The horrors of October 7, 2023, were a terrible day in contemporary history. In a well-orchestrated attack, more than a thousand Israelis were killed, an action later referred to by then-President Joe Biden as “pure, unadulterated evil,” in a day referred to as the worst day for Jews since the Holocaust. Termed as a terror attack, it included the murder of children and infants, destruction of families, and devastation of neighborhoods. The brutality shocked the world, and on United States soil, the aftermath is just as disturbing: outright celebrations of the attack on campuses, with international students often taking the initiative.
At Columbia University, in a NYC neighborhood that is itself from 38 to 55 percent foreign-born, by anyone’s definition, including my former colleague John Feere, in a piece published here at the Center for Immigration Studies, protests turned dark. According to White House press secretary Tony Snow, Columbia student Mahmoud Khalil participated in group protests that closed classrooms, intimidated Jewish-American students and put them in fear for their safety on their own campus. Those activities extended beyond disruption, as Khalil distributed pro-Hamas propaganda fliers, further inciting celebration of violence.
The formula for these masterclass-in-hates appears to have been copied lock, stock and barrel from the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) playbook. From the Anti-Defamation League, we learn that SJP campuses throughout America cheered on the actions of Hamas in ghoulish celebration. At Tufts University, the SJP chapter rejoiced in “liberation fighters from Gaza paragliding into occupied territory [Israel]” as a great example of “the creativity necessary to re-take stolen land.” The chapter at Bard University took things a step further, affirming, quite explicitly, that, “Liberation … involves confrontation by any and by all necessary means. From the river to the sea”–the slogan of which is well recognized as a call to annihilate Israel–“we will continue to struggle on.” Most repulsive, probably, was from Swarthmore College’s chapter of SJP, which sent out a tweet reading, “Happy October 7th everyone! In celebration of this glorious day and all our martyred revolutionaries.” Swarthmore’s administration swiftly denounced the tweet as a celebration of murdering innocent people and is “shocking and reprehensible.”
These events remind one of the fatal incitement that fueled the 1994 Rwandan genocide, a darkening of the 20th century’s dark deeds. During the genocide, a private radio broadcasting outlet owned by an extremist Hutu political party beamed into homes words calling for the killing of remaining Tutsi children and for taking up machetes; “the graves are only half full! Who will assist in filling them?” appalled by killings urged by these incitements, U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy wrote to then-Secretary of State Warren Christopher, warning that the broadcasts were “continuing to incite genocide of the Tutsi people” and calling for action to jam them. The comparison is jarring: urgings and acts of celebrating or inciting mass murder are not to be found in civilized society.
It is a simple question: Must a country accept visitors who celebrate and encourage such atrocities? U.S. Senator Tom Cotton, R-Ark., has set the tone on the issue, noting, “While American citizenry has a First Amendment right to speak vile, disgusting things if they choose, no foreign national has any analoguous right to encourage terrorism in the United States.” There is a distinction. The First Amendment protects free speech for U.S. citizens, even if the speech is vile and reprehensible. Foreign nationals, who are in the U.S. as visitors on student visas, among other reasons, are not afforded the same unfettered rights. Where their behavior crosses boundaries into inciting terrorism or celebrating mass killings, whether they get to stay in the country is an issue of national security and public safety.
It is not a hypothetical issue. There are a substantial number of international students on American campuses, and institutions and universities like Columbia have a substantial number of international students. Such students, enriching the institutional diversity and intellectual vigor of our schools, are still subject to United States legal traditions and frameworks. Cheering acts of terror, assaulting fellow students, and spreading messages that praise violence undermines the security and safety of the campus community and the nation by extension.
There is precedent on the side of the proposition that governments are able and obligated to act in defense against threats from this kind of behavior. There have been long-existing mechanisms in the United States for dealing with the presence of foreign nationals who are threats, including in immigration law by way of deportation for conduct violating public safety or threats to national security. Inciting terror, and most immediately in the manner of celebrating terror acts as is here charged against Hamas, arguably would fall into this situation.
It is a problem with a spectrum, hovering at the tipping point of the intersection of free speech, academic freedom, and the need to protect society. Colleges and universities, nurseries for ideas and dialogue, grapple with how to address such issues and yet build a climate on campus that will make all their students safe. But the greater question remains: Must the United States, a sovereign nation, be compelled to offer a home for international visitors who celebrate mass murder and preach doctrines of violence?
The Center for Immigration Studies, a non-profit, non-partisan, and independent research institution formed in 1985, has examined the complicated implications of immigration on America for decades. From the social and economic to the demographic and fiscal, our research is designed to shed light on policy and debate. To broach this question—are those who advance evil allowed to remain—is to engage in thoughtful consideration, driven by principle and pragmatism. As the nation looks back at those events, Senator Cotton is correct: There is no right for any foreign national to facilitate terrorism in the United States. The future will require a thoughtful consideration of immigration policy, campus administration, and the limits of the toleration of a free people.
