BY: ILYA FEOKTISTOK AND CHARLES JACOBS “If they find out I’m Jewish, they’ll target me.” This is one of a litany of chilling claims by Jewish students at Northeastern University in Boston MA about the anti-Semitic hostility they have been forced to deal with on campus, as quoted in a letter recently sent by the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) to Northeastern’s President Joseph Aoun. First alerted by our organization’s exposés of the university’s hostile climate for Jews, the ZOA’s own investigation has gone much further to lift the curtain on what Jewish students can expect to face if they enroll at Northeastern. ZOA’s letter, based on first-hand reports from students, shows that the problem at Northeastern is not simply a case of professorial academic bias against Israel. Northeastern’s professors are using the basest forms of social bullying and intimidation to silence Jewish students who dare defend their Jewish identity in the classroom. According to ZOA’s investigation, Professor Denis Sullivan, Director of the university’s Middle East Center goes furthest in abusing his authority in the classroom to violate his students’ academic freedom. Here are some vignettes from what the students told ZOAabout Sullivan’s lack of academic ethics in class: “A Jewish student in the class raised her hand and asked a legitimate question… Instead of answering the question, Professor Sullivan personally attacked the student, as the rest of the class snickered. …She was so traumatized by the attack that she began crying and had to leave the room.” “According to one Jewish student, when you question what Sullivan tells the class about Israel, Sullivan ‘finds a way to make you feel stupid.’” A Jewish student wrote a paper taking the position that Hamas, with its genocidal goals, cannot be given legitimacy. “Professor Sullivan rejected the student’s paper and threatened her with a poor grade unless she rewrote it … The Jewish student felt that she had no choice but to rewrite her paper.” “One student reported that he is afraid even to reveal his Jewish identity in Sullivan’s class.” When a Jewish student questioned the anti-Israel position of a visiting Palestinian diplomat Sullivan brought as a guest to his class, “Professor Sullivan publicly ridiculed the student.” The diplomat “refused to answer the question, characterizing it as offensive.” Sadly, Sullivan is not the only Northeastern professor who has victimized Jewish students, according to the ZOA: “When a Jewish student respectfully challenged” Northeastern Sociology and International Affairs Professor Berna Turam’s justification of Islamic honor killings during class, “Professor Turam – and the other students in the class – laughed at the student, humiliating her. On another occasion, ProfessorTuram laughed at and publicly mocked this same student as she presented her research proposal in class … Strangely, Professor Turam repeatedly referred to this student as “Rachel” – a Hebrew name – despite being told that this is not the student’s name. This student stopped wearing her Star of David to Professor Turam’s class.” Readers of this column will have heard by now about Northeastern’s Economics Professor and Pakistani citizen M. Shahid Alam, who was caught on video telling students that anti-Semitism is something that one should be proud of and bragging about intimidating pro-Israel students in his classes. As the ZOA’s investigation revealed, in an e-mail to Northeastern’s President Joseph Aoun, a Jewish student personally recounted his feelings in response to hearing Alam’s hateful words: “I sat painfully listening to Professor Alam insinuate that students should be proud to be called anti-Semitic. I had never in my life, ever, experienced anti-Semitism firsthand until this past year when I witnessed Professor Alam and Professor Sullivan display an age-old hatred against the Jewish people … No one should experience hatred like this in their learning environment.”
Posted on: Fri, 27 Sep 2013 17:32:37 +0000
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