College and University Monitor

Every so often an opinion piece in New York Review of Books catches our attention. When Israel is mentioned, it’s rarely positive. A recent op-ed by Professor Katherine Franke is no exception. Ominously-titled “The Pro-Israel Push to Purge US Campus Critics”, Franke paints a picture of Israeli censorship curtailing freedom of speech in American academia.

From the very beginning, the piece is rife with exaggeration and riddled with inaccuracy. Early on, Franke makes a particularly egregious claim – that “the US Department of Education recently adopted a new definition of anti-Semitism, one that equates any criticism of Israel with a hatred of Jews.” This, quite simply, is untrue....