26 | APRIL 11 • 2024 

OUR COMMUNITY

STACY GITTLEMAN 
CONTRIBUTING WRITER
I

n the days immediately following 
the Oct. 7 attacks, University of 
Michigan President Santa Ono 
released a statement condemning 
the violent brutality set on the Israeli 
people by Hamas. In the statement, he 
reaffirmed the university’s academic 
and research ties to Israel and the 
Israeli people and said he reached out 
to his colleagues at Israeli universities 
to check on their well-being. 
On Oct. 11, more than 1,000 faculty 
members signed an open letter to 
President Ono, saying that his state-
ment failed to address the plight of the 
Palestinians and called Israel a system-
ic apartheid state. 
Some Jewish faculty at U-M were 
astonished about the content of that 
letter and how many hundreds of their 
colleagues readily signed on. They 
said the letter was laced with “blatantly 
antisemitic and factually inaccurate” 
statements.” 
That is why they formed U-M Faculty 
and Staff Against Antisemitism, a small 
group giving support to Jewish aca-
demics and their students. 
“At least 20 of the signees are col-
leagues from engineering and the 
College of Literature, Science and Arts 
(LSA),” said Professor Rachel Goldman. 
“I reached out to several of them, 
asking them to consider the impact 
of their statements on de-legitimizing 
Israel and promoting antisemitism in 
the wake of the largest slaughter of 
Jews since the Holocaust.”
When the group attempted to get 
faculty signatures on an open letter to 
Ono countering the claims of the other 
letter and called for a firm definition 
of antisemitism on campus, less than 
100 agreed to sign it openly, accord-
ing to Goldman. Many more said they 
supported it, but feared that signing 
openly could affect their career, mental 
health and/or safety. The letter was 
never published publicly though it was 
communicated to key decision makers. 
 
“I have experienced multiple disrup-
tions at the inside entrance to the cafe-

teria on north campus,” Goldman said. 
“That’s where protesters stand in the 
way of foot traffic to try to influence 
students who are interviewing with 
defense contractors and other com-
panies that are accused of ‘wrongly’ 
supporting Israel.”
U-M Faculty and Staff Against 
Antisemitism claim that a key source 
of the antisemitism and anti-Israel 
rhetoric is coming from listserves and 
organizations focused on diversity, 
equity, justice and inclusion, with these 

groups inviting anti-Israel and antise-
mitic speakers as well as distributing 
information about Israel being a colo-
nist settler state.
One member of the group said there 
is a lot of pressure on deans and other 
leaders to be “pro-Palestinian” since 
that voice is so loud and is connected 
with the university’s DEI focus.
The faculty member said it is difficult 
for faculty and students to concentrate, 
study, learn, hold office hours and 
properly conduct class instruction in 
buildings along the Diag during inces-
sant noisy protesting. He said it is hard 
to hear students protesting on a nearly 
daily basis of “calls for the death of all 
Jews and then have to teach them in 
our classes.” Ultimately, it is eating into 
workplace culture and safety. 
“The Oct. 11 letter is anti-Israel, 
antisemitic and contains inaccurate 
facts,” said Galit Levi Dunietz, associate 
professor at the University of Michigan 
Medical School. “Still, more than 1,000 
faculty and staff signed off on it just 
days after the massacre and before 
the war in Gaza had even begun.”
Dunietz said those who signed 
the letter advocate for human rights. 
However, the letter excluded the hor-
rors of Oct. 7.
“I don’t recall any open faculty letter 
that was published against other ongo-
ing conflicts in the world,” Dunietz said.
While Dunietz hasn’t experienced 
direct antisemitism on campus, she 
said she’s aware of efforts to delegit-
imize the existence of Israel through 
listserv emails circulated by grad stu-
dent instructors and faculty members.
“These efforts are not helping the 
people in Gaza nor contributing to our 
community,” Dunietz said. “Still, there 
are many people on campus who sup-
port Israel and the Israeli and Jewish 
communities. As for the university’s 
Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, 
I believe it will not exclude the Jewish 
minority from its agenda.”
Students interviewed said they have 
referred to this open letter to see if any 
of their current professors or graduate 
student instructors had signed off on 

U-M Faculty and Staff Against Antisemitism

Faculty member Hannah Ross’s survey 
shared with students and later retracted.

