BUZZ
UPDATED
The American Historical Association’s leadership again vetoed anti-Israel resolutions brought by its members.
Over the weekend, historians met in Chicago for the annual conference of the academic group. As like last year, they passed resolutions condemning Israel and asking the association to take an official stance.
“The first resolution criticized what it characterized as intentional ‘scholasticide’ in Gaza, where most of the educational system, including all 12 universities, has been damaged or destroyed,” the New York Times reported. “The second condemned ongoing attacks on academic freedom at American universities, including the silencing of protest against ‘the U.S.-sponsored genocide perpetrated by Israel in Gaza.'”
“Both resolutions passed with nearly 80 percent support from the roughly 360 members who attended the vote, held on Saturday during the group’s annual conference in Chicago,” the newspaper reported. “But on Sunday the 16 voting members of the executive council voted not to pass them on to the full membership of roughly 11,000 for final consideration.”
A similar situation played out last year, when leadership rejected a “scholasticide” resolution for the same reasons, arguing it was improper for the association to take a political stance.
“Approving [the resolutions] on behalf of the entire association would present institutional risk and have long-term implications for the discipline and the organization,” the executive leadership stated this year.
New School historian Natalie Petrzela again raised concerns that such a resolution would lead to increased scrutiny from the Trump administration, an objection she raised in 2025 as well.
“History is under assault right now,” Petrzela told the New York Times. “Pushing the pre-eminent organization of historians to take an overtly political stance only serves to divide the organization and also to jeopardize its reputation as a place for nonpartisan historical inquiry.”
But proponents said the resolution should have been allowed to go to a full vote of the more than 10,000 members of the association.
The NY Times reported:
Margaret Power, a retired professor at the Illinois Institute for Technology, said the executive council’s action reflected an “anti-Palestinian bias among leadership” and a lack of respect for members’ democratic wishes.
“If they had any hesitation of which way to go, they should have sent it to the full membership, so the entire membership could express its opinion,” she said. “That’s how a democratic organization operates.”
Meanwhile, conservative law professor Josh Blackman commented the vote shows that academic historians have liberal political biases.
“Professional historians are not apolitical,” he wrote for Reason.
“They lean overwhelmingly to the left, and are subject to the same sorts of biases as conservatives,” the South Texas College of Law Houston professor wrote.
Blackman, citing the NY Times, noted the Modern Language Association also advanced an anti-Israel resolution for a full vote over the weekend. Members of the organization helped write the resolution for the American Historical Association.
“As left-wing as the legal professoriate is, it still seems moderate when compared to the liberal arts,” Blackman wrote. “The MLA, of course, passed the Gaza resolution.”
Following the publication of this article, the MLA reached out to The Fix and said it did not write the resolution.
“The resolution was created by the Radical Caucus in English and the Modern Languages, a separate entity from the Modern Language Association,” Director of Outreach Anna Chang told The Fix.
“And while it was approved by the MLA Delegate Assembly, it has not been passed by the MLA,” Chang wrote. “A resolution approved by the Delegate Assembly must next go to a vote of the full membership, which will take place in the spring.”
“For a resolution to be ratified, it must be approved in a ‘majority vote in which the number of those voting for ratification equals at least ten percent of the association’s membership,’ according to the MLA constitution.”
Editor’s note: The article has been updated with comments from the Modern Language Association and to clarify authorship of the Israel resolution.
