On June 8, DePaul University professor Norman Finkelstein was denied tenure for criticizing the brutal Israeli occupation of Palestine. The Zionist-backed tenure decision was announced by DePaul’s president, Rev. Dennis Holtschneider.
Finkelstein has been an assistant professor in the Political Science Department at DePaul since 2001. The son of
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Finkelstein’s work primarily focuses on Zionist manipulation of the holocaust to support U.S. imperialism’s and Israel’s aggression in the Middle East. He is widely recognized as a leading scholar in his field.
Another DePaul professor, Mehrene Larudee, was denied tenure as well. Larudee is an assistant professor in the International Studies Department who has published on the impact of globalization on poverty and inequality. Her tenure bid was denied ostensibly because of her vocal support for Finkelstein.
Both professors enjoy popular support among students and fellow faculty members. When their promotion to tenure was considered, they both were supported by their departments and college faculty panels. Finkelstein’s department voted 9-3 in favor of his tenure, and the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Personnel Committee voted 5-0 in favor of tenure.
As soon as Finkelstein and Larudee came up for tenure, Zionist forces across the country began to fight against them. Alan Dershowitz, an outspoken promoter of Israel who teaches law at Harvard University, began a full-blown campaign against Finkelstein. He circulated anti-Finkelstein petitions and relentlessly contacted university officials in an effort to get them to deny Finkelstein tenure.
Dershowitz increased his anti-Finkelstein campaign leading up to the publication of Finkelstein’s latest book. Dershowitz threatened lawsuits and even contacted California’s governor in an attempt to prevent University of California Press from publishing Finkelstein’s book. The book criticizes Dershowitz’s own Zionist screed, “The Case for Israel,” for its unsupported historical claims and “apologetics for atrocities and violence” on the part of the Israeli government.
Amidst student protest, DePaul’s president, Holtschneider, publicly announced the university’s decision to deny tenure. While Holtschneider claimed that the decisions were not tied to Finkelstein’s positions on Zionism and Palestine, his statement acknowledged that he gave significant credence to Dershowitz’s claims about Finkelstein’s scholarship.
The attack on Finkelstein is part of a larger assault launched by pro-Israel academics on scholars who speak or write against the colonial-settler state of Israel. The most ardent attacks have often been leveled against Arab and Muslim professors, like Columbia University professors Joseph Massad, George Saliba, Rashid Khalidi and Hamid Dabashim; U.C. Berkelely professor Dr. Hatem Bazian; and Northeastern University professor Shahid Alam.
A notorious website, Campus Watch, run by arch-racist Daniel Pipes, monitors professors deemed to be “dangerous”—meaning pro-Palestinian or anti-Zionist. The denial of tenure to Finkelstein was covered in depth by Campus Watch.
Students, professors fight back
Students at DePaul immediately saw through the university’s lies. They continue to demand tenure for Finkelstein and Larudee.
On June 11, a group of students held a sit-in at the president’s offices to demand that he reverse the tenure decisions. The students presented Holtschneider with a petition of 800 signatures supporting Finkelstein’s tenure. The sit-in lasted through June 13th. Students were threatened with arrest and expulsion.
Community groups have rallied and picketed outside the downtown campus of DePaul in support of the two teachers. There has been an international campaign of letters and petitions to Holtschneider decrying the denial of tenure to Finkelstein and Larudee by members of the academy.
Students also protested at DePaul’s graduation ceremony, where they displayed signs that demanded tenure for Finkelstein and Larudee. Some students refused to shake Holtschneider’s hand as they received their diplomas.
On June 25, five students started a hunger strike to overturn the university’s tenure decision.
The attacks against Finkelstein and Larudee are meant to threaten and silence the growing U.S. movement in solidarity with the people of Palestine.
Growing solidarity with Palestine is a threat to U.S. hegemony in the Middle East. Maintaining Israel as a racist client state is a primary concern for the ruling class and its strategic interests in the Middle East.
Increased knowledge about Palestine and support from the U.S. working class and progressives threatens this project. The heightened attacks on anti-Zionist intellectuals are an effort to replace solidarity with fear.
