http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2016/images/an-najah.jpgWe were very disturbed to learn at the beginning of September that an online petition had been launched by the Middle East Forum, a neo-conservative, pro-Israel group led by Daniel Pipes and David Horowitz, named as leading Islamophobes by the Southern Law Poverty Center, calling on San Francisco State University President, Leslie Wong, to terminate the MOU with An-Najah. The petition accuses An-Najah of "incitement to violence, anti-Semitism and the glorification of terrorism." It cites the opinions of other discredited Zionist organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) as sources for these inflammatory allegations. The vilification of An-Najah, which is consistently ranked as a leading academic institution in the Arab world, is accompanied by an attack on Dr. Abdulhadi who is condemned for initiating the MOU and for her "record as an anti-Israel activist." Some of the examples given include her role as a founding member of the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel and her service as faculty advisor for SFSU's General Union of Palestine Students (GUPS). Unfortunately, the petition is not an isolated diatribe but part and parcel of an escalating backlash by pro-Israeli, Zionist organizations to undermine support for Palestine which has been gaining momentum on college campuses across the United States over the past ten years, catalyzed by the international Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign. The 2015 report, "The Palestine Exception to Free Speech" by the Center for Constitutional Rights and Palestine Legal explains how pro-Israel groups "leverage their significant resources and lobbying power to pressure universities, government actors, and other institutions to censor or punish advocacy in support of Palestinian rights."

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