The media seems to get some of it right...but not all. The WSJ is correct; kissing the tuchus of folks illegally squatting on the lawn is stupid. Very simple...you're free to protest so long as it isn't hate speech, or antisemitic and you don't set up tents...otherwise, you're getting shown the door immediately.
Supporting peaceful protest on the other hand is what America's all about.
As for the way the WSJ throws around the term "antisemite"...not sure I buy that. You can protest against the way Israel is handling Gaza or is treating the Palestinians without being antisemitic. For example...if you're like me! Yes, I'm Jewish and the last time I checked I'm not antisemitic...I don't hate myself.
Northwestern’s Deal With Campus Antisemites
The school president defends his concessions to anti-Israel protesters.
By The Editorial Board, WSJ
May 24, 2024
Michael Schill, President, Northwestern University, at a hearing of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce on Thursday PHOTO: MICHAEL BROCHSTEIN/ZUMA PRESS
Things haven’t gone well when university presidents appear before Congress, and the latest embarrassment was turned in on Thursday by Northwestern University President Michael Schill.
Before the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, Mr. Schill defended his school’s decision to offer academic set-asides for Palestinians in exchange for an end to protesters’ encampment on campus. The deal includes promises to fund two Palestinian faculty members per year for two years, scholarships for five Palestinian undergraduates, and new space on campus for Muslim students.
Mr. Schill said the concessions were an effort to protect Jewish students who were being harassed on campus. The encampments were “a source of incidents of antisemitic intimidation,” Mr. Schill told lawmakers, so we “made the decision to talk to our students, to model the behavior that we want to be engaged in.” He considered the university “fortunate” that the anti-Israel students were “willing to negotiate.”
Fortunate? The encampments were illegal and protesters’ conduct included multiple violations of university policy as Mr. Schill defined it during the hearing. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R., N.Y.) noted reports that Jewish students at Northwestern were assaulted and spat on. Mr. Schill says no students have been suspended or expelled, so presumably the perpetrators are still on campus.
An antisemitism task force might help, but Northwestern’s version disbanded recently after seven Jewish students resigned to protest the university’s agreement to end the encampment. Others on the antisemitism task force had previously supported anti-Israel boycotts and the call to free Palestine “from the river to the sea.”
Northwestern’s agreement to appease the protesters has also landed the school in legal trouble. The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty has filed a complaint against Northwestern on the basis that its scholarships and professorships for Palestinians violate Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination “on the grounds of race, color, or national origin.”
Northwestern says it is reviewing its code of conduct, but a code is irrelevant if university leaders lack the courage to enforce it.
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