Former University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill’s resignation has been met with celebration, calling for the heads of Harvard and MIT to also resign for failing to condemn anti-Semitism on campus.
Many saw Magill’s resignation Saturday as the start of university presidents waking up and facing consequences for not condemning student calls for genocide of the Jews, although others believed it was a victory for the censorship of pro-Palestinian voices.
“One down. Two to go,” said New York Rep. Elise Stefanik. published in X after Magill’s announcement.
“@Harvard and @MIT, do the right thing,” the Republican wrote. “The world is watching.”
Stefanik, chairwoman of the House Republican conference, grilled Magill, along with Harvard University President Claudine Gay and Massachusetts Institute of Technology President Sally Kornbluth, during the week’s tense hearing. pass.
He said Magill’s resignation was “just the beginning of addressing the pervasive rot of anti-Semitism that has destroyed America’s most ‘prestigious’ institutions of higher education.”
Stefanik also warned that Harvard and MIT can now “anticipate a robust and thorough congressional investigation into all facets of the negligent perpetration of anti-Semitism at their institutions, including administrative, faculty, financial, and broader leadership and governance.”
Harvard President Claudine Gay also faces calls to resign. MIT President Sally Kornbluth is also the target of criticism following her testimony before Congress. AP
The StopAntisemitism organization called Magill’s resignation “great news.”
He said his dismissal came after Magill allowed “the once prestigious university to fall into a chaotic cesspool of Jewish hatred last year.”
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“Let’s hope the next president of Harvard is Gay”, StopAntisemitism published in X.
Billionaire Bill Ackman, who has called for the resignations of Magill, Gay and Kornbluth, welcomed the news of Magill’s resignation. by saying that “Morals have spoken.”
He previously said there is “hope for UPenn” if Magill resigns.
University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill resigned Saturday following her disastrous testimony before Congress. AP
Trucks with billboards calling for Gay’s firing were seen circling the Massachusetts campus on Sunday.
According to Fox News, the privately funded trucks read “FIRE GAY” and were accompanied by photographs of Gay during his appearance before Congress.
The three university presidents, during the hearing, repeatedly dodged Stefanik’s direct question about whether “calling for the genocide of the Jews” would violate their schools’ codes of conduct.
Magill infamously responded that “it’s a context-dependent decision.”
Gay apologized for his comments in an interview with the school newspaper The Harvard Crimson on Thursday and said he had the support of the Harvard Corporation, which had not commented publicly on calls for his resignation.
According to Crimson, and the school’s Board of Overseers, Harvard’s governing bodies, met on Sunday to discuss Gay’s leadership, the reaction to his testimony, and whether the university should issue a public statement.
Meanwhile, the MIT Corporation’s executive committee said Kornbluth had its “full and unreserved support” in a statement Thursday.
Liyam Chitayat, an Israeli doctoral student at MIT, gave an impassioned speech criticizing Kornbluth for his comments and the executive board for its response.
“Given that the executive board responded to this pathetic congressional hearing of our President Sally Kornbluth by stating that they support Sally because of her ‘excellent moral compass,’ I have to ask all of you about this continued obsession with context,” Chitayat said in speech. , a video of which was posted online Saturday night.
“I want someone to tell me, when is the appropriate context to come and urinate in the window of the MIT Hillel prayer room in front of the Jewish students praying inside?” Chitayat said, while highlighting some of the anti-Semitic attacks that Jewish students at MIT have recently suffered.
“Tell me, when is the right context to respond to reports of students facing blatant anti-Semitism by telling them, ‘Well, you can try talking to the police, you can go to therapy, or you can go back to where you came from?’” she continued . “I want to know when a dozen students are allowed to barge in and harass individual staff members who work, or who are Jewish or Israeli.”
Representative Elise Stefanik subjected university administrators to repeated questioning. ZUMAPRESS.com
“In some ways, there is a context in which Jewish students can be told not to come to the entrance of MIT and go to their classes through the back door,” added Chitayat, a doctoral student who studies computational and systems biology. at MIT.
“There is a context in which it makes sense that 70% of Jewish students at MIT show no signs of being Jewish because they are afraid. “There is a context in which a consulting chaplain is allowed to stop an event four times to say that Israelis are European racists, white settlers, right before asking who in this room eats kosher.”
Chitayat went on to say that he sees the faces of some of the Israelis taken hostage by Hamas in those of his own family, and when he looks in the mirror, “I see the face of Naama Levy, who was seen being dragged through the streets of Gaza with blood gushing from his thighs.”
He then turned his attention to Kornbluth and Gay, addressing both by name and asking, “When you look in the mirror, what do you see?”
Billionaire Bill Ackman welcomed Magill’s resignation. REUTERS
Others have interpreted Magill’s resignation and the pressure for other school presidents to resign as censure for the pro-Palestine protests, which have persisted on the Pennsylvania campus and others across the United States, with protesters chanting: “From the river to the sea, Palestine We will be free,” a song that many claim calls for the elimination of the Jewish State of Israel.
Journalist Alex Kane said the pressure for Magill’s resignation was “not solely due” to his comments. alexbkane.com
Alex Kane, a reporter for Jewish Currents magazine, said the pressure for Magill to resign is “not just about” her. posting that: “The main story is a McCarthyite atmosphere that consumes university campuses due to calls for Palestinian liberation.
“Magill tepidly defended the freedom of expression of Palestinian advocates, then made a major public relations misstep and fell into a right-wing trap,” he said.
“Al Jazeera” reporter Laila Al-Arian noted that Magill had been facing criticism for months, ever since the university organized a “Palestine Writes” festival, in which one speaker called for “death to Israel” and another who carried a Nazi t-shirt. -inspired outfit.
“The president of [UPenn] “Liz Magill was under attack for months for simply allowing a literary festival called ‘Palestine Writes’ that featured writers, academics and artists to take place on campus.” Al-Arian wrote. “Efforts to silence and censor Palestinian voices are relentless.”
Magill had been under increasing pressure from both donors and lawmakers when the Ivy League school suddenly announced his resignation on Saturday.
Scott L. Bok, chairman of its board of directors, said that both he and Magill had “voluntarily” resigned from their positions, noting that Magill would remain in office until an interim president was named, with an announcement to be made in the coming days. a plan for new leadership. .
Bok also defended Magill, saying she simply “made a very unfortunate misstep, consistent with that of two university leaders sitting next to her, after five hours of aggressive questioning before a Congressional committee.”
He went on to praise the ousted president as a “very good person and talented leader” who “is not in the least bit anti-Semitic.”
Bok also claimed that Magill was “worn down by months of relentless attacks” and “provided a legalistic response to a moral question” that “produced a gruesome 30-second clip in what was more than five hours of testimony.”
“After that, it became clear that her position was no longer tenable, and she and I decided at the same time that it was time for her to leave,” he said in a statement to the Daily Pennsylvanian.
A source close to the situation previously told The Post that the mood was sad Saturday when 27 Penn administrators met for two hours without Magill or Bok’s knowledge and decided to recommend that she consider resignation.
The Post has also reached out to other board members for their reactions.
Jewish leader Julie Platt will now take over as president of the board of directors until a permanent replacement is found.
“As current vice president, Julie was the clear choice to agree to serve in this capacity during this time of transition,” the Board of Trustees executive committee said in a statement to The Daily Pennsylvanian.
In his acceptance, Platt touted his work to end anti-Semitism on campus.
“As vice president of the university’s board of trustees these past few months, I have worked hard from within to address the growing issues of anti-Semitism on campus,” Platt said, according to the Jerusalem Post.
“Unfortunately, we did not make as much progress as we should have and intended to make.”
Platt, the mother of actor and singer Ben Platt, also emphasized that she would only serve as interim president, as her position as president of the Board of Directors of the Jewish Federations of North America takes priority.
“As president of the Jewish Federation of North America, we are leading the largest mobilization in our history in support of Israel’s right to protect its citizens and against the rise of anti-Semitism in North America, including organizing the Jewish rally largest in American history at the National Mall.
“We will continue this fight with all our energy.”
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Source: vtt.edu.vn