Supporters of Palestinian rights have for many years faced repression on college campuses. This is not surprising—while the United States postures as a bastion of democracy, official support for the garrison state of Israel is part of the ruling class consensus. As such, those who violate this rule of contemporary capitalist discourse appear to be considered outside the pale of the First Amendment. Professors who have spoken out against U.S./ Israeli oppression of the Palestinian people have been targeted with hostile campaigns; in several cases prominent scholars have been denied tenure while student groups have been accused of “anti-Semitism” and face attempts to shut down their organizing.
The latest round of attacks on pro-Palestine speech on U.S. college campuses attempts to silence faculty and students alike.
Support Steve Salaita
Palestinian American scholar Steve Salaita was offered a position at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign as a tenured professor in American Indian Studies. Having already quit his job at Virginia Technical Institute, Chancellor Phyllis Wise fired him three weeks before classes were to start, in response to strongly worded Tweets that were made during this summer’s U.S. supported Israeli massacre of Gaza. (New York Times)
Salaita does not stand alone however. A petition in solidarity with Salaita has garnered over 17,000 signatures. Eight departments at the university have taken votes of no confidence in the chancellor. Over 3,000 scholars have pledged to boycott the school, resulting in the cancellation of numerous events. Now even the chancellor herself is backtracking, saying that the decision reflected not hers but the wishes of the board of trustees—although earlier she had indicated that the decision was unilateral. The struggle for Steve Salaita ‘s rights is far from over. Sign the petition here.
You can also donate to support Salaita who is now without income to support his family.
The firing (or is it “de-hiring”) of Salaita hinged on the allegedly “uncivil” language used in his Tweets. Of course, those who concerned themselves with F-bombs on social media had nothing to say about real bombs being dropped on Gaza.
Defend Megan Marzec
Student activist Megan Megan Marzec at Ohio University is facing death threats for her unique pro-Palestinian take on the popular “ALS ice bucket challenge” in which she dumped a bucket of blood over her head and challenged the president of OU to divest from Israeli apartheid. According to the organizers of a petition in Marzec’s support, “Pro-Israel students and anti-free speech Zionists from around the world have flooded Megan’s email and social media accounts with well over 1,000 messages of hate and intimidation within the last 24 hours alone.
“These attacks have been incredibly derogatory. Many have included extremely sexist and racist language. Nearly all of them have attempted to intimidate her into resigning from her position in the Student Senate. One of the messages directed the “n-word” at Ohio University’s black president, Dr. Roderick McDavis, who has not taken a position on the Israeli massacre in Palestine. The worst messages have included explicit death threats.”
In a message of solidarity for Marzec, OU Film Studies professor and activist Louis-George Schwartz said, “I am named after two great Uncles who were killed in Auschwitz. For many reasons I don’t usually claim or care about my ‘identity’ as a Jew, but I have been asked to stand with the threatened activists. I stand with them. I say unequivocally that those who threaten anti-racists in the name of ‘THE Jews’ do not speak for me, and they dishonor my ancestors. I say unequivocally that those who support the murderous state dominating the territory of Palestine do not speak for me.”
