Eghbariah's May 2024
Columbia Law Review article "
Toward Nakba as a Legal Concept" argues for the adoption of the term
Nakba—describing the Palestinian experience of
Zionism, including the ongoing process of displacement, fragmentation, and denial of self-determination—as a legal framework. His thesis argues that the
ongoing Nakba should be classified similarly to other internationally recognized crimes against humanity such as apartheid or genocide.
Harvard Law Review essay Eghbariah originally formulated this concept in a 2,000-word essay solicited by the online chairs of the
Harvard Law Review a week into Israel's assault on Gaza in October 2023 and meant to be published by on the HLR website in November. The essay, “
The Ongoing Nakba: Toward a Legal Framework for Palestine” was subject to the HLR's standard procedure for articles, including commission, contracting, submission, rigorous editing,
fact-checking, and approval by relevant editors for publication, but it was blocked from publication shortly before it was due to go live on November 10 in an unprecedented intervention from the Harvard Law Review president,
Apsara Iyer. On November 18, an emergency full-body meeting of over 100 HLR editors was convened, and after six hours, 63% voted anonymously against publication. The HLR faced public backlash and the journal became "embroiled in internal strife." Over 25 editors issued a dissenting statement. Over 100 law professors, including legal scholars
Duncan Kennedy,
William Schabas, and
Makau Mutua, signed an open letter describing the censorship as “authoritarian” and expressing concern over the impact on
academic freedom. Yale Law School professor Asli Bali described the article as an “excellent piece of legal scholarship.” In one of his responses to the Harvard Law Review editors, Eghbariah wrote, “This is discrimination. Let’s not dance around it — this is also outright censorship. It is dangerous and alarming." In June 2024, the article, now over a hundred pages long, titled “Toward Nakba as a Legal Concept,” was published on the CLR website. Following its publication, the Columbia Law Review Board of Directors shut down the Law Review's website to prevent access to Eghbariah’s article, citing “deviation from the Review’s usual processes.” Editors at both the Harvard Law Review and Columbia Law Review wrote that “important procedural conventions that protect academic freedom were breached to silence Eghbariah [in both instances].” Eghbariah became the first Palestinian to publish with the Columbia Law Review. In response to the decision to suspend the website, Eghbariah stated that he saw the decision as “a microcosm of a broader authoritarian repression taking place across U.S. campuses” and that “there is a continuum between the material reality in Gaza and shutting down these debates.” == References == == External links ==