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JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.

WHAT’S DRIVING THE AMERICAN JEWISH CONVERSATION

Learn about what’s going on with campus antisemitism by joining a Zoom conversation led by the Forward’s Arno Rosenfeld on May 19 at 7:30 p.m.

Today is Yom Hazikaron, Israel’s Memorial Day. Egypt joins genocide case at international court, what a school divesting from Israel actually looks like, 13% of 2020 Biden voters say president’s pro-Israel stance will change their 2024 vote, and a high school newspaper in hot water over Hitler.

CONFLICT ON CAMPUS

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators at Pomona College's commencement Sunday in Los Angeles. (Getty)

Campus commencements…

For the most part, the second weekend of college commencements went off without major protests. However, there were some incidents, including…

Hundreds of graduating students disrupted the ceremony at the University of California, Berkeley. About 60 graduates walked out of the Virginia Commonwealth University commencement, and some University of Wisconsin students stood with their backs to the chancellor as she spoke.

Roughly 30 students chanting “Free, free Palestine” walked out of the Duke University graduation when the commencement speaker, Jerry Seinfeld, took the stage. Seinfeld and his wife, Jessica, have been vocal supporters of the Jewish state since the war began, and traveled to Israel in December to meet with families of the hostages. Watch Seinfeld’s speech.

Emma Platt, left, and Lila Steinbach at Washington University in St. Louis. (Andrew Silverstein)

Looking ahead…

We dispatched Andrew Silverstein to St. Louis to interview two Jewish seniors at Washington University who are graduating today…

They differ on Israel, but share a sense of loss: “Both young Jewish women graduated from Jewish day school, attended Jewish summer camps and wear Star of David necklaces. Both believe Israelis and Palestinians have a right to self-determination,” reports Andrew. “But they headed in opposite directions during the most contentious year on campus — one finding a home in Hillel and one deciding that she did not have a place there anymore.” Read the story ➤

➤ Colson Whitehead, the Pulitzer-Prize winning novelist, canceled his upcoming commencement address at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, over the school’s decision to call the police on protesters.

Students at the University of Texas commencement Saturday in Austin. (Getty)

On the money…

A major foundation paused its donations to Columbia University, a move that threatens to cost the school tens of millions of dollars over the coming years.

Union Theological Seminary, an ecumenical school that shares a graduate studies program with Columbia University but is independent, voted to divest from companies profiting from the war.

Over the past week, several schools — including Middlebury College, Rutgers and the University of Minnesota — agreed to discuss divesting from Israel in exchange for protesters packing up their encampments.

Opinion | Student protesters want universities to ‘divest’ from Israel. What does that actually mean? “Practically nothing,” writes Dany Bahar, who is on the faculty at Brown University. It’s “either insignificant, as only about 1% of all firms in the American stock exchanges are Israeli, or so completely unrealistic and unreasonable — severing ties with almost all American multinational companies — as to be an ineffective tool to pressure the Israeli government.” A better bet, he suggests, is to invest in Palestinians, “an idea that we could all rally behind.” Read his essay ➤

Plus…

A majority of Jewish college students in the U.S. say they feel less safe due to campus protests, according to a study released Monday by Hillel which interviewed 310 students, nearly half of which attend schools in the Northeast.

The president of Cornell University will step down, becoming the third Ivy League leader to announce her resignation in the wake of campus conflicts about the war.

The U.S. Department of Education opened an investigation into the School District of Philadelphia, after some parents complained about antisemitism at K-12 schools.

🔎 Zooming out: Officials from K-12 schools in California, Maryland and New York testified before Congress last week over similar allegations.

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ISRAEL AT WAR

Israeli army tanks move near the border with Gaza on Monday. (Getty)

Egypt said it would join South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice.

Around 13% of the voters who say they voted for President Joe Biden in 2020 do not plan to do so again, citing his foreign policy or the war in Gaza, according to a new set of polls.

A secret Hamas police force has for years monitored the political activity, and even the love lives, of everyday Palestinians, according to an investigation by The New York Times.

A small group of pro-Palestinian protesters near Disney World on Saturday blocked an exit and caused some traffic disruption.

Is your favorite author a Zionist? So asks a viral list that is igniting antisemitism fears in the literary world. “It’s truly chilling,” said the CEO of the Jewish Book Council.

A nuanced book about daily life in Israel for Palestinians, written before Oct. 7, won the Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction last week, but “the discourse around it is hopelessly siloed,” writes our editor-in-chief, Jodi Rudoren, in an interview with its author.

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NEW FROM THE FORWARD

WHAT ELSE YOU NEED TO KNOW TODAY

Israel’s Eden Golan performed at the Eurovision finale Saturday night in Sweden. (Getty)

🎶 Israel’s Eden Golan placed fifth Saturday night at the Eurovision Song Contest amid boos and protests from critics of her country and its prosecution of the war in Gaza, our Talya Zax reports from Sweden. (Forward)

🤦 A Sacramento high school put its journalism adviser on paid administrative leave after its student newspaper printed a quote from a student praising Adolf Hitler. (Sacramento Bee)

🦴 Prosecutors looking to learn more about the human skeletons recently found buried outside Hitler’s former lair in Poland have ended their investigation because the advanced decay made it impossible to determine the cause of death. (AP)

Shiva calls ➤ Nancy Neveloff Dubler, a bioethicist who pioneered methods to help deathbed patients, died at 82 … Ilon Specht, a marketing copywriter who hatched a feminist ad campaign for L’Oreal, died at 81 … Sam Rubin, a Los Angeles TV anchor known for his celebrity interviews, died at 64.

What else we’re reading ➤ As antisemitism surges post-Oct. 7, more volunteers are training to protect synagogues … Drugs, sacraments or medicine? Psychedelic churches blur the line … The chaotic rise and fall of the anti-Netanyahu protester who became Israel’s spokesperson.

PHOTO OF THE DAY

Israelis observe two minutes of silence on a Jerusalem street Monday to mark Memorial Day. (Getty)

Joint Israeli-Palestinian Memorial Day ceremony calls for sharing grief, not keeping score: “Pain is pain, and we need to share it,” Ahmed Alhelou, a Palestinian who has seen 61 relatives killed in Gaza, told our Susan Greene in Israel. Yonatan Ziegen, a son of the peace activist Vivian Silver, who was killed on Kibbutz Be’eri on Oct. 7, said that observing Memorial Day should be an exercise in “humanity and compassion, not nationalism.” Read the story ➤

Related: For the siblings of hostages, every day is Memorial Day.

Thanks to Antonia Fusco and Jacob Kornbluh for contributing to today’s newsletter, and to Beth Harpaz for editing it. You can reach the “Forwarding” team at [email protected].

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