Chris Walker
Truthout / February 27, 2026
“The weaponization of antisemitism…creates significant adverse consequences for Jews and non-Jews,” the APA wrote.
The American Psychological Association (APA) has updated its “Resolution on Antisemitism,” removing a previous guidance that suggested any criticism of the state of Israel — including opposition to Israel’s genocide of Palestinians in Gaza — was an antisemitic act.
The update, which occurred at the organization’s meeting this month, still includes many of the same examples of antisemitic views as previous iterations of the resolution, including “hold[ing] Jews collectively responsible for the actions of the state of Israel,” and “assum[ing] that Jews are more loyal to Israel than to their home countries.”
“Multiple contemporary definitions of antisemitism all share the recognition that antisemitism involves hostility, prejudice, discrimination, harassment, hatred, or violence against Jews as Jews,” the resolution states, citing multiple organizations, including the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA).
But the IHRA definition of antisemitism has also traditionally included the erroneous belief that any criticism of Israel’s actions is inherently critical of Jewish people altogether, and thus antisemitic. The APA removed that idea from their resolution this year, and updated it to include the belief that using claims of antisemitism to silence criticism of Israel is itself detrimental.
“The weaponization of antisemitism — the manipulative or bad faith invocation of accusations to silence legitimate criticism, scholarship, or activism — creates significant adverse consequences for Jews and non-Jews who oppose the state of Israel’s actions and support Palestinian rights,” the updated resolution says.
Indeed, there have been several documented examples of the Trump administration wrongly deeming protests at college campuses antisemitic in order to justify eroding free speech rights. The administration has also detained and threatened to deport student activists over their criticism of Israel’s genocide.
Responding to the updated guidelines, JVP Academic Council member Barry Trachtenberg, who is the Rubin Presidential Chair of Jewish History at Wake Forest University, called the action “a principled stand rooted in both scholarship and justice.”
“By refusing to conflate criticism of Israel with antisemitism, this resolution strengthens the fight against genuine anti-Jewish hatred while also protecting Palestinians – including scholars, students, and clinicians – from being silenced for speaking about their lived realities, rights, and trauma under Israel’s oppressive and genocidal rule,” Trachtenberg said.
The new resolution represents “a major victory for academic freedom, for combatting real antisemitism, and for Palestinian liberation,” said Jonah Rubin, senior manager of campus organizing for JVP.
Rubin added:
At a time when so many academic institutions are bowing to the Trump administration’s authoritarian demands, it is heartening to see the APA reject the weaponization of false charges of antisemitism that attempted to tarnish critics of Israeli policies of genocide and apartheid.
A recent study published in The Lancet Global Health estimates that more than 75,000 Palestinians in Gaza were killed by Israel during the first 16 months of Israel’s genocidal assault on the region, confirming estimates that were published throughout that time by Gaza’s Ministry of Health, which, up until recently, Israel refused to acknowledge as accurate. A study released last fall by the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Germany and the Center for Demographic Studies in Spain, examining additional months of the war on Gaza, suggests the death toll could be well over 100,000 people in the region.
“We will never know the exact number of dead…we are only trying to estimate as accurately as possible what a realistic order of magnitude might be,” said researcher Irena Chen, co-lead of the study.
Chris Walker is a news writer at Truthout, based in Madison, Wisconsin
