While the University of Coimbra is publicly condemned for shielding antisemitism, it rolls out the red carpet for the Palestinian ambassador – and city authorities look the other way as terrorist-glorifying posters plaster the streets.

In a striking display of institutional double standards, Portugal’s oldest university – founded in 1290 and long regarded as a beacon of learning – has been formally rebuked by the country’s Provedor de Justiça (Ombudsman) for its “fundamental passivity” in the face of a sustained campaign of antisemitic harassment against a Jewish-Israeli doctoral student. The landmark ruling, finalised in early 2026, found that the University of Coimbra violated fundamental rights and administrative law by failing to protect Bar Harel, a software-engineering PhD candidate, after the October 7, 2023 Hamas attacks on Israel triggered an explosion of hatred on campus.

Graffiti and stickers proliferated with swastikas, slogans such as “Zionists should carry a certificate to prove they’re human”, “Beware of Zionists”, “Yahya Sinwar was a hero” and explicit calls for a new intifada. Harel himself became a target: he received death threats declaring that “your family deserves a second Holocaust”, was physically assaulted for displaying a small Israeli flag on his backpack, saw posters bearing his name demanding his expulsion and worse, and had his personal data doxxed online. University officials repeatedly dismissed the incidents as protected “freedom of expression” or mere “figures of speech”. When Harel sought help, the student ombudsman, Cristina Vieira, went so far as to suggest he required psychiatric treatment – a private opinion that was leaked, breaching data-protection law.

The Ombudsman’s report described the university’s response as a “grave” abuse of authority and ordered formal reparations together with the adoption of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism. Harel ultimately abandoned his doctorate and left Portugal in September 2025 after security alerts from the Israeli and American embassies.

Yet only days after the Washington Times published Harel’s own account on 19 April 2026, the same university leadership hosted the Palestinian ambassador to Portugal, Rawan Sulaiman (also referred to as Rawa Suleiman), the first woman to hold the post. On 22 April the ambassador was received by University Rector Amílcar Falcão and other academic figures for official meetings that, according to the organisers, “addressed ways to enhance bilateral cooperation between the two countries in the fields of culture, scientific and academic research, and tourism”. One can only imagine the tourism promotion pitch in a region still reeling from the very real consequences of the conflict the ambassador had come to discuss.

The irony deepens in the city centre itself. Just steps from Praça do Comércio, public walls are covered in posters openly glorifying terrorism. One features Hassan Nasrallah, the late Hezbollah leader, with the caption “Labayk Ya Nasrallah! Long live the Resistance. Long Live Hezbollah”. Others proclaim “Glory to Gaza – That gave hope to the oppressed, that humiliated the ‘invincible’ zionist army”, “Defend Iran – Destroy Ziomerika”, and “Resistance for a free Palestine” illustrated with armed figures. Most surreal is the poster demanding “Freedom for Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates” – a demand as comical as it is revealing of the ideological confusion behind such activism. These are sovereign states; the UAE, in particular, is a prosperous Gulf monarchy with deep economic ties to the West. The posters do not merely criticise Israeli policy – they celebrate designated terrorist organisations and incite broader regional upheaval.

Under Portuguese law, such public apology for or glorification of terrorism is a criminal offence. The Lei de Combate ao Terrorismo (Law 52/2003, as amended by Law 60/2015 and subsequent updates) punishes these acts with up to four years’ imprisonment. Yet neither the university authorities nor the municipal leadership appear to have noticed – or chosen to act. Deputy Mayor Miguel Antunes represented the City Council at the ambassador’s events, while the broader municipal apparatus has remained silent on the proliferation of these materials in the historic heart of Coimbra.

We have seen this pattern before. In the 1930s, polite society in Europe often dismissed antisemitic incidents as isolated excesses or free-speech matters while simultaneously courting those who would later unleash far greater horrors. History rarely repeats exactly, but the echoes are unmistakable. When an ancient seat of learning and a proud city council can simultaneously ignore documented persecution of Jewish students and celebrate “solidarity” with a cause whose street-level expressions openly praise Hezbollah and Hamas, one is left wondering what, exactly, they are teaching – and to whom.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)