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Harvard President: Campus Demonization of Israel Down

(Jerusalem Post)Hilary Keila Krieger - Demonization of Israel and anti-Semitic tension on American campuses has lessened considerably and the divestment movement has dissipated, according to Harvard University President Larry Summers. "While these tensions are by no means absent, they seem to have receded somewhat over the past two years," he said Wednesday in Jerusalem. "The clear and firm refusal of major universities in the United States to contemplate divestiture has led to the drying up of the divestiture movement." Summers lashed out at those who take no moral position. "One of the disturbing tendencies in academic life is that there is a desire on the part of many in the name of open-mindedness to fall into a kind of relativistic denialism in which all positions are equally legitimate, all positions must be respected, and compromise must be entered into no matter what the starting point or reasonableness of the two parties," he said. "It seems to me that Israel is right. Its friends are right. Moral people everywhere are right to resist this approach." The need to view all conflicts symmetrically - "the response of appeasement" which suggests that if there is so much antipathy towards the United States and Israel it must be their "fault" - is a dangerous one, Summers warned. "It's dangerous because it emboldens those who engage in such [demonizing] rhetoric; dangerous because it is not recognizing and telling the truth."
2004-12-24 00:00:00
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