In February of 2025, New York Governor Kathy Hochul ordered Hunter College, a public university in the City University of New York (CUNY) system, to eliminate a job listing calling for a “Palestinian Studies Cluster Hire.” Hochul, while claiming to be defending against antisemitism, led the university to delete a job listing which could have led to a more widespread acceptance of Palestinian-Americans and a deeper understanding of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which could potentially humanize people on both sides of the war through critical discussion. Hochul set a dangerous precedent, allowing interference from government officials in the hiring of educators.
Ever since Hamas, a terrorist organization primarily located in Palestine, led an attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, the ensuing war has led to intense discussion, protest and violence in the United States. U.S. Citizens have resorted to extremism on both sides of the conflict, with many promoting violent antisemitism while others call for a complete abolishment of any sort of Palestinian support, even as it relates to culture and history uninvolved with the violence promoted by Hamas.
Hochul seems to have resorted to the latter in an attempt to rid the New York school of any knowledge surrounding Palestine. She defends her actions as a defensive attack on antisemitism, but instead of protecting the Jewish community at Hunter College, she seems to be attacking the Palestinian one. Simply learning about Palestinian culture and history is not antisemitic. The original job description calling for someone “who takes a critical lens to issues pertaining to Palestine including but not limited to settler-colonialism, genocide, human rights, apartheid, migration, climate and infrastructure devastation, health, race, gender, and sexuality,” seems intended to find an individual willing to discuss the issues surrounding Palestine at length, and nowhere suggests that antisemitic ideas will be enforced. Shortly after removing the original description the job notice was reissued without mentioning “genocide,” “settler colonialism” and “apartheid.”
Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, a former CUNY trustee, claims that the description demonizes Israel, saying that, “to make a Palestinian Studies’ course – completely about alleged Jewish crimes – is akin to courses offered in the Nazi era which ascribed all the world’s crimes to the Jews.” While the histories of Israel and Palestine are deeply intertwined, nowhere in the aforementioned description is it suggested that the point of the course would be to preach antisemitism. While Jewish communities certainly have the right to be wary of antisemitism, which has led to unwarranted death and destruction throughout global history, calling for a complete abolishment of education surrounding Palestine is erasing the culture of another group of people. In an attempt to protect one group of people, the freedom of another is in danger.
Hochul’s actions in this matter set a dangerous precedent for other lawmakers; partisan lawmakers are responsible for overseeing educational hiring. This idea is obstructive to freedom of information and could lead to the silencing of certain groups of American students as well as a lack of information surrounding topics that go against lawmakers’ personal ideologies. By censoring Hunter College’s attempt to provide a second perspective on Palestinian culture, Hochul is promoting hatred towards all Palestinians, neglecting the fact that most are not affiliated with Hamas. Under the guise of defending students against violence, Hochul is spreading uneducated hatred.
This is hardly the first time that politicians have unethically involved themselves in university hiring. In 2023, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis appointed seven new highly conservative members to the New College Board of Trustees, a public university with a prominent LGBTQ+ community. DeSantis’ actions, targeting LGBTQ+ individuals within the university, were intended to directly harm specific students due to their sexual orientation. The appointments made by DeSantis, who later used their power to replace the New College president Patricia Okker, are undoubtedly greatly harmful to the student population, whose academic freedom is being infringed upon as an environment is built around them specifically designed to make them feel unsafe.
University hiring decisions need to be left to the educational institution from whence they originate, rather than government officials who either have limited knowledge of the subject which they seek to change or are motivated by their own personal, often religious, ideologies. It is incredibly dangerous to allow often biased politicians to interfere in freedom of information and education, especially in a country with a democratic system of government that relies on the decision-making of the citizens. Information is a necessary right, and politicians should not be using their power to take it away.
Julia Cholerton, FCRH ’28, is an English major from Gig Harbor, Wash.
