Tony Palermo is a GW alum who earned degrees in 1991 and 1993 and served as The Hatchet’s editorials editor.

University President Ellen Granberg, welcome to GW. My affiliation with GW is as a proud alum 1991 BA and 1993 MPA. It’s been a long time since I have been on the campus I love. I am in Florida now with a successful career in local government and urban planning. I am grateful to GW for that and contribute to the University when I am able.

My experience at GW was good and included basketball games and a stint as editorials editor at The Hatchet from 1990-1991. It was a different time and place. The Hatchet was more dependent on the University for survival. It was a very free and fun paper, including an April Fools issue that was (intentionally) very offensive. It was also a time of war — in Iraq the first time — and a new phenomenon called “political correctness.” We, The Hatchet and most students generally, hated political correctness and censorship. We loved free speech. We loved our First Amendment and still do.

Again, the First Amendment is under attack — this time it is worse. Wokeness threatens freedom of thought and expression, yes. We oppose that too. At least most of us do. But this time the battle against free speech is even more important. So called free speech absolutists favor free speech for themselves but not for others. Today there is the Palestinian exception to free speech. That’s my concern now.

I have watched with interest GW’s own issues with Palestinian efforts to speak out against the killing in Gaza and the war on Palestinian people. It’s collective punishment — anyone with eyes can see that. For saying that, many supporters of Israel cry to censor Palestinian students, exclude them from GW’s campus and implement other “Palestinian exceptions.” They equate support for Palestine and critiques of Israel as antisemitism. They are wrong. They are censors. They want freedom for some, not for all. Nothing more. Nothing less. It’s apartheid, which we also fought against in the 1980s.

Please speak up for the principle of free speech on GW’s campus. Please do it when it is difficult. Please do it even if you are called an antisemite, a terrorist sympathizer or worse. Make GW proud. Support free speech on our campus with no exceptions — it’s for all people.