Jewish students stormed out of their graduation ceremony Thursday after a Massachusetts Institute of Technology commencement speaker accused the prestigious institution of supporting the erasure of “Palestine from the face of the Earth.”
Megha M. Vemuri, president of the Class of 2025, sparked a mixture of boos and cheers as she started her controversial speech praising her classmates for protesting Israel immediately after Hamas launched a deadly terrorist attack on the Jewish state on Oct. 7, 2023.
“You have faced the obstacle of fear before, and you turned it into fuel to stand up for what is right — you showed the world that MIT wants a free Palestine,” Vemuri told the crowd as some students stood up and waved the Palestinian flag, according to a video posted by MIT.
“Last spring, MIT’s undergraduate body and graduate student union voted overwhelmingly to cut ties with the genocidal Israeli military. You called for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. And you stood in solidarity with the pro-Palestine activists on campus,” she continued.
“You faced threats, intimidation and suppression coming from all directions, especially your own university officials. But you prevailed, because the MIT community that I know would never tolerate a genocide.”
Vemuri continued her speech, claiming that no universities remain in war-torn Gaza, as the divided crowd chanted in solidarity with others walking out and shouting, “Shame.”
“We are watching Israel try to wipe Palestine off the face of the earth, and it is a shame that MIT is a part of it,” Vemuri charged, as she encouraged anti-Israel activists to push the school to sever all association with the Jewish state to scattered applause.
“The Israeli occupation forces are the only foreign military that MIT has research ties with. This means that Israel’s assault on the Palestinian people is not only aided and abetted by our country, but our school.”
She concluded the divisive address by condemning the university of being “directly complicit in the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people.”
Vemuri’s contentious remarks led to her being barred from attending Friday’s undergraduate ceremony, an MIT spokesperson told Fox News Digital, noting that the speech she delivered was not the version submitted in advance to university officials.
“MIT supports free expression but stands by its decision, which was in response to the individual deliberately and repeatedly misleading Commencement organizers and leading a protest from the stage, disrupting an important Institute ceremony,” the university said in a statement.
The Massachusetts institution was among numerous college campuses that saw hostile anti-Israel agitators block Jewish students from attending class, clash with police and deliver incendiary speeches last year in the wake of the war in Gaza.
One Israeli graduate told the outlet that all the Jewish families — “not only the Israelis” — walked out of what was supposed to be a happy occasion.
“All of our families came from far to see the ceremony and were extremely disappointed,” the disheartened grad said.
