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Is This Why Some American Universities Aren't Cracking Down on Hamas Sympathizers?

Guy Benson
Guy Benson  |  October 17, 2023 10:05 AM

I've been quite critical of my alma mater's response to Hamas' brutal murders of 1,300 Israelis on October 7. It began with days of silence, followed by a privately-relayed decision against making any institutional comment (reported publicly by me), followed by an incoherent and hypocritical public statement that there would be no institutional comment, followed by another public statement clarifying that the terrorists' butchery of Jews was, in fact, an affront to the university's values, after all.  A mess.  With pro-Hamas student groups in full throat, I've heard from disgusted pro-Israel students and alumni, including quite a few Jews who are deeply and especially disturbed.  

It is entirely possible that NU has bungled this situation with a string of embarrassing moral failures due to garden variety cowardice, particularly in light of the indecisive and weak 'leadership' of its new president, Michael Schill.  It's more than plausible that Schill et al feared stirring anger from both pro-Israel and "pro-Palestine" community members, opting to slink around in unprofessed neutrality in the face of the deadliest single-day slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust.  Once that poor decision created a backlash, and a counter-backlash, we were treated to a flurry of equivocal statements, all seemingly designed to avoid incurring various constituencies' wrath.

Another theory I've seen floating around, of which I was initially dismissive, is that Northwestern -- which has rarely shied away from wading into a wide range of national and geopolitical controversies -- might be treading very carefully in this circumstance due to financial interests.  The university has a campus in Doha, Qatar, critics have noted, so follow the money.  And there is an awful lot of money involved.  More on that below.  First, consider this terrible statement from the CEO of the Qatar Foundation, a deep-pocketed, government-sponsored non-profit organization:


Qatar's official government stance is basically identical and unsurprising, coming from an anti-Israel regime that harbors the highest-level Hamas terrorists:


As a reminder, this is the country that corruptly won its bid to host the World Cup, used highly exploitive and deadly labor practices to build the facilities, and barred fans from publicly supporting LGBT rights (getting virtually zero pushback from corporate sponsors, who suddenly lost their collective taste for cultural and political virtue signaling).  It is also the country that has established a complex of American universities in its capital city.  That project, spearheaded by the pro-Hamas, state-funded Qatar Foundation, has been extremely lucrative for the schools involved:

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A small but wealthy Persian Gulf petrostate, Qatar recently became the top foreign funder of American universities, donating at least $4.7 billion between 2001 and 2021...The top recipients of Qatari funds have something in common: they all have branch campuses in the country. According to the Department of Education, Northwestern University received more than $600 million in Qatari gifts and contracts since it opened a branch campus in the country in 2007. The Illinois-based university is one of six American campuses in Qatar, each of which has a particular specialization...The Qatar Foundation (QF), a state-led non-profit founded in 1995 by Qatar’s ruling family to improve Qatari society, funded this educational complex...After founding QF, Qatar began to recruit Western universities to build branch campuses in Education City, Doha. QF recruited Northwestern to establish a Qatari branch campus in the hopes that the university would train future journalists who could build Qatar’s media presence abroad. At first, this purpose was largely unstated. In 2013, however, NU-Q entered a formal agreement with the Qatari-owned news outlet Al Jazeera designed to train journalists for the outlet...

Universities that enter into agreements with Qatar receive significant criticism because of the emirate’s illiberal practices. Qatar is a quasi-absolute monarchy that offers little in the way of protections for workers, women’s rights, or freedom of the press. Critics of the Qatari government frequently end up in jail, so academic freedom for professors at branch campuses remains a major concern—as does the willingness of American universities to turn a blind eye to Qatar’s illiberal practices...Qatar’s National Vision, a development plan, emphasizes its intention to modernize to keep up with globalization, but modernization does not mean liberalization. Indeed, the National Vision clearly stipulates that Qatar will not compromise its local and traditional values for the sake of modernization. Qatar’s stipulation prompts a natural concern about whether American universities should enter partnerships with the Qatari government...

That piece was published last year.  I'll note that the Israeli government calls Al Jazeera a "propaganda mouthpiece," while others accuse the network of both aiding terrorism and doing the bidding of Qatar's intelligence service (update: A report last year shone a spotlight on the problematic relationship between Northwestern and anti-Israel 'journalistic' training at the Qatar campus).  All of this "prompts a natural concern about whether American universities should enter partnerships with the Qatari government" due to the conflict in basic values, yes, but could there be an even bigger worry?  Might the hyper-generous flow of Qatari petro dollars into university coffers influence those institutions' decisions and public statements on matters such as, say, Israel's self-defense in the face of shocking bloodshed?  Can Northwestern meaningfully assure students, faculty, and alumni that there is no connection whatsoever between Qatari funding and the school's response to the events of October 7?  Not just a denial; substantive assurances. 

It is rather interesting to see an elite institution that prides itself on progressive values tie itself into knots over what to say about a group of medieval savages slaughtering 1,300 Jews in cold blood.  Hamas isn't exactly socially tolerant or enlightened on women's rights, or LGBT rights...or any rights, really).  A clear-eyed, categorical castigation of the attack should be an easy layup for any civilized person and entity.  It has proven to be something other than that for NU.  It's also fascinating to see a school that trumpets its green agenda back home taking nine-figures in petro funding from a regressive regime. Were there ideological and values strings attached to the more than $600,000,000.00 has taken in from the pro-Hamas Qatar Foundation -- stated explicitly, or otherwise?  Incidentally, NU isn't alone in enjoying the Qatari government's exceptional largesse:


For what it's worth, Cornell's president released a statement that failed to condemn Hamas' barbarism, prompting a follow-up denunciation and apology, made under pressure. Carnegie Mellon engaged in some vague, passive voice both-sidesism. Hamas was not mentioned in the Georgetown statement.  This was appropriately strong language from VCU in its (notably delayed) initial statement, followed-up with far more watered-down pablum. Texas A&M's statement was relatively good, but also did not mention Hamas.  It's sadly true that various leaders of universities without deep financial ties to a Hamas-harboring government have behaved similarly or worse than some of these examples listed here.  To be clear, I am not accusing any of the institutions above of predicating their responses to the attack upon Qatar's position, or even being influenced by that consideration.  But following the money certainly raises questions.  I'll leave you with a timely reminder that in spite of pro-Hamas sentiment running shockingly high on certain college campuses, American public opinion is squarely behind Israel and its right to defend itself:


UPDATE - A very timely, scandalous episode that underscores the point of this post.  It's almost as if this meltdown from yesterday was specifically cued up to highlight the nature of the concerns laid out in our post: