‘…it would not be appropriate for me to make public comments at this time,’ David Penslar said in a written statement
The head of the anti-Semitism task force at Harvard dropped out of a panel on defining antisemitism Sunday, saying he did not want to publicly answer questions related to the “goings-on” at the Ivy League school.
Derek Penslar, who co-chairs the university’s Presidential Task Force on Combating Antisemitism was due to participate in the What is Antisemitism? Definitions and Debates panel being held at the Center for Jewish History in New York City, but attendees learned at its start that he had canceled at the last minute.
Moderator Gavriel Rosenfeld read a statement from the Harvard professor when he announced his absence, according to the Washington Free Beacon .
“I am mindful of my role as co-chair of the Harvard Task Force on Combating Anti-Semitism,” Penslar said in his statement that was read aloud to the audience by the Fairfield University history professor , “and since at the symposium I would invariably be asked to speak about the goings on at Harvard, and since the task force is only now just being put together, and its plan of action is being formed, it would not be appropriate for me to make public comments at this time.”