Over 30 Scholars of Antisemitism, Holocaust Studies, and Jewish History Challenge Trump’s Attack on Free Speech

Over 32 prominent Jewish scholars of antisemitism, Holocaust Studies, and Jewish History today challenged the Trump administration’s authoritarian crackdown on free speech by demonstrating the danger and falsehood of its false claims to care about Jewish safety. The Trump administration uses the guise of fighting antisemitism in order to attack the Palestinian rights movement and enact its broader authoritarian agenda including dismantling higher education and targeting student activists. Trump and his allies use a controversial, dangerous, and discredited IHRA definition of antisemitism, which inaccurately conflates criticism of the State of Israel with antisemitism. The IHRA definition and its associated examples have been criticized and rejected by Jewish, Palestinian, Israeli, civil rights, and human rights organizations for years.

The first Trump administration embraced the discredited IHRA definition in a 2019 Executive Order and has reinforced it in another EO from January 2025. Over the last several months, the IHRA definition has been a tool in the Departments of Justice, Education, and Health and Human Services’ broad attacks on universities, including their withholding billions in federal funds from institutions of higher education, and their egregious detainment of student activists. The Trump administration is now pushing universities to adopt this flawed definition of antisemitism, as part of a broader campaign of censorship and ideological control over universities. Many scholars, including Kenneth Stern, the author of the definition, have warned that Trump is using this definition to attack academic freedom and free speech.

Raz Segal, Associate Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Stockton University: “We take action to expose the absurdity of the IHRA definition of antisemitism. Hundreds of Jewish scholars around the world oppose it, including those who have publicly violated it today in rallies and protests in cities and campuses across the United States. The IHRA definition prohibits experts from talking about well-documented historical and contemporary realities, such as the systemic racism in Israel that is expressed explicitly and in unashamed terms in Israel's own Jewish Nation-State Basic Law. The IHRA definition also requires us to censor truths about Israel’s genocide in Gaza documented by the UN, Amnesty Internation, Human Rights Watch, and a growing number of Holocaust and genocide scholars who describe the killing of more than 50,000 Palestinians, including over 18,000 children, as a genocide. As a Jewish-Israeli scholar of the Holocaust who grew up with four grandparents who had survived the Holocaust, I reject this definition and I am proud to join dozens of Jewish scholars today in violating it and insisting on the value of our expertise and our scholarship.”

The intentional violations of the discredited IHRA definition took place across the country as part of a larger “Day of Action” organized by the Coalition for Action in Higher Education, in partnership with the American Association of University Professors, Jewish Voice for Peace, and other organizations.. Scores of other scholars, organized by Jewish Voice for Peace and the Liberatory Jewish Studies Network, engaged in similar violations at rallies across the country and in recorded statements.
The flawed IHRA definition outlines several examples of “contemporary antisemitism” that dangerously and falsely conflate criticism of Israel with antisemitism. For example, the definition asserts that it is antisemitic to “draw.. comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.” This provision is an egregious overreach that silences Holocaust scholars and Holocaust survivors who have found it necessary to draw comparisons.

At the AAUP-organized New York City rally in Foley Square, Marianne Hirsch, Professor of English and Comparative Literature and a scholar of Holocaust Memory at Columbia University said: “The widespread embrace of the confusing IHRA definition of antisemitism has created a crisis in my field of Genocide and Holocaust Studies. When I teach the history and memory of the Holocaust, I necessarily use historical analogy as a method of knowledge and inquiry. We learn things by comparing, as long as we do it with care. Right now, it is irresponsible to teach the Nazi persecution of Jews – which included ethnic cleansing, population transfer, starvation, expulsion and murder —without referring to the Israeli military’s brutal assault on Gaza. To do so is to violate the terms of the IHRA definition. Not to do so is to capitulate our intellectual integrity as scholars, our moral fiber as human beings and our sense of justice as citizens.”

Jonah Rubin, Sr. Manager of Campus Organizing at JVP: “The white supremacists, Christian Nationalists, and far-right authoritarians driving Trump’s so-called antisemitism policy do not care about Jewish safety. They embrace discredited definitions of antisemitism as a tool to attack social movements , rip visa holders away from their families and communities, and dismantle higher education. Today, some of the most prominent scholars of antisemitism, Holocaust Studies, and Jewish history are putting themselves on the line and laying out a challenge for every college and university president: will you continue to bow down to Trump’s demands or believe the experts and reject the IHRA definition and stand up for free speech.”
Interviews with scholars including Raz Segal, Marianne Hirsch, and Judith Butler available upon request

Participants include:

Rabbi Dr. Rebecca T. Alpert, Professor of Religion Emerita at TempleDr. Joel Benin, Donald J. McLachlan Professor of History and Professor of Middle East History, Emeritus at Stanford University. Dr. Bernadette Brooten, Kraft-Hiatt Professor Emerita of Christian Studies and Professor Emerita of Women's and Gender Studies at Brandeis University.Dr. Rachel Ida Buff, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.Dr. Judith Butler, Distinguished Professor, University of California, Berkeley Dr. Hasia Diner, Paul And Sylvia Steinberg Professor of American Jewish History at New York University.Dr. Jonathan Feingold, Associate Professor of Law, Boston University.Dr. Penny Gold, Burkhardt Distinguished Professor of History, Emerita at Knox College.Dr. Emmaia Gelman, professor in Social Sciences at Sarah Lawrence College and the founding Director of the Institute for the Critical Study of Zionism.Dr. Lisa Heineman, Professor of History, University of IowaDr. Marianne Hirsch, William Peterfield Trent Professor Emerita of English and Comparative Literature and the Institute for the Study of Sexuality and Gender at Columbia University. Dr. Nitzan Lebovic, Apter Chair of Holocaust Studies and Ethical Values at Lehigh University.Dr. Bruce Levine, J. G. Randall Distinguished Professor Emeritus of History, University of Illinois Urbana-ChampaignDr. Mark Levine, Professor of Modern Middle Eastern History, University of California, Irvine.Dr. Laura Levitt, Professor of Religion, Jewish Studies and Gender at Temple University.Dr. Zachary Lockman, Professor of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies, and History at New York University.Nina Mehta, Co-Director of PARCEO.Dr. Eli Myerhoff, AAUP Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom Fellow.Dr. Donna Nevel, co-director of PARCEO and an expert in antisemitism.Dr. Atalia Omer, Professor of Religion, Conflict, and Peace Studies at Notre Dame University.Dr. Penny Rosenwasser, City College of San Francisco. Dr. Jonah Rubin, Sr. Manager of Campus Organizing, Jewish Voice for Peace.Dr. Rayaa Rusenko, Independent Scholar, National Coalition of Independent Scholars.Dr. Jennifer Ruth, Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Professor of Film at Portland State University.Dr. Daniel Segal, Jean M. Pitzer Professor Emeritus of Anthropology and Professor Emeritus of History at Pitzer College.Dr. Raz Segal, Associate Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Stockton University.Dr. Aaron Shakow, Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, Harvard University.Dr. Victor Silverman, Emeritus Professor of History, Pomona College.Dr. David Slavin, Emory University.Dr. Tamir Sorek, Liberal Arts Professor of Middle East History at Penn State University. Dr. Arlene Stein, Distinguished Professor of Sociology, Rutgers UniversityDr. Barry Trachtenberg, Rubin Presidential Chair of Jewish History at Wake Forest University.Dr. Alan Wald, H. Chandler Davis Collegiate Professor Emeritus at University of Michigan.