As inflated allegations of antisemitism rock American colleges and universities, the media and establishment politicians continue to shift focus from the Palestinian struggle for survival and liberation.

On December 5, Elizabeth Magill, Claudine Gay, and Sally Kornbluth, the respective presidents of the University of Pennsylvania, Harvard University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, testified for over five hours in a congressional hearing about antisemitism on US college campuses. Just four days later, amid a backlash to their testimony, Magill resigned from the UPenn presidency, and on January 2, Gay, the former Harvard president, did the same.

During the December hearing, Magill, Gay, and Kornbluth fielded a variety of questions about campus antisemitism and the presidents’ efforts and willingness to combat it: “What is Harvard doing to educate members about . . . false accusations that Israel is a racist, settler-colonial, apartheid state?” or “Will you commit to doing everything necessary to keep Jewish students and faculty safe?” In particular, Republican congresswoman Elise Stefanik repeatedly asked the presidents to condemn protest slogans, citing a video taken on UPenn’s campus. In the video, attendees of a recent march in support of Palestine chanted, “Intifada, revolution,” which Stefanik identified as a call for Jewish genocide.