The leaders of three universities denied that their campuses have become “hotbeds of antisemitism,” as one House Republican described them in a congressional hearing on Thursday. But they acknowledged missteps in the handling of the pro-Palestinian demonstrations that have engulfed American universities in recent months, and said that some acts of hostility toward Jewish students need to be addressed.
The hearing grew heated at times, especially as Republicans accused the leaders of Northwestern and Rutgers of “giving in” to demonstrators. But for the most part, the presidents of the two schools, as well as the chancellor of the University of California, Los Angeles, appeared to fare better than other university leaders who have testified before the same committee since the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel.
Although they got caught up in some testy exchanges and seemed to dodge a few questions, the leaders appeared to have navigated their testimony on Thursday without many significant missteps. Their responses were at times considered, and at other times combative. They pointed to the challenges of balancing student safety with free speech — especially at Rutgers and U.C.L.A., which are both public universities that must abide by the First Amendment — and they condemned episodes of antisemitism on campus.
Here are five takeaways from the hearing.
Republicans expressed outrage over agreements with protesters at Rutgers and Northwestern.
The presidents of Rutgers and Northwestern said that the goal of striking deals with pro-Palestinian protesters had been to end the encampments and restore safety for all students, including Jewish students who found the demonstrations threatening.
Coming to agreements with the demonstrators had made that possible, they said — and noted that they had done it without committing to divesting from Israel, as students had demanded.
“We had to get the encampment down,” said Michael Schill, the president of Northwestern University, adding that he had sought to avoid police intervention on campus — a decision that many of his peers have made, leading to nearly 3,000 arrests at universities since April 18.
Mr. Schill pushed back on the notion that he had rewarded students who engaged in antisemitic conduct. “We agreed to none of their demands,” he added.
Jonathan Holloway, the president of Rutgers, also defended coming to an agreement with pro-Palestinian demonstrators and rejected harsh characterizations of them from some Republicans on the committee.
“They were not, as some have characterized them, terrorists,” he said. “They were our students.”
A Democrat zeroed in on U.C.L.A.
Republicans spent much less time focused on Gene D. Block, the chancellor of the University of California, Los Angeles, where more than 200 pro-Palestinian demonstrators were arrested — but only after a violent attack on their encampment by pro-Israel counterprotesters, none of whom have yet been publicly identified or apprehended.
The most pointed questions of Dr. Block came from Representative Ilhan Omar, Democrat of Minnesota, whose own daughter was suspended by Barnard College for participating in the protests at Columbia University. She asked about the “appalling” images from U.C.L.A. and said the counterprotesters had “attacked students you were responsible for.”
Early in the hearing, Dr. Block acknowledged that he had made mistakes in dealing with the encampment, which was removed after the attack. He added that U.C.L.A. had taken decisive action in recent weeks to keep people on campus safe, including creating a new security office reporting to the chancellor.
“Are any of these people in jail?” Ms. Omar said of the counterprotesters. “It’s been over a month.”
Dr. Block said that the Los Angeles Police Department was working to identify perpetrators of the violence, and that he had tried to get the police there as quickly as possible. Ms. Omar pointed out that there were videos of university security standing by as the attacks unfolded for several hours.
“You should be ashamed for allowing such violence to happen,” she added.
Previous congressional hearings have been more fraught than this one.
This was the fourth in a series of fiery congressional hearings on campus antisemitism in recent months. The university leaders who testified on Thursday appeared to have learned from the previous hearings, which prompted upheaval at several colleges.
In December, a line of questioning from Representative Elise Stefanik, Republican of New York, helped push the presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania out of their jobs, after they appeared to offer evasive answers about whether students who called for genocide would be punished.
Ms. Stefanik’s questions on Thursday were more specific to the events that had happened at the three leaders’ universities, allowing them to challenge her characterizations of what had happened on campus.
Eric Burlison, Republican of Missouri, asked whether leaders believed that phrases like, “From the river to the sea,” and, “Intifada, revolution,” which have been used at some campus protests, were antisemitic. Mr. Schill and Dr. Holloway agreed, to a point.
Mr. Schill said that the phrases had become “dog whistles for antisemitism.” And Dr. Holloway said that the phrases were antisemitic when they “incite violence, threaten or harass.”
Dr. Block said more definitively that he believed that they were antisemitic, though he said surveys suggested that many people would not agree. It was a considered — though not legalistic — approach that appeared to leave the leader largely politically unscathed.
Asked about discipline, university leaders stressed the importance of due process.
Early on, Representative Virginia Foxx, a North Carolina Republican who chairs the House Education and the Workforce Committee, asked all three university presidents how many students had been suspended or expelled for antisemitism since Oct. 7.
Mr. Schill said no Northwestern students had been suspended or expelled. Dr. Holloway said that four people had been suspended at Rutgers, and that the university had imposed some discipline on 19 others. Dr. Block said that U.C.L.A. is evaluating more than 100 reports of antisemitism and Islamophobia.
But as in similar hearings over the past few months, the university leaders said that reports of antisemitism had to be investigated and substantiated before universities could act.
In pointed questioning, Ms. Stefanik asked Mr. Schill about several instances of reported attacks on Jewish students on his campus. Mr. Schill responded that the allegations were being investigated. “We believe, at Northwestern, in due process,” he said — something he repeated later when asked about the actions of several faculty members.
Some of the broadest questions forced university leaders to demur.
Some questions forced the administrators to take a detour into broader issues, including domestic and global politics.
Rep. Burgess Owens, Republican of Utah, pressed Mr. Schill on how much funding Northwestern has received from Qatar, whose government has poured millions of dollars into the Gaza Strip for years, helping to prop up the Hamas government there. Those payments have been tolerated and encouraged by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel.
Mr. Schill said that this was not his area of expertise. But he did say that the university would look into the relationship between its journalism department and Al Jazeera, the influential Arab news network owned by Qatar.
Bob Good, Republican of Virginia, asked Dr. Holloway whether Israel’s government is genocidal. Dr. Holloway said that he did not have an opinion “in terms of that phrase,” but added that he did believe Israel that has “a right to exist and protect itself.”
Mr. Good also asked him whether “MAGA Republicans” were a threat to American Jews.
“I’m not in a position to answer that question, sir,” Dr. Holloway said.
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