Tensions on Minnesota campuses rise as colleges and universities grapple with the Israel-Hamas war

Days after Hamas militants crossed into Israel and slaughtered Jewish civilians, University of Minnesota interim President Jeff Ettinger issued a statement condemning the attack and lamenting "the countless innocent civilians who have lost their lives, been injured, or are being held captive." Administrators would support people with roots in Israeli and Palestinian communities who were worried about loved ones in the region, the statement said.

Some university faculty and staff found the message biased; 750 signed an open letter crafted a few days later, noting years of Palestinian suffering and citing thousands of Palestinian deaths in the war. They called for an apology.

The signers mourned civilian deaths in Israel and Palestine, the letter said, but "Ettinger's statements ... have presented a one-sided perspective showing solidarity and concern only for Israel with no acknowledgment of the ongoing and historical suffering and death of Palestinians."

In Minnesota and across the country, college administrators, faculty and students are wrestling with tense questions of free speech and academic freedom as well as demands for institutions to take stands on the highly divisive war.

Protesters are taking to quads and student unions. Faculty, students and staff are signing letters and calling for administrators to take certain stances. Universities are reporting upticks in hate-fueled vandalism.

The only consistent response from universities across the country is the concern and hope that the situation can be resolved, said Ted Mitchell, president of the American Council on Education. Some higher education leaders have sent out several statements to their campus communities as the situation has progressed, he said.

"Every president needs to deal with it the way they see fit," Mitchell said. "But there is a point of view that says that, in fact, institutions shouldn't make statements because that compromises their ability to organize contentious debates, because they will already be seen as having taken a position."

Protests and fears

At the University of Minnesota, hundreds of students joined a coordinated walkout at college campuses around the country last month in support of a free Palestine. Students sat or lay silently on tarps spread across the sidewalk in front of Coffman Memorial Union as a loudspeaker blared names of Palestinian families reported killed by Israeli airstrikes.

Other students looked on as they passed, stepping around their protesting fellow classmates and onto the damp grass. Members of the Students for Justice in Palestine called for an immediate ceasefire in the war — and for an apology for Ettinger's statement.

While some messages from the U or comments from professors about their support for Israel have disappointed senior Sasmit Rahman, she said she's seen a good amount of empathy for the Palestinian struggle.

"When you go online, it feels like overwhelmingly all of the rhetoric is very pro-Israeli, all of the media is very pro-Israeli," Rahan said. "It has been incredible to see the overwhelming amount of in-person support on campus."

At the same time, Jewish campus groups have requested additional security from the university's Department of Public Safety for small gatherings, such as Shabbat dinners. Student leaders are wary of holding large public displays of support for Israel, they said, fearing they could be targets of violence.

Seeking a reprieve from the mental exhaustion of the war, about a dozen Jewish students stopped by the university's Hillel building Friday for a breakfast of Israeli iced coffee and bourekas, a popular pastry.

Having a place for the Jewish community on campus has always been important for junior Arielle Shofman, but its felt especially important in recent weeks, she said.

When new posters of missing hostages held by Hamas were dropped off, students briefly abandoned their coffees to hang them in windows. The posters were double-sided so they could not be torn down, as they had been elsewhere on campus.

Many students supportive of Israel are concerned about an uptick in antisemitism, said Benjie Kaplan, executive director of Minnesota Hillel.

"Hamas' terror attacks have led to increased efforts on campus, both in the classroom and in public, to marginalize, demonize, and dehumanize Jewish and pro-Israel students and faculty," Kaplan said in an email. "These efforts only further divide the campus community, and leave those of us who remain hopeful for a peaceful future between Israelis and Palestinians feeling defeated."

Jewish students are in a haze as they struggle to process that loved ones are at war, and that they may be targets on campus, said Shofman, who also serves as board president of religious Jewish student center Chabad.

"Everyone's proud of being Jewish, but for our own safety, we have to be a little bit quieter right now," she said. "I know a lot of my Jewish friends have taken off their Star of Davids."

The violence in Gaza and Israel is having a profound personal effect on people on campus, the university said in an email.

"These are difficult conversations that intersect with people's identities, and we engage in these conversations knowing some may feel hurt or unheard by what we have said," the statement said. "University leaders are offering support and resources to anyone who needs it."

'The world that could be'

Student protests about global issues on college campuses are far from new, said Katherine S. Cho, assistant professor of higher education at Loyola University Chicago. In the 1960s and '70s, colleges mailed zines to one another to share information, she said. And in the '80s and '90s, similar protests erupted on campuses against apartheid in South Africa.

"Part of being a student is having the ability, the time and space as students learning about the world, to be able to critique the world," Cho said. "Because they're dreaming of the world that could be."

Still, being vocal in the closely watched conflict can come with consequences:

Columbia and Harvard students found their names and faces broadcast on a "doxxing truck" for their support of the Palestinians.

One person was arrested Tuesday in connection with threats made against Jewish students at Cornell University.

Responding to a push by Gov. Ron DeSantis, Florida's university system chancellor ordered pro-Palestinian groups at state colleges to disband.

On Monday, the Biden administration condemned an alarming rise in antisemitic incidents on college campuses.

The Anti-Defamation League reported antisemitic incidents in the U.S. have risen by more than 300%.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations reported the most incidents of bias against Muslims and Palestinians in a similar time period since 2015.

Academic freedom

Students are angry and mourning the lives lost in Israel and Gaza, said T. Anansi Wilson, a professor at Mitchell Hamline School of Law in St. Paul. But there's been fear, too, of the consequences of speaking out, said Wilson, who advises the Black Student Union where many Black and Muslim students of color have sought community in recent weeks.

"You have these CEOs and these law professors and others saying, 'We're not going to recommend these people for jobs,' or rescinding jobs based on your political speech," Wilson said. "It's been a moment where they felt both targeted, but also gaslit because you're a law student, you're supposed to be speaking about issues of social import and demystifying those for the public."

The fear of curtailed academic freedom is real for professors from the Middle East who brace themselves daily for disciplinary action when checking their emails, said Sima Shakhsari, U associate professor of Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies, one of several who penned the open letter supporting the Palestinians.

"The fact that I fear that every day says something," Shakhsari said. "I don't feel like this university, that administration is actually supporting me."

Setting guardrails

Some students are calling for an immediate cease-fire. Others are protesting their university's direct ties to Israel. Others are scrutinizing statements their university made in the early days of the conflict, Cho said.

Some schools have chosen to make no statement.

The obligation to protect students from violence — physical and digital — is more important than ever, Cho said. Students are incredibly vulnerable to doxxing and to well-financed powerful organizations that can easily find a lot of information about them, she said.

Mitchell, of the American Council on Education, said there's no longer such a thing as a private act that takes place in public, and there is a real concern that students could demonize one another for their point of view. Universities must set guardrails around this debate, not stifle it, he said.

"Colleges are there to help people get a perspective on things that they might react to strictly emotionally and to bring some argument, logic, history, perspective into the debate," he said. "I'd be worried if college students weren't responding to these issues."