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SALT LAKE CITY — A University of Utah law professor and son of Holocaust survivors took the presidents of Harvard and Penn to task for both their congressional testimony on antisemitism and their attempts to clarify their words.
Amos Guiora, who was born in Israel to Hungarian Holocaust survivors, wrote in an op-ed Sunday for The Hill that University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill and Harvard President Claudine Gay embarrassed themselves and stained the reputations of their schools.
"It is as if these high-ranking academics had never heard of the Holocaust, antisemitism or threats to their Jewish students. One got the sense that this was an abstract academic exercise that they had to participate in while sitting in their sunroom, sipping tea and eating a scone. Their disdain for history and contemporary realities was palpable," he wrote.
And their attempts to clarify their testimony weren't any better, Guiora told the Deseret News in a telephone call from Israel, adding that the "apology tour" never works.
"Their lawyer-written public relations clarification of their testimony in the recent hearings on campus antisemitism was simply offensive," he wrote.
Magill resigned after her comments at a House Education and Workforce Committee hearing last week led to a congressional investigation of Penn. Magill was just one of several college presidents who spoke at the hearing, and she faced particular criticism over her answer to a question about genocide.
"At least Magill was shamed into finally doing the right thing," Guiora wrote. "But what about Harvard? Every day Gay stays on the job, the failure to fire her brings disgrace upon all those who hired her."
During the hearing, Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., asked Magill, "Specifically calling for the genocide of Jews, does that constitute bullying or harassment?"
"If it is directed and severe and pervasive, it is harassment," Magill answered.
Stefanik then asked, "So the answer is yes?"
"It is a context-dependent decision, congresswoman," Magill replied.
'In utter disbelief'
Guiora said it's not difficult to say genocide can't happen or that it's bad. "There's a thing called basic humanity," he said.
Jewish students at Harvard don't feel safe coming out of their dorm rooms because of threats being made against them. The university presidents failed in their obligation to keep all students safe, Guiora said.
Guiora noted that he is not a graduate of Harvard or Penn. He is the only child of two Holocaust survivors, and he said he's grateful his parents aren't around to see what academia is becoming.
"My late father, who taught for years at the University of Michigan, would be appalled that this is who leads America's great universities. My late mother would be in utter disbelief," he wrote.
Guiora served for 19 years in the Israel Defense Forces and held a number of senior command positions, including legal adviser to the Gaza Strip and commander of the IDF School of Military Law. He retired as a lieutenant colonel. His son currently serves in the Israel Defense Forces.
'The determined silence'
In the op-ed, Guiora described the atrocities Hamas terrorists committed against Israeli and non-Israeli women. He said those acts are and should be understood as war crimes. He also criticized international organizations for not condemning those gender-based war crimes.
"One need not see the videos to understand that this met every test created by international law and rightly emphasized by international women's organizations," he wrote.
"Except this time, when the crime is against Israel, the very organizations whose sole purpose is to draw attention to crimes against women have chosen, metaphorically, to exercise their Fifth Amendment right to remain silent."
Guiora said those organizations have abandoned the victims, which he said is akin to complicity and enabling, a subject he knows well. He wrote a book titled "Armies of Enablers: Survivor Stories in Complicity and Betrayal in Sexual Assaults," about team doctors at USA Gymnastics, Michigan State University, Ohio State University and the University of Michigan abusing female athletes.
"No, the organizations did not enable the actual rapes and no, they were not complicit in the mutilation. But they are, most certainly, complicit in protecting the perpetrators and guilty of enabling future heinous, unimaginable similar crimes," he wrote.
"That triangle — enabler-perpetrator-victim — reappears in the determined silence and damning acquiescence of the very organizations whose sole purpose is to protect women."
