BUZZ
Two scholars who left Harvard University after facing criticism from an antisemitism taskforce recently found new positions at Union Theological Seminary in New York City.
A Washington Free Beacon report on the new hires’ views comes shortly after a student group at the seminary hosted an Islamic studies scholar who praised the assassination of two “Zionists.”
Theology Professors Diane Moore and Hussein Rashid will co-direct the seminary’s new center for Religion and Public Life starting in the fall, a recent news release states.
Moore and Rashid resigned from Harvard Divinity School last year after the university’s antisemitism taskforce accused them of pushing an “anti-Israeli” agenda, the Free Beacon reports.
Both were leaders of the school’s Religion and Public Life program, which was “widely perceived as consistently anti-Israeli” under their leadership, according to the taskforce.
The antisemitism taskforce mentioned a number of examples, the Free Beacon reports:
The task force’s report describes an August 2024 paper Moore coauthored with Harvard RPL associate director Hilary Rantisi, explaining that the goal of the program’s annual trip to Israel and the West Bank was to teach a “decolonial approach” to the “Jewish settler colonial project in Palestine” and to “dezionize Jewish consciousness.”
Moore saw at least some success: One student said the excursion helped her “realize the way that Israeli apartheid intends to destroy everything—from after-school art programs to independent film festivals.” …
Just four days after Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, terror attack, Moore and Rashid coauthored a statement urging students to “challenge single story narratives that justify vengeance and retaliation.”
“Start with the rockets fired into Israel by Hamas on October 7, 2023 and not with the illegal occupation of Palestinian land by Israel and the blockade of Gaza since 2007, and you have an entirely different story,” the statement read.
In their new positions this fall, Moore and Rashid will oversee the Union Theological Seminary’s Religion Conflict and Peace Initiative, which will “educate students, both through classroom and experiential learning, about how religions mediate conflict, and can be instrumental in just peacemaking,” according to the news release.
Rashid said in a statement that he is pleased to be joining the seminary, “an icon of social justice movement building.”
“There is a natural connection between Union’s history and the work we do, working towards a just peace,” he stated in the news release.
Earlier this month, the seminary’s chapter of Students for a Liberated Palestine hosted an Islamic studies scholar who called for “jihad” and told students to “be a threat,” The College Fix reported.
The event initially was scheduled to be held on campus, but administrators revoked support and required the student group to find another venue after learning of the “violent nature” of the talk, President Serene Jones stated.
MORE: Scholar calls for ‘jihad,’ praises murder of ‘Zionists’ at Union seminary students’ event
