Anti-Zionist Harvard Professor To Lead Antisemitism Group

ANALYSIS – You just can't make this stuff up. Even as Harvard University struggles to regain any respect amidst its cascading failures in combating antisemitism on campus, the now disgraced, formerly elite school says to itself: ‘hold my beer.' 

And then proceeds to step even deeper into its own anti-Jewish excrement. Harvard actually appointed a well-known leftist Jew-hating professor of Jewish history to co-chair its new presidential task force on antisemitism.

This, along with an equivalent task force to combat so-called ‘Islamophobia' on campus.

As the Daily Wire reported:

On Friday, Harvard University announced the formation of an anti-Semitism task force to be co-chaired by a professor who was also one of many signatories to a letter last August that accused Israel of an “illegal occupation of millions of Palestinians” and forcing Palestinians to live “under a regime of apartheid.” The letter also accused the current Israeli government of a “messianic, homophobic, and misogynistic agenda” and endorsed a “Demand from elected leaders in the United States that they … restrict American military aid from being used in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.”

Nearly 2,900 academics, clergy members, and other public figures signed the open letter from the leftist group ‘Academics4Peace' in early August, before the Oct. 7 Hamas attack. And it was harshly anti-Israel and anti-Jewish.

The letter claimed that Israel was determined to “ethnically cleanse all territories under Israeli rule of their Palestinian population.” The letter added: “Meanwhile, American Jewish billionaire funders help support the Israeli far right.”

So, who is this left-wing, Jew-hating Harvard academic? 

He is Dr. Derek J. Penslar, the William Lee Frost Professor of Jewish History in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Among other antisemitic tropes he has repeated, Penslar, stated in his 2023 book, “Zionism: An Emotional State,” that “veins of hatred run through Jewish civilization.” 

The New York Post reported that: “In the days after Gay's resignation, Penslar publicly downplayed the campus antisemitism he is now charged with investigating, telling the Jewish Telegraphic Agency outsiders had ‘exaggerated' the issue.”

Appointing Penslar to co-chair an antisemitism task force makes as much sense as appointing a KKK Grand Wizard to lead a task force on racism in the South.

In response to his latest Harvard assignment, former Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers wrote on X: “Prof Penslar has publicly minimized Harvard's anti-Semitism problem, rejected the definition used by the US government in recent years of anti-Semitism as too broad, invoked the need for the concept of settler colonialism in analyzing Israel, referred to Israel as an apartheid state and more.”

Summers added: “I believe that given his record, he is unsuited to leading a task force whose function is to combat what is seen by many as a serious antisemitism problem at Harvard.”

Meanwhile, billionaire investor Bill Ackman, who led the charge against former Harvard President Claudine Gay, simply posted on X:

“Harvard continues on the path of darkness.” 

And there seems to be no light at the end of Harvard's dark tunnel.

Ted Frank, director of litigation at the Hamilton Lincoln Law Institute, a non-profit law firm, added: “Harvard is going to double down on its anti-Semitism. Firing Gay was just shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic. The problem remains the racist and anti-Semitic DEI ideology.” 

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of American Liberty News.