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When members of the American Historical Association (AHA) gathered in Chicago for their annual conference from January 8-11, 2026, many hoped the professional society would condemn the undermining of education and historical research in the United States and abroad. While the majority of members who attended the conference’s business meeting on January 10 voted in favor of two resolutions denouncing the destruction of education infrastructure in Gaza and attacks on core principles of education in the United States, respectively, the wins were short-lived. On January 11, the association’s leadership announced that it had voted not to approve the two resolutions.

“This is a really egregious violation of both the AHA’s principles and mission, but also the democratic vote,” AHA member Mezna Qato, a historian of Palestine at the University of Cambridge and a member of the Palestinian Historians Group (PHG), told Truthout. The success of the two resolutions at the January meeting was the result of months of organizing spearheaded by groups within the larger association, including PHG, Historians for Peace and Democracy (HPAD), and Historians for Palestine.

Qato told Truthout that a growing number of academics have been spurred to action as they witness escalating attacks against their profession and on-campus Palestine solidarity movements. “Part of it is about bringing your historical profession in alignment with your moral and civic and political values and doing so in a way that supports and advances other struggles within the AHA, including a defense of academic freedom, freedom of speech, [and] the profession itself against the vagaries of this rising authoritarian turn in the U.S.,” she told Truthout.

“This is a really egregious violation of both the AHA’s principles and mission, but also the democratic vote.”

Members who put forward the resolutions see the AHA as a powerful space within which to organize. Chartered by congress in 1889, it is the oldest professional association of historians in the United States. It is also the largest such association in the world, with over 10,000 members who research various regions and eras at institutions worldwide.

This year’s conference in Chicago featured panels on academic freedom, immigration, and teaching Palestine........

© Truthout