hear Kamala Harris and the liberal Democrats, who couldn't stop gushing about “freedom” at their recent national convention, denouncing this assault on political speech and protest. Then again, this is an “energized” Democratic Party that finds “joy” in genocide... in the “unfreedom” of the Palestinian people.
Why Is This Happening: New Repressive Measures = Pre-Positioning for Turmoil and Conflict
To understand this new wave of repression, this NAZI-ficiation* of the university, we have to pull the lens back. The universities play an integral and particular role in the functioning of the U.S. empire on its capitalist-imperialist foundation—from training personnel for government and corporate institutions, to conducting military research, to providing all kinds of social science studies and policy prescriptions to advance the interests of empire.
But at the same time, the universities have been one of the few institutional spaces where critical thinking and dissent have had some initiative in U.S. society. And as Bob Avakian (BA) pointed out, as the 2023 campus protests grew and campus administrators moved to quash them:
[T]his repression is happening because representatives of the ruling class in this country have a definite sense that if youth especially at “elite” universities begin to seriously question and act against what this system is doing—if the system “loses the allegiance” of large numbers of those students—that can be a big factor in creating a real crisis for the system as a whole, as happened in the 1960s: a crisis that, now more than ever, this system really cannot afford, when the whole country is already being torn apart by deep divisions, with bitter clashes right among the ruling powers.... The ruling class is desperate to prevent opposition to its fundamental interests from spreading and involving masses of people, from all parts of society.
These are the underlying dynamics, this is the strategic calculus, driving the new and unprecedented restrictions on protest and thought on U.S. college campuses. And BA's analysis of ruling-class concerns and worries over the societal spillover potential of campus protest, and “loss of allegiance” to the system, takes on more acute relevance now.
The conflict between the MAGA-fascist Republicans and war-criminal Democrats is intensifying, and will likely come to a head around the November presidential election. The norms of political life, with the MAGA-fascists speaking openly of civil war, are being torn apart. The norms of academic life, with NAZI-fication taking hold, are being torn apart. There is the growing danger of wider war in the Middle East, and possibly direct U.S. military involvement.
Society is roiling with contradictions and conflicts. Student protest and resistance to repression are not only a concentration point of this, but can be a tremendously positive factor for the revolution so urgently needed—and more possible in this time.
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*Historical Note: Nazi-fication, the remaking, of German universities was brutally enacted after Hitler came to power in 1933. The regime moved to root out dissent and opposition to government policies. Severe restrictions were placed on critical inquiry and freedom of expression; Jewish and left-wing professors were purged; new pro-Nazi curriculum was introduced; and teaching and political activity of faculty and students were monitored by Nazi student groups. [back]
Bob Avakian on Why Protesters Against Genocide in Gaza Are Being Suppressed
The following is from Bob Avakian’s social media message Revolution Number 17, which was posted @BobAvakianOfficial on March 20, 2024.
[W]hat is going on right now is providing further, living proof that this so-called “great American democracy” is in reality a dictatorship, where the power of the ruling institutions is used to viciously persecute, punish, and even eliminate people who pose a threat to the interests of the ruling class. Along with the murder by police and mass incarceration of thousands and millions of people in this country, which is continuing as you are listening to this, there is the vicious repression being brought down against people protesting the genocide in Palestine carried out by Israel, with the full backing of the U.S. government and both ruling class political parties (Democrat and Republican). Colleges, and especially “elite” universities, have been a focus of this repression—repression which has crudely violated supposed “rights of free speech” and “standards of academic freedom.” Students and faculty have been targeted, and even university presidents have been driven out of their positions for failing to fully repress these protests.
Why is this happening? Because fundamental interests of U.S. capitalism-imperialism are at stake. Because Israel plays a “special role” as a heavily armed bastion of support for U.S. imperialism in a strategically important part of the world (the “Middle East”). And Israel has been a key force in the commission of atrocities which have helped to maintain the oppressive rule of U.S. imperialism in many other parts of the world.
And this repression is happening because representatives of the ruling class in this country have a definite sense that if youth especially at “elite” universities begin to seriously question and act against what this system is doing—if the system “loses the allegiance” of large numbers of those students—that can be a big factor in creating a real crisis for the system as a whole, as happened in the 1960s: a crisis that, now more than ever, this system really cannot afford, when the whole country is already being torn apart by deep divisions, with bitter clashes right among the ruling powers. So, at the same time as they are bitterly divided, the ruling powers of this country are firmly united in their determination to punish and intimidate especially students at elite universities who have stepped forward to protest the genocidal slaughter of Palestinians. The ruling class is desperate to prevent opposition to its fundamental interests from spreading and involving masses of people, from all parts of society.
All this reveals, more “nakedly” than in “normal situations,” the actual dictatorship behind the outer shell of “democracy” of this country—and it shines a light on the strategic weakness of this system, when it does lose the allegiance of major sections of the people and this has the potential to spread to all parts of society, including among the dominant institutions of this system.
Revolution 17: American Exceptionalism: further exposing the reality behind the myth
Bullshit Pretexts for Suppressing Protest and Critical Thinking on Campus
A) “Disruption.” The University of Michigan has introduced a new “disruptive activity policy.” This in fact is a running rationale for these moves to muzzle and punish pro-Palestinian protest: that protest “disrupts” normal academic life. Precisely! A strike disrupts production, a boycott disrupts commercial sales, and encampments and demonstrations “disrupt” academic life “as usual.” And that's because a genocide is happening with full U.S. military, financial, and political backing. Some 40,000 Palestinians have been killed and some 93,000 wounded. It is a genocide that must be stopped!
Disruption? Where's the condemnation of the violent Israeli-U.S. “disruption” of academic life in Gaza? In the first 100 days of the onslaught against Gaza, all 12 of its universities were bombed, and are now wholly or partially destroyed. Some campus libraries preserving precious documentation of Palestinian history and culture have been reduced to rubble. Through April of this year, 95 university professors in Gaza were killed. UN investigators have coined the term “scholasticide” to describe scale and horror of what is happening.
B) “Interfering with learning.” As for the charge that encampments, rallies, and other protest activity “interfere with learning,” the truth is actually the opposite. Upsurge and movements like those opposing the war in Vietnam in the 1960s and '70s, apartheid in South Africa in the 1980s, and, more recently, the racist police murders of George Floyd and others—have contributed to intellectual ferment, debate, and new learning on campus (and in society). In the current situation of the controversy and debate sparked by pro-Palestinian protests, people have learned and argued about the nature of Israel, the role of the U.S. in the maintenance of this apartheid state, and (not least) the complicity of the university in the workings of the U.S. empire. And it is this learning and truth that university administrators are attempting to shut down.
C) “Institutional Neutrality.” New York Times columnist Bret Stephens recently wrote about the need for universities to reassert and restore their “institutional neutrality.” What bullshit. The recent wave of student protest, like the anti-Vietnam war upsurge, has exploded this reigning myth of the university as a “neutral” site of knowledge. Major universities (especially in the sciences and engineering) have all kinds of ties to aerospace and defense companies, many of which are involved in weapons sales to Israel. University endowments (where big financial donations go) have shares, assets, or other investments in companies and institutions linked to Israel. And consider this: it has only been in the last few years that several Ivy League universities have reckoned with their “non-neutrality” and complicity with U.S. slavery and come around to issuing statements about moral failure.