Iran fostered protests at Syracuse University, the university’s chancellor Kent Syverud said at a Monday Alums for Campus Fairness panel, which also saw Vanderbilt University Chancellor Daniel Diermeier asserting that third-party organized networks had exacerbated the campus unrest.
Syverud explained, according to a YouTube video uploaded on Tuesday, that in the first few months after October 7, there was a hospitable campus atmosphere for both pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian vigils and activities, but then there was an artificial change.
The demonstrations “I really believe [they] were encouraged from Iran; it did not have the involvement of very many – if any – of our own students,” said Syverud.
Diermeier said that Vanderbilt had experienced a similar situation in which there was accommodating and respectful activism for the first months, but then things soon changed due to the involvement of “organized networks.”
'More than a social contagion'
Some protests were due to “social contagion,” but the chancellor said it was “much more direct coordination across campus that was fully established in the late fall and winter.”
“There was not a large group, maybe 30+ students or something, but they were looking; they were using the playbook that they had seen at Columbia [University] and at other places that were putting into it – it was the same messaging,” said Diermeier.
“So it’s more than social contagion. I think they’re organized networks as well, and for sure we saw that and that was we saw that things were pivoting much more aggressive[ly]; it was very clearly intended to have us denounce Israel of genocide, divest, and so forth.”
Some protests on campuses were organized, he added, while others were the result of social contagion, and in the future it would likely be revealed “whether there was third-party influence on that and how that worked.”
“There was certainly contagion, but I think [there was] much more direct coordination across campus that was fully established in the late fall and winter,” said Diermeier.
Last July, Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines said that American intelligence had seen Iranian government actors taking “advantage of ongoing protests” by posing “as activists online, seeking to encourage protests, and even providing financial support to protesters.”
Haines noted that Americans who participated in the October 7 protests did so in good faith and may not be aware if they were interacting or getting support from a foreign state actor.
“Iran is becoming increasingly aggressive in their foreign influence efforts, seeking to stoke discord and undermine confidence in our democratic institutions, as we have seen them do in the past, including in prior election cycles,” Haines had warned.
“They continue to adapt their cyber and influence activities, using social media platforms and issuing threats. It is likely they will continue to rely on their intelligence services in these efforts, as well as Iran-based online influencers, to promote their narratives.”
Last May, rescued hostage Shlomi Ziv alleged in a lawsuit against anti-Israel groups that his Hamas captors had told him that they had operatives on American campuses, showing photographs of Columbia University protests.