On October 10, 2023, just three days after a significant attack by Hamas, I was gearing up to teach a graduate seminar on terrorism at Northeastern University. As I was getting ready, someone handed me a flyer promoting a meeting in Cambridge that called for Palestinian resistance. I took the flyer but decided to place it in my office before heading to class.
During the class, an intruder, insisting he was a student, interrupted. He wanted to discuss my course, claiming it didn’t align with his anti-Israel views. Despite my attempts to move forward with our lesson plan, he refused to leave and started pacing the room, spouting diatribes against Israel and urging my shocked students to leave.
It wasn’t just me facing such disruptions. Other Jewish educators at the university were also encountering similar issues with anti-Israel activists attempting to stifle academic freedom. My lesson that day was focused on right-wing extremism—nothing to do with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, yet it still attracted unwelcome attention.
After the incident, I filed a formal complaint with the Office of Student Action and Dispute Resolution (OSCCR), but they opted not to investigate. Later in the semester, I received troubling reports from a friend indicating there were violent protests during a police graduation ceremony that had caused quite a scene, highlighting a lack of accountability from the university regarding student extremism.
I often call my mom, who frequently asks me whether there’s more chaos on campus. When she inquires about this, it reflects a misunderstanding of the complexities Jewish faculty face, especially heightened since the October 7 terrorist attacks and ongoing tensions at universities nationwide.
Such events have garnered significant media attention. However, the more pressing concern for me was the university administration’s lack of support. They failed to check in with me, my students, or to provide security after the tension-filled class. The situation deteriorated to the point of embarrassment as the school struggled to handle known problematic students, culminating in national news coverage of a graduation ceremony gone awry.
This pattern of negligence appears widespread across universities facing similar uprisings, often leaving Jewish students and faculty feeling vulnerable. Since Donald Trump’s reelection, there’s been a noticeable shift; it seems that extremism associated with anti-Semitism is now more seriously addressed. My classroom hasn’t seen a repeat of the previous disruptions, likely due to the awareness that misbehavior will be met with consequences from the administration.
For the first time in my decade at Northeastern, my contributions supporting Jewish students through programs like Chabad and Hillel have been recognized in merit reviews for pay and promotions. I think this positive change ties back to Trump’s influence.
