A writer and wife of a distinguished Harvard economics professor is apologizing after a video in which she said a student in a keffiyeh was wearing a “terrorist scarf” went viral.
Eve A. Gerber appears in the 26-second video clip, which follows a student filming the interaction.
“Hello, camera. “Thank you for walking through the neighborhoods with your terrorist scarf and making families feel unsafe,” she said of the traditional Palestinian keffiyeh.
“You know, the Palestinians felt pretty unsafe when the Israelis occupied their land,” replied the student, who remained anonymous.
“I’m glad you’re so proud of the slaughter of civilians,” responds Gerber — whose husband is Jason Furman, a former adviser to Barack Obama — to which the student replies, “I’m not.”
Now Geber says she “deeply regrets what I said and did” after the Oct. 14 encounter went viral.
A writer and wife of a distinguished Harvard economics professor is apologizing after a video in which she said a student in a keffiyeh was wearing a “terrorist scarf” went viral
Eve A. Gerber (pictured at right in 2007) is seen in the 26-second video clip, which follows a student filming the interaction
According to progressive media outlet The Sparrow Project, the anonymous student claims Gerber saw her and got out of her car to follow her when she spotted her.
“Student felt compelled to share this video after three Palestinian students Tahseen Ali Ahmad, Kinnan Abdalhamid and Hisham Awartani were horrifically shot in Burlington, VT,” the medium tweeted.
Awartani was paralyzed in the shooting, in which all three men were wearing keffiyehs.
Gerber – who has written for The Atlantic and is US publisher of Five Books – sent an apology to X on Wednesday.
“After I left on October 14th. After hearing chants that I found disturbing at a rally near my house, I spoke to a person on my block who I assumed was from that event. “As the political dispute escalated, I used indefensible words,” she wrote.
“It was wrong to confront someone based on their clothing and to use divisive, accusatory language.” “In the two months since that video, I have tried to learn more and take reparative action.”
“I will continue to do that.” Hatred and inhumanity in any form are abhorrent to me. “I deeply regret what I said and did,” she concluded.
The viral incident has since been condemned by MPs including Ilhan Omar, who called it “shameful and disgusting”.
Gerber's husband, Jason Furman (pictured left), is not only the Aetna Professor of the Practice of Economic Policy at Harvard Kennedy School, but also served as a top economic adviser to President Barack Obama
Before her marriage to Furman, Gerber was married to Bill Gerber (center), a producer of films such as “A Star is Born” and “Gran Torino.”
Jason Furman – who also worked for President Bill Clinton – was the 28th chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers.
According to the Harvard Crimson, Furman privately apologized in a text message to the graduate student on October 20, six days after the confrontation. The confrontation came a week after Hamas's Oct. 7 attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people.
The attack sparked war across the Middle East and outrage on college campuses, and numerous pro-Palestine protests erupted in the weeks that followed.
Furman wrote to someone claiming to represent the person who recorded that there was “absolutely no excuse” for Gerber's actions.
'I'm sorry. “No one should have to go through what your friend went through,” he added.
Before her marriage to Furman, Gerber was married to Bill Gerber, a producer of films such as “A Star is Born” and “Gran Torino.”
Since the start of the Hamas-Israel war, anti-Semitism in America has risen 388 percent, Jonathan Greenblatt, director and CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, said earlier this month.
Barack Obama's former National Security Council adviser has been arrested and charged on multiple counts after shocking footage showed him insulting a halal vendor
Stuart Seldowitz, 64, spent his Thanksgiving morning in court after being charged with five counts of an Islamophobic attack on a halal street vendor
In addition to the shooting of the three students wearing keffiyehs in Burlington, there have also been Islamophobic incidents.
Barack Obama's former National Security Council adviser spent his Thanksgiving morning in court after being charged with five counts in connection with an Islamophobic attack on a halal street vendor.
Stuart Seldowitz, 64, offered a half-hearted apology for letting loose on the street cart owner amid the war between Israel and Hamas in New York City.
Seldowitz appeared before Judge James G. Clynes at Manhattan Criminal Court alongside his attorney, Scott Bookstein. He pleaded not guilty to all charges and was released without bail.
He was wearing the same outfit as when he was arrested the night before. An NYPD spokesperson confirmed that Seldowitz was arrested and charged Wednesday evening.
Seldowitz was charged under the city's hate crimes law with second-degree aggravated harassment and two counts of stalking.
Shocking footage emerged of him telling 24-year-old Mohammad Hussein: “If we killed 4,000 Palestinian children, it wouldn't be enough.”
He also asked whether the victim “raped his daughter like Mohammed and even threatened him with deportation to Egypt” during the medical tirade.
Harvard President Claudine Gay said at Tuesday's congressional hearing that calling for genocide against Jews does not necessarily violate the school's code of conduct
A billboard at Harvard University called for the removal of President Claudine Gay on Sunday. The billboard featured New York Rep. Elise Stefanik mocking Gay after she failed to condemn a blatantly anti-Semitic statement
In recent news at Harvard University, the school's president, Claudine Gay, told Congress that calls for genocide following the raging war between Israel and Hamas could be permissible under college rules.
Gay has received intense backlash when two advertising vans were sent to the Massachusetts campus with a repeat of her remarks to Congress, hours after her fellow college boss Elizabeth Magill was forced out as president of the University of Pennsylvania.
Billboards at Harvard University called for Gay's firing, and similar posters calling for Magill's firing recently appeared on the UPenn campus.
The couple faced intense backlash for their disastrous appearance alongside MIT President Sally Kornbluth on Tuesday as they decided whether calls to eliminate an ethnic group constituted “bullying or harassment.”
Billionaire donors have threatened to strip funding from elite colleges until all three are gone and the activists behind yesterday's action were confident their time was up.
“One down, two more,” a source who used the trucks at Penn and Harvard told Fox News Digital.
Gay also found herself in turmoil after the Ivy League university opened an investigation in October into allegations that she had plagiarized some of her academic papers – months before the allegations became public knowledge, Harvard revealed.
Gay was accused of copying two paragraphs from papers by then-Harvard scholars D. Stephen Voss and Bradley Palmquist. A paragraph is almost identical except for a few words
Harvard launched an investigation in October into allegations that President Claudine Gay plagiarized some of her academic papers, months before the allegations surfaced publicly
The university's board of trustees issued a statement Tuesday announcing that Gay would remain in her post despite calls for her resignation following her disastrous testimony before Congress on anti-Semitism.
The board said: “The University became aware of allegations relating to three articles in late October.” At President Gay's request, the Fellows immediately arranged for independent peer review by respected political scientists and conducted a review of their published work.
The school's newspaper said some of Gay's writings “apparently violate Harvard's current policies regarding plagiarism and academic integrity.”
This came after the Washington Free Beacon and right-wing bloggers Christopher Rufo and Christopher Brunet alleged that Gay had plagiarized portions of four academic papers, including her 1994 PhD dissertation at Harvard entitled “Taking Charge: Black Electoral Success and the Redefinition of American Politics.”
Billionaire Bill Ackman amplified the allegations as part of his campaign to oust Gay from the top job at his alma mater.
Gay defended her work on Tuesday, telling The Boston Globe: “I stand by the integrity of my scholarship.” “Throughout my career, I have worked to ensure that my scholarship meets the highest academic standards.”