【中美创新时报2024 年 11 月 1日编译讯】(记者温友平编译)学生团体“走出被占领的巴勒斯坦”在科学中心广场组织了周四下午的集会,重申呼吁大学撤资任何支持以色列对加沙战争的组织或企业。《波士顿环球报》记者Danny McDonald 和 Tonya Alanez 对此作了下述报道。
本月早些时候,哈佛大学校长艾伦·加伯(Alan Garber )在给一个学生团体的一封信中表示,学校无意“撤资以色列”,同时拒绝了迫使该机构削减在该国投资风险的措施。
周四的集会吸引了大约 70 名学生,他们围成半圆形,发言者呼吁学生加倍致力于这一事业。他们高呼“当巴勒斯坦人受到压迫时,抵制、制裁和撤资”。
21 岁的塔玛·塞拉是一名大四本科生,她在集会开始时批评加伯未能“采取一项阻止捐赠基金资助侵犯人权行为的政策”。
“这样的建议应该没有任何争议,没有任何争议,但加伯仍然加倍努力,证实了哈佛的一贯立场,即它无意从以色列撤资,”塞拉说。
加伯在致该组织的信中表示,他不会指示管理该大学 532 亿美元捐赠基金的哈佛管理公司改变方针。
“哈佛不会利用其捐赠基金来支持一个在我们社区中造成严重分裂的复杂问题的有争议的观点,”这封日期为 10 月 3 日的信中写道。“避免采取这种行动的理由几十年来一直被我的前任们阐述,值得重复。”
他说,学校的投资策略“旨在支持学术使命,而不是作为社会或政治变革的直接工具。”
该学生团体本周早些时候发布了一份新闻稿,严厉批评了加伯的回应。
“他的回应表明,捐赠基金缺乏真正的社区参与渠道,同时也表明令人不安地否认了关于巴勒斯坦当前危机的既定、广泛认同的事实,”新闻稿说。
在声明中,该学生团体表示,他们在 9 月与哈佛高层的会议上提出了两项提案,期间他们讨论了学校 530 亿美元的捐赠基金。
其中一项措施呼吁“通过一项人权投资政策声明”,该声明将“明确说明哈佛致力于将人权纳入 HMC 的投资组合。” 该组织称,第二项措施要求任命一个工作组来审查 HMC 的投资组合,以查找任何可能违反哈佛对人权承诺的投资。
“这两项提案都建立在数十年来负责任的机构投资实践的先例之上,并且是在与行业专业人士的对话中构建的,”新闻稿中写道。
学生团体和加伯之间的最新冲突发生在哈佛大学动荡的一年之后,加沙战争是校园冲突的中心。
2023 年 10 月 7 日,哈马斯武装分子及其合作者冲进以色列南部,杀死了大约 1,200 人,其中大部分是平民,并绑架了另外 250 人。以色列在加沙的报复性军事行动随后不久开始,目前已造成 42,000 多人死亡,并卷入黎巴嫩和伊朗的冲突,并引发了哈佛校园的大规模抗议活动。一些人认为示威活动包含反犹太主义元素。
哈佛大学今年夏天发布的两份报告发现,自战争开始以来,反犹太主义、伊斯兰恐惧症和反巴勒斯坦偏见在校园内激增。
与此同时,常春藤盟校的亲巴勒斯坦学生活动人士的个人信息被公布在网上,受到威胁,并失去了工作机会。
本月初,大约十几名哈佛教职员工周五聚集在校园图书馆前,抗议对亲巴勒斯坦学生抗议者的纪律处分。学生们在哈佛园的怀德纳图书馆举行了一场几乎无声的“自习”,抗议以色列在加沙地带的军事行动。
图书馆抗议活动是哈佛大学今年夏天颁布的一系列新规定或新实施的规定首次测试之一。这些规定是大学为避免以色列-哈马斯战争造成的混乱而做出的努力的一部分,这场战争扰乱了上个学年的大部分时间,并最终导致学生们在哈佛园进行了长达数周的集会。
国会共和党人已开始调查哈佛大学和其他大学对反犹太主义的反应,并向管理人员施压,要求他们严厉打击亲巴勒斯坦活动。
最近几周,在 10 月 7 日袭击事件周年纪念日前后,一些亲巴勒斯坦校园团体誓言要“升级”他们的策略。10 月 7 日至 10 月 8 日夜间,一名身份不明的人砸碎了大学礼堂的窗户,并在约翰哈佛雕像上泼了红漆。哈佛警方表示,该事件正在调查中。
此外,警方正在调查哈佛广场周围张贴的几张带有反犹太主义符号的“宗教威胁”贴纸。
这些贴纸被贴在查尔斯河地区的灯柱上,并于本月初向哈佛大学警方报告。警察搜查了该地区,但未能找到责任人。
根据学生报纸《哈佛深红报》获得的照片,贴纸上是一面以色列国旗,其中大卫之星被纳粹十字记号所取代,显然是将以色列与纳粹德国进行了比较,并附有“停止资助以色列恐怖主义”的字样。
或许,校园分裂的棘手性质的典型代表是一起袭击案,该案源于亲巴勒斯坦的哈佛研究生与以色列哈佛商学院学生之间的冲突。该案导致调查人员相互对立,并引起了联邦调查局的注意。
1 月初,哈佛大学首位黑人校长克劳迪娜·盖伊 (Claudine Gay) 辞职,此前她的短暂任期因以色列-哈马斯战争、校园反犹太主义以及学术作品抄袭指控等争议而脱轨。
今年夏天,哈佛大学宣布,加伯将继续担任校长三年。去年,加伯因在未遭到警方突袭的情况下结束了哈佛为期三周的学生抗议营地而受到赞誉。
题图:哈佛大学“走出被占领的巴勒斯坦”周四在哈佛科学中心广场举行集会。Barry Chin/Globe 工作人员
附原英文报道:
At rally, Harvard student group reiterates call for divestment from groups supporting Israel
By Danny McDonald and Tonya Alanez Globe Staff,Updated October 31, 2024
Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine held a rally at Harvard Science Center Plaza on Thursday.Barry Chin/Globe Staff
CAMBRIDGE – The student group Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine organized a Thursday afternoon rally on the Science Center Plaza to reiterate its call for the university to divest from any organization or business that supports the Israeli war on Gaza.
In a letter to a student group earlier this month, Harvard president Alan Garber said the school has no intention of “divesting from Israel,” while rejecting measures that pushed for the institution to slash its investment exposure in that state.
Thursday’s rally drew about 70 students, who formed a semicircle as speakers called for students to double down on their commitment to the cause. They chanted, “when Palestinians are oppressed, boycott, sanction, and divest.”
Tamar Sella, 21, an undergraduate in their final year, opened the rally with criticisms of Garber’s failure “to adopt a policy that stops endowments from funding human rights violations.”
”Such a suggestion should be of zero controversy, of any contention, and still Garber doubles down, confirming Harvard’s consistent position that it has no intention of divesting from Israel,” Sella said.
In his letter to the group, Garber said he will not direct the Harvard Management Co., which runs the university’s $53.2 billion endowment, to change course.
“Harvard will not use its endowment funds to endorse a contested view on a complex issue that deeply divides our community,” read the letter, which was dated Oct. 3. “The reasons for avoiding such an action have been articulated for decades by my predecessors and bear repeating.”
The school’s investment strategy, he said, “is designed to support the academic mission, not to serve as a direct instrument of social or political change.”
The student group issued a press release earlier this week slamming Garber’s response.
“His response exemplifies the lack of outlets for real community engagement with the endowment, while also demonstrating a troubling denial of established, broadly agreed-upon facts about the current crisis in Palestine,” the release said.
In the statement, the student group said it presented two proposals at a September meeting with Harvard brass, during which they discussed the school’s cq$53 billion endowment.
One of the measures called for “the adoption of a human rights investment policy statement,” which would “specifically state Harvard’s commitments to incorporating human rights in HMC’s investment portfolio.” The second asked for the appointment of a task force to review HMC’s portfolio for any investments that might violate Harvard’s commitment to human rights, according to the group.
“Both proposals build on decades of precedence of responsible institutional investment practices, and were constructed in dialogue with industry professionals,” read the release.
The latest clash between the student group and Garber comes after a tumultuous year at Harvard, with the war in Gaza at the center of campus strife.
On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas militants and their collaborators stormed into southern Israel and killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted another 250. Israel’s retaliatory military campaign in Gaza, which has now killed more than 42,000 people and entangled Lebanon and Iran, began shortly afterward, and prompted large protests on Harvard’s campus. Some saw the demonstrations as containing antisemitic elements.
A pair of Harvard reports released in the summer found that antisemitism, Islamophobia, and anti-Palestinian bias had surged on campus since the war began.
Pro-Palestinian student activists at the Ivy League school, meanwhile, had their personal information published online, received threats, and lost job offers.
Earlier this month, around a dozen Harvard faculty members and staffers gathered in front of a campus library on Friday to protest disciplinary action against pro-Palestinian student protesters. The students had staged a mostly silent “study-in” at Widener Library in Harvard Yard to protest Israel’s military campaign in the Gaza Strip.
The library protest was one of the first tests of a set of new, or newly enforced, rules that Harvard promulgated during the summer. The rules were part of the university’s effort to avoid the turmoil over the Israel-Hamas war that disrupted much of the last academic year and culminated in a weeks-long encampment in Harvard Yard.
Republicans in Congress have launched investigations of the responses of Harvard, and other universities, to antisemitism and pressured administrators to clamp down on pro-Palestinian activism.
In recent weeks, around the anniversary of the Oct. 7 attack, some pro-Palestinian campus groups vowed to “escalate” their tactics. Overnight, between Oct. 7 and Oct. 8, an unidentified person smashed windows at University Hall and splashed red paint on the John Harvard statue. The Harvard police said the incident is under investigation.
Additionally, police are investigating after several “religiously threatening” stickers with antisemitic symbols were posted around Harvard Square, officials said.
The stickers were placed on light poles in the Charles River area and reported to Harvard University police earlier this month. Officers searched the area but were unable to find who was responsible.
The stickers showed an Israeli flag with the Star of David replaced with a swastika, in an apparent comparison of Israel to Nazi Germany, along with the phrase “Stop Funding Israeli Terrorism,” according to photos obtained by The Harvard Crimson, a student newspaper.
Perhaps typifying the intractable nature of the campus divide is an assault case grounded in a confrontation between pro-Palestinian Harvard graduate students and an Israeli Harvard Business School student. The case has pitted investigators against one another and drawn the attention of the FBI.
In early January, Claudine Gay, Harvard’s first Black president, resigned after her brief term was derailed by controversies stemming from the Israel-Hamas war, campus antisemitism, and allegations of plagiarism in her scholarly works.
During the summer, Harvard announced Garber, who in the past year was credited with ending Harvard’s three-week student protest encampment without a police raid, would stay on as president for another three years.