The Columbia University Law School funded an event that featured a professor who previously voiced support for Hamas.
Columbia Law Students for Palestine, the South Asian Law Students Association, Columbia OutLaws, and the Queer and Trans People of Color at Columbia Law School hosted the event on Thursday afternoon, which focused on “Israeli pinkwashing and Queer-Palestinian solidarity,” according to a graphic posted by a professor who spoke at the event.
Columbia University Middle East Institute Visiting Professor Mohamed Abdou and Columbia Ph.D. candidate Aya Labanieh spoke at the event.
A graphic for the event states that the event was funded by the Columbia Law School Student Senate.
As Campus Reform previously reported, Abdou praised Hamas and the tactics it used during an interview in November 2023.
“The warriors, the resistance fighters that were in Hamas, numbered less than 1,500 and look how they flipped the table—not only on an entire settler colonial state with no definable borders, but rather on the whole world,” Abdou said, referring to the Oct. 7 attack in Israel.
“You don’t need mass movements to change the world,” he continued. “You need a dedicated thousand, 1,500, a few thousand, that really are organized and know what it is that they’re doing, what they’re fighting for.”
According to the Anti-Defamation League, pinkwashing is used by anti-Israel activists to accuse the country of using the promotion of LGBTQ rights as a “premeditated Israeli strategy to deflect attention from what they argue is Israel’s persecution of the Palestinians.”
The Canary Mission told Campus Reform in a statement that Columbia should fire Abdou.
“Abdou continues to show support for antisemitism and Hamas, influencing Columbia’s students through his classes and anti-Israel events. Columbia has allowed its university to become a hub for Jewish hatred and has remained silent, doing little to condemn and reduce hate on its campus. We call on Columbia to take a stand and fire Abdou, showing its backbone and desire to provide a safe and unbiased educational environment for all students,” the organization said in a statement.
Campus Reform reached out to Columbia for comment.
