NYU accused the graduate of misusing “his role as student speaker to express his personal and one-sided political views.”
New York University has withheld the diploma of a student who condemned the ongoing Israeli genocide in Gaza and US “complicity,” during his graduation speech.
“I want to say that the genocide currently occurring is supported politically and militarily by the United States, is paid for by our tax dollars, and has been live-streamed to our phones for the past 18 months,” undergraduate Logan Rozos said to resounding applause, and some boos, on Wednesday.
“I condemn this genocide and complicity in this genocide.”
NYU student Logan Rozos denounced Israel’s genocide in Gaza during his graduation speech to roaring applause. In retaliation, NYU has withheld his diploma and is threatening further disciplinary action. pic.twitter.com/VzjRoOAq2k
— BreakThrough News (@BTnewsroom) May 15, 2025
“I do not wish to speak only to my own politics today, but to speak for all people of conscience, all people who feel the moral injury of this atrocity,” Rozos continued, adding, “I want to say that I condemn this genocide and complicity in this genocide.”
Disciplinary Actions
NYU subsequently issued a statement denouncing “the choice by a student at the Gallatin School’s graduation today—one of over 20 school graduation ceremonies across our campus—to misuse his role as student speaker to express his personal and one-sided political views.”
Logan Rozos is having his diploma withheld by @nyuniversity for SPEAKING UP ABOUT #PALESTINE in the most mild mannered and civil way possible. They liken the speech, which was met with raucous and agreeable applause, to an abuse of privilege. Shameful, NYU. CONTACT JOHN BECKMAN. pic.twitter.com/EwS3rIvBM8
— dev (@devspicedlatte) May 15, 2025
The university alleged that Rozos “lied about the speech he was going to deliver and violated the commitment he made to comply with our rules.”
“The University is withholding his diploma while we pursue disciplinary actions,” the statement said.
It added that NYU was “deeply sorry that the audience was subjected to these remarks and that this moment was stolen by someone who abused a privilege that was conferred upon him.”
Use of ‘Zionist’ in Conduct Guidelines
This is not the first time NYU has taken action against voices critical of Israel, Al Mayadeen reported.
In August, the university updated its Guidance and Expectations on Student Conduct guidelines to include the use of the word “Zionist”.
“Using code words, like ‘Zionist,’ does not eliminate the possibility that your speech violates the NDAH Policy,” it states. NDAH refers to “Nondiscrimination and anti-harassment.”
More than 100 Palestinians were killed, injured, or remain missing following heavy Israeli airstrikes on northern Gaza’s residential areas and medical services.https://t.co/ns8uGnSx6z pic.twitter.com/T1MqoEGKfr
— The Palestine Chronicle (@PalestineChron) May 16, 2025
“For many Jewish people, Zionism is a part of their Jewish identity. Speech and conduct that would violate the NDAH if targeting Jewish or Israeli people can also violate the NDAH if directed toward Zionists,” the policy adds.
The updated rules reportedly followed a wave of student-led demonstrations on campus against the Gaza genocide. In response, NYU’s administration called police to campus, resulting in widespread arrests of students and faculty, Al Mayadeen reported.
They Never Stopped: Gaza and the Legacy of Israeli Colonial Violence
Last December, the report added, two tenured professors, Andrew Ross and Sonya Posmentier, were declared “personae non gratae” by the university after joining a sit-in demanding NYU divest from companies profiting from Israel’s military assault on Gaza. They were barred from entering certain campus buildings.
(PC, Al Mayadeen)
Losing a diploma means little or nothing… I have 2 diplomas and rarely look at them, never had an employer request to see them… I wish he would have denounced the university also. If a seeming institute of higher learning is more concerned about delicate ears hearing the Truth than it is about ascertaining the Truth and opening its eyes to a horrific Genocide,…than that institute is no longer worthy to be referred to as a university.
*“For many Jewish people, Zionism is a part of their Jewish identity. Speech and conduct that would violate the NDAH if targeting Jewish or Israeli people can also violate the NDAH if directed toward Zionists,” the policy adds.*
This is among the most staggering, hypocritical BS I have ever read. Zionism is a supremacist, fascist ideology and its adherents must be trialed irrespective of their faith. I want to remind the hypocrite who made this policy that Nazism was part of the German identity too in the time of the Third Reich. This Zionist propaganda isn’t much different than that of the Nazis, and the fate of both ideologies will not differ.
“For many Jewish people, Zionism is a part of their Jewish identity” — yet, many Jewish people utterly reject and condemn that racist, bigoted, chauvinist, and supremacist ideology. Now what New York University? Only Jewish people may say that now? Or, only people who are Zionist (Jewish or not) may graduate?