Different kind of paper chase: In the wake of Oct. 7, a handful of Big Law firms criticized anti-Semitic protests at Ivy League law schools like Harvard and threatened to stop recruiting graduates from those schools. Now, the Harvard Law students who helped drive the protests are getting their “revenge.”
Harvard Law School’s chapter of the National Lawyers Guild recently hosted a “Wikipedia Edit-A-Thon.” Student activists gathered to “edit the Wikipedia pages of Big Law firms,” according to an announcement on Harvard Law School’s website. And while event organizers said they would target firms that argued cases they deemed unsavory, one participant, law student Aashna Avachat, took aim at two firms, Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, that criticized anti-Semitism at Harvard.
“The edit logs show Avachat changed the term ‘antisemitic incidents’ to ‘pro-Palestine protests’ and reworded references to ‘incidents targeting Jewish students’ to incidents that the law firms ‘described … as antisemitic,'” reports our Chuck Ross. “Avachat herself was involved in one incident at Harvard in which her law school classmate, Ibrahim Bharmal, accosted and shoved a Jewish student during an anti-Israel ‘die-in.’ Avachat said she witnessed the incident and claimed Bharmal was protecting ‘peaceful protesters’ against an ‘aggressive’ Jewish student. Both Bharmal and another student activist, Elom Tettey-Tamaklo, were charged in connection with the ‘die-in,’ a case that Harvard delayed by refusing to cooperate with local prosecutors.”
The event “comes at a tumultuous time for Harvard and its law school, which saw its ranking fall to its lowest on record amid concerns about anti-Israel activity on its campus.” By facilitating it, “Harvard Law could also risk alienating the country’s largest law firms, which recruit heavily at the school and are represented on its various advisory boards.”
READ MORE: At Harvard-Hosted ‘Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon,’ Law Students Target the Pages of Firms That Criticized School’s Response to Anti-Semitism
Anti-Semitic symphony: Berklee College of Music is the largest independent contemporary music college in the world and one of the most prestigious, with past students including Quincy Jones and Melissa Etheridge. Roughly six months ago, it made a splashy announcement that “child prodigy” and “leading voice in American popular music” Nicholas Payton would become chair of its brass department. The school did not mention another quality Payton is known for: Jew hatred.
Payton, our Jon Levine reports, “has a years-long history of posting anti-Semitic and historically inaccurate claims about Jews, accusing them of oppressing black people and blaming them for slavery.” In the summer of 2020, he said Jews “still control a large portion of the media and entertainment industry” and have a “sordid past” in which they “exploited” people of color. He also shared a video claiming that “Jewish slave dealers operated in every place slavery existed” and condemned the “synagogue of Satan.” When the video got him called out on social media, he doubled down.
“It’s a quote from the Bible,” Payton said. “He’s speaking on those who claim to be Jews, but are not.”
A New York City-based opera singer, Gideon Dabi, told Levine that Payton’s history of hate did not surprise him. “I wish I had something profound to add except that the music world—which is usually behind trends—is often a monoculture where anti-Semitism is explained away while other types of hate are swiftly published.”
READ MORE: Berklee College of Music Professor Attacked Jews as ‘Vile Predators’ and Blamed Them for Slavery
Away from the Beacon:
- Donie O’Sullivan, the CNN journo who says that only the right suffers from “extremism,” sat down with Taylor Lorenz to laud Luigi Mangione, the CEO killer whom Lorenz described as “handsome,” “smart,” and a “morally good man.”
- U.S. officials haven’t commented publicly on the details of Saturday’s nuclear negotiations with Iran, but according to the Wall Street Journal, Tehran “sought sanctions relief from the United States in exchange for limits on its nuclear program” and sought to “lay a foundation for further negotiations.” Israel probably won’t like the sound of that.
- NBC’s Kristen Welker asked Cory Booker whether Kamala Harris should run for president in 2028. “You know, I know Vice President Harris,” Booker said. “I don’t think she’s concerning herself with 2028.”
- Gretchen Whitmer was widely mocked for hiding behind a binder while facing photographers in the Trump White House—but she swears she has no regrets. “Public service is about putting the people of Michigan before my own interest,” Whitmer told the New York Times. “And that’s what I was doing.”
- Bryce Mitchell, the Holocaust-denying, Hitler-praising UFC fighter, got his ass beat Saturday night in Miami, and Dave Portnoy celebrated the affair by donning a kippah and waving an Israeli flag.
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