The September 10 assassination of right-wing “influencer” Charlie Kirk was an attack on free speech of the most serious and dangerous kind. It should be unequivocally condemned. Kirk’s murder served up an excuse on a silver platter for the Trump administration and its allies to accelerate their assault on democratic rights. The White House is now using the horrendous killing to propel Trump’s drive toward autocratic rule.
This is an open letter by Rashid Khalidi to the administration of Columbia University, where the renown Palestinian American historian served as the Edward Said Professor of Modern Arab Studies for 23 years. “Although I have retired, I was scheduled to teach a large lecture course on this topic in the fall as a ‘special lecturer’ but I cannot do so under the conditions Columbia has accepted by capitulating to the Trump administration in June,” Khalidi explains.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are fleeing Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city, as Israel steps up its bombardment and threatens an imminent, even more massive invasion.Meanwhile, opposition to Israel’s genocidal war continues to grow. It includes encampments and other protests by students on campuses across the United States. Many of these student actions have been violently suppressed by the police on the request of university authorities. Faculty members and others across the country have issued statements condemning this crackdown and defending the students’ right to free speech. They include a statement by the Academic Advisory Council of Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), “An Open Call to Fellow Jewish Academics,” which World-Outlook is sharing in this post.
In the wake of the October 7 Hamas-led attack and Israel’s brutal retaliatory invasion of Gaza, new challenges have been raised to the right to free speech. Across the United States, restrictions on the democratic right to express one’s views on the conflict in the Middle East center today on college campuses. But precedents set there will be extended, with dangerous consequences for free speech, if they are not answered and opposed.