SEEKING CLARITY: Students, faculty involved with Palestine teach-in take issue with university response

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n an Oct. 31 campus-wide email, Syracuse University Chancellor Kent Syverud and Provost Gretchen Ritter wrote that, due to “security concerns,” a teach-in with a “Middle Eastern studies scholar” would not go on that day as planned.

Student organizers with the Africa Initiative — who planned the teach-in on Palestine — and African American studies professor Horace Campbell said they took issue with the way the university handled the event, believing its response to safety concerns highlighted SU’s difficulties with academic freedom.

Campbell wrote in a memo obtained by The Daily Orange to Amy Kallander and Thomas Keck, the co-chairs of the Committee on Academic Freedom, Tenure and Professional Ethics in the University Senate, that for over a year, students had been asking that the Africa Initiative hold a session on Palestine. After Hamas’ attack on Israel on Oct. 7, students came to Campbell’s office with questions about the war and its context, he wrote.

One organizer involved with the initiative, an SU graduate student who wished to remain anonymous for their safety, said students believed there was a lack of education contextualizing the Israel-Hamas war.

“We were receiving a lot of messages from students, some in person, saying that they need to understand what was going on in the Israel-Palestine conflict in terms of the history, the politics of it, the international relations aspect of it,” the graduate student said. “That’s how we came to organize the event itself.”

The group, along with the Black Graduate Student Association and the African Graduate Student Network as co-sponsors, invited Rabab Abdulhadi, an associate professor of ethnic studies at San Francisco State University. The teach-in was originally scheduled for 4 p.m. on Oct. 31 at 319 Sims Hall.

After a flyer for the event was sent on the Middle Eastern studies Listserv, Campbell wrote that “immediately, there were hostile responses, one in a clear threatening tone from a ‘student’ organization on campus.” Three organizers connected to the event confirmed people received threatening messages after the flyer started to circulate.

“They were basically telling us that we should focus on other things (in) Africa,” the graduate student said. “The Pan-African movement has always had a connection with the struggle in Palestine. So, teaching on Palestine is not outside the Pan-African context.”

On Nov. 1, after the initial event was set to take place, Campbell said the FBI contacted a student in the African Graduate Student Network. The Ph.D. student similarly confirmed the FBI did contact a student. After The D.O. asked the FBI field office in Albany for comment about the claim, the office wrote it would not speak on specific interactions.

“I can say the FBI regularly meets and interacts with members of the community to ensure we are tracking any concerns that could help us ensure the safety of our communities,” wrote Sarah Ruane, public affairs specialist for the FBI Albany field office.

Using the flyer, a change.org account named “Concerned Syracuse University Jewish Student” posted a petition on Oct. 30 writing that they, along with a group of Jewish Syracuse students, parents and alumni, were concerned about the teach-in. In the petition, they called Abdulhadi “a known anti-semite” and referenced recently reported antisemitic bias incidents on campus.

Abdulhadi previously drew criticism for helping to plan and moderate a roundtable discussion with Leila Khaled, a Palestinian who hijacked planes in 1969 and 1970. In the 1970 hijacking with Patrick Argüello, Khaled carried grenades on the plane, something she later claimed was only for self-defense, according to PBS.

After learning about the threats a student received after posting about the teach-in on the Middle Eastern studies Listserv, Campbell wrote that he sought to have a meeting with Craig Stone, the chief of campus safety and emergency management services at SU. Campbell wrote Stone also had Andrew Clary, a lieutenant with a focus on special events and community policing, present.

Another organizer, a Ph.D. student who wished to remain anonymous for their safety, said one of the students who had received threats also went to the Department of Public Safety.

Campbell wrote that at his meeting with Stone and Clary, attendees agreed DPS would provide security for the teach-in. A university spokesperson did confirm the meeting took place but disagreed with Campbell on the meeting’s outcome.

“During that discussion, Chief Stone shared that the university would assess the safety of the reserved room in Sims Hall to determine how or if it could facilitate the safe execution of the event for attendees and the speaker,” the spokesperson wrote to The D.O.

Campbell then had an additional meeting with university administration at 8:30 a.m. on Oct. 31, the day of the teach-in. The meeting included Dean of the Graduate School Peter Vanable, Senior Associate Dean for Academic Affairs Gerry Greenberg and Associate Provost for Faculty Affairs Jamie Winders.

In the meeting, Campbell said he was informed Greenberg would open the teach-in and lay the “ground rules” for the event.

“I agreed to the conditions that were laid down in the meeting. I stressed that the objective of the meeting was for the education of our students and that as a faculty member, I was just as concerned about the safety of students as the administration,” he wrote to Kallander and Keck. “I stated in the meeting with the administration that we wanted clarity for our students and were just as concerned about disruptions.”

The university spokesperson confirmed the meeting did occur. They wrote to The D.O. that the meeting was to advise Campbell on how to make the meeting as “constructive and respectful as possible.” At the time of the meeting, DPS’s “review of safety planning was still underway,” the spokesperson wrote.

Before noon, only hours removed from the meeting with administration, Winders told Campbell the university had canceled the initial event. Campbell wrote that Winders gave two reasons: “First, the university could not guarantee the safety of those in attendance, and second, the university was ‘aware of threats in the local area on both sides.’”

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The university spokesperson said that with the short notice, Winders told Campbell the university felt there was not enough time to “take steps to ensure the safety of the speaker, participants and campus community.”

“The university tried to identify other rooms but due to other events and class schedules, there were no rooms available on such short notice,” they wrote to The D.O.

Then, at around noon, Syverud and Ritter announced the event’s cancellation in a campus-wide email.

“Syracuse University cares deeply about free speech and remains strongly committed to academic freedom,” the chancellor and provost wrote. “In this current environment, it is vital that all of us plan carefully and in advance to ensure free speech also occurs in a time, place and manner that takes into account the safety and security of our whole community.”

Two weeks later, in a Nov. 15 address to the University Senate, Syverud said the university was prioritizing student safety over free speech and academic freedom. On Nov. 14, Stone said he was not given proper notice about the event, adding that two weeks would have been enough time.

The Ph.D. student organizer did say the event was very “last minute.” They said the Africa Initiative did not know if they would have the money for the event until shortly before their flyers started to circulate. The student said the quick process was never a problem previously.

“We’ve never passed our things through the administration, through DPS, none of our events. So this is a whole new thing that they’re saying they require,” they said.

Both students involved with organizing the event took issue with not being included in talks with the university regarding the event’s safety and eventual cancellation.

“The students that were actually involved in organizing the event, they’re not receiving communications from the people that contacted Professor Campbell,” the graduate student said. “So in terms of the university’s decision to cancel the event, it all went to Professor Campbell and then Professor Campbell contacted us.”

The university wrote to The D.O. that student organizers never approached the university for support, and they only learned of the event when Campbell brought his concerns to DPS.

In a letter to the editor to The D.O., SU’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors wrote that, with enough notice and planning, the university should guarantee the safety and security of events, and they should not be postponed.

“While we understand that security risks were assessed and thought to be serious enough to warrant cancellation by the administration and Department of Public Safety, questions remain,” the SU AAUP wrote. “How can the administration of SU guarantee academic freedom for outside speakers and those who invite them in times of contestation? How are threats against speakers and those who invite them being addressed?”

The event did occur on Oct. 31, just not at SU. Abdulhadi spoke to around 30 people at the Syracuse Center for Peace and Social Justice, syracuse.com reported.

After the university canceled the initial event, Campbell and organizers said more incidents occurred.

In one instance, a student visited the Department of African American Studies after the building closed looking for the department’s head, Campbell wrote. Once the student found the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library open, Campbell said they berated a student worker — saying they felt unsafe, demanding to know why the posters for the event were hanging in the department and promised to bring their father to campus to take them down.

Another person interrogated students as they walked through the building’s corridors, taking pictures and demanding the flyers be taken down, Campbell said.

Organizers, as well as Campbell, also said they took issue with how Syverud and Ritter announced its initial cancellation. In the email, the chancellor and provost did not mention the teach-in was related to Palestine, only writing, “one of our academic departments, in partnership with student groups, had planned to host a Middle Eastern studies scholar for a teach-in.”

Campbell wrote that the email was vague and did not state that students wanted to hold a teach-in specifically on Palestine.

“I met people who read the first email when our event was canceled. Nobody knew that that was about Palestine. Nobody knew the speaker (was) Palestinian, nobody knew the co-sponsors,” the Ph.D. student said. “So it fed into the narrative that this was more antisemitism. Antisemitism is real, it’s something we need to combat, right? But so is racism.”

The Ph.D. student contrasted Syverud and Ritter’s email with Ritter’s email on Nov. 9. In the message regarding on-campus pro-Palestine protests earlier that day, Ritter wrote that “one of the speakers specifically called out a number of Jewish student organizations by name, accusing them of being ‘complicit’ in genocide.’” Ritter called the speaker’s behavior “reprehensible.”

“I will never be named and claimed,” the Ph.D. student said. “You’re going to say (Jewish students are) under threat. But when it’s like Black and brown people, when it’s people that don’t fit into their narrative, they’re not even going to name us.”

Ending his message to Kallander and Keck, Campbell said he looked forward to hearing the results of their investigation into the initial event’s cancellation. After multiple requests for comment from The D.O., neither Kallander nor Keck commented on the status of an investigation.

The Ph.D. student said the original purpose of the event was to create discussion between different groups, especially considering the wide variety of views on campus. The point of an academic institution, they said, is to have experts who can be challenged.

The graduate student said the time following the event was draining, specifically because of the university’s response.

“What kind of work am I even allowed to do if that work isn’t fitting into the narrative?” the Ph.D. student said. “Because is it (about) politics or knowledge?”