A Harvard University faculty group. the“Harvard Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine,” had the anti-Semitic cartoons above appear on its Instagram page. It is a newly-formed organization of Harvard University faculty and staff “committed to supporting the cause of Palestinian liberation,” as the group explains on its webpage. It “wholeheartedly reject[s] accusations that critique of the Israeli state is antisemitic.” One hundred and twelve members signed a statement that attacks “Israel’s genocidal war and ethnic cleansing in Gaza.” The group does not mention Hamas or the terrorist attack that thrust the terrorist organization and Gaza into war with Israel.
Rabbi David Wolpe, the Harvard Divinity School scholar who resigned from the anti-Semitism advisory committee set up by disgraced ex-Harvard president Claudine Gay, wrote at the time that he had concluded that “the system at Harvard… is itself evil.” In reaction to the above cartoons, Wolper wrote on Twitter/X, “The cartoon is despicably, inarguably antisemitic. Is there no limit?”
Prof. Sidney Chalhoub, the head of Harvard’s History Dept, is a member of the Harvard Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine. The group now claims that the offensive cartoons were posted without their knowledge or approval. (Funny how that happens…) After Harvard condemned the post containing the cartoons as “despicable,” the anti-Israel faculty group said it did not “condone” the images “in any way.” In its statement, the Harvard Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine said that it “has come to our attention that a post featuring antiquated cartoons which used offensive antisemitic tropes was linked to our account.” Then it re-posted the apology of one of the groups responsible for the offensive graphic, the Palestine Solidarity Committee and African and African-American Resistance Organization:
That “updated” post celebrates Stokely Carmichael, the Black Panther Party leader who in 1970 called Adolf Hitler the “greatest white man” and in a 1990 address, referred to Jews as “zionist pigs,” among other anti-Semitic outbursts.
Here is the official statement to the Harvard community I found in my inbox this morning:
Dear Members of the Harvard Community,
A few groups purporting to speak on behalf of Harvard affiliates recently circulated a flagrantly antisemitic cartoon in a post on social media channels. The cartoon, included in a longer post, depicted what appeared to be an Arab man and a Black man with nooses around their necks. The nooses are held by a hand imprinted with the Star of David, and a dollar sign appears in the middle of the star. Online condemnation of this trope-filled image was swift, and Harvard promptly issued a statement condemning the posted cartoon. While the groups associated with the posting or sharing of the cartoon have since sought to distance themselves from it in various ways, the damage remains, and our condemnation stands.
Perpetuating vile and hateful antisemitic tropes, or otherwise engaging in inflammatory rhetoric or sharing images that demean people on the basis of their identity, is precisely the opposite of what this moment demands of us. As members of an academic community, we can and we will disagree, sometimes vehemently, on matters of public concern and controversy, including hotly contested issues relating to the war in Israel and Gaza, and the longstanding Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But it is grossly irresponsible and profoundly offensive when that disagreement devolves into forms of expression that demonize individuals because of their religion, race, nationality, or other aspects of their identity.
The members of the Corporation join me in unequivocally condemning the posting and sharing of the cartoon in question. The University will review the situation to better understand who was responsible for the posting and to determine what further steps are warranted.
Reckless provocation draws attention without advancing understanding. Jewish, Israeli, Muslim, Palestinian, and Arab members of our community have reported feeling targeted, rejected, and ostracized. The war and its effects on the lives of people directly affected by the conflict demand our profound concern and sympathy. We must approach one another with compassion, open minds, and mutual respect, our discourse grounded in facts and supported by reasoned argument.
Sincerely,
Alan M. Garber
Harvard yanked this ugly and dangerous genie out of its bottle when it began pandering to the worst elements of the far, far Left decades ago, abandoning its commitment to core American values and a liberal arts education, empathizing divisive tribalism, and devoting at least as much energy to ideological indoctrination as it did to scholarship. I have tried to document a lot of this ethics rot for many years.
Harvard asked for this disaster with its arrogance, hypocrisy and blindness. Its fall, which still has a long way to go, was completely avoidable and predictable, but bias makes even Harvard stupid.
I have no sympathy for the university at all. It is getting exactly what it deserves.
______________
Sources: Washington Free Beacon; Mediaite
Ethics Alarms 
So, you can anonymously post things on Instagram?
Was the dollar sign the extent of the use of anti-semitic tropes?
I could not discern it when I looked at the the picture, so I was a bit puzzled what “trope” they were mentioning.
Is that the only one?
-Jut
There’s a Star of Israel on the hand over the lynching, for one thing…
It is possible they combined the lynching trope with the ‘puppet master’ trope. Creative.
Yes, I saw the Star of David, but that would seem to me to be simple editorializing (accurate or not). Yes, it is a statement about the actions of Israel, but I don’t think that would make it a trope.
For that matter, I get the connection between the Star and the Middle-Eastern person. And, I get the connection between lynching and the black person, but I don’t get the connection between the Star and the black person, unless the connection is just a generalized Zionist connection.
-Jut
Farrakhan was a major anti-Semite.
It “wholeheartedly reject[s] accusations that critique of the Israeli state is antisemitic.”
This is one of those convenient technical truths that some people mean legitimately, while other people are using it as a cover for their legitimate anti-semitism. I touched on this at Substack:
https://humbletalent.substack.com/p/this-post-is-not-about-israel
“There’s too much in the world to focus on everything, so people not only can, but have to, prioritize. I understand why Middle Eastern Americans might focus on Israel. I understand why European Americans might focus on Ukraine. Not only are these tragic circumstances, but people have personal connections to these areas. My grandfather came to Canada from Ukraine, escaping communism. I have opinions on both Ukraine and Russia.
I don’t understand the progressive hyperfocus on Muslims in Palestine beside the myopic ignorance of Muslims in China. In almost every metric possible, the fact pattern for China’s treatment of Uighurs is worse than Israel’s. So why choose to focus there?
To be clear, explicitly: I’m not saying that the only reason is Anti-Semitism. But I don’t think it’s entirely coincidental that the only country that some people choose to take personal offense at the policies of just so happens to be the one filled with Jews, particularly after some of the mask-off moments we’ve had following October 7th. There is a number, it is not zero, and it is disgusting.”
And
“I don’t expect people to be familiar with the Uighurs, so as a Primer:
The Uighur plight is interesting for the parallels to the Palestinian plight. Ethnic Uighurs and ethnic Han both claim the area of Xinjiang, they’ve had what I’ll euphemistically refer to as “differences in cohabitation” for more than a hundred years. Often, when there’s a difference in opinion being settled, the Hans win because they’re-in-charge,-and-fuck-you. This has led to points in time where the Uighurs protested, often violently, to the point where the Chinese government consider them terrorists. The current arc probably starts in the ramp up to the 2008 Olympics, where the government of China started to focus on stability to keep up appearances to the influx of visitors they planned for, but the more obvious point in time to look at is the rise of Zhang Chunxian to a position in the government in charge of Chinese religious policy. Zhang’s goal, stated plainly, was to create a single state-race, to build “a copper and iron wall around terrorists”, and that this unity would be the foundation of China as a new modern superpower. By 2016, the situation had deteriorated to the point that Uighurs with passports were given a single opportunity to flee China. After that, Xinjiang province commenced a “People’s War” against the “Three Evil Forces” of separatism, terrorism, and extremism. 200,000 soldiers were deployed to the area in what was called the “Civil Servant-Family Pair Up program”. By the end of 2017, mass arrests were taking place.
We in the west struggle around talks about banning burkas, China had no such hang-ups. They not only banned veils, but regulated beard length. Heck, you can’t name your child “Mohammad” in China. Around this time, foreign reporters were banned from Xinjiang province, and the “re-edcation camp” program that started before 2008 was drastically expanded.
By 2019, estimates hover around 1.8 million Uighurs had been detained. Allegations include forced sterilization, rape, torture, conversion therapy, medical experiments, and finally: forced Labor. As a spotlight was shone on the re-education camps, China shifted policy and they were wound down in favor of forced labor camps and contemporary prisons.
But outside of the camps, China was still very concerned about birth rates in Xingjian, performing regular pregnancy checks on minority women. In 2018, 80% of new IUD placements were conducted in Xingjian, despite the province accounting for less than 2% of the Chinese population. Coincidentally, I’m sure, birthrates fell 40% that year. In fact, as the mother of all coincidences, the birthrates in the two largest Uighur communities in Xingjian, Kashgar and Hotan, fell by more than 80% between 2015 and 2018. And if that wasn’t enough: If despite the regular checkups, forced abortions, and sterilizations, you as a Uighur managed to have a child, policy was that “birth control violations of Uyghurs” was punishable by extrajudicial confinement.
This is what a non-violent genocide looks like. An ethnicity of 12 million people will functionally cease to exist within a century. And we did hear about this, to be clear, for a little while. But it was short lived, we have moved on, and the same people who are very vocal about the plight of Palestinians seem ideologically opposed to even thinking about Uighurs.
I understand why some people might have opinions on Palestine. I can’t take seriously anyone who could not find it in themselves to spare even a thought for the Uighurs while affecting vapors over this crisis. It feels fake.
Angela Davis, Stokey Carmichael, and Malcom X are the heroes of this organization. Their images cancel out the lipid apology.