42 No. 74 JUSTICE Since the signers of the letter did so “as historians,” that is, as scholars obligated to evaluate all critical evidence, the letter was a stunning example of either ignorance of or lack of interest in the Hamas Charter. Alternatively, if the signatories had bothered to read this crucial document, their letter indicated something worse: an indifference to raw Jew-hatred and a hatred of Israel so intense that it made them willing to support Israel’s enemies, no matter how racist, antisemitic and reactionary they were. The signatories of the July letter, an unknown number of whom were members of the American Historical Association, incorporated the Hamas war against Israel into the attack on American foreign policy and the State of Israel. In addition to the two failed attempts in 2015 and 2016 to convince attendees at the AHA business meeting to pass BDS-type resolutions, HAW pursued a remarkably intense activist campaign against Israel outside the professional organization. This required far more time and energy than most professors could offer given their commitment to teaching, research and service. In 2017, in response to the election of Donald Trump, Historians Against War changed its name to Historians for Peace and Democracy (H-PAD) in order to “integrate our work against the dangers of war abroad with threats to democracy at home.” At every annual meeting of the AHA since 2018, with the exception of 2021 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, H-PAD ran a mini-conference “focused on radical and anti-war themes within the larger conference.” “Mini conferences” at the AHA have long been a standard feature though they are defined by region (e.g., Latin America) or theme (e.g., Catholic, etc.). It appears that the H-PAD mini-conferences were the first time that the AHA allowed an explicitly political organization to hold such a gathering, thereby puncturing even the appearance of scholarly objectivity in the conference program. At the 2024 convention in San Francisco, for example, it “sponsored 17 sessions.”19 Over the past decade, if not longer, the leadership of the AHA tolerated the presence of a political organization at the annual meetings which proudly saw no distinction at all between scholarship and politics and dispensed with even the appearance of objectivity and balanced analysis. That has turned out to be a serious error. This level of intense activism and organizational preparation was evident at the AHA meetings in New York in January 2025. H-PAD partnered with the Radical History Review journal to sponsor eighteen sessions.20 Two dealt with Israel: “Boycotts and Divestment in Historical Perspective,” and “Genocide in Palestine: Understanding the Nakba and the Holocaust.”21 The H-PAD website also includes a separate page on a “Resolution to Oppose Scholasticide in Gaza,” which included arguments in favor and statements by a number of historians making the case,22 as well as links to statements critical of Israel adopted by the Latinx Studies Association, American Psychological Association, Middle East Studies Association, American Sociological Association, American Library Association and American Anthropological Association.23 The website displayed technical skill and effort that required considerable time. The success of H-PAD as an organizational weapon was evident at the AHA business meeting, an event that usually attracts only a small attendance. Because HAW and then H-PAD have continued to introduce resolutions denouncing Israel, the number of AHA members attending the business meeting increased to approximately 200 as those of us opposed to the resolutions also attended. On January 5 in New York, the mobilizing abilities of H-PAD led to what turned out to be 438 people who voted in favor of the “scholasticide” resolution.24 19. “About Us,” HISTORIANS FOR PEACE AND DEMOCRACY, available at https://www.historiansforpeace.org/aboutus/ 20. “H-PAD at the AHA Annual Meeting in 2025,” HISTORIANS FOR PEACE AND DEMOCRACY, available at https://www.historiansforpeace.org/aha2025/ 21. “Boycotts and Divestment in Historical Perspective,” AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION, available at https:// aha.confex.com/aha/2025/webprogram/Session26452. html; “Genocide in Palestine: Understanding the Nakba and the Holocaust,” AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION, available at https://aha.confex.com/aha/2025/webprogram/ Session26450.html 22. “A Resolution to Oppose Genocide in Gaza,” HISTORIANS FOR PEACE AND DEMOCRACY, available at https://www. historiansforpeace.org/scholasticide-in-gaza/ 23. Ibid. 24. For an account of the meeting that quoted me and raised questions about the “scholasticide” resolution, see Pamela Paul, “Historians Condemn Scholasticide Resolution: The Question is Why,” N.Y. TIMES (Jan. 9, 2025), available at https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/09/ opinion/israel-gaza-scholasticide.html. On January 24, 2025, Paul was fired from the Times. The Opinion Editor, Kathleen Kingsbury, who fired Paul, said: “We don’t discuss personnel matters, but any insinuation [that] I
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjgzNzA=