Yale University has become the latest top institution in the United States to ban a pro-Palestine group, this time for protests against a visit by far-right Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.
Ben-Gvir’s stop near the university in New Haven, Connecticut, on Wednesday sparked outrage as protesters criticised the minister’s support for surging attacks on Gaza, and most recently, his calls to bomb “food and aid depots” in the Palestinian territory.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, Raed Jarrar, the advocacy director at Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), described the university’s silence about Ben-Gvir, who has “openly called for genocide”, and its subsequent crackdown on protesters “not just a moral contradiction – it’s a moral and legal failure”.
The demonstrations began on Tuesday night when protesters gathered on campus and began setting up tents at a short-lived encampment. While lasting just a few hours, the scene was similar to encampment protests that swept across US universities last year, often prompting crackdowns and policy changes from administrators.
The next day, Yale said in a statement that the encampment had violated its policies related to the use of outdoor spaces and students who had been warned or punished in previous incidents would face “immediate disciplinary action”.
It added that the university was investigating “concerns … about disturbing anti-Semitic conduct at the gathering” without providing any details.
The administration also said the student organisation Yalies4Palestine would lose its official status for sending “out calls over social media for others to join the event” and for later taking credit for the event.
In a statement to the student newspaper, the Yale Daily News, a group of pro-Palestine protesters denied the event was affiliated with or planned by any group.
The protests then continued on Wednesday night when Ben-Gvir arrived for a speech at the Shabtai, a private Jewish society that describes itself as “based at Yale University” although it is not formally affiliated with or located at a property owned by the university.
Ben-Gvir briefly taunted the protesters with what his office told CNN was a “victory sign” gesture as he was met with chants of “shame on you”, according to video of the event.
His office later said a water bottle had been thrown at him from the crowd, which included students and nonstudents, and he was unharmed.
‘Attacking students … won’t save Yale’
Yale’s latest punishment for pro-Palestine protesters comes during a wider pressure campaign on top universities by the administration of President Donald Trump.
While former President Joe Biden was seen as endorsing crackdowns on pro-Palestine protests, which he broadly described in April last year as “anti-Semitic”, the Trump administration has escalated the response.
Using claims of “anti-Semitism”, the Trump administration has sought to deport noncitizen pro-Palestine university protesters and has frozen or threatened to freeze federal funding for several top institutions, including Columbia University in New York and Harvard University in Massachusetts, if they do not agree to a series of policy changes.
Throughout the protest movement, organisers have repeatedly challenged the notion that such demonstrations are anti-Semitic, noting the regular involvement of Jewish students and disavowing rare instances of anti-Jewish statements made at often publicly open demonstrations.
In their statement carried by the student newspaper, pro-Palestine protesters at Yale accused administrators of coming down particularly harshly to avoid recourse from the Trump administration.
“Attacking students and alienating community members didn’t save Harvard or Columbia. It won’t save Yale,” they said.
Yale did not reply to Al Jazeera’s request for comment on whether concerns about a Trump administration response informed its disciplinary actions or if it had any response to Ben-Gvir’s visit.
For her part, Harmeet Dhillon, the assistant attorney general of the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, responded to a video on X showing protesters refusing to break a human chain to allow a student to pass through their ranks on campus.
The post claimed: “Jewish students aren’t allowed to walk through Yale’s campus anymore!”
Dhillon wrote that her office is “tracking the concerning activities at Yale, and is in touch with affected students”.
While critics said heavy-handed responses to pro-Palestine protesters have become commonplace in the US, some observers said the dissonance on display at Yale has been particularly striking.
Ben-Gvir was convicted in 2008 by an Israeli court of inciting racism and supporting a “terrorist” organisation, the founded Kach group, which supported the annexation and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian territories.
He has called for a no-holds-barred military operation in Gaza, where UN experts already say Israel is committing “genocidal acts”.
He has appealed for Israel to commit what would constitute war crimes under international law in Gaza. Most recently, he posted on X that he told “senior Republican officials” at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida that Israel should bomb “food and aid depots”.
‘Deepest contradiction’
Eman Abdelhadi, a sociologist at the University of Chicago, said Yale’s silence regarding Ben-Gvir speaking at an organisation that claims to be based at the university “exposes the deepest contradictions in our society and in these institutions that are supposed to be dedicated towards truth seeking and critical thought”.
“[Ben-Gvir] faces no red line,” she said. “But the people protesting can face severe consequences.”
“This is a moment where universities are fighting for their lives and trying to argue to the American public that they are worth saving in the face of Trump’s onslaught,” she said. “And yet they show no moral courage.”
