Larry Summers slammed Harvard for inviting a controversial Palestinian American scholar to the Ivy League campus twice since the Oct. 7 terror attacks despite his alleged “antisemitic” views — but hasn’t reached out to any pro-Israel speakers.
The former Treasury Secretary and Harvard president decried the invitations extended to Rashid Khalidi, a professor of modern Arab studies at Columbia University and former de facto spokesperson for the Palestinian Liberation Organization.
Summers — one of the first people to call out his alma mater for not condemning the massacre — likened Khalidi to Edward Said, another Palestinian American scholar who taught literature at Columbia University and was critical of Israel.
“I note Edward Said’s intellectual heir, Rashid Khalidi, who many see as anti-semitic has been invited twice since October 7 to speak at the University,” Summers wrote in a lengthy X post on Tuesday.
“Everyone should be free to speak or invite speakers. I also note with disappointment, but not actually surprise, that to my knowledge Harvard has not had speakers like Dennis Ross or Bret Stephens who take pro-Israel positions.”
Summers went on to say that “with all the rhetoric about open dialogue and debate, it is remarkable that in Harvard College there is no yet announced dialogue or debate on any Middle East or diversity related issue.”
The Post has sought comment from Summers, Harvard and Khalidi.
In the 1970s, Khalidi acted as a spokesperson for Yasser Arafat’s PLO while teaching in Beirut. The PLO relocated its forces to Lebanon after its expulsion from Jordan in 1970.
In the early 1990s, he was an adviser to the Palestinians during peace negotiations with Israel.
Weeks after Hamas killed 1,200 people in its stunning attack in Israel, Khalidi told journalist Glenn Greenwald that “I think it’s very clear that if you occupy and if you imprison and blockade and besiege a population, sooner or later that population is going to react, violently and negatively.”
Khalidi declined to say whether Israel had a “legal and moral right” to respond with force to the Hamas attacks.
“Israel had assumed that it could live a peaceful, quiet life whilst putting its boot heel on the Palestinians in the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip. And sooner or later, that had to explode,” Khalidi said.
In 2008, the Los Angeles Times reported that it obtained a video showing then-state Sen. Barack Obama giving a toast to Khalidi at a 2003 farewell dinner in Chicago.
When Obama ran for president, Khalidi told the LA Times that Obama was no longer in touch with him despite having had dinner with him on several occasions when they both lived in Chicago.
In Summers’ lengthy post, he added: “My confidence in Harvard leadership’s ability and will to confront anti-semitism and the demonization of Israel continues to decline.”
“Unfortunately, it is becoming ever clearer why Harvard ranks first on anti-semitism, even as it ranks last on upholding free speech.”
He cited Harvard’s Center for Middle Eastern Studies, whose executive committee recently endorsed a statement by the board of the Middle East Studies Association of North America that accused Israel of “besieging the Gaza Strip and indiscriminately bombarding its population and infrastructure.”
Israel “kills, maims, and displaces Palestinians” while “exacerbating the structural violence of Israeli rule...[which] does little to increase the safety of Israelis,” according to the statement.
Summers accused Harvard’s Center for Middle Eastern Studies of endorsing a statement that “demonizes” Israel.
The Post has sought comment from the Harvard Center for Middle Eastern Studies.
Famous Harvard alumni like Summers and hedge fund billionaires Ken Griffin and Bill Ackman have blasted the school for its response to antisemitic incidents on campus in the wake of Oct. 7.
Griffin told a conference in Miami on Tuesday that he would halt financial support for Harvard unless it undertakes significant changes to its policy regarding antisemitism as the hedge fund billionaire lamented the “whiny snowflakes” that were being produced by Ivy League schools.
Ackman, founder and CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, was one of the leading voices calling for the ouster of Claudine Gay, the Harvard president who resigned earlier this month after it was learned she had plagiarized several academic papers.
Gay’s replacement, interim president Alan Garber, sparked outrage after he named a fierce critic of Israel, Prof. Derek Penslar, as co-chair of a presidential task force devoted to combating campus antisemitism.
Summers panned the move last week, saying: “I have lost confidence in the determination and ability of the Harvard Corporation and Harvard leadership to maintain Harvard as a place where Jews and Israelis can flourish.”
