Letters & Statements

We welcome your announcement of the U.S. Commission on Unalienable Rights which will ground U.S. foreign policy on human rights in America’s founding principles of individual dignity and freedoms, later reflected in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

While Prof. Abdulhadi has the right to express religious, ethnic or political hatred on her personal platform, it is a flagrant breach of academic conduct for her to use her administrative position and the Facebook page bearing her academic unit’s logo — which includes the name “San Francisco State University” — to do so.

You decried Rep. Omar’s Antisemitic comments, and referred to Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) “joining in on the chorus against the Jewish people.” It was deeply heartening to hear you insist that “this cannot stand in the United States of America,” and to see 6000 people rise to their feet in enthusiastic response

The faculty endorsement of an SJP-initiated effort to demonize Prof. Hill, combined with the well-documented, proven link between SJP and acts of Antisemitism directed at individual Jewish students, may be deemed sufficient to establish the university’s liability for creating a hostile environment for its Jewish students.

As you clearly understood, refusing to write letters of recommendation for students is just one of many ways that faculty members can privilege their own personal politics over the welfare of their students, and by so doing, not only harm their students but undermine the academic mission of the university

Rep. Pramila Jayapal’s “Medicare for All Act” would overturn decades of federal precedent, eliminate Hyde Amendment and other lifesaving protections, and explicitly remove existing safeguards against federal abortion funding.

It is amazing that the very same groups which claim it a violation of free speech for a state to dissociate itself from discriminatory, Antisemitic boycotts now demand that Professor Hill be muzzled. But the hypocrisy is hardly limited to free speech.

This event seeks to equate Israel’s soldiers and innocent victims of terrorism with those who murdered them in cold blood, often in suicide attacks. Israel’s victims of terror includes people of all ages, religions and creeds, including Jews, Christians, Muslims, Druze, and people from various nationalities including many Americans.

Without robust protection for those whose religious beliefs demand more traditional practices, the Equality Act has the potential to bring the United States’ centuries-long history of robust protection of our religious liberties to an abrupt and ignominious end.

As described in the press release, this is not an educational event but a political rally. Moreover, the event organizer and several speakers are all outspoken anti-Israel activists who have engaged in expression deemed antisemitic not only by the vast majority of world Jewry, but also by the standards established by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA).