Israeli Prime Minister blasts Harvard, Penn, and MIT administrations over anti-Semitism in address to Congress
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called out university administrators in his address in a joint chamber of Congress on Wednesday.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called out university administrators in his address in a joint chamber of Congress on Wednesday.
After a tumultuous spring at college and university campuses, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticized the response to pro-Palestinian and anti-Semitic protests that have happened on college campuses.
In his statement before Congress, he stated, “We recently learned from the National Security Director, the U.S. Director of National Intelligence, that Iran is funding and promoting anti-Israel protests in America.”
He added, “They want to disrupt America.”
Netanyahu also said, “It is not only the campus protesters who get it wrong, it is also the people who run those campuses.”
“80 years after the Holocaust, the presidents of Harvard, Penn, and I am ashamed to say, my alma mater, MIT, couldn’t bring themselves to condemn the calls for the genocide of Jews,” Netanyahu added later in his address.
“Remember what they said? They said, it depends on the context. Well let me give these befuddled academics a little context. Anti-Semitism is the world’s oldest hatred. For centuries, the massacre of Jews was always precede by wild accusations. We were accused of poisoning wells, to spreading plagues, to using the blood of slaughtered children to make passover matzah’s.”
At Harvard, for example, one Jewish student was harassed during an anti-Israel protest.
Harvard - another student has been identified participating in the antisemitic mob caught harassing a Jewish pupil in this now viral clip.
Meet Harvard Divinity School student Elom Tettey-Tamaklo. Tettey-Tamaklo graduated from Haverford College with a concentration in political… pic.twitter.com/wNOQ0phRFr— StopAntisemitism (@StopAntisemites) November 10, 2023
As the speech was occurring, protesters were outside of the capitol building protesting Prime Minister Netanyahu’s address to Congress, a protest that Campus Reform reported was planned in advance and was promoted by the Students for Justice in Palestine.
Discussing the violence on campuses itself, he also stated, “So these protesters burn American flags even on the fourth of July, and I wish to salute the fraternity brothers at the University of North Carolina who protected the American flag. Protected the American flag, against these anti-Israel protesters.”
Fraternity brothers at UNC protect American flag from pro-Hamas agitators and sing the National Anthem as it’s raised. There’s hope! pic.twitter.com/jvmiaGWlaq
— Media Research Center (@theMRC) May 1, 2024
[RELATED: ACLU calls for charges to be dropped against disruptive anti-Israel activists in NH]
Following a long clap as a response from lawmakers on Capital Hill and lawmakers chanting, “USA, USA, USA,” the Prime Minister continued, “For all we know, Iran is funding the anti-Israel protests that are going on, right now, outside this building. There are not that many, but they’re there, and throughout the city.”
Netanyahu also added a statement for the anti-Israel protesters who had come to the capital building to protest his speech, saying, “Well I have a message for these protesters: When the tyrants of Tehran, who hang gays from cranes, and murder women for not covering their hair, are praising, promoting, and funding you, you have officially become Iran’s useful idiots.”
Addressing the protesters themselves, Netanyahu added, “Some of these protesters, hold up signs proclaiming gays for Gaza, they might as well hold up signs saying, chickens for KFC!”
“These protesters chant, ‘From the river, to the sea,’ but many don’t have a clue what river and what sea they’re talking about. They’d not only get an F in geography, they’d get an F in history. They call Israel a colonial state. Don’t they know that the land of Israel is where Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob prayed. Where Isaiah and Jeremiah preached, and where David and Soloman ruled.”
Campus Reform has also reported on anti-Semitic actions that have taken place leading up to Prime Minister Natanyahu’s address.
Pro-Hamas activists got into the hotel where Netanyahu is staying in the D.C. and dumped maggots on a table in the suite, where many of the protesters involved have ties to the Students for Justice in Palestine.
Campus Reform has contacted Harvard, Penn State, MIT, and the University of North Carolina for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
