thursday feb. 1, 2024
celebrating 120 years
free
on campus
Report alleges admin turned ‘blind eye’ to antisemitism at SU By Kendall Luther news editor
A group of Syracuse University students and parents have submitted a report to the United States House of Representatives alleging the university administration is turning “a blind eye to antisemitism, or giving no consequences for flagrant violations,” according to a release sent to The Daily Orange Wednesday. The report is in response to the House Committee on Education and the Workforce’s establishment of a centralized reporting system in December 2023 for investigating antisemitism on college campuses in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The document is part of a larger filing involving 20
universities and colleges, according to the report. Under Title VI, antisemitic harassment becomes a violation when the harassment creates a hostile environment where the conduct is “sufficiently severe, pervasive or persistent so as to interfere with or limit a student’s ability to participate in or benefit from the services, activities or opportunities offered by a school,” the report stated. The report lists 13 specific complaints of antisemitism, which illustrate “persistent” and “ongoing” incidents that created a “hostile and discriminatory” environment, as well as the university’s failure to address their occurrence. A university spokesperson wrote in a statement to The D.O. that uni-
versity leaders have said on multiple occasions that student safety is SU’s top priority. In a November University Senate meeting, Chancellor Kent Syverud said the university’s administration was prioritizing student safety over free speech and academic freedom amid the Israel-Hamas war. “Consistent with our educational mission, we also permit the discussion and debate of difficult and controversial topics inside and outside the classroom, so long as our policies on impermissible harassment are respected in that process,” the spokesperson wrote.
Women and Gender Studies
The report alleges a visiting teaching professor in SU’s Women’s and Gender Studies Department “incorporated an
antisemitic opinion” into an Oct. 12, 2023, lecture. The report states the visiting teaching professor referred to Israel as “Palestinian occupied land” and issued “defamatory condemnation of Israel” as an “oppressor.” “Jewish students in the class felt very uncomfortable and attacked by (the teaching professor’s) slander of the Jewish state,” the report states. Later that day, the teaching professor sent a follow-up email, acknowledging the student response and referred students to the website for Jewish Voice for Peace, which the report claims is a self-described Jewish organization that uses its identity to “directly confront the American Jewish community about its positions on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”
On its website, JVP describes itself as a Jewish organization that stands in solidarity with Palestine. A Syracuse chapter was started in Fall 2016 and has been active in various demonstrations in the city and in Wednesday’s commemoration of lives lost in Gaza at the Schine Student Center. “(The visiting professor’s) editorializing views about oppression and occupation, coupled with suggestions for aligning with Hamas and Palestinian interests and against Israel is hostile, antisemitic, and – especially in the time frame of being issued only five days after the outbreak of the most horrific war on Jews since the Holocaust — abusive of the teacher-student power dynamic by dismissing the Jewishsee report page 3
on campus
University Neighborhood businesses reflect on the area’s future By Siron Thomas
senior staff writer
Collin Smith remembers frequently visiting J Michael Shoes on Marshall Street as a child in the 2000s. Even though the store took up 300 square feet at the time compared to the 3,000 square feet of space now, Smith said you could feel the pulse that came from community and customer interactions. Now an assistant manager at the retailer, Smith said he felt a change in the “vibration” of the store, which
he sees as a second home, and in the university neighborhood as a whole. “You would feel an energy when you stepped on those bricks,” Smith, who’s been working at the store for around two and a half years, said. “That energy is still there, but I just don’t feel like it’s quite as strong as it used to be.” After years of sales, construction and disruption in the university area, some local business owners are worried about the future state of the neighborhood. This comes
as Syracuse University raises the cost of attendance to the highest it’s been in years and struggles to house new students. In November, SU announced it will convert the Sheraton Syracuse University Hotel & Conference Center — which the university bought in 2000 — into undergraduate housing, with construction set to be finalized before the fall 2024 semester. Students have already been living at the Sheraton as well as at other non-traditional locations like 206 Walnut Ave.
While Smith said the conversion of the Sheraton may help bring more students closer to local businesses, he expressed concern about visitors losing vital lodging close to campus. The nearest hotels to SU’s campus as of now — besides the Sheraton — include Collegian Hotel & Suites, Crowne Plaza and Hotel Skyler. “A majority of families that we’ve seen over the last couple of years book way in advance for the Sheraton,” Smith said. “What are these families gonna do when they come to visit now?”
The university’s influx of purchases and acquisitions is ongoing. In 2019, SU demolished nine buildings on the 700 block of Ostrom Avenue. It also acquired and demolished property on the 800 block of Comstock Avenue in 2022. In July 2021, SU bought The Marshall, which originally opened in 2018, for $69.4 million to increase student housing. The university recently announced it will function as a second-year residence hall in the spring 2024 semester.
see marshall page 3