Arun Gandhi - grandson of the revered Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi - has resigned from the board of his institute on nonviolence, housed at the University of Rochester. And so the controversy about his early-January Washington Post blog has subsided as quickly as it arose.

And with Gandhi gone, the UR has avoided being caught in the middle of an emotional conflict.

The topic of Gandhi's blog - assigned by the Washington Post - was "the future of the Jewish identity." In it, Gandhi concluded that "the future of Jewish identity appears bleak" because that identity remains "locked in the Holocaust experience."

Gandhi accused Jews of "overplaying" the Holocaust and said that in an international culture of violence, "Israel and the Jews are the biggest players." He seemed to be suggesting that Jews should forget about the Holocaust and, in his words, "move on."

Gandhi has since apologized for the way he worded some of his concerns, particularly for including all Jews in his accusations about violence. But there has been strong negative reaction, including hundreds of comments posted on the Washington Post's website.

And at the University of Rochester, home to the MK Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence since last year, President Joel Seligman expressed dismay, saying that Gandhi's views "seem fundamentally inconsistent with the core values of the University of Rochester." Seligman also said that Gandhi's apology "inadequately explains his stated views."

Shortly afterward, Gandhi submitted his resignation as the institute's president - a step he took, he said in an interview with City Newspaper last week, to protect the institute.

(Seligman has declined City Newspaper requests to further discuss his statement or the university's response to the controversy.)

The University of Rochester has been home to the Gandhi Institute since last year, when Gandhi moved it from Memphis, where he and his late wife had founded it in 1991. The UR has not provided funding for either Gandhi or the Institute, and Gandhi has not taught classes there. But the university has provided space for it.

In a July 2007 City Newspaper interview, Gandhi said that the goal of the Institute was "to inform the younger generation in particular" about the philosophy of non-violence "and why it should be a part of our lives."

"For several generations now," he said, "we have been inundated with violence to such an extent that it has become a force in our culture and an integral part of our lives. Our language, our images, our relationships with each other - you know, nearly everything about us is being influenced by this culture of violence. And that is slowly but surely destroying us."

"I believe that needs to be reversed," he said in the July interview, "and the only way that we can do that is through teaching nonviolence."

Gandhi lectures around the world and has met with both Israeli and Palestinian leaders - including the late Yasser Arafat - urging non-violence.

In the July interview with City, he said he gave this message to Arafat: "The work you do, the suicide bombers, that is not martyrdom. That is plain and simple terrorism."

But Gandhi's Washington Post blog focused solely on Israel and the Jews, and that set off a rash of criticism, in Rochester and on the Post's website. His resignation apparently put an end to the controversy, but the community has missed an opportunity to discuss some important, controversial issues. For example:

Can the perpetrators of the Holocaust ever be forgiven? Should they be?

Does forgiving require us to forget?

Does Israelis' dedication to the memory of the Holocaust - and their conviction that forgetting risks repetition -color their decisions about the dealing with Palestinians?

Is the philosophy of non-violence at odds with the tensions of today? Can it be carried out in hostile situations like that between the Israelis and the Palestinians? (In Darfur? In Kenya?)

Must criticism of Israel - and the United States' relationship with Israel - always set off angry, emotional reactions?

And what is the responsibility of a university when such a controversy erupts?

What is the right response of an institution - whether it's a university, a radio station, or a newspaper - when someone associated with it - makes an offensive comment?

"There is nothing we can't accomplish," Gandhi said in his interview with City Newspaper in July, "no problem so great, that we can't learn something from sitting down and talking to one another."

The Gandhi Institute is considering holding a public forum on the controversy in the spring, but no date has been set.

And university officials say that "for now," the MK Gandhi Institute will remain on the UR campus.

Gandhi on his blog and his intention

Arun Gandhi - in India at the time - didn't expect the controversy that erupted from his comments on the Washington Post website in January. He is one of several people who write blogs as part of the Post's Saturday website series, "On Faith," and his posting was on a topic suggested by the Post: the future of the Jewish identity.

He has since apologized for some of the wording, but he says he remains concerned about the role of Israel - and the United States - in what he calls a widespread "culture of violence."

Other than his apology, issued three days after his blog was posted, Gandhi has not commented on the situation. But in an interview with City late Friday afternoon, Gandhi talked about his controversial blog, his feelings about the Holocaust, and the University of Rochester's reaction to his posting. An edited version of that interview follows.

City: What were you trying to say in your blog? What you were trying to express?

Gandhi: Well, I was certainly trying to express what is happening in that part of the world today, and the amount of violence being used. I have been frustrated for some time after talking with the Israelis as well as the Palestinians. I've wanted them to think of non-violent ways to resolve this, and I was not getting any kind of sympathetic hearing from both sides.

When this opportunity to write about the Jewish identity came up, I kind of expressed my frustration in that article. And many people asked why I didn't write about the Palestinians, too. But this was specifically about the Jewish identity. It was about the Jewish identity and their responsibility toward creating a better state.

And I have been feeling, rightly or wrongly, that they have kind of overdone the Holocaust experience. I do have tremendous concern. That whole experience should never have happened to anybody. I do accept that, and still feel that way very strongly.

But what they've done now is branded the Holocaust as a Jewish experience, and the other kind of Holocaust that takes place in the world is not a Holocaust; it's anything but a Holocaust.

For instance, the 20 million killed in Russia, the millions killed in Cambodia, the millions killed in Rwanda, and all of these places: you can never say these are Holocausts; these are massacres. That implies that the Holocaust is something that has happened only to the Jews. They say this will never happen again, but what they really mean is this will never happen to them again. They do not seem to be very concerned about this kind of violence taking place in other parts of the world.

And I feel that they have been through so much violence, and so much hate and prejudice, they should lead the way in resolving this issue so we don't have a recurrence of this kind of thing all the time. Instead of saying this should never happen to the Jews again, they should say this will never happen to humanity again.

If you were writing this again for the first time, what would you change in it? Is there a particular phrase you would change or write differently?

I was a bit general. I made some broad statements about incorporating all of the Jews, which I think, on reflection, I would have changed. Instead of saying the Jews and the Israelis are the biggest players in violence around the world today, I would say they are one of the biggest. The United States is a brother in arms with the Israelis. Both of them together play a very significant role in spreading violence. I don't think the gist of what I was saying about the reaction of the Jewish people to violence was wrong.

Address your critics directly. I don't think you are saying the Holocaust didn't exist. Some of this you've covered in your previous statement, but could you expand on it a little bit more?

I'm not denying that the Holocaust took place. There is historic evidence of it. I went to Auschwitz myself to see for myself what things took place there. What I'm saying is if they want to spend so much money and attention about what has happened to them, they should also be concerned about what is happening to others in a similar fashion. I mean, maybe they are not being gassed in Rwanda, but they are being slaughtered in a similar fashion. Being slaughtered to death is just as terrible as being gassed. So let's not just think about ourselves; let's think about what is happening to humanity.

I was trying to instigate a dialogue on this whole question of violence that is consuming human society, and I was hoping the Jewish people would take the initiative. They have experienced it.

Was your resignation, in your mind, the best way to protect the institute? Do you still think that your resignation was the right thing, or a bit of an overreaction?

I was trying to protect the institute. When this whole thing happened, I was in India, and I was getting frantic calls from the university, from the president and from everybody else telling me to come back immediately. I said, I can't. I have commitments here. I have traveled all this way. I have a group of 27 Americans with me. I can't just leave them. It's not a life-or-death crisis.

I came back on the 23rd. All of the discussion that took place before, and at the time of my arrival, indicated to me that the university was under tremendous pressure. They would lose funding because of my presence there. I got the indication from those discussions that the alternative was they would throw out the institute, as well as me. If I am the persona non grata, then I will get out and let the institute be there.

You are not with the institute, so what will you do now?

I have always been doing these university lectures privately. It has nothing to do with the institute. This was my private income, and I used some of it to fund the institute. So I will continue to lecture wherever I am invited to lecture.

Have you looked at the blogs and the comments to your blog? Some have been very critical and some have sort of agreed with you.

I haven't read all of them. I have seen the worst of them, and I have seen the best of them. I appreciate that it's a point of view. Some people don't agree with me, and it's their right not to agree with me.

One of the statements President Seligman made, and I am not quoting him directly, but it was that a university is a place where ideas and opinions shouldn't be suppressed. And there should be the opportunity for open dialogue. But at the same time, the intent to have you resign seems contradictory. Is that your sense?

That is something he should answer, not me. It didn't make sense to me. On the one hand, they say "freedom of speech and freedom of thought," and then on the other hand people are penalized for it.

It's kind of contradictory.

UR faculty: Gandhi's apology ‘not enough'

Conflict over controversial topics is not unusual at a university. But at the University of Rochester, Arun Gandhi's Washington Post blog on Israel, Jews, and violence has created less public discussion than similar controversies have at other academic institutions.

The UR's Faculty Senate joined University President Joel Seligman in immediately denouncing Gandhi's statements. At the time, Seligman said that the role of universities is "not to impose intellectual orthodoxy, but provide opportunity to develop and articulate opinions or beliefs that may be unpopular." But he also said that Gandhi's view "seems fundamentally inconsistent with the core values of the University of Rochester."

The Faculty Senate agreed.

"It's not a question of not having the ability to explore an idea or a theory," says Nicholas Bigelow, a UR physics professor and the Senate's co-chair. "But to come out and say something fundamentally wrong and inaccurate, attributing violence in the Middle East to a cultural stereotype: this is not acceptable. And it would be the same if it were a member of faculty or a student."

And the Senate did not believe Gandhi's apology was adequate, Bigelow said in an interview last week.

"There were a number of ways that Arun had the opportunity to explain his position, but he didn't really change his position," Bigleow said. And, he added, while a public forum between the Jewish community and Gandhi to discuss his views is a good idea, it's not the UR's responsibility to coordinate it. Gandhi is not an employee or a member of the UR faculty. For the university to sponsor a forum, said Bigelow, could imply that the university was somehow part of the controversy generated by Gandhi's blog.

In the interview, Bigelow noted that the UR has a large Jewish student population and that some of its board members are Jewish.

Asked whether the Faculty Senate was also concerned about the impact on donations to the university, Bigelow said: "Yes, to some extent, the development efforts were a concern. But that was only a piece of it."