Less than 24 hours after the alleged antisemitic incident, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal showed up unannounced at a board of directors meeting for the National Foundation of Political Science (FNSP), which handles Sciences Po’s administrative and financial strategy, and said that the university’s leadership would need to implement measures to counter an “active and dangerous minority.”
The university’s deans and research center heads subsequently spoke out against the prime minister’s surprise visit, expressing “in the strongest terms (their) indignation” in a statement published on Monday, saying that “no political figure should take actions that undermine the principles of academic independence and freedom.”
Fears of importing American-style campus wars, complete with political proxy fights stemming from the Israel-Hamas war, appear to have fueled the government’s speedy intervention.
“I will never let a French university become the mouthpiece for a North American ideology which, under the guise of modernity, promotes intolerance, rejects debate, and curbs freedom of expression,” Attal, also a graduate of Sciences Po, said Tuesday during a question period in parliament.
Unclear circumstances
The controversy at Sciences Po was spurred by the French Jewish students union (UEJF) saying that one of its members had been barred from entering an auditorium which was occupied by pro-Palestinian protesting students at a solidarity event on March 12.
“UEJF students are being targeted as Jews and zionists,” the organization wrote in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.
