Stephen M. Flatow is President of the Religious Zionists of America (RZA) He is the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995 and the author of A Father’s Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terror. Note: The RZA is not affiliated with any American or Israeli political party.
The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) was once respected as the guardian of academic freedom on college and university campuses. Today, under its current president Todd Wolfson, it has transformed into a megaphone for anti-Israel propaganda, abandoning its mission in favor of political activism that isolates Jewish and Zionist academics.
In a recent interview, Wolfson declared that the United States should not send “any” weapons to Israel — “not defensive or offensive, nothing.” He even referred to Israel’s war against Hamas as “the genocide… taking place in Gaza.” These are not the words of a neutral defender of intellectual debate. They are the slogans of an activist determined to demonize the Jewish state.
Two organizations that have dedicated themselves to countering antisemitism, the Anti-Defamation League and the Academic Engagement Network, blasted Wolfson’s remarks, warning that his rhetoric fuels hostility against Jews and Zionists on campus. As AEN pointed out, the AAUP has taken “a pattern of escalating extreme political stances” since the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre. In April, it even partnered with Jewish Voice for Peace and Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine to sponsor a “National Day of Action” — code for mobilizing campuses against Israel.
Wolfson’s statement is just the latest step in a troubling trajectory. Under his leadership, the AAUP dropped its longtime opposition to academic boycotts. That decision opened the door to quiet but effective discrimination: professors refusing to assign Israeli scholarship, blocking Israeli academics from conferences, or denying students the ability to study in Israel. This is not academic freedom — it is academic blacklisting.
Even longtime members are alarmed. Jeffrey Podoshen, a professor at Franklin & Marshall College and former AAUP chapter president, suspended his dues, saying the group now has a “singular fixation on Israel” and is more interested in politics than its original mission. Gregory Brown, a historian at the University of Nevada, noted that statements once carefully vetted now appear to come from one man at the top. The AAUP’s credibility, he warns, is collapsing.
This descent fits neatly into what Natan Sharansky called the “3 D’s” of modern antisemitism: “demonization, delegitimization, and double standards.” Israel is demonized as committing “genocide,” delegitimized as unworthy of self-defense, and held to standards applied to no other nation. China, Russia, Iran — all escape serious scrutiny from the AAUP leadership. Only the Jewish state is singled out.
For American Jews who have clung to the illusion that these professional organizations are neutral forums for scholarship, the message is clear: they are not. For Israelis, who value education as a sacred calling, the lesson is just as stark: the institutions shaping America’s future teachers and professors are indoctrinating them to view Israel not as a vibrant democracy under siege, but as a pariah to be shunned.
The AAUP and its allies talk of “freedom of speech” and “academic freedom,” but they are practicing the opposite. By enforcing ideological conformity on Israel, they are silencing dissent, punishing Zionist voices, and promoting antisemitism under the banner of progress.
The damage will not be limited to campus debates. The professors trained under this new orthodoxy will educate the next generation of Americans. If Israel is consistently cast as illegitimate and evil, what kind of support will Israel find among tomorrow’s leaders?
The AAUP has humiliated itself. Its president calls Israel’s self-defense “genocide,” while cozying up to fringe anti-Zionist groups. Its policies enable academic boycotts that punish Jewish scholars and students. And its members, by staying silent, risk complicity.
Academic freedom should mean robust, open debate. Instead, under Wolfson, the AAUP has turned into a factory of double standards. For Jews and Israelis, the warning could not be louder: America’s educational establishment is increasingly hostile territory, and its hostility is aimed squarely at the Jewish state.