A flurry of Harvard University students and groups are desperately trying to backtrack on their organization’s support of a letter blaming Israel for the mass slaughter of its own people by Hamas terrorists — as some business titans seek to blacklist them from future jobs.
Four of the initial 34 student organizations attached to the inflammatory statement have already withdrawn their support — while board members of other groups have quit to distance themselves.
Late Tuesday, 17 other Harvard groups joined around 500 faculty and staff and 3,000 others in signing a counter-statement attacking the other groups’ letter as “completely wrong and deeply offensive,” according to the campus paper, the Harvard Crimson.
A third letter from nearly 160 faculty members also ripped Harvard’s response to the scandal, writing that it “can be seen as nothing less than condoning the mass murder of civilians based only on their nationality.”
Others in groups supporting the initial letter — which held “the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence” — quit while distancing themselves from any involvement.
“As a board member of a Harvard group that signed the statement on Israel, I think it was egregious and have resigned from my role,” a Harvard student posted on X.
“I am sorry for the pain this caused,” the law student continued. “My organization did not have a formal process, and I didn’t even see the statement until we had signed on.”
Follow along with The Post’s live blog for the latest on Hamas’ attack on Israel
She added that she “prevented another student group I remain on the board of from signing on when I saw the statement.
“This statement is not representative of my values, and my heart is with those impacted.”
Israel-Hamas war: How we got here
2005: Israel unilaterally withdraws from the Gaza Strip more than three decades after winning the territory from Egypt in the Six-Day War.
2006: Terrorist group Hamas wins a Palestinian legislative election.
2007: Hamas seizes control of Gaza in a civil war.
2008: Israel launches military offensive against Gaza after Palestinian terrorists fired rockets into the town of Sderot.
2023: Hamas launches the biggest attack on Israel in 50 years, in an early-morning ambush Oct. 7, firing thousands of rockets and sending dozens of militants into Israeli towns.
Terrorists killed more than 1,200 Israelis, wounded more than 4,200, and took at least 200 hostage.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was quick to announce, “We are at war,” and vowed Hamas would pay “a price it has never known.”
The Gaza Health Ministry — which is controlled by Hamas — reported at least 3,000 Palestinians have been killed and more than 12,500 injured since the war began.
“I also want to make it clear that I know firsthand some of my fellow students are in this situation too,” she wrote, noting: “I wasn’t the only board member who stepped down today.”
She later clarified that her organization had signed onto the letter without her knowledge, and has received support from CEO billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman as well as from the Harvard Jewish Law Students’ Association — which acknowledged she was “in no way involved in the joint statement” and thanked her for “standing up for what’s right in a very public manner.”
