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NYU Withholds Diploma of Commencement Speaker Who Condemned Israel’s Genocide in Gaza

HeadlineMay 16, 2025

New York University has come under fire for withholding the diploma of a student who used his commencement address to condemn the genocide in Gaza. This is Logan Rozos delivering that speech on Wednesday.

Logan Rozos: “The only thing that is appropriate to say in this time and to a group this large is a recognition of the atrocities currently happening in Palestine. … The genocide currently occurring is supported politically and militarily by the United States. It’s paid for by our tax dollars and has been live-streamed to our phones for the past 18 months.”

Logan Rozos received cheers and standing ovations from his crowd of peers and has been widely commended for his bravery.

This comes as students at Yale, Stanford, UCLA and the California State University system are continuing their hunger strikes to demand their schools divest from Israel and protect free speech on campus. Students have reported deteriorating health as school administrators continue to rebuff requests to meet.

In related news, a new study finds more than 1,000 students across the U.S. were targeted — many of them penalized — over their speech between 2020 and 2024.

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