The dystopian future is here. Yale University has suspended a scholar in its law school after a Jewish news website that uses AI to produce articles called her a member of a terrorist group. It comes as the Trump administration has launched a relentless campaign to silence any speech sympathetic to the Palestinian cause.
Already, ICE has arrested an activist at Columbia University who helped lead Palestinian protests. It was also recently reported that the State Department will use AI to scan social media and deport international students who express pro-Palestinian views. The Trump administration has pulled federal funding from universities that continue to allow protests that are supportive of Palestine, which it claims are antisemitic. Conservatives care a lot about protecting free speech on social media platforms, except when it is speech they disagree with.
Helyeh Doutaghi, the scholar at Yale Law School, told the New York Times that she is a “loud and proud” supporter of Palestinian rights. “I am not a member of any organization that would constitute a violation of U.S. law.” The article that led to her suspension was published in Jewish Onliner, a Substack that says it is “empowered by A.I. capabilities.”
The website does not publish the names of its authors out of fear of harassment. Ironically, Doutaghi and Yale were reportedly the subject of intense harassment after Jewish Onliner published the article linking Doutaghi to terrorism by citing appearances she made at events sponsored by Samidoun, a pro-Palestinian group.
Last year, the Treasury Department added Samidoun to the U.S. sanctions list, claiming it is a “sham charity” that raises money for a terrorist organization, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. The terrorist designation is now used as a cudgel to silence any activity that is anti-Israel as being “illegal.” According to recent estimates, the war in Gaza, in which Palestinians have sought liberation from Israel, at least 46,000 Palestinians have been killed. Roughly 1,700 Israelis have died.
Jewish Onliner is vague about how it uses AI to produce its articles, but the technology is known for making lots of mistakes and hallucinating information that is not true. It is quite possible that Jewish Onliner relied on AI to source information it used to write the article. That could open it up to liability if it did not perform fact-checking and due diligence on its writing.
Besides the fact that Doutaghi says she is not a member of Samidoun, she attended events it sponsored that support Palestinian causes, Yale Law School said the allegations against her reflect “potential unlawful conduct.”
Using AI to surveil and silence speech has long been raised as a boogeyman by privacy advocates—something that could happen, in theory. Now, it is actually happening, and anyone can be a target for anything they might say online. There is nothing good to come from that, especially when placed in the hands of fascist governments.
