Florida Should Investigate Ties with Dutch Universities Because They Violate the State’s Anti-BDS Law

Florida’s anti-BDS laws explicitly prohibit public institutions from partnering with entities involved in discriminatory boycotts of Israel.

Yet Florida’s universities currently maintain academic relationships with Dutch universities that appear to have withheld critical information from their American counterparts. Recently, multiple Dutch institutions — including Erasmus University Rotterdam, Radboud University Nijmegen, Tilburg University, University of Amsterdam, Utrecht University, Maastricht University and Delft University of Technology — have limited, suspended, or terminated their academic ties with Israeli institutions such as Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv University, Bar-Ilan University, and the University of Haifa, citing indirect or alleged associations with the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) and human right violations.

Notably, none of these decisions were based on concrete evidence linking Israeli universities directly to human rights violations. The mere suggestion of association with the IDF was deemed sufficient to justify academic boycotts. At Wageningen University, almost 400 lecturers even publicly refused to supervise exchange students from the Hebrew University– an explicit act of discrimination directly violating Florida’s anti-BDS framework. None of these lecturers faced sanctions.

Meanwhile, Maastricht University actively maintains collaboration with Tehran University of Medical Sciences (TUMS), directly overseen by Iran’s government, which calls for the destruction of Israel and the United States. It is widely known that Iranian universities systematically suppress student dissent through surveillance, intimidation, suspension, and expulsion — often facilitated by Iran’s brutal Basij militia. Yet Maastricht University remains silent about Iranian abuses while swiftly freezing ties with Israeli institutions using criteria never applied to their Iranian partners.

Moreover, Maastricht University activists from Free Palestine Maastricht (FPM) — affiliated with the Iranian-linked extremist group Samidoun — publicly spread grotesque blood libels, accusing Hebrew University of organ theft from Palestinians. Rather than condemning this vile antisemitism, Maastricht’s administration appeased these activists, granting formal meetings and swiftly freezing partnerships with Israeli universities following aggressive demonstrations in May 2024. Yet, Free Palestine Maastricht has an office within the building of Maastricht University.

During my tenure as chair of Maastricht University’s University Council, the Iranian community on campus, Iranian students and faculty, approached me desperately, asking the Board of Governors and University Council to issue a formal statement expressing solidarity with their families in Iran — mothers and sisters protesting under the “Women, Life, Freedom” movement following the death of Mahsa Amini. (Mahsa Amini died in September 2022 after being detained by Iran’s notorious “morality police.”) I was told this request was refused.

What I heard next chilled me: some Tehran-aligned staff within Maastricht’s academic community argued that any such declaration would be perceived as insulting the Iranian regime and, by extension, Islam itself — even if no such intent existed.

Dutch universities have recently demanded Israeli academic counterparts explicitly denounce Prime Minister Netanyahu’s government as a condition for continued cooperation. This coercive interference in the internal democratic affairs of Israel during wartime closely mirrors Iran’s tactics. Iran’s Supreme Leader openly praised Western student protests against Israel, calling them “on the right side of history.” Iranian academic institutions have even offered scholarships to Western students expelled for anti-Israel activism, underscoring Iran’s strategic exploitation of Western academia’s hostility toward Israel.

This blatant hypocrisy is even clearer given my own experience: A senior administrator at Maastricht University just a week ago threatened me in the form of a question: “What is it like to be you always opposing the university policy. Would [you] not rather work somewhere else?” — implying that opposing antisemitism and supporting Israel contradicted official university policy. When I asked if this meant that Maastricht University’s stance was antisemitic, I received no answer — only chilling silence and disdain.

Dear Governor DeSantis, Dutch universities apply outrageous double standards. Throughout my academic career, I proudly taught students from the Military Academy of the Netherlands, without criticism. Yet Israeli universities are uniquely targeted simply for alleged connections to their nation’s military, without evidence of wrongdoing.

Recently, the Jewish community in Rotterdam generously offered unused cemetery land to Erasmus University Rotterdam for urgently needed student housing. However, after Erasmus University severed ties with Israeli institutions, the Jewish community promptly withdrew this offer. Their decisive action sent a clear moral message: Cooperation and generosity cannot coexist with institutionalized antisemitism and discriminatory boycotts.

Given these troubling realities, Florida’s anti-BDS legislation provides a critical framework for action. I respectfully urge you, Governor DeSantis, to formally encourage Florida’s public universities to reconsider and suspend partnerships with Dutch academic institutions explicitly engaged in discriminatory boycotts of Israel, antisemitic propaganda, and direct or indirect collaboration with Iranian-linked extremist groups.

Amanda Kluveld is a Holocaust historian and an associate professor of history at Maastricht University the Netherlands. 

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