Israel’s Netanyahu Takes Aim at Harvard, Student Protesters in Speech to Congress

Updated July 26, 2024, at 8:21 p.m.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took aim at Harvard in his address to a joint meeting of Congress on Wednesday, criticizing the “befuddled academics” who failed to condemn antisemitism.

Netanyahu, whose speech was boycotted by roughly half of the Democrats in Congress, praised both President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump for their support of Israel — reserving his sharpest criticism for the presidents of American colleges and universities and pro-Palestine student protesters.

His speech directly referenced former Harvard President Claudine Gay’s disastrous congressional testimony in December, which contributed to her resignation less than one month later.

“Eighty years after the Holocaust, the presidents of Harvard, Penn, and — I’m ashamed to say — my alma mater MIT couldn’t bring themselves to condemn the calls for the genocide of Jews,” Netanyahu said. “Remember what they said? They said ‘it depends on the context.’”

“Well let me give these befuddled academics a little context,” he added. “Antisemitism is the world’s oldest hatred.”

The viral Dec. 5 exchange between Rep. Elise M. Stefanik ’06 (R-N.Y.) and the three university presidents has proven to be an enduring flashpoint in American politics more than seven months after it first sparked national outrage.

Stefanik touted the hearing’s role in pressuring Gay and former University of Pennsylvania President Elizabeth Magill to resign during a speech at the Republican National Convention earlier this month. The Trump campaign also invited a recent Harvard Divinity School graduate who is suing the University to speak at the RNC in support of Trump’s proposal to combat antisemitism on college campuses.

“Harvard has and will continue to be unequivocal – in our words and actions – that antisemitism is not and will not be tolerated on our campus,” University spokesperson Jason A. Newton wrote in a statement.

“We remain committed to combating hate and to promoting and nurturing civil dialogue and respectful engagement,” Newton added.

More than 100 members of Congress including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) boycotted Netanyahu’s speech over his policies surrounding Israel’s war in Gaza. More than 39,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the war began Oct. 7.

Netanyahu railed against the campus protests, saying that criticism of the Israeli state as “racist and genocidal” is intended to “demonize Jews everywhere.”

Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine, a coalition of pro-Palestine student groups that organized a 20-day encampment in Harvard Yard in the spring, wrote in a statement that “Benjamin Netanyahu is a war criminal currently overseeing a genocide.”

“He deserves nothing but contempt and criminal prosecution,” HOOP wrote. “His invitation to speak in Congress is a travesty of epic proportions. It will go down as a particularly grotesque episode in the history of the US Congress.”

As Netanyahu spoke, thousands of pro-Palestine protesters demonstrated outside the Capitol and clashed with local police officers.

The speech and large-scale protests outside the Capitol were immediately used to garner support for the House-wide investigation into how Harvard and other universities respond to antisemitism on their campuses.

Harvard is currently under investigation by six different House committees, each with explicit instructions from House leadership to investigate the University’s federal funding. Interim Harvard President Alan M. Garber ’76 is currently in the process of reviewing recommendations made by his task forces to combat antisemitism and anti-Muslim and anti-Arab bias in June.

House Committee on Education and the Workforce chair Virginia A. Foxx (R-N.C.) wrote in a statement that Netanyahu’s address — which accused protesters of being funded by Iran — justified her committee’s investigations into antisemitism on university campuses.

“To those who participated in illegal encampments, harassed Jewish peers, and chanted ‘from the river to the sea’ on college campuses: stop being ‘Iran’s useful idiots,’” Foxx wrote, quoting Netanyahu. “Stand with our ally Israel and stand for the democratic values that make our two nations great.”

Rep. Jake D. Auchincloss ’10 (D-Mass.), who has previously hinted that he believes Harvard’s federal funding should be in jeopardy, also took to X Wednesday to condemn the pro-Palestine protests.

“The Jew hate and anti-American garbage coming out of college campuses this spring didn’t end with the last day of school,” Auchincloss wrote. “College presidents, you’re on notice: Enforce your codes of conduct from day one of the fall semester.”

—Staff writer Cam E. Kettles can be reached at cam.kettles@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @cam_kettles or on Threads @camkettles.