Defeating Lawfare: Palestine, Academic Freedom & Activism
Come meet Professor Abdulha
for an interactive discussion
WHEN: Wednesday, February 27th | 6:00 - 8:00 PM
WHERE: CUNY Graduate Center | 365 5th Avenue, Room 5414 (5th Ave. and 34th St.)
Wheelchair accessible
DESCRIPTION
In 2017-2018, Professor Rabab Abdulhadi, her legal team and a very broad-based movement of Palestine solidarity activists and allies fought a harrowing battle to stop efforts by the Lawfare Project to use the courts to destroy AMED (Arab and Muslim Ethnicities and Diasporas) Studies, a popular and unique academic program at San Francisco State University. They won their case—a decisive blow against Lawfare’s McCarthyite tactics of harassment and bullying. This first legal victory sends a strong and loud message to other US campuses where Palestine-related teaching, scholarship and advocacy are under attack from right-wing organizations.
But the struggle hasn’t ended there. In response to outside pressure, the SFSU Administration has escalated its harassment and retaliation against Professor Abdulhadi, AMED and campus activism and continued to promote racist and Islamophobic policies. This past week alone, the SFSU Administration published the university’s 2019-2020 calendar of religious observances which omits the Muslim holidays of Ramadan and Eid Al-Fitr and defines “Israel Independence Day” as a Jewish religious holiday, in effect collapsing Judaism into nationalism and erasing over 100 years of Jewish divergence over Zionism and the State of Israel.
Professor Abdulhadi has now filed a lawsuit to hold SFSU accountable for its biased and discriminatory policies. This struggle has crucial implications for campuses in New York and elsewhere across the country:
• What are the best ways to organize and educate students and faculty about academic freedom concerning teaching and learning about Palestine?
• How does the SFSU case help to expose the linkages between universities and donor-driven racist agendas, pro-Israel politics, and ultra-right hate groups?
• How can this case broaden our understanding of the larger context of white supremacy, Islamophobia, colonialism and colonized education in the United States?
• How can we develop intersectional, anti-racist coalitions and strategies to address these issues on our own campuses and in our communities?
Come meet Professor Abdulhadi and Attorney Mark Kleiman, who is co-representing her, to hear more about the case and engage in a lively, interactive discussion.
Co-sponsors: Adalah-NY, CUNY4Palestine, Jewish Voice for Peace-NYC, JewsSayNo!, National Lawyer’s Guild and Women in Black