Open
Letter
CALIFORNIA SCHOLARS FOR
ACADEMIC FREEDOM
June 28, 2017
Dr. Leslie Wong, President
San Francisco State University
president@sfsu.edu
CSU Board of Trustees
lhernandez@calstate.edu
Dear President Wong and CSU Board of Trustees:
We write on behalf of California Scholars for Academic Freedom (cs4af)*
to express opposition to the ongoing defamation, intimidation, and
assaults against the academic freedom of SFSU faculty members by the
right-wing Zionist organization, The Lawfare Project. We are troubled
by the absence of a clear public statement from President Wong to offer
a principled defense of Professor Rabab Abdulhadi who has been
repeatedly and unfairly targeted by such attacks as has the College of
Ethnic Studies and Dean Kenneth Monteiro.
The Lawfare Project filed its lawsuit against SFSU in federal court on
June 19, 2017. The suit conflates criticism of Israel and its denial of
Palestinian rights with anti-Semitism, and on that basis charges SFSU
with violating the constitutional and civil rights of Jewish students
and community members. The intent of the lawsuit is clear: to silence
researchers and advocates for Palestinian rights and to ensure that
they are punished.
The Lawfare Project describes itself as “the legal arm of the
pro-Israel community.” Its director, Brooke Goldstein, has appeared
several times on Fox News and other media and has made explicit
Islamophobic statements, for example, discrediting the word
"Islamophobia" as a “made-up term propagated by the Muslin
Brotherhood.” She has dismissed concerns around the growing hate speech
against Muslims as a “dangerous phenomenon”. She has denied the
very existence of Palestinians, stating, “Why are we using the word
Palestinian? There’s no such thing as a Palestinian person” [1].
Furthering its agenda, the Lawfare project has also attacked human
rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch and the Center for
Constitutional Rights.
The Lawfare Project suit references the protest in April 2016 by SFSU
students of a SF Hillel event featuring Jerusalem Mayor Nir
Barkat. The impetus for the student protest was Barkat’s history
of home demolitions and racism against Palestinians [2]. When students
protested the talk, SF Hillel broadcast false allegations of
anti-Semitism and nonexistent physical threats towards Jewish
students. SFSU then conducted its own investigation and
determined that these allegations were unfounded.
This independent investigation commissioned by President Wong and
conducted by the Van Dermyden Maddux Law Firm on the “April Event”
concluded that:
“The
protest was directed towards the Mayor of Jerusalem based on his
politics, and not towards any of the audience members based on the
audience members’ protected characteristics. The record tips in
favor of concluding that the protestors’ attention, comments and
conduct were directed at the Mayor. This finding is bolstered by
the fact that the protestors left the Event shortly after the Mayor
exited the room [3].”
And further that “While some audience members were deeply hurt, even
frightened, by the protest, in this specific circumstance there were no
direct threats of imminent violence that would have justified police
intervention, specifically arrest and removal from the area [4].”
The SFSU report found that while disruptive of the Mayor’s talk, the
protest posed no safety risks and was focused on the mayor because of
his racist policies, and not the attending students for their Jewish
identity.
The lawsuit falsely accuses Prof. Abdulhadi of anti-Semitism and of
having links with terrorist organizations; the entire College of Ethnic
Studies (COES) is targeted in repeated statements throughout the
lawsuit; and SFSU is portrayed as “the most anti-Semitic campus in the
nation.” These outrageous and insulting accusations demand a clear,
strong and immediate response to vindicate the academic reputations of
the faculty at SFSU and to repudiate the racism implicit in them.
Yet, instead of citing the results of SFSU's own investigations and
reassuring the campus community and the public at large that the
allegations in the lawsuit are false, President Wong's statement
erroneously conceded that the disruption of the Mayor Barkat event was
an “ugly reminder” that “anti-Semitism … is real and our community
has work to do [5].”
To be perfectly clear, there was nothing anti-Semitic in the protest
that was entirely directed against certain policies promoted and
implement by Mayor Barkat.
The conflation of criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism has become a
standard tactic by Zionist organizations, which seek to censor
criticism of the Israeli state. That tactic itself is
fundamentally anti-Semitic because it associates with Jewishness an
unending list of well-documented racist policies and crimes against
humanity committed by the state of Israel, and it ignores the many Jews
who actively oppose those crimes. Far from the worthy goal of
fighting real anti-Semitism, this lawsuit serves the propaganda aims of
the government of Israel, at the expense of academic freedom and the
constitutionally protected rights of California residents.
Public universities have a special responsibility to protect academic
freedom and freedom of speech. Academic freedom allows professors to
conduct and disseminate scholarly research, to design courses and teach
students in the areas of their expertise, and to enjoy First Amendment
protections for extramural speech. These are essential
activities for any institution calling itself a university.
We strongly urge President Wong to uphold and defend the academic
freedom of Professor Rabab Abdulhadi and all faculty members at San
Francisco State University, and to publicly stand against false
accusations by outside organizations with racist agendas. And do so
with the same resolve he expressed in his June 16, 2016 message by
extending to Professor Abdulhadi and the College of Ethnic Studies his
declaration that, “No person in
our community should feel disrespected or unsafe and we must all work
together to ensure this is not the case”.
We look forward to receiving your response,
California Scholars for Academic Freedom
Contact Persons:
Sondra Hale, Research Professor, Anthropology and Gender Studies, UCLA
Sonhale@ucla.edu
Nancy Gallagher, Research Professor, Department of History, UCSB
Gallagher@history.ucsb.edu
David Klein, Professor of Mathematics, CSU Northridge
Dklein8@gmail.com
James Quesada, Professor and Chair Department of Anthropology, SFSU
jquesada@sfsu.edu
cc. Chancellor Timothy White
twhite@calstate.edu
[1] https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/israel-lawfare-group-plans-massive-punishments-activists
[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_ayRyCkryU.
[3] https://president.sfsu.edu/sites/default/files/Independent%20Review%20Regarding%20April%20Event.pdf
[4] https://president.sfsu.edu/sites/default/files/Independent%20Review%20Regarding%20April%20Event.pdf
[5] https://news.sfsu.edu/announcements/san-francisco-state-university-statement-disputing-lawsuit-affirming-commitment
**CALIFORNIA SCHOLARS FOR ACADEMIC FREEDOM is a group of more than 200
academics who teach in 20 California institutions. The group
formed as a response to various violations of academic freedom that
were arising from both the post-9/11/2001 climate of civil rights
violations and the increasing attacks on progressive educators by
neo-conservatives. Many attacks have been aimed at scholars of Arab,
Muslim or Middle Eastern descent or at scholars researching and
teaching about the Middle East, Arab and Muslim communities. Our
goal of protecting California Scholars based mainly in institutions of
higher education has grown broader in scope to include threats to
academic freedom across the United States, and where relevant, globally
as well. We recognize that violations of academic freedom anywhere are
threats to academic freedom everywhere.
A Representative List of cs4af Members:
Hatem Bazian
Asian and Asian American Studies
UC Berkeley
hatem@berkeley.edu
Judith Butler
Maxine Elliot Professor of Comparative Literature and Critical Theory
University of California, Berkeley
jpbutler@berkeley.edu
Anne-Marie Debbané,
Department of Geography
San Diego State University
adebbane@mail.sdsu.edu
Gary Fields
Department of Communication
University of California, San Diego
gfields@ucsd.edu
Manzar Foroohar
Professor of History
Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo
manzarforoohar@gmail.com
Jess Ghannam
Professor of Psychiatry
School of Medicine
University of California, San Francisco
Jess.ghanam@ucsf.edu
Alessandro De Giorgi
Associate Professor, Justice Studies
San Jose State University
Alessandro.degiorgi@sjsu.edu
Claudio Fogu
Professor of Modern Languages
University of California, Santa Barbara
claudiofogu@gmail.com
Nancy Gallagher, Research Professor
Department of History
University of California, Santa Barbara
Gallagher@history.ucsb.edu
Farah Godrej, Associate Professor
Department of Political Science
University of California, Riverside
farahgodrej@gmail.com
Sondra Hale, Research Professor
Anthropology and Gender Studies
University of California, Los Angeles
Sonhale@ucla.edu
Gillian Hart
Professor Emerita
Geography and Gender Studies
University of California Berkeley
hart@berkeley.edu
Sang Hea Kil, Ph.D.
Associate Professor Department of Justice Studies
San José State University
sangheakil@gmail.com
Ivan Huber
Research Scholar
Professor Emeritus of Biology
Fairleigh Dickinson University
Ivan@randomtech.com
Katherine King
Professor of Comparative Literature
University of California, Los Angeles
king@humnet.ucla.edu
David Klein, Professor of Mathematics
California State University, Northridge
Dklein8@gmail.com
Dennis Kortheuer, Emeritus
Department of History
California State University, Long Beach
dennis.kortheuer@csulb..edu
Mark Levine
Professor of Modern Middle East History
School of Humanities
University of California Irvine
mlevine@uci.edu
David Lloyd
Distinguished Professor of English
University of California Riverside
dclloyd@ucr.edu.
Afshin Matin-asgari,
Professor of History and Middle East Studies
California State University, Los Angeles
amatina@calstatela.edu
Ahlam Muhtaseb
Professor of Communication Studies
Interim Director of the Center for Islamic & Middle Eastern Studies
California State University, San Bernardino
Ahlam.muhtaseb@gmail.com
David Palumbo-Liu,
Louise Hewlett Nixon Professor,
Stanford University
djpl.2008@gmail.com
David Pellow
Dehlsen Chair and Professor of Environmental Studies
University of California Santa Barbara
pellow@es.ucsb.edu
Susan Presswood Wright
Professor of Politics
University of California, Santa Cruz
Spw1616@gmail.com
James Quesada, Professor and Chair
Department of Anthropology
San Francisco State University
jquesada@sfsu.edu
Vida Samiian
Professor of Linguistics & Dean Emerita
California State University, Fresno
vidas@csufresno.edu
Susan Slyomovics
Distinguished Professor of Anthropology and Near Eastern Languages and
Cultures
University of California, Los Angeles
http://www.anthro.ucla.edu/faculty/susan-slyomovics
Howard Winant
Distinguished Professor of Sociology
University of California, Santa Barbara
hwinant@gmail.com
Stephen Zunes
Professor of Politics & Coordinator of Middle Eastern Studies
University of San Francisco
zunes@usfca.edu