Much like in the real world, the Israel-Palestine conflict is often seen as the third rail of reasoned debate on college campuses. To touch it is to invoke the righteous (or self-righteous, as the case may be) wrath of whoever disagrees with you, no matter which side you’re on.

Northeastern University Wikimedia Commons

The Northeastern chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) was sadly taught this lesson in March when it was suspended for distributing fake ‘eviction notices’ to students, in order to draw attention to the forced eviction of Palestinians by the Israeli government. Two students were also threatened with further disciplinary action for participating in this benign act of political protest.

This came after a year in which the group was sanctioned for organizing a mass walkout during a presentation by Israeli soldiers, leading to accusations that the college was picking and choosing which groups to allot free speech rights.

The suspension set off a miniature firestorm on campus, with protests and petitions launched to defend the students. The ACLU, Center for Constitutional Rights, National Lawyers Guild, and Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) came to SJPs defense, with FIRE Director Peter Bonilla writing that “Northeastern University has a lot to overcome if it wishes to dispel the notion that it wrongly punished Northeastern SJP for its protected protest activities.” (Disclosure: Harvey Silverglate is co-founder and current Board chairman of FIRE.)

The college ended up reinstating the organization in late April, but the damage was already done. For its selective enforcement of vague campus speech policies to punish protected political speech, Northeastern earns a Muzzle.