Israeli billionaire Idan Ofer and his wife are resigning from their posts on the executive board of Harvard’s Kennedy School in protest of school president Claudine Gay’s belated, lukewarm response to the student letter blaming Israel for the massacre committed by Hamas terrorists on Saturday.
Ofer, the shipping and chemicals magnate whose net worth was valued by Forbes at $14 billion as of Thursday, said he and his wife were quitting the board, according to the Hebrew-language news site TheMarker.
Ofer and his wife, Batia, said they resigned “in protest of the shocking and insensitive response by the president of the university, who did not condemn the letter by student organizations who blamed Israel for the massacres.”
The Post has sought comment from the Ofers as well as from Harvard.
Gay has come under fire from Harvard alums including former school president Larry Summers, who decried the “delayed” statement from her office in response to the student letter.
Idan Ofer, an Israeli shipping and chemicals magnate worth an estimated $14 billion, and his wife, Batia, are resigning from the executive board of Harvard Kennedy School. Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images“Why can’t we give reassurance that the University stands squarely against Hamas terror to frightened students when 35 groups of their fellow students appear to be blaming all the violence on Israel?” Summers wrote in his social media post late Monday.
Summers’ disappointment was in response to the lukewarm statement released by the president’s office on Monday.
Idan and Batia Ofer jointly own a majority stake in Israel Corp, the largest holding company in Israel. REUTERS
The Ofers said Harvard president Claudine Gay’s refusal to explicitly condemn a letter from student groups blaming Israel for the massacres perpetrated by Hamas triggered their decision to quit. AP“We write to you today heartbroken by the death and destruction unleashed by the attack by Hamas that targeted citizens in Israel this weekend, and by the war in Israel and Gaza now underway,” Harvard administrators wrote in the statement from Monday.
The statement did not explicitly condemn Hamas, prompting Summers to post his criticism.
Gay published a follow-up statement on Tuesday stating: “As the events of recent days continue to reverberate, let there be no doubt that I condemn the terrorist atrocities perpetrated by Hamas.”
“Such inhumanity is abhorrent, whatever one’s individual views of the origins of longstanding conflicts in the region,” Gay wrote in her statement.
The Harvard Kennedy School is considered one of the most prestigious in the country. Getty ImagesMore than 30 student groups issued the incendiary letter hours after Hamas staged an assault on Saturday morning that left more than 1,200 Israelis dead and thousands more wounded.
In a letter titled “Joint Statement by Harvard Palestine Solidarity Groups on the Situation in Palestine,” 31 student organizations — including the Ivy League’s affiliate of Amnesty International — condemned Israel.
Israel-Hamas war: How we got here
2005: Israel unilaterally withdraws from the Gaza Strip more than three decades after winning the territory from Egypt in the Six-Day War.
2006: Terrorist group Hamas wins a Palestinian legislative election.
2007: Hamas seizes control of Gaza in a civil war.
2008: Israel launches military offensive against Gaza after Palestinian terrorists fired rockets into the town of Sderot.
2023: Hamas launches the biggest attack on Israel in 50 years, in an early-morning ambush Oct. 7, firing thousands of rockets and sending dozens of militants into Israeli towns.
Terrorists killed more than 1,200 Israelis, wounded more than 4,200, and took at least 200 hostage.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was quick to announce, “We are at war,” and vowed Hamas would pay “a price it has never known.”
The Gaza Health Ministry — which is controlled by Hamas — reported at least 3,000 Palestinians have been killed and more than 12,500 injured since the war began.
The groups claimed Hamas’ attack “did not happen in a vacuum,” and the Israeli government has forced Palestinians to live in an “open-air prison for over two decades,” according to the letter obtained by The Post
“We, the undersigned student organizations, hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence,” the letter reads.
Larry Summers, former Harvard president, has also been critical of the school administration’s response to the letter. Peterson Institute for International Economics“The apartheid regime is the only one to blame,” the groups claimed.
The letter prompted a furious response from business leaders, chief among them hedge fund billionaire Bill Ackman, who demanded that Harvard produce a list of names of the students who count as members of the groups that co-signed the letter.
Ackman enlisted the support of at least a dozen business executives who vowed to never hire students who are members of the groups that supported the statement.
But Summers and Harvard professor Jason Furman pushed back on Ackman, saying he went too far.
The Ofer family is one of the wealthiest in Israel. The late patriarch, Sammy Ofer, derived most of his wealth from his ownership stake in Israel Chemicals as well as ZIM, the cargo shipping service.
Idan and Batia Ofer jointly own a majority stake in Israel Corp. and Kenon Holdings, which was spun off from Israel Corp.
