Professor Hussein Rashid, associate dean of the "Religion in Public Life" program at Harvard Divinity School, recently resigned citing anti-Muslim bias and the university's failure to condemn racist remarks. He was the second Muslim member of faculty to do so. In a letter to students he claimed Harvard didn't protect him from attacks by Jewish groups on campus, including Hillel International and Chabad Rabbi Hirschy Zarchi.
Rashid accused Harvard of allowing the Jewish community to portray his academic center as a "Hamas stronghold on campus" without refuting the claims.
In his resignation letter, Rashid, a Muslim-American, wrote: " Since I was a student here decades ago, I have been acutely aware of the anti-Muslim bias (amongst other racisms and discriminatory attitudes that exist here). That bias has only gotten worse and Harvard is not a space where I choose to spend my time.”
He pointed to a Chabad on Campus Instagram post in which Rabbi Zarchi claimed Harvard had "academic centers functioning as de facto embassies of Hamas or the Palestinian Authority," and called for their closure or a complete overhaul.
The Religion in Public Life program, established in 2020, prepares students in public policy for issues related to religion's role and its response to global conflicts. Rashid's resignation follows the abrupt departure of Professor Diane Moore, an associate dean in the program.
Moore had planned to retire at the end of the academic year but left unexpectedly in January. A university spokesperson declined to say whether she resigned or was dismissed and Moore didn't comment.
The crisis escalated after faculty members, including Moore and Rashid, issued a statement days after Hamas' October 7 attack, urging students not to ignore "generations of Israeli occupation and oppression."
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A newsletter to students read: "Starting the story with Hamas' attack on October 7 instead of Israeli occupation and the Gaza siege presents a completely different picture. Recognizing the context of this latest wave of violence does not diminish the pain and suffering."
Jewish campus groups, including Hillel International and Zarchi, accused the program of justifying Hamas' terror and blaming Israel for the attack. Mounting pressure led to the cancellation of a planned course, Narratives of Displacement and Belonging in Israel-Palestine, which included a student trip to the West Bank.
These resignations are part of a broader crisis at Harvard following the October 7 massacre, which included the university president's resignation and lawsuits by Israeli and Jewish students alleging a hostile environment.
Last month, Harvard settled its antisemitism case, agreeing to collaborate with an Israeli academic institution and adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which critics argue restricts free speech on Israel. The day after the agreement, another Harvard official, Jay Ulfelder, head of the "Nonviolent Action Lab" at the public policy school, resigned.
In his letter, he accused Harvard of "suppressing protests against a genocide punctuating a 76-year history of violent dispossession and subordination of the Palestinian people " and called the adoption of the IHRA definition of antisemitism "the final push" for his departure.
The Harvard Jewish community sees the resignations as a victory. In a letter to Jewish students, Rabbi Jason Rubenstein of Hillel International wrote: "In the 10 days following the settlement, three of the most vocal anti-Zionists have departed, or announced their impending departure, from Harvard’s faculty.”
Rashid, however, said such statements prove the hostile environment he faced. “It became a very permissive attitude to accuse us if we said anything that people didn’t like. I kept asking for somebody to say something and they never did. I find this an untenable situation. I have to get out of an environment that is actively and directly harmful to me,” he said.