No Campus Support For Jihad Terrorists
In the jihadist quest to bring the holy war to America, college campuses have become the focus of the most overt support for terrorist organizations like Hamas.
During the most recent war in Gaza in the summer of 2014, numerous chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) together with some chapters of the Muslim Students Association (MSA) openly declared their support for Hamas’s unprovoked aggression against Israel, part of its ongoing campaign to destroy the Jewish state. In campus demonstrations, SJP followed the Hamas propaganda line, falsely accusing Israel of horrendous war crimes, reciting the names of Gaza’s dead over loudspeakers, and holding “die-ins” to protest Israel’s attempt to defend itself against the rocket attacks started and perpetuated by Hamas. As with every recent outbreak of violence involving Israel and its terrorist adversaries, Israel was responding defensively to military attacks from its neighbors who have pledged themselves to its destruction. In the case of Operation Protective Edge, the incitement was increased rocket fire towards Israel and the horrific kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers by Hamas members. Yet on American campuses, SJP and MSA portray Hamas and Palestinians as the victims, and defend their war crimes against the Jewish state.
American campuses are also one of the strongest supporters of the Hamas-inspired international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign which is designed to weaken and destroy the Jewish state. BDS against Israel has a long and brutal history. In 1933, Nazi collaborator Haj Amin al-Husseini, head of the Palestinian Arab Executive Committee, called for a boycott of the Jews living in the Palestine Mandate which was then controlled by Britain. Starting in 1945, 15 Arab nations initiated a boycott of Israel even before it was officially recognized, expanding this effort once it formally became a state. Leaders of these nations openly stated that their goal was the “liquidation of Israel.” These are the origins of the current BDS movement that has overtaken our campuses.
In America, 24 campuses have already passed resolutions supporting BDS against Israel and another 30 campuses have considered them. The chief sponsors of these resolutions are members of Students for Justice in Palestine and the Muslim Students Association, and their leftwing allies.
Hamas propaganda is also prominently featured on the anti-Israel ‘apartheid walls’ and displays created by SJP and MSA. This propaganda includes photos of dead Palestinian children and Hamas maps that fraudulently claim that there was a Palestinian state in 1947 that was subsequently infiltrated and occupied by Jews.
No Campus Privileges For Anti-Israel Hate Groups
Through “Israeli Apartheid Weeks” and “Nakba” commemorations, phony student eviction notices and “checkpoint” harassments, campus organizations such as Students for Justice in Palestine and the Muslim Students Association seek to demonize Israel and its Jews and transform the Islamic terrorists into “freedom fighters.” These groups are also the main supporters and promoters of the Boycott, Divest and Sanction (BDS) campaign which was designed to further the goals of terrorist groups like Hamas to delegitimize, weaken and destroy the Jewish State.
These university-approved organizations engage in rhetoric and activities that clearly fall under the U.S. government’s official definition of “anti-Semitism.” They deny the Jewish people - and only the Jewish people - their right to self-determination; they demand that Israel live up to standards not expected of any other nation; they deploy classic anti-Semitic imagery and libels; they demonize Israel – the most tolerant nation in the Middle East – as an “apartheid state” and hold all Jews collectively responsible for the perceived actions of the Israeli state.
These anti-Jewish events violate the most basic and universally held codes of student behavior promulgated by university administrations. Their sponsoring groups operate on university facilities, and with the support of university funds even though their hateful behaviors are explicitly forbidden under the rules of conduct administrators have promulgated, and which are invoked to protect every ethnic group but Jews.
Universities are obligated to enforce their own codes of conduct for all student organizations equally. Campus hate groups like SJP are entitled to exist, but they are not entitled to official university recognition, privileges and funding.
No Student Funding For Apartheid Hate Weeks
Every year at dozens of campuses across America, the terrorist-affiliated campus hate groups Students for Justice in Palestine and the Muslim Students Association hold week-long propaganda festivals whose sole purpose is to demonize Israel and drive it into extinction.
These so-called “Israeli Apartheid Weeks” compare Israel, the only liberal democracy in the Middle East and the only nation in that region to fully uphold the rights of religious minorities, women, and homosexuals, to apartheid-era South Africa.
Apartheid Weeks typically feature extremist anti-Israel and anti-Semitic speakers such as Omar Barghouti, founder of the current BDS movement, or Amir Abdul Malik Ali who has compared the Jews to Nazis and openly expressed support for Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad. Students construct “apartheid walls” meant to mimic the defensive border fence between Israel and Gaza which they plaster with anti-Israel and anti-Semitic propaganda including photos of dead Palestinian children and Hamas maps which fraudulently claim that there was a Palestinian state in 1947 that was subsequently infiltrated and occupied by Jews. Some chapters organize mock-checkpoints to harass students as they attempt to go to class or ceremonies to honor the Palestinian dead.
Universities would not provide funding to hate-fests targeting any other nation or minority, but they regularly underwrite the costs associated with bringing Israeli Apartheid Week to campus. This is a double-standard that needs to end.