Rabbi Heller's Blog

As often as I can, I will work into my sermons that I'm a Harvard alum. Now I have a child who attends as well. Following the horrific events of October 7, my alma mater was the one of the first points of focus for concern about anti-Israel and anti-semitic activity on US campuses. I share my own journey in case it is useful to you in thinking about how you interact with the colleges that matter to you as a parent, alum, or supporter.

Right now, our students are targets of protests and hateful rhetoric on almost every campus. Late last week, students at Cooper Union in New York had to shelter in a library as a mob rampaged across campus. Death threats against Jewish students and the kosher dining hall at Cornell, and the assault against a student at Tulane were shocking, but not surprising. Here in Georgia, our campuses have also been the site of protests, vandalism, and assault.

In the first days after the October 7 attack, as the situation was first developing, much attention was paid to the anti-Israel letter signed by 31 Harvard student organizations, and the university’s tepid response. I immediately spoke up to express my concern.  I was one of 4000 university affiliates who signed a letter calling out the university’s initial poor reaction, and I’ve signed on to other efforts since then.  I reached out to the Harvard development department to express my concerns, and spoke with a member of their team on October 10th. Even though I am fairly confident that I donate less to the university per year than of my peers who graduated from the computer science department, let alone any of the even more illustrious dropouts, the fact that we are paying full tuition puts us in a rarified atmosphere. One of their development staff was willing to take significant time listening to me as I shared that I was holding back on my support until I felt comfortable that Jewish students were safe and supported on campus.

Meanwhile, many friends reached out with expressions of concern for my child’s welfare, based on the original article in the New York Post or its echoes. However, it is very easy to get caught up in a media frenzy. I felt the need to invoke the spirit of the verse we will read this week, Genesis 18:21, as God contemplated what to do about Sodom and Gomorrah:

"I will go down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is come to Me; and if not, I will know." Sometimes one can’t pass judgment without seeing for oneself. As it turns out, I spent this past Shabbat at Harvard visiting my child, and getting a sense of the campus.

The mood on campus is difficult. On Friday afternoon, as I passed the law school, I witnessed a vocal protest, with chants that are not particularly uncommon on campuses, about there being no peace without the destruction of Israel. Under other circumstances, I might have come closer to see and understand the claims of the protestors, but a previous demonstration at the business school had ended with demonstrators (including an undergraduate resident advisor, technically an employee of the university) "accosting" an Israeli student. So this past Friday afternoon was the first time I can recall, in decades of Harvard affiliation, that I felt unsafe wearing a kippah on campus. My wife wanted to delay our walk to dinner at Hillel because she was concerned that we would have to encounter members of the group on our path. Passers by came up to me and expressed embarrassment that this was happening on their campus, but that unease will never be erased.

I took consolation that the president of the university Dr. Claudine Gay, as well as the Provost, College dean and other administrators, came to Shabbat dinner at Hillel that same night. I give the president credit for choosing to be at Hillel for two hours when there were a lot of other places her advisors and fundraising handlers might have rather had her be. I also appreciate that when she spoke, it was after listening respectfully to students and staff talking about how painful these past weeks have been, and calling her out on the failures of the campus response.

I believe that her words from that night, which she reinforced in a brief conversation with my family, are a step in the right direction.

https://www.harvard.edu/president/speeches/2023/remarks-at-harvard-hillel

I think it is the first time in the history of that university that any senior leader (even the previous president, who was Jewish) has spoken as forcefully about the institution's legacy of antisemitism. The issues, which stretch back to the quotas of the 1920s, improved significantly for stretches of time, but never went away. Indeed, this spring there were issues of Kennedy School faculty discriminating against Israeli students, which were not addressed appropriately, and were one of the factors which led to a major Jewish foundation to pull funding.

Now, there's a task force designated to deal with these issues. A task force alone is clearly insufficient to resolve this.There is also a task force set up to support the students who were "doxxed" after signing the pro-terrorism letter and have suffered public shaming. Accountability for one's public statements and actions is, a valuable part of any education. In a university, task forces are often designated to deal with issues where the administration wants to implement immediate, decisive, and long-lasting inaction. Nonetheless, recognizing the existence of a problem is the first step towards its solution.

So, how do I assess the current state of affairs? My sense is that President Gay, having just been inaugurated, did not have this on her bingo card as one of the top ten issues to address in her presidency. Therefore as things first unfolded, she had not really gotten her head around the seriousness of the issue. Over the past few weeks I thinks he has come to understand that this is a point of inflection for the University, and for higher education in general. Whether she can turn the ship is, I suppose, another question. The stands she has taken are not without risk for her. A number of times (even before October 7) her presence at major events has been disrupted by anti-Israel hecklers.  I suspect that at many colleges, administrators would rather not engage, and have been hoping that this issue will fade into the background with time and a minimum of intervention. We need to help them realize that it will not, and that it is important to be on the right side, even if that means being unpopular.

So, I suppose the question is- when do we lean in, and decide that we need to make a difference on campus, and when do we wash our hands. It can be tempting to decide to withdraw our support from a campus. Having threatened it myself on October 10th, I can tell you that it is very satisfying to declare that one is taking one's toys and going home. And indeed, sometimes walking away is a powerful act of messaging when an institution demonstrates that it simply does not care.

The physical safety of Jewish students anywhere and everywhere is non-negotiable. Each of us has an obligation to speak up at the campuses that matter to us, by demanding that every step be taken for the safety of Jewish students, and by engaging in advocacy.There are very few campuses where there has not been an incident, and so the question is not whether there are students and faculty who are hateful at a particular college or university, but whether the leadership of that institution are willing to show backbone. For the moment, I have reduced my annual giving to Harvard, as an institution, to $1, pending compelling evidence that President Gay's words will be backed up by institutional action.

Ultimately, we have to decide when to cede the battlefield, and when it is worthwhile to find allies and lean in. if we decide to disengage from America’s major universities, are we not surrendering to those who want to drive us out? The battle for the hearts and minds of America’s future leaders is taking place at America’s notable campuses. The bulk of Jewish history is about our people excelling and creating change in environments where they were not truly welcome.

I am a believer that Jews should be focusing a significant portion of our giving on Jewish causes. Even when we do give to worthy causes in the general society, or in the context of larger institutions, we have the obligation to direct that giving in a way that matches our values. And so, it is worth considering- if you give to a university, are you supporting Hillel or other organizations and departments that support Jewish students, Jewish life and Jewish ideas on campus?

Universities pride themselves on being places of free inquiry, but free inquiry is surprisingly expensive. Anti-Israel forces are funding scholarships, programs, lectures and whole departments that promote anti-Israel narratives, and providing cover for those who are trying to make campus uncomfortable for Jews. If you give to your favorite college, whether that gift is just a token, is enough to guarantee good football tickets (in which case we should talk about Shabbat) or there’s a campus building named after your family (in which case, we should talk in general), let me suggest that you have an obligation to think about the deeper purpose of your gift. Consider how that giving can be directed towards resources that give Jewish students support on campus, towards Jewish studies departments, towards bringing Israeli scholars and students to campus, and towards making sure that we giving our all to win the war of ideas. Of the two wars being fought in this moment, it is the one which is physically far less hazardous, but may well take longer to win.