Universities Should Cease Negotiating With Terrorists

Gone is the America that does not negotiate with terrorists. Its universities are capitulating to pro-Hamas demonstrators’ antisemitic demands. And, make no mistake, their target today is Jews, but their terrorist tactics won’t stop there. Higher education’s craven concessions have only emboldened these groups.

In exchange for taking down tent encampments and standing down on terrorizing students, campus administrators have agreed to meet with student protest organizers — often from activist groups such as Students for Justice in Palestine — to discuss divesting from Israel and other steps to validate the October 7th massacre of Israelis.

Northwestern University and Rutgers University’s concessions advance the anti-Israel agenda: new scholarships, teaching and staff positions, and programming for Palestinians regardless of the individual’s merit. Harvard University revoked suspensions and promised listening sessions on a potential Palestine studies center. Princeton University has reportedly promised to consider divestment and to waive disciplinary measures for student protesters. Brown University, Occidental College, Evergreen State College, and the University of Minnesota have agreed to consider divestment from Israel.

Appeasement assaults the dignity and hard work of most students who tried to study for finals or attend graduation as pro-Hamas militants used physical force and intimidation to shut down campuses. It’s the coward’s choice. But it is also a direct insult to Jewish students who now see those who tormented them for months be rewarded.

Terrorism is “(threats of) violent action for political purposes,” the Cambridge Dictionary defines. That is exactly what has been going on on our nation’s campuses over the past few months and why I have filed 33 Title VI complaints with the Department of Education. Earlier this month, protesters at the University of California, Los Angeles knocked a Jewish female student unconscious. Students at Cal Poly Humboldt shoved police as they illegally occupied a building. The janitor who was held hostage in Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall told the press that protesters stormed the building with zip ties and rope to use against anyone who opposed them.

These protesters know what they’re doing. They embrace terrorist tactics. A new poll shows 36% of college students “support protestors engaging in violent acts” and 40% “sympathize” with the terrorist organization. Protesters across the country embody the revolutionary zeal for a globalized “Intifada Revolution”. They are terrorists.

These useful idiots get resources and funding from National Students for Justice in Palestine, US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, and other outside organizations, many of which benefit from George Soros’ Open Society Foundations. Student protesters know what they’re doing but they don’t see that they’re stooges for the adults who want a global revolution.

Their terror tactics directly push an anti-Jewish and anti-Israel agenda, but that’s only step one in a larger anti-America vendetta. Schools that negotiate with students will no doubt pay the price of additional demands, protests, riots, and violence in the years to come. That’s how it goes with terrorists. They don’t honor civility, fairness, or “agreements.”

The good news is that some schools have modeled an appropriate and effective way to maintain a proper learning – and living – environment on campus. The University of Florida’s President Ben Sasse refused to tolerate protesters when they not only broke school policy but also the law by assaulting and spitting on police officers. He had them arrested and their encampments removed, restoring the collegial learning environment that the vast majority of students want and deserve.

The University of North Carolina (UNC) has also been resolute in quelling protests and has beefed up policing on campus. This zero-tolerance approach to unlawful and childish behavior will yield benefits for these universities unlike schools that cowardly appeased. In the words of a Rutgers protester: “We will be back if the demands are not met!”. That’s not a negotiation; it’s a hostage scenario.

But to truly fix this crisis, universities need to eliminate the source of this weaponized student radicalism: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programming. UNC has now joined universities in Virginia, Alabama, Florida, Texas, and Wyoming in banning DEI. This is the kind of leadership we need to see from college and university presidents.

The DEI programming complex has enabled hateful student activism (and terrorism) to spread on campuses. DEI’s guiding principles sow division between groups to propagate anti-American resentment via antisemitic stereotypes that legitimate the complex’s at-all-costs agenda for socially engineered outcomes. Anti-Jewish terrorism has made university and political leaders see that DEI facilitates the radicalization of undereducated youth. To stop the Intifada from spreading off college campuses, universities must go after the fount of incitement and division: DEI programming and values.

Universities that have taken firm action and have rightly suppressed DEI gaslighting provide the blueprint for the way forward. The others will learn the hard way that negotiating with terrorists is cowardly and weak. They will most certainly be back for more.

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Zachary Marschall is editor in chief of the Leadership Institute’s Campus Reform and an adjunct assistant professor at the University of Kentucky.

The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.