Updated
Updated · The New York Times · Jun 25
MIT Denies 78-Year-Old Professor Funds to Promote Antisemitism Book
Updated
Updated · The New York Times · Jun 25

MIT Denies 78-Year-Old Professor Funds to Promote Antisemitism Book

1 articles · Updated · The New York Times · Jun 25

Summary

  • Yossi Sheffi, 78, said MIT administrators refused to provide money to promote his completed book on antisemitism at the university.
  • Sheffi said he wrote the book after the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attack and subsequent 2023-24 Gaza war protests, which he says left Jews and Israelis facing hostile treatment on campus.
  • MIT did not issue the kind of formal antisemitism report produced by some peer schools, and Sheffi said his book effectively fills that gap.
  • Sheffi said administrators are embarrassed by the book's contents and fear the Trump administration could use them to threaten MIT research funding.

Insights

Is fear of losing research funds forcing universities to suppress uncomfortable truths about campus antisemitism?
When a professor writes the report his university won't, is the institution now trying to silence him?
Can a single professor's book reveal what official university task forces on antisemitism might have missed?