Professors at an Ottawa university are demanding that school officials reinstate accused terrorist and fellow lecturer Hassan Diab.
“The senior administration has a chance to do the right thing. It’s never too late,” said Peter Gose, chairman of the sociology and anthropology department at Carleton University.
The Lebanese-born Diab, who is now a Canadian citizen, is accused by French authorities of killing four people and injuring dozens more in the 1980 bombing of a Paris synagogue.
He faces an extradition hearing in January and is under virtual house arrest. Diab was teaching a summer course this week when he learned he had been terminated.
Gose said university president Roseann Runte asked for a meeting with the department on Thursday afternoon, two days after Diab was fired. Of the 42 academics permanently employed in the department, 22 showed up for the meeting, including Diab’s common-law wife Rania Tfaily.
But Runte did not attend, citing ongoing union issues.
“The department is solidly behind the idea that he should not have been dismissed,” Gose said.
Gose said he is also concerned that the course Diab was teaching was assigned to another faculty member without consultation.
“That’s not the way it’s supposed to be done. It’s supposed to be done by the department. It’s an area of the university we manage,” he said.
Diab must wear an electronic monitoring bracelet, report regularly to the RCMP and can’t own a cellphone. Under his bail conditions, Diab must live with Tfaily in her Ottawa home. He may leave for work and legal and medical appointments, but only if accompanied by Tfaily or one of the other four people who put up $250,000 in combined bail, including Gose.
“The judge said he was not an immediate threat to anyone,” said Gose.
On Monday, an Ottawa court heard that Diab had been hired to teach over the summer.
He was fired Tuesday in the wake of criticism, including a statement by the Jewish advocacy group B’nai Brith.
The dismissal is being grieved by Diab’s union.
