New England Scholars Speak, an educational public service initiative composed of more than 1,000 academics from the New England region, sent a letter addressed to President Biden on Feb. 14 titled “US Scholars to President Biden: You Must Act Now to Prevent Genocide in Gaza.” The letter demands an immediate cease-fire, restoration of humanitarian aid and a “just and peaceful” resolution for both Palestinians and Israelis amid the ongoing violence in Gaza.
The open letter currently has more than 4,100 signatories — more than 50 of whom are from the University of Michigan — and is signed by faculty, instructors, fellows, research associates and doctoral alumni of U.S. colleges and universities. The letter expresses disapproval of the Biden administration’s policy in Gaza its support for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The letter also says it is the obligation of scholars to speak out in the face of injustice.
“Mr. President, with all due respect, there is simply no explanation that PM Netanyahu — or you — could offer to justify this ongoing massacre and weaponization of humanitarian aid against the people of Gaza,” the letter reads. “You must heed these warnings, which have emanated even from within your own administration. As scholars and educators, we object in the strongest possible terms to the collective punishment of Palestinians, including the use of starvation as a war tactic and the recent suspension of US support for (the United Nations Relief and Works Agency), a lifeline for Gaza’s 2.2 million people.”
The letter to Biden was adapted from an earlier letter sent by NESS to U.S. senators of New England on Dec. 5, 2023. This letter called for a permanent cease-fire; the deployment of United Nations peacekeepers in Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem; and the establishment of a commission to investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity during the ongoing Israeli military campaign.
In an interview with The Michigan Daily, Malak Rafla, assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and NESS Working Group member who helped write and review the letter, spoke about the initiative and how scholars worked together to address their concerns about the violence in Gaza.
“We, collectively, in our own individual professional circles, began to realize a pattern, or a similarity, of a silencing or censoring in our academic roles when we try to address some of the concerns (about the war),” Rafla said. “We decided to get together, think together, brainstorm together, about how we could collectively respond to this situation.”
Rafla said one critical principle of NESS is promoting academic freedom and free speech when discussing the violence in Gaza.
“One of the initiatives that we’re trying to do is to defend academic freedom and not allow it to be undermined or threatened in particular ways,” Rafla said. “This is my very firm and strong belief. Justice and equality for Palestinians means justice and equality for Jews, for Blacks, for Indigenous populations, for all walks of life. That in and of itself, comes to the core power of this movement.”
Su’ad Abdul Khabeer, U-M American culture associate professor and signatory of the February letter to Biden, said Israel’s destruction of all of Gaza’s universities contributed to her decision to sign the letter expressing disapproval of U.S. military aid to Israel.
“I remember (University President Santa) Ono’s first letter that didn’t even say the word Palestinian but mentioned Israeli universities, and one of the things that the letter I signed talks about is how so many, if not all, the universities in Gaza have been completely destroyed,” Abdul Khabeer said. “Prominent academics — my colleagues, basically — have been killed by the Israeli government and paid with the support of the U.S. government with U.S. military aid. That’s an affront to so many things that I value.”
Abdul Khabeer said she believes faculty members should be able to freely express their opposition to the violence in Palestine and the suppression of academic freedom in related conversations.
“We need more faculty to be engaged and be vocal about their moral and scholarly opposition to what’s happening in Gaza and in the West Bank in occupied Palestine,” Abdul Khabeer said. “But also their opposition to the ways in which academic freedom and scholarship and student protests is being suppressed as well because those things are directly related.”
In an interview with The Daily, Mariam Odeh, member of U-M Students Allied for Freedom and Equality, said she is not convinced that the letter will impact Biden’s policy on the Israel-Hamas war given his unwavering and steadfast support for Israel.
“It’s trying to appeal to the humanity of one of the most prominent funders and enablers of the genocide,” Odeh said. “How are you begging somebody who’s bypassing Congress to continue sending funding to Israel? How are you begging somebody like that to put a stop to it, and trying to appeal to his humanity?”
SAFE board member Zainab Hakim said in an interview with The Daily that she believes the letter’s wording contributes to narratives normalizing Israel’s occupation of Palestine.
“They say this thing about a ‘just resolution in Israel-Palestine,’ and this is always a problematic phrase that people throw around because it equates an occupying power with an occupied population,” Hakim said. “It plays into both sides’ narratives, and it just normalizes brutal military occupation and two-statism. In reality, Israel and Palestine can’t simultaneously exist. Israel is an occupying power, and Palestinians are a native population, and they are a threat to the existence of Israel because Israel is a settler colonial state.”
Odeh said, despite the letter’s wording, she believes it signifies a large shift surrounding conversations about speaking up for Palestine.
“It’s so unfortunate the events that had to take place for the shift to be so monumental, but it’s happening,” Odeh said. “People are still at the end of the day, tiptoeing, still playing into both sideism, completely ignoring power dynamics. But at the end of the day, it is a big step forward.”
Hakim said she thinks the increased support from U-M faculty through the formation of a Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine and the Senate Assembly vote for divestment from companies with financial ties to Israel is only adding to the momentum of student activism on campus.
“As SAFE members, it’s been so cool to see more support from faculty over the last few months,” Hakim said. “We hope to continue working even more collaboratively with them, and we encourage any and all faculty members to get involved.”
Daily Staff Reporter Noor Khanafer can be reached at noorkk@umich.edu.