iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Michael Rothberg

The US Commission on Civil Rights has formally rebuked the Trump administration's legal strategy for its "anti-antisemitism" on campus campaign, citing Jewish Studies scholars arguing that "Zionism is not an ethnic or ancestral trait." www.usccr.gov/reports/2026...

usccr.gov

The Federal Response to Antisemitism on American College and University Campuses

The Federal Response to Antisemitism on American College and University Campuses examines how institutions of higher education and the federal government have responded to allegations of antisemitism ...

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Dan Sinykin @dan-sinnamon.bsky.social · 8h

Working on this reported essay, just published, increasingly took over my life for the last two months. PEN America did a terrible disservice with its sloppy reporting about American Jews and Israelis in publishing in July. Josh Lambert and I tried to do better. jewishcurrents.org/what-pen-ame...

jewishcurrents.org

What PEN America Got Wrong About Antisemitism in Publishing

Misleading anecdotes, flawed data, and oversimplified analyses are at the heart of a narrative of Jewish exclusion promoted by the free expression…

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

robin celikates @robin-c.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

I’m so angry I wrote an article: In Germany, fascist majorities are a real possibility again, but the centrist merger of a revived Red Scare with open racism shows that mainstream media & politics are unable or unwilling to comprehend the seriousness of the crisis tribunemag.co.uk/2026/09/germ...

tribunemag.co.uk

Warning from Germany: It’s Socialism or Barbarism

Fascism is at the door, and liberals are ushering it in. Only the left offers hope.

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Joey Fishkin @fishkin.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

I also signed this letter. It's dismaying but I'll just put it plainly: Chancellor Frenk, the leader of my university, is pretty obviously speaking out of both sides of his mouth, aiming to send two very different messages to two very different audiences. And neither one of the messages is true.

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

For those who read German, a lovely piece by @aguigah.bsky.social on Baldwin and Foucault...

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Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

applying "Make ___ Great Again" to Germany really does kinda give the game away

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

#StupidSuez @diplomatofnight.com · 08/09/2026

BREAKING: At the same time that the UK announces a ban on trade with illegal Israeli settlement goods and services, the following states confirm their intent to implement their own bans and push for EU-wide ban. Canada Denmark Finland France Iceland Ireland Norway Poland, Portugal Spain Sweden.

gov.uk

Joint Foreign Ministers' Statement on the Two-State Solution

Statement of the Foreign Ministers of Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and the UK on the Two-State Solution

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Very much worth reading on the election in Germany (text is in English)...

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

This should be .... interesting.

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

#StupidSuez @diplomatofnight.com · 29/08/2026

"...Israel fully controls about ninety-two per cent [of the land west of the Jordan River]." Lowenstein asked, “Ninety-two per cent of the land for fifty per cent of the people—how is that sustainable?”

Kerry, in his warning speech nearly a decade ago, noted how the borders of the Jewish state had moved over time. The 1947 U.N. resolution proposing a partition of the territory left the Palestinians about forty-three per cent of the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. In the wars that immediately followed, Israel expanded its share to seventy-eight per cent of the land, leaving just twenty-two per cent for the Palestinian half of the population. The Oslo Accords, signed over thirty years ago, gave Palestinians at least administrative control of limited areas as a first step toward eventual control of the West Bank and Gaza—almost all of that twenty-two per cent of the land. But on the most recent map, Lowenstein told me, the settlements and outposts, and the military operations in Gaza, appear to permanently confine the Palestinians to control of even less than those limited areas, amounting to just eight per cent of the total land. Israel fully controls about ninety-two per cent. Lowenstein asked, “Ninety-two per cent of the land for fifty per cent of the people—how is that sustainable?” ♦

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

#StupidSuez @diplomatofnight.com · 29/08/2026

Frank Lowenstein, senior envoy on Israel-Palestine under the Obama administration, conceded in an article today published in the New Yorker that the two-state paradigm is basically dead and has been for years, rendering the same old rhetoric about supporting a 2SS fantastical without policy changes.

newyorker.com

New Maps Show How Israel Has Thwarted Hopes for a Palestinian State

The breakneck expansion of settlements in the West Bank has rendered American talk of a two-state solution increasingly irrelevant.

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Concerned Jewish Faculty & Staff @concernedjfaculty.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

STATEMENT: In light of new revelations about DOJ's sham antisemitism investigations, CJFS urges higher ed leaders to reject Trump admin's push to attack our institutions and communities, silence criticism of Israel, and smear Arab and Muslim faculty. www.concernedjewishfaculty.org/federalwhist...

concernedjewishfaculty.org

Federal Whistleblowers Reveal | Concerned Jewish Faculty & Staff

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Julia Carrie Wong @joolia.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

feels very Victor Klemperer-esque to note the evening’s headline - “ICE to spend up to $20m on gloves that can deliver painful electric shocks” - before bed

theguardian.com

ICE to spend up to $20m on gloves that can deliver painful electric shocks

According to manufacturer, shock ‘is usually effective in bringing individuals into compliance in less than three seconds’

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

it would appear that there is more memory politics ahead, so I am once again encouraging you to Read Theory www.bostonreview.net/articles/tru... bsky.app/profile/sale...

bostonreview.net

Truth Without Reconciliation

Why did Brazil’s democratic institutions hold firm while those in the United States so quickly wilted?

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Thomas Lay @thomas-lay.bsky.social · 25/06/2026

Just out: Simone Stirner grapples with poetry in the wake of the Holocaust. Attentive to contexts well beyond the immediate aftermath, Stirner shows how the embodied experience of poetry, as it's mediated formally, shows us new ways of understading trauma and grief.

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Razzball @razzball.bsky.social · 05/06/2026

“My Mayor is Muslim, my bagel is Jewish, my Christian’s Dior… Knicks in 4!!!”

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

William Clare Roberts 🇵🇸 @marxinhell.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

This, from Lorna Finlayson, expresses my view on universities better than I ever have myself. The process is farther along in Britain than elsewhere, but something of this trend is visible in too many places. newleftreview.org/sidecar/post...

This is where I find myself in a slightly awkward position. I don't unequivocally love the university either - and not only because it is not what it used to be. I don't buy the idea of a lost 'golden age' (although I can say from personal experience that things were far better even one decade ago than they are now). Nor can I take seriously the image of academics in general - either now or in some hallowed past - as noble truth-seekers chipping away at the coalface of enquiry, or brave truth-speakers to power. Much of what academics do is pointless or worse - pretentious or pernicious (or both). I'm far from confident, much of the time, that what I do has much positive value to anybody. So, why save the university? One reason is simply that there are numerous exceptions to every rule. A lot of academic work might be bad and useless, but even I don't think that all of it is bad and useless all of the time.
That might sound a feeble defence, but it's actually not at all. Most films might not be good. Most scientific experiments might not work. Most people you meet will not become your friends. But making or seeing no films (or cutting funding for independent film-making), conducting no experiments or meeting no people, is a sure way to guarantee that none of the good that comes of these things (even if only exceptionally) ever happens. There is a huge - technically infinite - difference between something and nothing.

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Adrian Daub @adriandaub.bsky.social · 27/05/2026

University administrators two years ago: we can’t allow social justice movements to change the university as we know it University administrators today: in order to accommodate the new probabilistic bullshit generator no one likes we must change everything about the university

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 25/05/2026

"Schools are not called to follow the pace of the digital world, but to offer that which the digital sphere by itself cannot provide, namely a shared time for learning and developing trustworthy relationships."

vatican.va

Encyclical Letter of His Holiness Leo XIV Magnifica Humanitas (15 May 2026)

ENCYCLICAL LETTER MAGNIFICA HUMANITAS OF HIS HOLINESS POPE LEO XIV ON SAFEGUARDING THE HUMAN PERSON IN THE TIME OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE [ Multimedia ] ___________________________

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Archana @archana-ravi.bsky.social · 02/05/2026

"Indeed, to suggest that applying the word genocide to the conduct of one state is itself evidence of bigotry implausibly places that state beyond the reach of legal (and scholarly) scrutiny. No nation-state can be exempt in principle from scrutiny under international law or scholarly analysis."

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Susan Hinton @susanhinton.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

“No nation-state can be exempt in principle from scrutiny under international law or scholarly analysis. Although the International Court of Justice has not yet made a definitive determination … [experts] have all come to the conclusion that acts of genocide have been perpetrated in Gaza.”

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Dr Kris Sargent @ksargent.bsky.social · 02/05/2026

This lays out the problem with calling criticism of Israel "antisemitic". "emotional injury to [Jews] presumes that they are “hurt” by the application of international law to[..] Israel. [..]aligns Jewish identity with state violence [..]collective stereotyping long associated with antisemitism."

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

The award-winning Palestinian poet and writer Mosab Abu Toha was castigated by the president of Le Moyne College for using the word "genocide" to describe the situation in Gaza. The Genocide and Holocaust Studies Crisis Network responded with a letter on Mosab's behalf. www.ghscn.org/letters-and-...

ghscn.org

GHSCN - Letters and Statements

April 29, 2026 - Letter to Le Moyne College in support of Mosab Abu Toha

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

ghscn.org

GHSCN - Letters and Statements

April 29, 2026 - Letter to Le Moyne College in support of Mosab Abu Toha

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 27/04/2026

"The structure whose supports our elites are steadily kicking down is also the one that props up their own personal safety from disaster and political invulnerability to accountability. And all of this can go away." me in @bostonreview.bsky.social www.bostonreview.net/articles/a-y...

bostonreview.net

A Year of Magical Thinking

Elite impunity has fueled the fantasy that catastrophes are for other people.

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Controversial Holocaust comparisons are a ubiquitous feature of our public culture. They're not a new phenomenon but they've clearly intensified since Oct 2023. In a new book I'm exploring what I call "comparison controversies" before and after 10/2023. This lecture from the fall offers a preview.

youtube.com

Comparison Controversies: Historical Analogy and the Politics of Holocaust Memory, Michael Rothberg

YouTube video by Simpson Center

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

youtube.com

Comparison Controversies: Historical Analogy and the Politics of Holocaust Memory, Michael Rothberg

YouTube video by Simpson Center

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Ignacio Gallup-Diaz @igallupd.bsky.social · 19/04/2026

"Pancreatic cancer mRNA vaccine shows lasting results in an early trial: Scientists caution that more research is needed, but nearly all of the patients who responded to the personalized vaccine are still alive six years later."

nbcnews.com

Pancreatic cancer mRNA vaccine shows lasting results in an early trial

Scientists caution that more research is needed, but nearly all of the patients who responded to the personalized vaccine are still alive six years later.

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 06/04/2026

Come listen online to four Palestinian scholars discuss the Nakba in light of ongoing war and destruction. Tomorrow. Registration link here: www.ghscn.org/events

Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

The Nakba after Genocide—a panel organized by the Genocide and Holocaust Studies Crisis Network. Tuesday, April 7.

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

The Nakba after Genocide—a panel organized by the Genocide and Holocaust Studies Crisis Network. Tuesday, April 7.

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

Thrilled that my Anton Wilhelm Amo Lecture on German memory wars and the extraordinary memory work of Pınar Öğrenci’s Aşît was just published as a booklet and a free download (see below). uvhw.de/files/downlo...

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

Glad to see Jewish affiliates at Harvard following what we at UCLA also did--denouncing the DOJ's cynical attempts to weaponize charges of antisemitism to attack higher education. sites.google.com/view/ucla-je...

sites.google.com

Home

An Open Letter from UCLA Jewish Faculty and Staff Opposing the DOJ’s Title VII Lawsuit Against UCLA 143 signatories (below) as of March 18 This letter was covered by the Chronicle of Higher Education ...

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

sites.google.com

Home

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Reposted by Michael Rothberg

Nick Barr @nicolaaspbarr.bsky.social · 23/03/2026

Join!

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Elisabeth R. Anker @libankerdc.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

I don't know about you but I, for one, am greatly relieved that a party of antisemites and Neo-n*zis stationed at all levels of government has made the decision to attack higher education in the name of protecting me and my fellow jews. this will go swimmingly thanks for the support

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Michael Rothberg @mrothberg.bsky.social · 18/03/2026

“For Orbán in Hungary, it took about four years, for Vučić in Serbia, it took eight years, and for Erdoğan in Turkey and Modi in India, it took about 10 years to accomplish the suppression of democratic institutions that Trump has achieved in only one year,” Lindberg says.

theguardian.com

‘Trump is aiming for dictatorship’. That’s the verdict of the world’s most credible democracy watchdog | Martin Gelin

Sweden’s V-Dem Institute warns that the US is no longer a liberal democracy. And autocracy is creeping across Europe too, says writer Martin Gelin

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Concerned Jewish Faculty & Staff @concernedjfaculty.bsky.social · 17/03/2026

Amazing effort from our friends at UCLA!

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