Joanne Liu, a renowned Canadian scientist who worked for Doctors Without Borders, was scheduled to give a lecture at NYU.
Just minutes before taking the stage, she was informed that she was no longer welcome at the university and had to leave immediately.
Her crime: mentioning in her PowerPoint presentation the number of doctors killed in Gaza.
Self-censorship in the United States, driven by the fear of losing government funding, is absolutely terrible and must be condemned. If Trump is attacking universities, it is horrifying, and believe me, it is the beginning of the end. To avoid drawing attention from the White House and the operatives in the Departments of Justice and Education, who are conducting a veritable witch hunt across some sixty universities, thousands of intellectuals are self-censoring and remaining silent.
It is hard not to think of the famous quote by philosopher Martin Niemöller, written in 1947:
“First they came for the Communists, and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak out for me.”
USA, it's time to wake up !