7 January 2025

Veteran campaigner Dr Alice Rothchild in Mondoweiss reports on the appalling mistreatment of Dr Rupa Marya (pictured) of the University of California, San Francisco, who questioned the suitability of enrolling IDF veterans in universities or health care institutions without accountability or screening, given that they are likely to have participated in war crimes or worse. As Dr Rothchild points out, it would be practically unbearable for students from countries attacked by the IDF to be obliged to study alongside Israelis who might have murdered members of their own families.

Demand the reinstatement of Dr. Rupa Marya at UC San Francisco

UCSF placed Dr. Rupa Marya on leave and threatened her medical license after she questioned admitting students who served in the Israeli military. She is right to raise ethical concerns about those who could have participated in genocide.

By Alice Rothchild  December 29, 2024 

Healthcare workers hold a vigil at San Franciso City Hall to honor healthcare workers who have been killed in Gaza. (Photo: John Avalos)

In September 2024, the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) placed Dr. Rupa Marya on paid leave and threatened her medical license.  These actions against Dr. Marya, a professor of medicine who has written extensively on the health impacts of systemic oppression, provoked many important questions. 

After being approached by alarmed students, Dr. Marya raised concerns about the implications of admitting students who may have recently served in the Israeli Defense Force, which has credibly been accused of human rights violations, war crimes, and genocide in Gaza and the West Bank. Because military service is mandatory in Israel, most Israelis will have participated in the IDF. Over 45,000 people have been killed in Gaza, two-thirds women and children, over 1,000 in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and over 4,000 in Lebanon. Multiple human rights organizations across the world have examined the language of Israeli leadership, the massive destruction of civilian infrastructure, healthcare and educational institutions, the denial of food, water, housing, and sanitation to Gazans under attack, and concluded that this qualifies as a genocide. The International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Gallant, as well as Hamas leader Muhammad Deif. 

Dr. Marya asked that the university examine the implications of inviting students with military backgrounds to join academic and health care institutions without accountability or screening. She also noted that students who come from regions under attack may have family being dispossessed, injured, and killed, and would likely feel extremely traumatized and fearful of personal and physical harm in a learning setting that should be promoting a safe, supportive, and trusting environment. Many students are in the U.S. on visas and fear deportation if they speak out or get arrested for their opposition to the war on Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon, or calls for a ceasefire.

Dr. Marya was immediately accused of targeting an individual student and of antisemitism. 

The university’s heavy-handed response blurs several concerns.  Students studying medicine should aspire not only to understand health, disease, and treatment of individual patients, but also to develop a larger understanding of society and its ills. War is the ultimate public health danger to human health.  It is reasonable to insist on an ethical obligation by medical educational institutions to ensure that trainees who have just served in a military force that is accused of genocidal behavior have not personally committed human rights violations. This is especially true given the pervasive anti-Palestinian racism and Islamophobia that permeates our cultures and is being further inflamed by leadership at the highest levels in the U.S. and in Israel. Medical institutions should not be part of the normalization of genocide. 

The accusation of antisemitism has also been widely used to silence critics of Israeli policy, as well as discussions of settler colonialism, the promotion of a ceasefire in Gaza, or an end to the occupation of Palestine. Criticism of the State of Israel or of Zionism, a political movement that privileges Jews over the indigenous communities of historic Palestine, is protected political speech in a democratic society. While some Jewish people claim Zionism as a sacrosanct core identity, this has been a controversial belief since its inception in the late 1800s; the Jewish community is not monolithic. 

The fear of harm among Palestinians, Arabs, and their supporters, is grounded in the rising hostile environments on many U.S. campuses. Responding to the false accusation of antisemitism, as well as to donor pressure, and fears of attacks from Republican Congresspeople, academics, including Dr. Marya, are facing fierce disapproval, reprimands, doxxing, and job loss for principled criticism of Israeli policy. Recently discharged IDF soldiers attacked Palestine supporters with an illegal chemical-based weapon known as skunk water, at Columbia University, sending eight students to the hospital. There have been other verbal and physical assaults across the country; peaceful protestors at an encampment at UCLA were beaten and pepper sprayed by a violent mob for three hours before police in riot gear moved in, ultimately taking down the encampment and arresting more than 200 people.  

Given these realities, Dr. Marya’s statements deserve serious, thoughtful consideration. Her awareness of the social, cultural, and political frameworks that impact health are critical for medical students and residents and will help them become more informed and empathic physicians. There are clear dangers to affected students who are expected to interact and study with former military personnel who may have been responsible for harms against their own families. The students’ military roles need to be clarified. The weaponization of the accusation of antisemitism is utterly inappropriate and will only impede crucial conversation and policy making.