Palestinian children crowd Gaza charity kitchen for food
Hungry Palestinian children crowd a charity kitchen with pots and pans in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, on Friday. A day earlier, desperate Gazans broke into a U.N. World Food Program aid warehouse in central Gaza, resulting in two reported deaths.
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Yahoo
41 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Contributor: Every shooting reflects our culture of violence, which the president cheers
On May 21, as they left the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim were fatally shot, and because they were employees of the Israeli Embassy and the suspect was associated with pro-Palestinian politics, the story was reported in the familiar mode of Middle East politics. The questions that reporters and pundits have been asking are: 'Was this antisemitic?' 'Was this killing a direct result of Israel's starving of Palestinians in Gaza?' 'Was this another act of pro-Palestinian terrorism?' 'Is this the direct result of 'globalizing the intifada'?' While these are valid questions, they miss a central part of the story. Only in the eighth paragraph of the New York Times report are we told that the night before the shooting, according to officials, the suspect 'had checked a gun with his baggage when he flew from Chicago to the Washington area for a work conference' and, further, that officials said 'The gun used in the killings had been purchased legally in Illinois.' (The Los Angeles Times article does not mention these facts.) This tragic shooting, however, is not unique. In November 2023, a Burlington, Vt., man was arrested and charged with shooting three Palestinian college students without saying a word to them. (He has pleaded not guilty.) In October 2018, a gunman entered the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh and shot and killed 11 Jews at prayer. In 2015, three Muslim students were shot and killed by their neighbor in Chapel Hill, N.C. This brief and very incomplete list of the literally hundreds of thousands of people who have been killed by guns in the U.S. in the last decade does not include the racist mass shootings in Buffalo, N.Y., and at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C.; the mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Fla.; or the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history, at a music festival in Las Vegas in 2017. This macabre list also leaves out the thousands of people who have been shot and killed by law enforcement. The elephant in the room — so fundamentally accepted that it largely goes unmentioned — is the deeply ingrained culture of violence in the United States. Gun ownership, police violence and abuse, and mass shootings are symptoms of that culture. However, the militaristic approach to international conflict (from Vietnam to Ukraine) and the disdain for nonviolent solutions are also grounded in this culture, as are the manosphere and the cruelty of predatory capitalism. Now we have a presidential administration that embodies this culture. Kristi Noem, the secretary of Homeland Security, personifies this ethos of cruelty and violence when she is photographed in front of a cage full of humans in a Salvadoran jail known for torturous treatment of inmates or writing casually about killing her dog. Noem is a key player in the theater of cruelty, but she is not the only one, and the unparalleled star is of course President Trump. Trump's policy agenda is based on vengeance. He revels in the theatricality of violence of the world of mixed martial arts, and he signs executive orders that aim to destroy individuals, law firms and universities that have not bent the knee, and the economics of his 'Big Beautiful' budget moves money from those in need to those who need for naught. Now, the president wants a military parade on his birthday that will include tanks, helicopters and soldiers. Although Trump himself evaded the draft, and he reportedly called American soldiers who were killed in war suckers and losers, he likes the strongman aesthetic of an army that is at his beck and call. He exulted in the fact that 'we train our boys to be killing machines.' Although some want to draw a dubious line from pro-Palestinian campus demonstrations to the killings of Lischinsky and Milgrim, the direct line that should be drawn is the one that everyone seems to have agreed to ignore: a culture of violence coupled with the widespread availability and ownership of guns inevitably leads to more death. The only way we get out of this cycle of violence is by addressing the elephant in the room. Aryeh Cohen is a rabbi and a professor at American Jewish University in Los Angeles. @ If it's in the news right now, the L.A. Times' Opinion section covers it. Sign up for our weekly opinion newsletter. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
CNN
an hour ago
- CNN
What cheers at Harvard and boos at Columbia reveal about Trump's campus war
When Harvard President Alan Garber took the stage at commencement last week, he was met with cheers. Days earlier, Columbia acting President Claire Shipman was booed. The reactions may seem like campus drama – but they tell a deeper story about how two elite universities chose radically different paths in their battles with the Trump administration. One resisted federal pressure. The other largely complied. Now, those choices are reshaping national debates over who holds power on campus and what higher education should protect. The difference between the two commencements wasn't just about who stood at the podium – it was about how each university chose to respond to the most aggressive federal pressure elite higher education has faced in a generation. Since taking office, the Trump administration has launched a full-scale campaign against student activists amid a broader ideological battle with colleges, threatening federal funding, student visas, institutional reputations and academic partnerships at schools it accused of tolerating antisemitism during campus pro-Palestinian protests. Both Harvard and Columbia became central targets – but they made very different choices. Columbia's administration issued a public apology for its handling of protests on its campus months before Trump took office, disciplined students involved in protests and later took steps to cooperate with federal lawmakers once political pressure intensified. Harvard, in contrast, challenged the administration in court, worked to defend its autonomy and resisted demands to make major policy changes – even as the administration froze federal funds and intensified public attacks. 'The contrast in leadership at the two schools could not have been more stark,' Catherine Ross, a law professor at George Washington University, told CNN. 'Columbia's leadership was unstable and indecisive; Harvard's is strong and experienced.' Now, the fallout is playing out not just in courtrooms and congressional hearings, but on campus quads and graduation stages. Harvard's defiance has drawn praise from many students and faculty, while Columbia's concessions have sparked internal backlash, and deeper divisions. 'When faced with a hostile government takeover, Columbia more or less rolled over,' said Will Creeley, legal director at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression. 'Harvard decided to fight — and by doing so, Harvard galvanized the larger academic community.' While Harvard's larger endowment may have made it better positioned to clash with the federal government – also having seen how acquiescing early did not protect Columbia – the difference in their responses is notable, education experts say. Here's how each university navigated the Trump administration's mounting pressure – and what their decisions reveal about power, protest and the future of American higher education. As the Trump administration froze billions in federal funds and demanded the university bow to its demands, Harvard pushed back. Garber, the university president, promised to defend the university's right to free speech and maintain the school's independence despite escalating threats. 'Harvard is uniquely positioned to lead this fight on behalf of American higher education,' Ross said. 'Its actions encourage and give permission to other schools to try to defend themselves.' When the Trump administration scrutinized Harvard's handling of pro-Palestinian demonstrations, it argued the university had failed to prevent antisemitism and responded with a barrage of aggressive measures. The Department of Homeland Security last month temporarily revoked Harvard's ability to enroll international students, risking nearly 28% of the student body losing their visas. The administration also froze $2.2 billion in federal funding and $60 million in contracts after the Ivy League school refused to take steps including eliminating diversity, equity and inclusion programs, banning masks at protests, enacting merit-based hiring and admissions changes and reducing the power held by faculty and administrators 'more committed to activism than scholarship.' 'Using federal funding as a cudgel, the feds demanded control of Harvard's core academic decision-making,' Creeley said. 'The First Amendment bars the government from that kind of coercion.' Harvard openly criticized the administration's demands and took the fight to court, challenging the administration's attempts to control campus life. In launching legal challenges to block the funding freeze and visa threats, Harvard argued the government's actions were unconstitutional attacks on free speech and academic freedom – rallying the public around the principle that federal officials shouldn't dictate campus policies. Courts have so far sided with Harvard: A federal judge said Thursday she will order the Trump administration not to make any changes to Harvard's student visa program indefinitely. But President Donald Trump later threw Harvard's ability to enroll international students into doubt again on Wednesday when he signed a proclamation to suspend international visas for new students at Harvard. The funding freeze, meanwhile, is expected to remain in place as the case plays out in court this summer. 'Fighting this requires a deep pocket – like Harvard's endowment – a strong reputation to get public attention and a lot of courage,' Ross said. Meanwhile, Harvard settled two Title VI lawsuits alleging tolerance of antisemitism on campus. As part of the settlement, Harvard implemented several changes, including adopting the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's definition of antisemitism and hiring a point person to consult with on antisemitism complaints. The university's defiance earned Harvard support from many faculty and students, who rallied behind the institution's stance on free expression and academic freedom. Its resistance became a symbol of what it looks like to defend institutional autonomy in an era of political targeting, experts say. 'We are all very proud of the administration for the way it has stood up against the Trump administration – and stood strong,' sophomore Caleb Thompson, co-president of the Harvard Undergraduate Association, told CNN. There have been some concessions by Harvard that drew criticism. Harvard said it turned over data to the Department of Homeland Security in response to the agency's request for information on the illegal activity and disciplinary records of international students – data the agency later called insufficient before attempting to strip the university of its ability to host international students, according to the lawsuit by the university. Last month, the university also made a symbolic bow to White House demands, renaming its diversity, equity and inclusion office. Even if the university wins its legal battles, Harvard faces existential risks. By the time its fight for survival is resolved, the cost to Harvard in lost research and missing generations of students could be immense. Dr. David Walt, a pioneering scientist whose research helped significantly lower the costs of DNA sequencing, told CNN the funding freeze would undoubtedly 'cost lives.' Still, experts say it may discourage similar actions by the Trump administration against other schools. While Harvard's approach was not without risks – frozen grants impacting key research operations, visa uncertainties and threats to its tax-exempt status – the university's refusal to yield sent a powerful message: it would not allow the federal government to dictate its values, higher education experts say. Columbia University faced the same protests and political scrutiny that Harvard did, but chose a markedly different path. In disciplining students and cooperating with the federal government, Columbia hoped to reduce federal scrutiny, experts say. The moves sparked backlash from students and faculty who accused the university of capitulating to the administration's demands. They also apparently didn't go far enough to stave off funding cuts and threats to the university's accreditation. The Trump administration revoked $400 million in federal funding to Columbia, citing the university's alleged failure to address antisemitism during pro-Palestine protests. The administration demanded several policy changes, including a mask ban and a plan 'for comprehensive admissions reform.' In response, Columbia University announced a series of new policies, including restrictions on demonstrations, new disciplinary procedures and a review of its Middle East curriculum, as Armstrong warned losing federal funds would impact the university's critical functions. But the administration did not return the funds, and later went on to declare the school doesn't meet accreditation standards because it allegedly violated the Civil Rights Act by failing to protect Jewish students. 'Columbia erred by failing to demand that the government proceed according to government law and procedures,' Ross said. Title VI requires due process, investigation, congressional approval before funds are withheld and an opportunity for the school to respond, and withholding funds must be limited to the parts of the university that investigation found had violated the law, according to Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law. To cut off funds for a hostile environment against Jewish students, there would have to be a finding of 'deliberate indifference' on Columbia's part. In addition to policy changes, Columbia provided conduct reports, email correspondence and investigative reports related to campus protests to federal investigators amid a probe into the university's compliance with federal civil rights laws, according to the Department of Health and Human Services. The university also turned over some disciplinary records for students involved in demonstrations following a congressional request, but said it scrubbed them of identifying information, court records show. 'A number of the actions Columbia agreed to could well have been taken …earlier and without government intervention, but Columbia should not have allowed the US to interfere in the university's internal policy and decision-making,' Ross said. The university hoped cooperation would temper federal backlash and protect federal funding, experts say. But the response on campus was fierce. Some students and faculty accused the administration of betraying the university community, prioritizing politics over student rights. The policy changes and enforcement actions were seen by critics as Columbia bowing to the administration's demands, rather than standing up for the values of free speech and academic freedom. 'The mood at Columbia is still pretty dim – we are not too happy with the circumstances in which we find ourselves,' said a member of the Columbia University Senate who requested anonymity to be able to speak freely. 'There's a lot of broad distrust and disappointment in our leadership by recent moves and the way we've responded to these issues.' 'At least with Harvard, they're getting legal victories,' the member of the 111-member policy making body told CNN. 'We've made a short-term calculation.' Shipman, the acting president, said in April that the university has not reached an agreement with the Trump administration and noted that while some of the government's requests align with university policies, 'overly prescriptive requests about our governance, how we conduct our presidential search process, and how specifically to address viewpoint diversity issues are not subject to negotiation.' She said the university would reject 'heavy-handed orchestration from the government.' But the university's leadership may not be able to reach an agreement with the government and has 'made itself deeply unpopular with students' by collaborating with the Trump administration, Columbia math professor Michael Thaddeus told CNN. 'The breadth and ferocity of Trump's attacks on higher education make it clear that he simply wants to do as much damage as possible,' he said. 'Given this reality, all universities, including Columbia, should be fighting back vigorously, using all tools at our disposal, even as we recognize how difficult our circumstances really are.' In the interim, anxiety has spread among students and faculty members on visas or green cards, along with those in the lab sciences impacted by cuts in research funding, according to Thaddeus. Despite these tensions, Columbia avoided some of the harshest financial penalties that hit Harvard. Still, many in the university community believe the toll to its reputation and internal fractures have cost the school more, according to the Columbia University Senate member. Harvard's defiance and Columbia's cooperation reveal two contrasting strategies for navigating the Trump administration's intense scrutiny. Columbia has been 'very bad … but they're working with us on finding a solution and they're taken off that hot seat,' Trump told reporters in the Oval Office Wednesday. 'But Harvard wants to fight, they want to show how smart they are.' By choosing to fight, Harvard accepted short-term risks to defend academic freedom in the long term, experts say, while Columbia opted to cooperate in hopes of safeguarding funding and avoiding harsher penalties. While each tried to protect their institutions, their experiences have sparked discussions about what leadership looks like when universities become flashpoints in national culture wars. The two universities have become easy targets for the administration because the institutions have lost public trust among Americans, Creeley said. But for the Trump administration, Harvard is a more useful target than Columbia. 'For President Trump's constituents, Harvard epitomizes elitism, snobbery and lack of support for American values,' said Benjamin Ginsberg, chair of the Center for Advanced Governmental Studies at Johns Hopkins University. 'For Trump, a victory over Harvard is meaningful while defeating Columbia is less important.' To that end, the government's actions against Harvard have been more extreme, persistent and seem aimed at destroying the institution, Ross said. Among many reasons for the universities' differing responses: Columbia's battle with the government came first, so Harvard saw that acquiescing early on did not protect the university from further demands and interference, experts say. 'Columbia's efforts to work in good faith with the administration made clear to every college and university the simple fact that this administration isn't interested in addressing antisemitism or working towards good policy,' said Jon Fansmith, the assistant vice president of government relations at the American Council on Education. 'They want to harm and control schools.' Another reason is that Columbia is much more vulnerable than Harvard to pressure from the government because it receives more in government contract and grant dollars and has a smaller endowment, according to Ginsberg. The internal politics of the two universities are also different, with the Columbia board inclined to settle matters with the administration, while some members of the Harvard board – most notably chair Penny Pritzker – favor resistance, Ginsberg said. Together, the responses beg a broader question facing US universities: how to balance political pressures with commitments to free expression and institutional independence. 'If universities like Harvard and Columbia don't stand up for their First Amendment rights as private institutions to make decisions for themselves, then they have failed us,' Creeley said. The cheers at Harvard's graduation and the boos at Columbia's say less about the leaders themselves and more about what their schools chose to stand for – reflecting fundamental debates about the future of higher education in a deeply polarized era. CNN's Betsy Klein contributed to this report.
The Intercept
an hour ago
- The Intercept
A Doctor Said Israel's War Is Fueling Health Crises in Gaza. UCSF Fired Her.
Support Us © THE INTERCEPT ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Health care workers demonstrate against the genocide in Gaza in Chicago on Nov. 16, 2023. Photo: Jacek Boczarski/Anadolu via Getty Images A doctor and professor is suing the University of California, San Francisco, alleging school officials fired her for her advocacy for Palestinian human rights in an attempt to silence her. In late May, UCSF terminated Rupa Marya following a nine-month suspension from the elite medical school based on social media posts in which she criticized Israel's genocide in Gaza and questioned how Zionist ideology affects health care outcomes. As a part of her dismissal, UCSF officials will place a letter of censure in Marya's file for 10 years, which she said will likely damage her ability to seek future employment and continue practicing medicine. In two free speech complaints, filed simultaneously this week in state and federal courts in Alameda County, California, Marya alleges the school discriminated against her for advocating on behalf of Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim students and colleagues. She told The Intercept that it's especially important that those who work in medicine feel free to call out the conditions in Gaza, where Israel's attacks on hospitals and its blockade on aid have caused a suite of overlapping health crises, prompting a famine risk amid ongoing bombardment. 'It's critical that we have the ability to speak out about this as professionals, as health care workers, as citizens, and not only of the United States but of the world, but also as U.S. taxpayers whose money is going to fund this genocide,' Marya said. Her lawsuits seek damages for loss of income and emotional and psychological distress — and come at a time when the University of California system has censured multiple faculty and staff members for speaking out about Palestine. The University of California and UCSF did not immediately respond to The Intercept's requests for comment. The complaints, which name as defendants UCSF officials including the school's Chancellor Sam Hawgood, allege that UCSF began to target Marya's advocacy even before she began to speak out about Palestine. Marya's scholarship includes research into the impacts of colonialism and structural racism in health care. The state complaint says her advocacy for her Black or unhoused patients had drawn criticism from some of her white colleagues, who allegedly used 'racist tropes' against Marya, a woman of Indian descent and raised in a Sikh household. 'UCSF leadership repeatedly characterized Dr. Marya's advocacy for marginalized patients as 'unprofessional,' 'aggressive' and 'harmful,'' the complaints read. Such targeting was magnified, the complaints argue, when Marya began to speak out on social media against Israel's offensive in Gaza following Hamas's October 7 attacks. After she criticized the school's silence on the killings of Palestinians in her posts, UCSF Provost Catherine Lucey called Marya in for questioning, according to the state complaint. Marya continued to post about Gaza. She posted a viral tweet calling for solidarity with Gaza's health care workers, drawing threats of death and rape. Marya notified school officials, including Lucey, about the threats, asking the school to temporarily remove her personal email and her profile from the school's public website, the complaints said. In the past, Lucey and school officials had taken similar protective measures amid the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020. In this instance, however, UCSF officials ignored Marya's requests. Instead, Talmadge King Jr., the dean of UCSF's School of Medicine, emailed Marya, informing her that officials would assess whether Marya's social media posts about Gaza had 'violated university policies,' the complaints alleged. Marya had also reported 'racist, anti-Arab, and anti-Palestinian remarks,' including Islamophobic comments made by her colleagues in school email threads to the school's anti-harassment and discrimination office. The cases were closed without any serious investigations, the complaints alleged. Meanwhile, the university went on to highlight controversial pro-Israeli speakers such as Elan Carr, a U.S. Army veteran and CEO of the Israeli American Council, an influential pro-Israel lobbying and advocacy group, despite complaints from a broad coalition of Jewish, Palestinian, Arab, Muslim, LGBTQ+ students and staff at UCSF. A November investigation by The Intercept revealed widespread anti-Palestinian and pro-Israeli bias across UCSF, which runs the biggest hospital system in San Francisco. UCSF officials canceled and censored lectures by medical researchers for mentioning health impacts on Palestinians under Israel's apartheid system and its assault on Gaza. Some doctors were subject to internal investigations after giving talks that mention Palestine. One nurse practitioner, who had previously volunteered in Gaza, was fired earlier this year for wearing a watermelon pin to work. And in April, UCSF fired Denise Caramagno, a therapist and pioneering violence prevention advocate at the school after she spoke out in defense of Marya. UCSF isn't the only school in the University of California system accused of stifling pro-Palestine speech. A January report issued by the UCLA Task Force on Anti-Palestinian, Anti-Arab, and Anti-Muslim Racism found similar patterns of bias at UCLA's medical school, ranging from censoring academic work; suppression of speech of students, medical residents, and faculty around Palestine; and ignoring incidents of racism against Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim members of campus. And in early May, UCLA fired a faculty member, Eric Martin, for taking part in UCLA's pro-Palestine encampment one year earlier, the first known faculty firing of its kind across the UC system. Marya said she hopes her legal fight will help others know they can speak out against Israel's genocide despite ongoing attacks on pro-Palestine speech by both universities and the federal government. 'I'm hoping that a legal remedy would push the university for accountability, would educate the public more fully about what's happening — where our free speech rights are being violated around the country, as we are trying to stand for the right for all people to live in peace,' Marya told The Intercept. Read our complete coverage Since Palestinian solidarity encampments erupted on campuses nationwide in the spring of 2024, school officials have punished students and professors with arrests, firings, suspensions, and expulsions amid pressure from both Republican and Democratic lawmakers. The Trump administration has only escalated such attacks on universities and colleges over the supposed failure of schools to address reports of antisemitism, cutting federal funding at schools such as Columbia and Harvard, revoking visas for thousands of international students, and abducting pro-Palestinian students and professors. The Trump administration now plans to target the University of California system. Last week, Leo Terrell, head of the Justice Department's antisemitism task force, told Fox News the UC system should expect 'massive lawsuits' in the coming days. 'We are going to go after them where it hurts them financially,' Terrell said later in the Fox News interview. The UC responded by pledging to cooperate with the Trump administration to 'counter and eradicate [antisemitism] in all its forms across the system.' 'Dr. Marya's case fits this pattern that we're seeing across the United States,' said Wade McMullen, a human rights attorney who is a part of Marya's legal team, 'where universities and academic institutions are bowing to pressure from elected officials, whether that's the federal government or state and local government, combined with billionaire donors who sit on the boards of trustees and run these universities, to weaponize notions of antisemitism to suppress pro-Palestinian speech and organizing.' The new complaints nod to the outside pressures on UCSF to quiet its pro-Palestine movement. Mentioned in the complaint are social media posts from January 2024 in which Marya questioned the impacts of Zionism on health care, calling it 'a supremacist, racist ideology.' The posts drew immediate criticism from pro-Israel colleagues and from Democratic California state Sen. Scott Wiener, who accused her of antisemitism and 'attacking Jews.' The complaints allege that Wiener publicly criticized Marya on social media 'intentionally and maliciously in coordination with others.' Shortly after his post, Canary Mission, a pro-Israeli site that doxxes and blacklists academics and students who criticize Israel, created a profile on Marya, 'unleashing a flood of defamatory statements, hate mail, and threats against Dr. Marya.' The Helen Diller Family Foundation, UCSF's largest donor, gave $100,000 to Canary Mission in 2016, the complaint notes. Jaclyn Safier, the foundation's president and a member of UCSF's board of directors, has since distanced herself from the 2016 donation, which was handled by her late father, Sanford Diller. The university responded to the controversy by publishing a statement across its social media accounts addressing the posts without naming Marya, disavowing her statements as a 'racist conspiracy theory' and 'antisemitic attacks.' One of the complaints notes that a public records request later revealed the statement was indeed meant to target Marya. Wiener, the San Francisco-based lawmaker, immediately thanked UCSF for the statement. Wiener went on to single Marya out on social media for the September social media post that led to her suspension. In a tweet, Marya wrote that UCSF students were concerned that a first-year student from Israel may have served in the Israeli military in the prior year, then asked, 'How do we address this in our professional ranks?' Wiener shared Marya's tweet, accusing her of evoking 'an age-old antisemitic conspiracy theory that Jewish doctors are harming patients.' 'Wiener again misrepresented Dr. Marya's post on his social media, publicly accusing her of wrongdoing and mentioning her employment at UCSF,' the complaints state. The federal complaint called students' fears 'objectively reasonable,' citing the two Israeli military veterans who sprayed students at Columbia University with a noxious gas last year and an Emory University medical school professor who volunteered with the Israeli military in Gaza after October 7 before resuming classes and practicing medicine at the Atlanta school. During her suspension last October, the complaints allege, Marya's direct supervisor had attempted to solicit one of her colleagues at UCSF to file an incident report against Marya 'to claim that she was posing a threat to patient safety.' The colleague ultimately declined the request, according to the suits. In filing the lawsuits, Marya and her attorneys said they also seek to uncover any possible collaboration between the Diller Foundation, other donors, lawmakers, and university officials in the school's crackdown on pro-Palestine speech. The federal complaint asks the court to prevent the University of California from affecting her ability to practice medicine and to bar the school from sharing 'any comments about Dr. Marya based upon anything other than her clinical competence' with other hospitals. She had originally intended to seek injunctive relief from the courts to prevent her firing, but she received a surprise notice for dismissal on May 20. Marya and her attorneys said the university violated its own bylaws in firing her without a hearing before the school's academic senate. Marya said her firing was was largely based on her various social media posts and Substack essays that referenced her advocacy for Palestinians, in which she at times called out her colleagues for their support of Israel's genocide in Gaza. Some of her Jewish colleagues have responded by accusing her of creating a hostile work environment. Marya and her supporters at UCSF, who include anti-Zionist Jewish colleagues, have dismissed the conflation of anti-Zionism — which critiques an ethno-nationalist political ideology — with antisemitism. Mark Kleiman, a member of Marya's legal team, said this conflation 'disenfranchises a vast number of younger Jews, medical students, residents and younger clinical faculty, all of whom are terrified of speaking out, but certainly have very very strong feelings that what's happening [in Gaza] is horrendous and is a war crime.' Marya said she hoped the lawsuit and her continued advocacy would draw attention back to the unfolding genocide of Palestinians in Gaza. 'The real issue is that the entire health care system in Gaza has been destroyed, and health care workers have been kidnapped and tortured — some have been raped to death like Dr. Adnan Al Bursh, who's a professor of orthopedic surgeon surgery in Gaza,' Marya said. 'The real issue here is not whether what I said hurt the feelings of some people.' Join The Conversation
