Progressivism’s New Hate on Campus

The ‘Boycott, Divest, and Sanctions’ movement against Israel aims to cripple that country

By Andrew E. Harrod

Summary : Across American campuses, college radicals are fi ghting hard as they try to harm Israel and celebrate Palestinians. Though they call themselves nonviolent left- ists opposed to racism, they actually have no problem with anti-Semites and violent terrorists. This report shines a spotlight on the outrageous deeds and words of numerous leaders in the “Boycott, Divest, and Sanc- tions” movement.

he deck has long been stacked against Israel on America’s college cam- Tpuses. The Left’s BDS movement— the subject of this report—aims at Israel and Israel alone. BDS seeks to cripple the Jewish state whose creation gave refuge for the world’s Jews after Nazi Germany’s Ho- force—itself, a dubious concept—against its locaust incinerated six million of them. The enemies. Those who abhor Israel ignore January 2016 B, D, and S are the non-military weapons— the fact that it is surrounded on all sides by boycotts , divestments , and sanctions —that Muslim nations, many of which would drive CONTENTS Israel-haters use to undermine America’s the Jews “into the sea” if they could. strongest Middle East ally. Yet in the United States, anti-Israel cam- The movement’s activists mostly live on uni- paigners appear as occupying the moral high The BDS Movement versity campuses, dress themselves in moral ground. Fighting for its existence continu- Page 1 garments, and self-righteously denounce ously since 1948, the media depicts Israel Israel as racist, even genocidal, because it as a bully and a regional hegemon. Radical Briefl y Noted defends itself vigorously and refuses to die. pseudojournalist Max Blumenthal capital- No other country gets scolded by the na- ized on this perception in his 2013 book, Page 8 tions of the world for protecting itself from Goliath: Life and Loathing in Greater Israel , aggression or for using “disproportionate” which portrayed Israel as the “Little Satan,” Organization Trends compared to the “Great Satan” (America). The BDS movement “has exercised tactical the rights of Palestinian refugees to return This kind of propaganda is the norm when sophistication in ‘dressing up’ its radical link- to their homes and properties as stipulated it comes to Israel. ages and extremist ends,” analyst Dan Diker in U.N. resolution 194. writes at the Jerusalem Center for Public The BDS movement has managed to ac- Affairs website. Yet behind the façade of (Editor’s note: The Wall refers to the barrier complish so much with so little money (or a “progressive, nonviolent campaign” that built by the Israeli government in the West at least, so little money discoverable by the seeks “merely to pressure Israel toward Bank. Israel credits the separation barrier usual means). The movement is amazingly a two-state solution” lurks a hate-fi lled with reducing terrorist attacks, including sui- well organized. Its activists stir up much “political and economic warfare campaign cide bombings, against Israelis. West Bank controversy, media coverage, and under- against Israel.” residents complain that the wall impedes their graduate angst, draining activist energy away ability to move freely and commute to Israel from more worthwhile causes. The money BDS sprang out of events like the infamous for work. U.N. Resolution 194, adopted Dec. the movement gets its hands on comes from 2001 U.N. World Conference against Racism 11, 1948, established a theoretical framework relatively obscure foundations and from in Durban, South Africa—a conference so aimed at allowing Palestinian refugees to anonymous donors through donor-advised outrageous that the U.S. delegation walked return to their homes.) funds. We can only speculate whether out in disgust and the Ford Foundation, Muslim oil barons overseas are secretly which had funded Palestinian attendees Diker opines that “all three of these condi- underwriting BDS operations. linked to terrorism, had to apologize and tions can be understood as promoting the institute a grantmaking reform: requiring dissolution of the State of Israel as a Jewish Covering up radical ties grantees to promise not to “promote violence democratic state” and the “creation of another Israel is widely popular among Americans, or terrorism” or to call “for the destruction Arab-majority state in its place.” BDS “activ- while those who oppose Israel tend to be radi- of any state” (see “The Ford Foundation’s ists have more accurately characterized their cally left-wing in their politics. To increase International Agenda,” Foundation Watch, activities as a complementary strategy to the the popularity of the anti-Israel movement, its June 2004). The movement has become the policy of terror and political violence” of leaders are forced to pretend their supporters latest in a long line of Arab and European groups like Hamas that are trying to destroy are moderate, reasonable people. boycotts against Jews, Diker observes. Israel. The fi rst demand “sounds at fi rst hearing like a reference to the territories The BDS movement emerged on July 9, captured in the 1967 Six-Day War” by Israel, Editor: Matthew Vadum 2005, when 171 Palestinian non-govern- but “Hamas and other rejectionist groups Publisher: Terrence Scanlon mental organizations launched a campaign consider all of Israel to be occupied Arab to pressure Israel to “compl[y] with Inter- land.” Indeed, the “Palestinian Authority’s Organization Trends is published by Capital Research national Law and Universal Principles of offi cial media promote the notion that all of Center, a non-partisan education and Human Rights.” These Palestinian groups Israel is ‘Occupied Palestine.’” research organization, classifi ed by sought to force Israel, which they equate to the IRS as a 501(c)(3) public charity. apartheid -era South Africa, to “recognize Diker fi nds it “noteworthy that two of these Address: the Palestinian people’s inalienable right to three demands are unrelated to the aftermath 1513 16th Street, N.W. Washington, DC 20036-1480 self-determination.” The campaign makes of the 1967 Six-Day War.” Consider the sec- three demands of Israel: ond point, which he describes as a seemingly Phone: (202) 483-6900 Long-Distance: (800) 459-3950 “innocuous and uncontroversial appeal for 1. Ending its occupation and colonization of equal rights for Israel’s Arab citizens.” Yet E-mail Address: [email protected] all Arab lands and dismantling the Wall. in the “political discourse by Israeli Arabs” the “concept of collective equality between Web Site: http://www.capitalresearch.org 2. Recognizing the fundamental rights of Jews and Arabs means by defi nition that the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to Israel can exist only as a binational state.” Organization Trends welcomes let- full equality. The third point leaves unmentioned that the ters to the editor. “standard UN defi nition of a refugee does not Reprints are available for $2.50 pre- paid to Capital Research Center. 3. Respecting, protecting and promoting apply to ‘Palestinian refugees’” from Israel’s 2 January 2016 Organization Trends

1948 war, because those refugees “uniquely director Munayyer himself refused to de- Baltzer in turn differs little from her USCEIO inherit their status,” which is to say they pass nounce Hamas as a terrorist group during colleague Josh Ruebner, an American-Israeli their refugee status on to their progeny, and a Fox News interview with Sean Hannity Jew with an Israeli father. In 2004 he wrote so the number of “refugees” has naturally (July 24, 2014). about burning his Israeli draft papers in increased to over fi ve million in 2014. A front of Israel’s Washington, D.C., embassy “demand that Israel grant citizenship to some Munayyer’s USCEIO colleague, Anna Bal- and how with Zionism Jews “have turned fi ve million Palestinian Arabs who reject the tzer, some might argue, is the epitome of a our backs on our religious obligations and existence of Israel as the nation-state of the self-hating Jew. Her website offers typical should cooperate with this evil enterprise no Jewish people is essentially a call for Israel’s distortions of Israel, such as the canard that longer.” He often utilizes the dual-loyalty, destruction,” Diker notes. Israeli Arabs suffer discrimination in land anti-Semitic smear of “Israel Firsters” against purchasing. She has also claimed that Arab Israel’s supporters and considers American USCEIO armies invaded a newly independent Israel military aid to Israel a “sure-fi re sign of The BDS campaign, Diker notes, is a “Red- in 1948 to prevent Israeli ethnic cleansing a morally bankrupt policy.” He made the Green alliance” of “either far-left organiza- of Palestinians. During a 2015 appearance distorted claim in a March 2012 speech that tions or Islamist groups,” as analysis of the in Malaysia, she praised it for having “been the Israeli government studied Nazi Warsaw umbrella group U.S. Campaign to End the Is- a leader in having no diplomatic ties with Ghetto tactics in order to “attack and kill raeli Occupation (USCEIO) shows. Founded Israel.” Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.” in 2001, the group’s formal name is Education for Just Peace in the Middle East, and it had a Baltzer was most outrageous during a 2010 Mike Coogan, who has written that “Israel budget of just $477,740 in 2013, according to Irish radio interview in which she described views the mere existence of Palestinians as IRS fi lings. The group has received $20,000 how as an American Jew she became “anti- a threat,” and Ramah Kudaimi, round out from the Genevieve McMillan-Reba Stewart Zionist” during her travels to the Middle USCEIO staff radicalism. Kudaimi once Foundation (Cambridge, Mass.) since 2012, East (See http://theinfounderground.com/ wrote that Rasmea Odeh, a Palestinian who and $20,000 from the Firedoll Foundation archives/TiU.Radio.25th.Jan.2010.guest. tried to deny her history of terrorism in Israel (Walnut Creek, Calif.) since 2007. Former Anna.Baltzer.mp3). in order to avoid American imprisonment and USEICO organizer Noura Erakat, niece of deportation, deserved public recognition, not Palestinian chief negotiator Saab Erakat, She now wants to “bring down, inshallah , imprisonment. Yet Kudaimi condemned the gave an indication in 2006 of USEICO’s Zionism,” for “what Israel is doing has noth- “terrorism-defending ADL” (Anti-Defama- views when she chanted before Israel’s U.S. tion League) in a Twitter post. ing to do with Judaism,” and considers the embassy that “Palestine has been occupied Hamas leaders she met in Damascus to be since 1948.” USCEIO’s Steering committee offers more of “reasonable, strategically smart, intelligent the same, such as Andrew Kadi, a Palestinian- people.” (Editor’s note: inshallah is Arabic Current USEICO staff is no less radical. American who opposes fi lm production for “if Allah wills it.”) When her interviewer Executive director Yousef Munayyer, an and concerts in Israel. The Latino activist mentioned “a lot of Israeli, Zionist involve- Israeli Arab, was previously with the Jeru- Garrick Ruiz likewise leads a Los Angeles ment, wall to wall” in the terrorism of Sept. salem Fund (JF), an anti-Israeli think tank. BDS group that protested a local 2011 Israeli 11, 2001, she replied, “I would not put it JF founders supported Palestinian terrorism Philharmonic Orchestra performance. Later (FrontPageMag, Jan. 19, 2014) and this past my government or other governments he led a 2014 protest against the unloading writer personally observed a caption on a to have been involved in what happened on of an Israeli freighter in Los Angeles harbor temporary exhibit at JF that celebrated what 9/11.” She also revived the modern blood with chants calling for Israel’s elimination: it called a “symbol of the national struggle,” libel that accused Israeli soldiers of harvest- “From the [Jordan] river to the [Mediter- the terrorist Ali Taha, who was “killed in a ing the organs of Palestinians, claiming it ranean] sea, Palestine will be free.” hijacking operation he commanded” in 1972 “has been corroborated by different reliable (FrontPageMag, April 30, 2014). In an es- sources.” In 2014 Time magazine repeated Steering Committee members like the Ameri- say, one JF intern praised “Hamas and those the smear, which originated in an obscure can Jew Bekah Wolf have disturbing relations who support it [who] have the potential to Swedish newspaper in 2009, and retracted play a crucial role in the following years of to terrorism. She founded the radical Pales- the Palestinian resistance” (the document it the same day ( The Times of Israel , Aug. tinian Solidarity Project with her Palestinian is available at TheJerusalemFund.org). JF 25, 2014). husband, who spent time in an Israeli prison January 2016 3 Organization Trends for being a member of Palestinian Islamic Mohammed T. Mehdi, a bitter anti-Semite to Odeh. Sandra Tamari once celebrated Jihad. Hatem Abudayyeh, executive direc- and onetime adviser to Omar Abdel-Rahman, an Arab riot for “destroying a symbol of tor of the equally radical Arab American leader of the fi rst World Trade Center attack Israeli oppression, leaving only the tracks Action Network, has complained that the in 1993. behind,” namely a tram line in the Jerusalem “U.S. and Israel will continue to describe suburb of Shu’fat. She once appeared in a Hamas, Hezbollah and the other Palestinian Various USCEIO personnel like Steering political advertisement with the hashtag and Lebanese resistance organizations as Committee member Sydney Levy and “#PALESTINIANSSUPPORTFERGUSO- ‘terrorists,’” even though the “real terrorists Advisory Board member Joel Benin, a NBECAUSE,” saying the “murder of Mike are the governments and military forces of radical Stanford University professor, are Brown is driven by racism.” In fact, Brown, the U.S. and Israel” (FightBackNews.org, members of Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). a young black man, was not murdered. He July 22, 2006). The Anti-Defamation League has analyzed attacked a police offi cer who then fatally JVP’s ideology and declared it “nothing shot Brown in self-defense, as every offi cial Steering Committee member Nasser Barg- but a complete rejection of Israel,” perfect investigation, including one conducted by a houti leads a San Diego BDS group and for anti-Zionists like Levy and Benin. JVP, local grand jury, determined in the case. But condemned the “exclusionary Zionist vi- which had a budget of $1.1 million in 2014, the truth is rarely an obstacle for the Left. sion of creating a Jewish state” in a 2008 has described itself as the “‘Jewish wing’ of BDS supporters try to link their cause and article during Israel’s 60 th anniversary. He the Palestinian solidarity movement.” leftist movements like the Black Lives Matter affi rmed the thesis of The Ethnic Cleansing campaign, as Kudaimi explained at a Jerusa- of Palestine by Israeli historian Ilan Pappe Diker has noted that such “Jewish and Israeli lem Fund event. These two movements, she and argued that Israelis in 1948 expelled anti-Zionists play a critical role” in BDS, said, “carry on a mutual struggle to subvert Palestinians during what they often call the particularly as a “legitimizing force that the same colonial logics of supremacy and “Nakba” (Catastrophe). “For Palestinians, the campaign uses to insulate itself against exclusion that are inherent to the Zionist denial of the Nakba is tantamount to denying charges of anti-Semitism.” As the website colonization of Palestine.” the Holocaust for Jews,” he scandalously Legal Insurrection has opined, JVP is “‘Jew equated. washing’ the anti-Israel movement,” even as USCEIO Steering Committee member and JVP Executive Director Rebecca Vilkomer- AFSC Palestine-Israel program director Leading Israeli historian Benny Morris, son manifested JVP’s extremism in an inter- Mike Merryman-Lotze indicates the views though, has carefully analyzed how “Pappe’s view with the neo-Nazi, Holocaust-denying that have made AFSC endorse BDS. In an contempt for historical truth and factual website American Free Press. Internet posting that “does refl ect AFSC’s accuracy is almost boundless” and “render position,” he stated that Israel’s “denial his ‘histories’ worthless.” This befi ts an Such extremism has not prevented JVP of Palestinian rights is at the core of the Israeli anti-Zionist whose “language is fully from receiving grants from Wallace Global confl ict.” as virulent as Hamas’s, or worse.” Another Fund II ($50,000 since 2010), Ploughshares Israeli concludes that Pappe “inverts the Foundation ($30,000 since 2009), Tides “Israeli violence is the violence that must be historical record and turns a coordinated Arab Foundation ($16,500 since 2004), and from exercised to maintain a neo-colonial military attempt at ethnically cleansing Palestine of donor-advised funds provided by Schwab occupation and apartheid-like inequality. Pal- its Jews into a Jewish attempt at ethnically Charitable Fund ($693,450 since 2009) estinian violence is the inevitable response,” cleansing Arabs.” and Fidelity Investments Charitable Fund he added. “We must call for Palestinians’ ($80,000 since 2012), according to philan- right of return,” he wrote elsewhere, while Barghouti shares with USCEIO Advisory thropy databases. “arguments against return that deny rights Board member Nabil Mohamad an affi liation because of a perceived need to maintain a with the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination American Friends Service Committee particular demographic balance are funda- Committee or ADC. ADC exemplifi ed its The Quaker American Friends Service mentally racist.” radicalism in 2010 by honoring the late Committee (AFSC) unites several USCEIO anti-Semitic journalist Helen Thomas with Steering Committee members, including As one analysis states, the pacifi st AFSC has the ADC Mehdi Courage in Journalism the Palestinian-American Shirien Damra, “sacrifi ced its founding religious principles at award. This award itself bears the name of who once dedicated an award she received the altar of anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism”

4 January 2016 Organization Trends

(TheTower.org, issue #9, December 2013). Like Damra, two USCEIO Steering Com- align” with the MSA’s ideological legacy in AFSC co-hosted a 2008 “gala dinner with mittee members, Abraham Greenhouse and the Muslim Brotherhood. Yet MSA, another Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as Rahim Kurwa, have backgrounds in Students observer wrote, today often “interchanges its the guest of honor, despite Ahmadinejad’s for Justice in Palestine. Currently with JVP, members with SJP on the campuses” and, as Holocaust denial, anti-Semitism, and geno- Greenhouse attracted notoriety in 2003 as the Diker has reported, “has been an anchor for cidal threats against the Jewish state.” Yet Rutgers University student who threw a pie BDS activity, such as the annual and some- AFSC continues to receive numerous grants into the face of former Deputy Prime Minister times violent” Israeli Apartheid Week. for a variety of purposes from the Ford, Gates, Natan Sharansky ( New York Times , Oct. 11, Gill, MacArthur, Rockefeller, and Tides 2003). Kurwa, a member of SJP’s UCLA Accordingly, SJP has consistently shown Foundations as well as the Open Society chapter, once traveled to Spain and appeared a radical, violent, and anti-Semitic nature, Institute, among many others, according to on a panel with a Hamas supporter. such as when a Vassar College SJP chapter philanthropy database searches. tweeted a 1944 anti-Semitic Nazi propaganda Over 126 SJP American university chapters picture. While SJP events feature supporters Advisory board member Kathy Bergen is are the “primary organizer of anti-Israel of terrorist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah, affi liated with another Quaker institution, events on U.S. college campuses and the SJP members have often been involved in the Friends International Center in Ramallah. group most responsible for bringing divest- threatening, harassing, and assaulting Jew- She once declared in a radio interview that ment resolutions to votes in front of student ish students. Brandeis University student “most of the struggle against the occupation governments,” according to the Anti-Defa- Daniel Mael has noted a “pattern by SJP since 1967 has been nonviolent.” She is a mation League. Founded in 2001, “SJP has of scheduling anti-Israel events on Jewish USCEIO co-founder and also sits on the consistently demonized Israel” using Nazi, holidays.” advisory board of Friends of Sabeel—North Jim Crow, and apartheid analogies. Several America (FOSNA), whose formal name is SJP chapters designate one week every aca- Increasingly, the Anti-Defamation League Friends of Peace and Justice in The Holy demic year as “Palestine Awareness Week” notes, SJP chapters support the “notion that Land Inc. or “Israeli Apartheid Week.” a debate between pro-Palestinian and pro- Israel activists should be opposed because FOSNA and SJP Hatem Bazian founded SJP at U.C. Berke- it would grant legitimacy to the pro-Israel As the Anti-Defamation League has docu- ley as a graduate student after he had been position.” This “anti-normalization cam- mented, FOSNA is an affi liate of Jerusalem’s involved in the General Union of Pales- paign” has caused SJP chapters to reject Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology tinian Students (GUPS), a pro-terrorist dialogue with Jewish groups like even the Center. Sabeel and its founder, Palestinian student organization begun in Egypt in dovish J Street, as explained during a 2006 Anglican priest Naim Ateek, cast Israeli- 1959. GUPS members have included many speech at U.C. Irvine’s Israeli Apartheid Palestinian confl ict in supercessionist terms. notable Palestinians such as Yasser Arafat. Week, co-sponsored by SJP and MSA. SJP “One of the primary Christian anti-Jewish Bazian had led the Berkeley chapter of the speaker Amir Abdel Malik Ali stated that to ideologies is supersessionism, also known as Muslim Students Association (MSA), a “sit down with Zionists, for cookies and cake, replacement theology,” Diker has written, in group that “overwhelming evidence” shows and talk about issues…gives the impression which the “church had replaced ‘Israel’—that espouses “Wahhabism, anti-Americanism, that Zionism is like, it’s okay … Now, you is, the Jews—in God’s plan.” Ateek has often and anti-Semitism,” observes the Middle Jews, in all due respect, you wouldn’t sit used anti-Semitic deicide imagery, saying East Forum. down with Nazis for tea and cake.” Such that the “Israeli government crucifi xion sys- “anti-normalization” led Merryman-Lotze to tem is operating daily.” FOSNA, which had Bazian, as one analyst wrote, “found that participate in a Palestinian nonprofi t group’s a budget of $556,843 in 2014, has received there were practical limitations to what a “decision in late 2000 to end people to people $135,000 in grants from the Caitlin Founda- group recognized as being Muslim could programs with Israelis.” tion (Palm Beach, Fla.) since 1999, $15,000 accomplish” (MSA received one $37,000 from Charles and Mary Crossed Foundation grant from Chevron Community Foundation American Muslims for Palestine (Rochester, N.Y.) since 2003, and in 2003.) Co-founded by Bazian, the new Bazian went on to found American Muslims $35,000 since 2002 from the Theodore Albert SJP “appeared to be a secular social justice for Palestine (AMP) in 2005. AMP, the Anti- von der Ahe Jr. Trust (Pasadena, Calif.). movement whose agenda just happened to Defamation League writes, “is the leading

January 2016 5 Organization Trends organization providing anti-Zionist train- Mariam stated to USCEIO in 2004, Edward (See https://electronicintifada.net/content/ ing and education to students and Muslim Said “linked the Question of Palestine to why-are-palestinians-paying-germanys- community organizations in the country,” other struggles of the oppressed and colo- sins/11167). Perpetually viewing Israel as and “has also placed a heavy emphasis on nized people.” an aggressor, she has decried how Israel supporting” SJP. Given AMP’s roots in the “has in the past attacked Egypt, Lebanon, Islamic Association of Palestine, a defunct Huwaida Arraf was a founder in 2001 of the Syria, Jordan and Iraq, all on the pretext of American propaganda arm for Hamas, it’s International Solidarity Movement. ISM was pre-emption. And now it wants to attack no surprise that anti-Semitic statements and one of the organizers of the deadly 2010 fl o- Iran under the same pretext.” calls for Israel’s destruction consistently ap- tilla to Gaza. Observers have noted that she pear at AMP events. proclaims nonviolence to Western audiences Among the Advisory Board’s leftists, Peace while supporting her fellow Palestinians in Action executive director Kevin Martin Such statements have not troubled Steering terrorism. blithely assures that “Iran isn’t developing” Committee member Manal Fakhoury who nuclear weapons. The late Hany Khalil spoke at AMP’s 2015 annual conference. Several Advisory Board members have worked for United for Peace and Justice, a Advertising the “great speaker lineup” for expressed an unremitting hostility towards leftist pro-Castro group. Dr. Nancy Mur- the preceding year’s conference, she praised Israel. Georgetown University professor ray, whose Boston Coalition for Palestin- AMP’s “excellent job in teaching and em- Mark Lance decried the 1947 United Na- ian Rights refl ects the 2005 BDS appeal, powering our community to help change the tions partition plan for Palestine as unjustly endorsed a 2011 New York/San Francisco status quo on the issue of Palestine.” favoring a Jewish state. “Not surprisingly, “Bring the Troops Home Now!” rally. Along Palestinians rose up and were joined by with withdrawal from Afghanistan, Iraq, and Fakhoury argued in a 2013 presentation in several Arab states,” he wrote of the subse- Pakistan, the rally supported a potpourri of her home state of Florida that “Islam does quent war in which Israel faced annihilation. leftist demands such as “Support democracy not support terrorism” and “there is not a With a confi dence not shared by many, he movements all over North Africa and the single thing wrong with Islam” as a faith, predicted that in any post-“apartheid” one- Arab World” and “end to all foreclosures.” but many observers are less favorable to- state solution, “Israel would no longer remain wards her (See https://www.youtube.com/ majority Jewish, but that is not to say it could Professor Barbara Ransby is another US- watch?v=TGeInUzNk9g). Her relationships not remain a haven for Jews.” CEIO member who links BDS with other with Ahmed Bedier, a former leader with the leftist movements. She has condemned the Islamist Council on American-Islamic Rela- Similarly, writer Nadia Hijab has found it “racialized nature of U.S. capitalism” in tions (CAIR), raised several concerns. Pho- “heartbreakingly hard to accept” the “1967 Dissent magazine and called the “Ferguson tos of her posing in the Palestinian territories Arab defeat.” This “drove home the fact uprising” a “story of black poverty and white with portraits of Palestinian leaders like the that Israel was a reality and it was no longer supremacy” for the left-wing website Col- infamous Arafat also helped foil her ambition possible to liberate the part of Palestine that orlines.com (for more on Colorlines, which to create a sister-city relationship between became Israel in 1948.” The late Professor now features a section on “Islamophobia,” her Ocala, Fla. home and Ramallah. Naseer Aruri once declared to the anti-Se- see “The Structural Racism Racket,” Foun- mitic Veterans Today website that the “Oslo dation Watch, March 2013). Ransby and USCEIO’s Advisory Board listings hardly Accords constituted an act of surrender by other delegation members visiting Palestin- improve the organization’s image. Columbia Yasser Arafat.” ian territories, meanwhile, would “deplore University professor Rashid Khalidi, a close the Israeli practice of ‘pink-washing,’ the longtime friend of Barack Obama, is well Palestinian writer Susan Abulhawa has state’s use of ostensible support for gender known for his left-wing, anti-Israeli views shown bitter animosity towards Israel on and sexual equality to dress-up its occupa- as a one-time spokesman for the terrorist Facebook, describing Israeli policies as tion.” Speaking with groups like “Palestinian Palestine Liberation Organization. His Co- “reminiscent of Nazi mentality.” Over- Queers for BDS,” she and other delegation lumbia professorship is named for the late looking Arab countries, among others, she members somehow “consistently found like-minded Edward Said, whose widow has counterfactually condemned Israel as a evidence and analyses of a more substantive Mariam sits on the Advisory Board. “As “country with one of the worst human rights approach to an indivisible justice.” an Arab American of Palestinian origin,” records in the world”

6 January 2016 Organization Trends

Such progressive sentiments clash embar- saying they “have long contributed to our across sectarian lines. Far from being pro- rassingly with recurring anti-Semitism movement, providing useful resources and gressive, the BDS movement encompasses amidst USCEIO ranks. Advisory Board tirelessly advocating for Palestinian rights.” anti-Israeli/anti-Semitic hatreds, hackneyed member Rev. Dr. Fahed Abu-Akel , a former Merryman-Lotze from the AFSC concurred anti-Western leftist diatribes against colo- Presbyterian Church General Assembly that the “growth of If Americans Knew over nialism, and false history. In the distorted Moderator, recommended a speaker for a the last 15 years is impressive and many of BDS worldview, Israel can do no right and 2003 conference in Ohio. In comments the materials that it has produced are excel- its various Arab opponents can do no wrong from which Abu-Akel distanced himself, lent.” He did not “want to take away from as the BDS movement strangely celebrates the speaker invoked the anti-Semitic fraud the good work that If Americans Knew and Palestinians as liberal icons. Contrary to the Protocols of Zion and indicated that Zionism Alison have done.” He also made an uncon- BDS movement’s often prominent donors, all was worse than Nazism. vincing distinction: what is “problematic people of goodwill seeking a better Middle is not individual statements or explicitly East future should look behind the BDS Then there is the curious case of noted anti-Semitic and racist actions by Alison or movement’s veneer of fair-mindedness and anti-Semite Alison Weir and her website If If Americans Knew, but rather their repeated reject this regressive agenda. Americans Knew (IAK). As Anti-Defama- use of platforms that promote anti-Semitism tion League research shows, “Weir employs and racism.” Andrew E. Harrod is a freelance researcher anti-Semitic imagery and portrays Israel and and writer who holds a Ph.D. from the its agents as ruthless forces”; she once de- Hurting, not helping conditions on Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at famed Judaism as a “ruthless and supremacist the ground Tufts University and a J.D. from George faith.” Weir has also praised “research” into For all of the venomous zeal dominating Washington University Law School. He is the blood libel that Jews use the blood of BDS supporters, the movement actually admitted to the Virginia State Bar. Gentiles in religious ceremonies. hinders rather than helps any amelioration of conditions for Israelis and particularly (Note: This article relies heavily on Disco- Accordingly, Weir has made frequent ap- Palestinians. The “BDS movement,” Diker verTheNetworks, the online encyclopedia pearances in Holocaust-denying, white notes, “has triggered deep opposition and chronicling the Left.) supremacist, and conspiracy theory media resentment among the Israeli population.” outlets, like the American Free Press website This has “set back prospects for a peaceful, OT where JVP’s Vilkomerson once appeared. negotiated solution to the Palestinian-Israeli Yet through the years this never stopped confl ict.” Weir from collaborating at events with AMP, FOSNA, JVP, and USCEIO, until USCEIO The Palestinian Authority, Mael has simi- and the wider BDS community suddenly larly written, offi cially supports a two-state noticed her nefarious associations in summer solution in a peace process and has there- 2015. The Steering Committee announced in fore repeatedly criticized BDS. American a July 16 letter the removal of Weir and IAK Task Force on Palestine executive director from the USCEIO coalition for violating “our Ghaith al-Omari says BDS is “completely anti-racism principles” through her question- unacceptable” and “doesn’t fi t with the idea able choice of media outlets (See http://www. of the two-state solution.” The ideology of Please remember endtheoccupation.org/article.php?id=4510). the BDS-supporting SJP, Mael notes, is “in Betraying a disturbing view of Zionism, fact a lot closer to the beliefs and policies Capital Research Center the Steering Committee proclaimed that of Hamas than to the recognized Palestinian USCEIO nondiscrimination principles pre- leadership.” in your will and estate planning. cluded “any overtly Islamophobic, Zionist, or homophobic groups.” Ultimately, the BDS movement serves Thank you for your support. precisely the opposite of the goals left- The Steering Committee letter nonetheless ists consistently invoke, such as peaceful Terrence Scanlon, President qualifi ed its criticism of Weir and IAK, reconciliation and human understanding

January 2016 7 Organization Trends Briefl yNoted President Obama ’s Chicago-based nonprofi t group, Organizing for Action (OfA), has trained “more than 10,000 leftist organizers, who, in turn, are training more than 2 million youths in [Saul] Alinsky street tactics,” according to the Hoover Institution ’s Paul Sperry . This “army of social justice bullies” will carry on Obama’s campaign to fundamentally transform America after he leaves offi ce in January 2017, continuing his push to punish America for its imaginary sins and to pro- mote manufactured controversies. Some observers have compared OfA to the government-supported goon squads that Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro and Cuba’s Castro brothers use to harass and intimidate their domestic opponents. OfA units brought muscle to the 2011-12 fi ght in Wisconsin over laws that reformed the state’s out-of-control government labor unions. OfA has also bludgeoned Democrats that Obama deemed insuffi ciently left-wing, especially red-state congressio- nal Democrats who had been wavering on Obamacare.

The terrorist-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) wants to make America safe for Sharia law. So it’s not surprising that on Dec. 2 after 14 Americans were gunned down in San Bernardino, Calif.—an event the Heritage Foundation labeled the “75th Islamist-inspired terrorist attack or plot in the U.S.” since Sept. 11, 2001—CAIR tried to grab hold of the media narrative. CAIR, which the United Arab Emirates designated a year ago as a terrorist group, set to work crafting a storyline about the mass-murdering Muslim married couple, Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik to ensure Islam wouldn’t be blamed for this latest massacre committed in its name. CAIR-LA Executive Director Hussam Ayloush , who is also an Executive Board member of the California Democratic Party, fi rst played dumb, saying at a press conference, “We don’t know the motive. Is it work, rage-related? Is it mental illness? Is it extreme ideology? At this point it’s really unknown to us and it is too soon for us to speculate.” Two days later on CNN, Ayloush changed his tune, blaming America for the shootings. “Let’s not forget that some of our own foreign policy, as Americans, as the West, have fueled that extremism.”

GOP presidential contender Ben Carson is calling for the government to investigate CAIR’s links to the terrorist under- world. In a policy paper he unveiled last month, he urged that war be formally declared against Islamic State and that the State Department open a probe into CAIR, which he called “an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood and a supporter of terrorism.” Carson earned the ire of CAIR previously by saying that a Muslim who wished to implement Sharia law should not become U.S. president.

“Hardball” host Chris Matthews was offended last month when New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) called Islamic State terrorists “animals” but didn’t explain why he was miffed. Matthews said the terrorists should be called “bad guys.” “And also, animals! I mean, call them what they are, bad people. But what’s this animal thing that Christie’s throwing around?” said Matthews, a longtime Democrat who wrote speeches for the Carter administration and served as chief of staff to the late House Speaker Tip O’Neill (D-Mass.).

Student radicals at Atlanta’s Emory University are demanding end-of-semester course evaluations that would allow them to report professors for committing “microaggressions” against them. “The explicit goal of such a question on evalua- tions would be to punish professors who engaged in speech that offended students,” Reason.com reports. Two proposed questions are “Has this professor made any microaggressions towards you on account of your race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, language, and/or other identity?” and “Do you think that this professor fi ts into the vision of Emory University being a community of care for individuals of all racial, gender, ability, and class identities?” As Reason notes, there is “no standard for what counts as a microaggression—they are, by their very nature, vague, subjective, and incon- sequential.” Microaggressions, according to some college bureaucrats, can consist of statements such as, “Where are you from?” and “America is the greatest country.” 8 January 2016