There was a lawsuit filed yesterday against the University of Michigan, to try and stop them from holding the "Divestment Conference" on their campus. I'm not sure I agree with the motives of the lawsuit, but I have read the suit, and it does include a laundry list of past offenses by the proposed speakers that is worth reading. This is excerpted from the actual lawsuit:
9.After the Conference at Berkeley, as a direct and proximate result of inciteful speech and language uttered by speakers, several incidents of violence were committed against Jewish students on the Berkeley campus and nearby campuses, and citizens of the surrounding metro areas. 10. Fadi Kiblawi, a Michigan Senior (hereinafter, “Kiblawi”), heads Students Allied for Freedom and Equality (hereinafter, “SAFE”), a Michigan student group, and the sponsor of the Conference.
11.Kiblawi, is the author of an article in a University of Michigan student publication, in which he writes of his desire “to strap a bomb to one’s chest and kill . . . . The enemy is not just overseas, the enemy is also amongst us.” (Kiblawi, Fadi, “A Perspective on Palestine while High on Vicodin” (sic), Al-Risalah, University of Michigan (sic), Spring Edition II, June 24, 2001.)
12. Conference speakers (hereinafter, “Speakers”) announced by Conference organizers include a “Who’s Who” of supporters of terrorism and violence against the United States of America, Americans, and Jews.
14. Speakers include Sami Al-Arian (hereinafter, “Al-Arian”), the founder of and a Majlis Shura (“ruling council’) member of the terrorist group Islamic Jihad, which murdered New Jersey college student Alisa Flatow and countless others.
15. This year, Al-Arian was fired from his position as a professor at the University of South Florida (hereinafter, “USF”) by University President Dr. Judy Genschaft and the Regents of the USF. Security and safety of students were cited as reasons for Al-Arian’s dismissal. He is banned from the USF campus for the same reasons.
16. In a highly unusual instance, on February 21, 2002, U.S. Attorney Mac Cauley of the Middle District of Florida stated that federal prosecutors continue to conduct an ongoing investigation “into the conduct and activities” of Al-Arian. According to U.S. Department of Justice spokesman Steven Cole, “In rare cases, especially when public safety is an issue, the U.S. attorney is allowed to acknowledge an ongoing investigation. Mr. Cauley decided this was one of those occasions.” (Emphasis added.)
17. A 1995 letter by Al-Arian, discovered by FBI and INS agents, just 10 days after Islamic Jihad suicide bombers killed 18 people, sought "support to the jihad effort in Palestine so that operations such as these can continue” and stated, “The link with the brothers in Hamas is very good and making steady progress, and there are serious attempts at unification and permanent coordination.” (Exhibit A, Attached)
18. A chilling FBI surveillance video of Al-Arian’s fundraising tour of America’s mosques shows Al-Arian being introduced as, “the president of the Islamic Committee for Palestine, . . . the active arm of the Islamic Jihad Movement.” While others in the video praise the killing of Jews and Christians, Al-Arian states, “Let us damn America. . . . .Let us damn [her] allies until death.” Standing under Islamic Jihad banners, Al-Arian talks of a Koranic “curse” against “those who are the sons of Israel through David and Jesus, the Son of Mary. . . The Koran is our constitution. Jihad is our path.” (Exhibit B, Attached.)
19. Al-Arian is the author of this speech: “We assemble today to pay respects to the march of the martyrs and to the river of blood that gushes forth and does not extinguish, from butchery to butchery, and from martyrdom to martyrdom, from Jihad to Jihad.”
20. According to federal prosecutor John Loftus, "The Saudi government was laundering money through Florida charities run by University of South Florida (USF) professor Sami Al-Arian for the support of terrorist groups in the Middle East. And through the Al-Arian network, and others, the Saudi government secretly funded al Qaeda, Hamas and Islamic Jihad."
21.While a professor at the University of South Florida, Al-Arian employed Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, chief of Islamic Jihad, and Tariq Hamdi, who provided a replacement battery for the satellite telephone was integral to Al-Quaida’s 1998 bombing of two U.S. embassies in Africa.
22.Speakers at the Conference include Hatem Bazian. At a May 1999 conference in Santa Clara, Bazian stated, “The Day of Judgment will never happen until you fight the Jews . . . . [T]he trees and stones will say, oh Muslim, there is a Jews hiding behind me. Come and kill him!”
23. Speakers at the Conference include Mahdi Bray of the Muslim Public Affairs Council. In October, 1998, Bray coordinated and led a Washington rally of 2,000 people, during which he played the tambourine as the crowd repeated, “[L]et’s all go into jihad, and throw stones at the face of the Jews.”
24. On December 22, 2000, Bray organized and spoke at a rally outside the White House, at which the emcee and crowd chanted responsively in Arabic, “oh Jews, the Army of Muhammad is coming for you!” The Nazi swastika was openly displayed.
25. On October 28, 2000 Bray organized a march from Freedom Plaza to Lafayette Park in Washington, DC, at which protesters were led into singing, “Victory comes from Allah, and Hezbollah is our model.” Hezbollah murdered over 241 U.S.Marines in the early 1980s.
26. Speakers at the Conference include Adam Shapiro and Huwaida Arraf. In various articles, they praised “suicide operations” and “shaheed Allah” (martyrdom) as “noble.” They support violence and oppose “adopting the methods of Gandhi or Martin Luther King, Jr.” because “no other successful nonviolent movement was able to achieve what it did without a concurrent violent movement.” (Palestine Chronicle, January 29, 2002.)