NYU issues new hate speech guidelines discouraging students from targeting ‘Zionists’

Students and faculty who discriminate against or harass “Zionists” may be violating New York University’s hate speech policies, according to the school’s updated guidelines for the fall semester.

In July, Meta banned the use of “Zionist” as a cover for attacks on Jews or Israelis on its platforms. Now, NYU, which like many universities became embroiled in pro-Palestinian unrest during the last school year, appears to be the first college to take a stance on the term’s use.

“Using code words, like ‘Zionist,’ does not eliminate the possibility that your speech violates the NDAH [Nondiscrimination and Anti-Harassment] Policy,” read NYU’s new student community standards, which it published on Thursday.

The term Zionist, which has historically referred to people who support Jewish self-determination in the Land of Israel, has increasingly functioned as a pejorative in the overheated climate amid the Israel-Hamas war. Many pro-Palestinian protests over the past year loudly condemned “Zionists,” while progressive activists have increasingly targeted “Zionists” in the cultural landscape and some Jewish students have described feeling excluded from campus activities if they do not denounce Zionism.

Pro-Palestinian activists claim that targeting “Zionists” is not antisemitic because not all Jews identify as Zionists. But many Jewish leaders counter that claim by arguing that support for the existence of a Jewish homeland is normative among contemporary Jews.

NYU’s new policy echoes that argument.

“For many Jewish people, Zionism is a part of their Jewish identity,” the standards said. “Speech and conduct that would violate the NDAH if targeting Jewish or Israeli people can also violate the NDAH if directed toward Zionists.” 

The NYU chapter of Jewish on Campus, a national antisemitism watchdog group, posted about the new policy on Instagram, saying that the revised policy “makes it abundantly clear: Zionism is a core component of Jewish identity.” Commenters applauded the change and urged their own campuses to follow suit.

'Criminalizing Palestine solidarity'

Pro-Palestinian groups on campus, meanwhile, said the new code of conduct “criminalizes Palestine solidarity.” In an Instagram post, the student groups and the activist group Writers Against The War on Gaza (which includes several Jews) said the guidelines were “a deliberate attempt to dissolve student and faculty efforts to protest a genocide that is approaching the one-year mark, with a death toll rising into the six-digit range.”

NYU’s policy revision is one of many actions various universities are taking to manage student unrest over Israel and Gaza and protect Jewish students this semester.

The university, which recently opened up a new institute for antisemitism studies, was an early site of tension when the president of its law school’s Student Bar Association refused to condemn Hamas in a newsletter published days after the October 7 attacks. The association soon disbanded and its president lost a job offer from a law firm. NYU also recently settled a discrimination lawsuit brought by Jewish students.

In addition to advising against targeting “Zionists,” NYU’s revised guidelines spell out that encampments and overnight protests are not permitted on its campus. More than 100 people were arrested last spring when NYU cracked down on an encampment erected there.

The school’s new harassment policies offer examples of potential conduct violations, including instances when “Zionists” may have been singled out. The examples include: “Excluding Zionists from an open event, calling for the death of Zionists, applying a ‘no Zionist’ litmus test for participation in any NYU activity, using or disseminating tropes, stereotypes, and conspiracies about Zionists (e.g., ‘Zionists control the media’), demanding a person who is or is perceived to be Jewish or Israeli to state a position on Israel or Zionism, minimizing or denying the Holocaust, or invoking Holocaust imagery or symbols to harass or discriminate.”

In its policy, NYU cited guidelines from the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, which has investigated numerous schools for Title VI violations against Jewish students in the wake of October 7. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination at federally funded institutions on the basis of shared ancestry and national origin, and filing Title VI complaints became a first line of defense against campus antisemitism for Jewish and pro-Israel groups last year. 

As part of its settlement with Jewish students this summer, NYU promised to create a new Title VI coordinator position and also said it would embrace the International Holocaust Remembrance Association’s definition of antisemitism, which includes some criticism of Israel among its examples of antisemitism. A Pro-Palestinian law student group at the school accused NYU’s settlement of having “bolstered its support for the Zionist Entity.”

The school’s anti-harassment guidelines also forbid “calls for genocide of an entire people or group,” “use or dissemination of tropes about protected groups,” and “actions taken against someone based on their field of study, course enrollment, or study abroad participation.” Three leaders of elite universities, though not NYU’s, drew widespread backlash when they declined to unequivocally say in a congressional hearing last year that calls for the genocide of Jews violated school policy.

The guidelines do not distinguish between targeting Jews and targeting Zionists, nor do they address the presence of anti-Zionist Jews in many of the campus protests; one such NYU group calls itself Jews Against Zionism.