Harvard suspends anti-Israel protesters from library after 'pray-in'
Several students received a two-week suspension from the library after participating in a “pray-in” at the Harvard Divinity School library on November 4.
Several students received a two-week suspension from the library after participating in a “pray-in” at the Harvard Divinity School library on November 4. The demonstration lasted 45 minutes and was attended by approximately 70 participants.
At the demonstration, the graduate students prayed over religious texts such as the Bible, Torah, and Quran. Library suspensions were issued after campus security guards photographed the participants’ IDs, according to the Harvard Crimson.
Stephanie Tabashneck, a Jewish student and one of the event’s organizers, expressed dismay over the university’s response.
“There’s a serious tension there between the ideals that HDS purports to uphold and the consequences that they impose on students who are living out these very ideals,” she stated.
Tabashneck criticized the suspensions, calling them an attack on free speech and religious expression.
”I say this as someone who is Jewish and both concerned about antisemitism and concerned about the genocide of the Palestinian people,” she added.
Harvard Divinity School Dean Marla F. Frederick, in an email to students, acknowledged the importance of prayer and its connection to protest. “At HDS we honor the importance of prayer and what it represents for so many. And, as one colleague reminded us recently, ‘prayer is protest,’” Frederick wrote. “In and of itself, advocacy for the cause of people under duress — whether in Israel, Gaza, or other parts of the world — is noble,” she added.
However, Fredrick defended the suspensions, citing university policies that restrict protests in libraries and classrooms to preserve these spaces as zones for uninterrupted learning. “They are the rules we currently have and as such we must uphold them,” Frederick stated.
Organizers contend the pray-in was peaceful and faith-rooted, with no intent to disrupt. Tabashneck called the dean’s reaction to the pray-in “inconceivable.”
[RELATED: Harvard Library suspends 25 faculty members after pro-Palestine silent ‘study-in’]
“There’s a serious tension there between the ideals that HDS purports to uphold and the consequences that they impose on students who are living out these very ideals,” she stated.
“Students from the Divinity School were peacefully gathering in the library and praying, and the idea that praying would be cause for sanction is inconsistent with democracy and inconsistent with the values of the Divinity School,” Tabashneck added.
This incident follows similar actions across Harvard’s campus. In October, faculty and students faced library suspensions for participating in “study-in” protests.
