Reading the Salaita Papers

There are many developments today in the Salaita affair, so I’m going to do this as a two-part post. Part 2 is here.

This morning, the News-Gazette released 280 pages of documents obtained under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act revealing extensive donor pressure on Chancellor Wise.

As news spread in late July about a new University of Illinois faculty hire and media outlets began publishing some of his profanity-laden tweets, a number of wealthy donors threatened to stop giving money to the university, recently released documents show.

The letters about professor Steven Salaita started arriving in Chancellor Phyllis Wise’s inbox July 21, and the writers did not hold back.

“Having been a multiple 6 figure donor to Illinois over the years, I know our support is ending as we vehemently disagree with the approach this individual espouses,” wrote one UI business school graduate.

The letters from donors, some of them identifying themselves as members of the UI’s $25,000-plus “presidents council,” have also raised questions about the motivation behind the administration’s decision to not forward Salaita’s name to the board of trustees for formal approval last month.

The chancellor, however, through a spokeswoman, maintains her decision was not influenced by them, but was based out of concern for the students, campus and community.

Then tonight Phan Nguyen sent me 443 pages of documents he had posted online. These are all the documents released by the UIUC in response to four different FOIA requests from various news organizations. I’ve now spent the entire evening reading through these documents and here are some of the highlights.

When the Salaita story first broke in the local press, Associate Chancellor for Public Affairs Robin Kaler said, “Faculty have a wide range of scholarly and political views, and we recognize the freedom-of-speech rights of all of our employees.” That was on July 21. The UIUC documents reveal that not only was Chancellor Wise apprised of that statement minutes after it was emailed to the media, but that she also wrote back to Kaler: “I have received several emails. Do you want me to use this response or to forward these to you?” (p. 101) In other words, this was not the rogue statement of a low-level spokesperson; it reflected Wise’s own views, including the view that Salaita was already a university employee. Even though Wise already had been informed of Salaita’s tweets.

In the days following this forthright defense of Salaita, the Chancellor and her associates begin to back-pedal. Around July 23, Wise starts reaching out to select alumni, trying to arrange phone calls (and in one instance, struggling to rearrange her travel schedule just so she can meet one alum in person [pp. 78-94]). To another such alum, she writes, “Let me say that I just recently learned about Steven Salaita’s background, beyond his academic history, and am learning more now.” (p. 293) That “beyond his academic history” is going to get Wise in trouble on academic freedom grounds.

In the background of this change of tune are the donors and the university’s fundraising and development people. In a July 24 email to Dan Peterson, Leanne Barnhart, and Travis Michael Smith (all part of the UIUC money machine), Wise reports about a meeting she has had with what appears to be a big donor. In Wise’s words:

He said that he knows [REDACTED] and [REDACTED] well and both have less loyalty for Illinois because of their perception of anti-Semitism. He gave me a two-pager filled with information on Steven Salaita and said how we handle this situation will be very telling. (p. 206)

Once Wise and her team start back-tracking, the trustees are brought into the picture. On July 28, Susan Mary Kies, who is the secretary of the Board of Trustees, writes Wise, who had been apologetic about “filling your inbox” with Salaita info, “No problem, we will place the letters in weekly dispatch (as we did last week) so the trustees can see the depth of the matter!” (p. 62) The next day, Kaler starts writing to complaining alums that the final decision regarding Salaita lies with the trustees (this is the first we hear of what will become the ultimate strategy of the administration: putting it all on the trustees):

While I cannot comment on any specific employment decisions of the university, pursuant to the governing documents for the university the final decision for any faculty appointment at the level of assistant professor or above rests with the Board of Trustees. I, therefore, have passed your concerns along to the Secretary of the Board of Trustees. (p. 62)

What’s most stunning about these documents is that they show how removed and isolated Chancellor Wise is from any of the academic voices in the university, even the academic voices on her own team. As she heads toward her August 2 decision to dehire Salaita, she is only speaking to and consulting with donors, alums, PR people, and development types. Ilesanmi Adesida, the provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs, makes exactly one appearance in these 443 pages. That is on Tuesday, July 22. Even though Wise has been inundated with emails about Salaita for days, she only finally emails Adesida about the matter a day after the story has broken in the local press. His response: “Thanks for sending these emails. I was not aware of any controversy on this person until yesterday!” (p. 95) And he’s never heard from again.

Then on August 4, two days after Wise has informed Salaita and Robert Warrior, chair of the American Indian Studies department, that Salaita won’t be hired, Warrior writes Brian Ross, interim dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, to find out what happened. Warrior first gets an email back from one of Ross’s associates, who says, “Brian is not in the office today, and I’m not sure he knows anything about this because I presume he would have discussed it with me if he had” (p. 361). And then Ross himself writes back, “i am in NY, traveling back tomorrow. I have not seen the letter but have a request in and will let you know when I hear any more” (p.362). In other words, even two days after the Chancellor has dehired Salaita, she still hasn’t informed the dean of the largest college at the UIUC of her decision.

What’s also clear from reading these documents is just how high up the chain Salaita’s appointment had gone, and how ensconced at the university he was becoming—up until the day that he wasn’t. On September 27, 2013, for example, Reginald Alston, one of two associate chancellors who works directly in Phyllis Wise’s office, writes the following report on Salaita’s candidacy (pp. 238-239):

After closely reviewing Dr. Steven Salaita’s dossier, I support the Department of American Indian Studies’ (AIS) request to grant him the rank of Associate Professor with indefinite tenure at the University of Illinois. The uniqueness of his scholarship on the intersection of American Indian, Palestinian, and American Palestinian experiences presents a rare opportunity to add an esoteric perspective on indigeneity to our cultural studies programs on campus.

Again, I support offering Dr. Salaita a tenured position because of the obvious intellectual value that his scholarship and background would bring to our campus. His presence would elevate AIS internationally and convey Illinois’ commitment to maintaining a leading academic program on the historical and sociopolitical intricacies of American Indian culture.

On January 15, 2014, his appointment is approved by the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Access, which is one of the key and most powerful offices in any university hiring decision; if they don’t sign off, the appointment goes nowhere (p. 398).

Then, between July 22 and July 25, while the chancellor and her aides are formulating their strategy to deal with the backlash, Salaita and Warrior email back and forth about Salaita’s moving expenses. The UIUC had originally promised to cover up to $5000 of Salaita’s expenses (p. 387), but when the University-approved moving company comes back with an estimate of $7500, the department decides to cover the difference (pp. 341-347).

And then, when the tech support start asking Warrior about Salaita’s computer needs (“Did Steven Salaita say he had any special PC laptop needs? Does he run SPSS or any other resource intensive applications? Does he need something geared toward video work or any other special area?”), Warrior replies, “He’s pretty much a meat and potatoes user. Nothing complicated” (pp. 341-347).

That was on August 1. The next day, Chancellor Wise fired Salaita.

Update (12:20 am)

Apparently, Carol Tilley on Twitter revealed earlier today the identity of that the alum whom Wise scrambled to rearrange her schedule over. His name is Steve Miller; the UIUC redactor failed to catch it. Tilley then tweeted some other information about Miller. He’s a huge venture capitalist. In 2010, he donated a half-million dollars to endow a professorship in the UIUC business school. He’s given money for years to endow the Steven N. Miller Entrepreneurial Scholarships. He believes in “venture philanthropy.” And he’s on the board of Hillel.

 

65 Comments

  1. Phil Perspective September 3, 2014 at 12:36 am | #

    Has Salaita initiated a lawsuit yet? A lot of these documents and the later results, don’t look so good for the school. I wonder how much they’ll have to pay Salaita to go away. I’d say shoot for the moon because you can always negotiate down.

    • adam3smith September 3, 2014 at 1:55 am | #

      I don’t understand why people seem to be itching for a lawsuit: employment law is–as Corey, among others, has amply demonstrated–notoriously fickle in the US and in the hands of the wrong judge Salaita may well lose a lawsuit.

      It would be much better and send a much stronger signal if UIUC were to give in a hire Salaita because of the mounting pressure. Tenure is a much stronger institution if it’s social rules are so strong that we need to fall back on the legal ones as little as possible.

      • Phil Perspective September 4, 2014 at 1:26 am | #

        Unless the judge is extremely corrupt, or Salaita has a really crappy lawyer, I don’t see how he could lose. So they’ll probably want to settle. I also don’t see how Wise, and the Board, reverse their decision and approve Salaita’s hiring. Paying off someone to go away is a lot easier for people like Wise to take than is eating crow by backing down and hiring Salaita.

  2. David September 3, 2014 at 2:04 am | #

    There’s a tidbit I love in the Steve Miller email: Wise gives him her cell. He only provides a number that “will forward” to his (which he makes sure to point out). Presumably, as an Important Man, he has a few and can whitelist/blacklist callers etc. The subtle reinforcement of hierarchy…

    • nattyb September 3, 2014 at 10:11 am | #

      I take it you liked the part about “Venture Philanthropy”;

      BEGIN QUOTE:
      The owner of Origin Ventures likens his charitable philosophy to investing in a business, calling it “venture philanthropy.”

      “I just don’t write a check to invest in a company and forget about it. I invest my time, my expertise, my network connections, everything I have to help grow and scale an organization to make it better. That’s what I do in my for-profit life and that’s what I do philanthropically too.”
      END QUOTE.

      Ok buddy. I get it. Your check comes with “strings attached.” But leave those strings to the Business College. Like WTF man. You truly believe that your generous donation (1/3 subsidized by the Taxpayers) to the business school (can we call you an “endowment creators or “faculty creators” or, literally in this case, “two interview rooms on campus creator”) entitles you to veto faculty appointments in unrelated fields?!? And the school: (i) not only gives on this, but (ii) gives on it an incredibly ham-handed, and probably illegal manner. Where is the sense of academic purpose?!?!? Although I don’t work in the Academy (I do have a professional degree and father was a prof), I’ve always heard the ire towards administrators and how “they don’t add value, they’re the enemy blah blah blah,” but I’ve never really realized what that actually entails. But my god. Seeing these e-mails up close. I totally understand now what all the kvetching’s about. Did the donor’s also write the statements of defense by the Chancellor/BoT

      I’m so glad I’m not affiliated with UIUC in any respect (I have Big Ten ties but that’s as close as I get). If any of my alma maters put out a statements like the one Wise/BoT put out . . . oh man: It would just destroy all the goodwill I had towards those institutions.

  3. bor September 3, 2014 at 6:16 am | #

    Interesting compilation, even if some of the interpretation is questionable. For example, the Kaler remarks from July do not indicate that Salaita is an employee. They suggest that were he to become an employee, then he would receive the treatment she describes like all employees. The article is very specific that Salaita was to begin his new job on August 16, and we can be fairly certain this information was either provided or at the least verified to the reporter by Kaler.

    Second, the trove of emails is entirely legitimate. What makes any person affiliated with a university where buildings are named after donors, labs and research facilities are built with donor funds, chairs are financed with donor contributions, etc., assume that donors should continue to give money when the university hires a controversial professor who openly disparages Jews, oops, I meant Zionists?

    If Salaita had written tweets like, “”African American political activists: transforming ‘racism’ from something horrible into something honorable since the days of Malcolm X,” (a paraphrase of a similar, actual tweet he wrote about Zionists and antisemitism) would any of his defenders organize to ensure that he is hired? I think not. Would any of his defenders question Wise’s decision not to hire him? Not a chance. Would any of his defenders be surprised when donors to the school would seek to distance themselves from such a school? No way. Would his defenders be shocked that, in particular, the African-American donors wrote letters to Wise assuring her that they were no longer going to be associated with such a university? Of course not. Insert your favorite group in there and see how it works: Muslims, Christians, Russians, Hispanics. The only group that can be attacked with impunity is Jews, apparently (yes, Jews, otherwise don’t bring antisemitism into it).

    Wise was very clear in 2013: “the university opposes the boycott of Israeli academic institutions and values academic freedom as one of its core principles, stressing “the critical importance of the ability of faculty to pursue learning, discovery and engagement without regard to political considerations…Our institution opposes any efforts to limit the ability of our faculty to work with scholars from other institutions around the world, and we encourage such connections, as collaboration is one of our core values in the pursuit of knowledge.”

    It is clear from the quote Robin provides regarding her comment about Salaita that she’s learning about him “beyond his academic history,” that she was indeed becoming educated – thanks to these donor emails, it has to be said – about how her university is about to begin the employment of a man who not only posts bigoted, hateful and murder-supporting tweets (his remark after the three Israeli teens were “disappeared) but who actively engages in precisely the opposite of what she proclaimed were the values of the university. He seeks to stifle, limit and destroy the university’s ability to pursue research and knowledge. Of course as the university’s head she’s going to reject hiring such an individual. As well she should.

    Donors. by the way, have every right to inform the university that they won’t support a school that hires bigoted professors. It’s their money. Every day they choose where it should go and if the school is not longer a priority, other organizations will get the money. I would venture that it’s Wise’s job to be mindful of this fact no less than of Salaita’s hate-filled messages and advocacy for a boycott that contradicts the university’s values. Salaita didn’t even leave room for ambiguity by tweeting messages that no person who works for any organization would ever publish without awareness that their career would be affected. And, since Corey Robin leaves the fact that Steve Miller sits on Hillel’s board to the end, just so we “get” the implication, then perhaps he should consider that Miller would be an idiot to continue to give money to an institution that hires a professor who considers most Hillel students to be “awful human beings” and generators of antisemitism. Miller isn’t an idiot and if he sits on Hillel’s board, then his view of how students should be treated is diametrically opposite Salaita’s published comments.

    If anyone wishes to defend Salaita, why don’t you try doing it by using the African-American example I provide above. It will make the situation clear. Crystal clear.

    • matt w September 3, 2014 at 7:42 am | #

      It may be the donors’ right to tell the university they will no longer support them because a new hire expresses a view that they dislike. It is certainly not the chancellors’ job to buckle under to this pressure by firing the professor they don’t like. As many people have pointed out, if donors offered to fund a university chair on the condition that they could veto the professors who were being hired for this, any self-respecting university would reject the offer as impermissible donor interference with the academic process. All the more reason that a self-respecting university should tell donors that they can’t fire a professor that they’ve already hired because of donor pressure over his views, since that violates not only the autonomy of the university but also the professor’s contractual rights and the integrity of the hiring process (as many people have observed, the hiring process will be much more cumbersome and difficult if no lateral hire can safely accept a job until the Board of Trustees has met).

      You are also, by choice or not, unfamiliar with the context of Salaita’s tweets; he was very careful to distinguish Judaism and Zionism and to reject anti-Semitism throughout. I’m Jewish and I considered myself a Zionist for a large part of my life, if you need my bona fides.

      And your attempt to play the victim by pretending that Jews (Zionists, really) can be attacked with impunity. There have been several cases of hiring and tenure decisions being reversed because of public pressure against professors for being anti-Zionist in some way, with Salaita the most egregious because of the contractual details. I haven’t seen anyone cite a single case where this happened to a professor who was excessively pro-Zionist.

      • bor September 3, 2014 at 3:07 pm | #

        Let’s let the lawyers and judges determine whether Salaita was actually already an employee or not, but it seems to me that ceremonial or not, we all agree that the final step in hiring required BOT approval and he didn’t get that.

        Any university leader has a right to consider multiple factors in hiring or not hiring someone. As I point out, Wise had stated that her university’s “core” values reject boycotting Israel and stifling academic speech. Here she was confronted with a situation she didn’t know about and part of her introduction was provided by donors, probably because they have access to her that other university community members do not. There is nothing improper about that.

        She heard, she studied, she must have seen the ugly tweets, understood that the soon-to-be hire was going to become a campus magnet for activism that undermines her university’s core values, understood that donors were probably reflecting the discomfort of a portion of the student body and that Salaita’s remarks could certainly be construed to indicate hate, intolerance and a desire to engage his perceived political opponents using foul accusations and claims, and then she did what any reasonable leader would do in this situation: blocked his hiring.

        You don’t have to be Jewish to see how sensible this is. One can try to deflect what Salaita has done with his tweets and his book and his advocacy for boycotts by trotting out the cabal, or one can simply look at what he’s written and said and acknowledge that he’s an accident waiting to happen and that many students would be concerned about taking his courses. He’s an openly divisive figure who disparages his perceived opponents in hideous terms. The problem is that he may teach some of those perceived opponents and he will definitely be an active member of any movement at the university that presents them in negative terms. If they support Israel, he has publicly stated, he considers them nothing less than awful human beings. He has also publicly stated that the world is divided into two groups: the massive one to which he belongs and the awful, much smaller one, made up of Israel supporters. Perhaps the department that hired him doesn’t see this as being problematic, but that’s precisely why you have a hierarchy and a process that permits a university to evaluate its hiring decisions by multiple parties.

        Regarding Salaita’s tweets, I express my opinion in a little more detail in my response to Elizabeth below. I don’t believe he is careful to “distinguish Judaism and Zionism” except when it suits him. In the case of the offensive tweet I quoted, he actually didn’t explain himself. He did explain himself regarding a proximate tweet but that was hours later after he had been challenged by a “Jewish anti-Zionist.” My guess is that the challenge made him realize he had overstepped a line and then he adjusted accordingly. I’d give him a pass, but I can’t because I am still shocked – I’m not exaggerating, I am shocked – by his unbelievable claims in one of his books about the supposed sexual depravity of Israeli international border guards.

        “And your attempt to play the victim by pretending that Jews (Zionists, really) can be attacked with impunity” is valid. If anyone is playing the victim, it is Salaita who has done things that would get him unhired or fired at any normal workplace in a jiffy. Anal probes, indeed.

        Anybody with two eyes can see what is being done to Jewish students around campuses throughout North America. That academics are permitting this to happen on their campuses under the guise that it’s legitimate political discourse and therefore it is reprehensible to restrict it, is incredibly myopic (especially the game pretending to differentiate between Jews and Zionists, precisely because the vast majority of Jews are Zionists), short-sighted and deeply unfortunate. By allowing this climate to exist on their campuses, and oftentimes personally participating in this political war against Israel, one that often devolves into nasty and offensive caricatures of Israelis and Jews, academics who actively participate or who turn a blind eye are being complicit in making campuses extremely uncomfortable for Jewish students who are placed in a very challenging situation. And make no mistake, this challenging situation is one that anti-Israel activists seek out because it ensures that their potential opposition on campus isn’t just weakened in the short term, but presumably in the long term as well.

        If Wise meant what she wrote in rejecting Salaita’s job candidacy, her premise for rejecting Salaita is a big positive for her university and her actions are laudable.

        • Corey Robin September 3, 2014 at 3:15 pm | #

          “She…understood that the soon-to-be hire was going to become a campus magnet for activism that undermines her university’s core values, understood that donors were probably reflecting the discomfort of a portion of the student body and that Salaita’s remarks could certainly be construed to indicate hate, intolerance and a desire to engage his perceived political opponents using foul accusations and claims…”

          Interestingly enough, in the extensive paper trail that’s been provided to all of us, including, we get no evidence of such concerns on Chancellor Wise’s part.

          As for Wise “meaning what she wrote in rejecting Salaita’s job candidacy”

      • bor September 3, 2014 at 4:16 pm | #

        I’m responding to Corey Robin’s comment.

        I actually believe Wise did say that in her original (and only) public letter regarding Salaita.

        Here is what she says:

        “What we cannot and will not tolerate at the University of Illinois are personal and disrespectful words or actions that demean and abuse either viewpoints themselves or those who express them. We have a particular duty to our students to ensure that they live in a community of scholarship that challenges their assumptions about the world but that also respects their rights as individuals.

        As chancellor, it is my responsibility to ensure that all perspectives are welcome and that our discourse, regardless of subject matter or viewpoint, allows new concepts and differing points of view to be discussed in and outside the classroom in a scholarly, civil and productive manner.

        A Jewish student, a Palestinian student, or any student of any faith or background must feel confident that personal views can be expressed and that philosophical disagreements with a faculty member can be debated in a civil, thoughtful and mutually respectful manner. Most important, every student must know that every instructor recognizes and values that student as a human being. If we have lost that, we have lost much more than our standing as a world-class institution of higher education.

        As a member of the faculty, I firmly believe that a tenured faculty position at the University of Illinois is a tremendous honor and a unique privilege. Tenure also brings with it a heavy responsibility to continue the traditions of scholarship and civility upon which our university is built.”

        Perhaps you disagree with my reading of it, but I think this is a polite way of stating “…that the soon-to-be hire was going to become a campus magnet for activism that undermines her university’s core values, understood that donors were probably reflecting the discomfort of a portion of the student body and that Salaita’s remarks could certainly be construed to indicate hate, intolerance and a desire to engage his perceived political opponents using foul accusations and claims…”

    • Elizabeth September 3, 2014 at 8:51 am | #

      bor, mattw has replied to you very well. But you might also be interested in this post by Josh Whitford, which takes up precisely the analogy you urge:
      http://scatter.wordpress.com/2014/08/31/clownish-conflation-of-ascription-and-achievement-constitutes-calumny/

      (The relevant part is the section that begins “Welcome to my parlor…”)

      • bor September 3, 2014 at 12:35 pm | #

        Elizabeth, if it’s okay with you, I didn’t bother reading your link to the end. That’s because I got to the part where the author explained his position by linking to three articles (“Others have unpacked this stuff in far more detail already”) and after reading them I found them to be wanting. One article was from Corey Robin, seeking to explain the tweet. I found Robin’s point unconvincing. Sorry. A second article merely tries to explain the tweets as a sophisticated version of “uh oh, you’re going to complain about antisemitism because of what I said instead of talking about Israel’s evil [insert your favorite Israeli “crime” here],” which is a take on the tweet that manages to double down on the insult. Not only does Salaita get away with it, but he becomes a saint staring down evil for saying this. Not buying that explanation either, sorry.

        And then, the third article, on that bastion of civility toward supporters of Israel, Mondoweiss, seeks to explain the tweet by exploring what preceded and followed it. However, the writer makes a key error by suggesting that Salaita explained his tweet in a follow up tweet, after being challenged, by claiming that he was deploring the manner in which Zionists use “antisemitism.” The problem there is that Mondoweiss got its timeline wrong. Here is the link: https://twitter.com/mikehesselmial/statuses/490695668584169472. As you can see, Salaita is actually responding to a different tweet of his that precedes the one under discussion. Also, even if you accept Mondoweiss’s deflection at face value along with Salaita’s dissembling, you have to consider that by then three hours had passed and even the insensitive Salaita, being caught out by an “anti-Zionist Jew,” probably realized that he needed to fine-tune his language and claim. Of course, you would have to have been exposed to the entire panel of tweets to even learn about any of this.

        I guess if you really, really, really, believe in Salaita’s inherent goodness, then we could cut him some slack and accept these pretzel-like contortions offered by his defenders. But some of us don’t believe in Salaita’s inherent goodness because he tweeted, after three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped, not only a complete lack of sympathy, but a wish that such violence would happen to many more people. Talk about dehumanization. Talk about a visceral desire to see dead Jews, oops, Zionists, oops, settlers (except that the poor kidnapped boys weren’t from the territory and only count as settlers if you consider Israelis within Israel proper to be settlers – which indicates willful distortion by Salaita).

        Anyway, the equivalent explanation, if we were to take my example and use “racism” instead of “antisemitism,” would be that all African-American political activists, by using language referring to racism as part of their debating points against those who attack them, are diminishing racism and the meaning of racism by pointing out claims with which their opponents disagree. First of all, it takes hubris for anybody to make this claim. Second, even if you allow for hubris (it is academia after all), it is a claim that seeks to gain leverage over all African Americans who agree with these activists’ claims by diminishing their true affliction and their history of being afflicted by racism. Third, it demonstrates a passionate (and putrid) hatred of the history and reality of racism these people have had to face (and still do, by the way) on the basis that racism is actually nothing more than an obstacle that the African Americans’ opponent must overcome in order to make his point and demonstrate superiority to their claims or complaints.

        Now let’s assume for a moment that this charge regarding the manipulative use of racism is a correct one and that indeed these hypothetical African American political activists (and Salaita would be talking about far more than just the activists since there are millions of people in agreement with them who aren’t activists and he’s referring to all of them, all the time, and leaves no room for nuance or ambiguity in his tweet) were indeed manipulating facts and distorting the truth in order to defend the egregious behavior that they were defending. Do you suppose that sworn opponents of theirs may by trusted to adjudicate and define what racism means? Do you suppose that these sworn opponents and their defenders are able to even comprehend what racism means to these African Americans (wow, what an Orientalism by Said moment)? And, why should any institution put such an insensitive, cynical, hateful person in a position of authority over African American political activists, not to mention non-political African American students? After all, their valid historic claim is nothing more than political fodder for him, to be abused whenever he wishes to make political claims against them. Or worse, just when he’s in a bad mood.

        I agree that it might be difficult to fire him if he’s already employed. But if he’s to be employed, not hiring him seems quite sensible.

    • nattyb September 3, 2014 at 8:52 am | #

      You write:
      “If Salaita had written tweets like, “”African American political activists: transforming ‘racism’ from something horrible into something honorable since the days of Malcolm X,” (a paraphrase of a similar, actual tweet he wrote about Zionists and antisemitism) would any of his defenders organize to ensure that he is hired?”

      AND:

      “If anyone wishes to defend Salaita, why don’t you try doing it by using the African-American example I provide above. It will make the situation clear. Crystal clear.”

      I think you’re trolling and not engaging this matter in good-faith. Because (i) I’ve seen you comment on this matter a lot and (ii) you haven’t managed to take the time to actually analyze his tweets, because the tweet in question you’ve referenced is defensible and not remotely racist, if actually viewed in context.

      His comment about “something honorable” means the exact opposite of the point you’re trying to make. He didn’t say “being racist against Jews” is something honorable. He was saying “if you’re saying, it’s ‘anti-semitic’ to oppose land theft, colonization and state violence, then you’ve made ‘anti-semitic’ to be something honorable (by virtue of Zionists likening criticism of Israel to be “anti-semitic”).

      You’d know this if you (i) read his actual tweets before and after the “making ‘anti-semitism’ honorable tweet or (ii) read any of the numerous analysis of his tweets, which have been linked to by Corey.

      Oh, and this: “university hires a controversial professor who openly disparages Jews, oops, I meant Zionists?” Is that what passes for snark on Breitbart? Corey’s a Jew (and an observant one at that). I’m a Jew. I’ve read his tweets. I didn’t find myself “disparaged.” I saw the anger of someone who longs for Palestine and is furious about its continued (violent) oppression. To be honest, I find myself disparaged every time Netanyahu says “on behalf of the Jewish people,” and then declares we need to bomb Gaza. Speak for yourself Bibi.

      ***

      Moreover, bor’s comment contains one item of interest as it’s something I’ve tended to notice in comments of those critical of Steve and supportive of the Chancellor/BoT’s decision: replace “Zionist/Israel” with “women/blacks/gays.” Criticizing a State, the founding ideology of that State and its ideological adherents, isn’t remotely comparable to making a universal criticism of all members of a sex/gender, sexual orientation or race. In my opinion, it’s just a lazy attempt, to make mud stick, like the “out-of-context” assertion re: the “making ‘anti-semitism’ honorable tweet,” that bor tried to use in his/her comment above.

      • bor September 3, 2014 at 3:08 pm | #

        “I think you’re trolling and not engaging this matter in good-faith. Because (i) I’ve seen you comment on this matter a lot”

        Great evidence. I hope you’ll understand if I simply ignore the rest.

      • David Corner September 3, 2014 at 8:05 pm | #

        You have given Bor an escape hatch to avoid having to reply to your valid doubts as to his sincerity in this matter.

        When feels justified in complains that Jews / Zionists (favorite tactic to lump the two together) can be criticized with impunity without even a hint of shame you can pretty easy predict the nature of the arguments that will follow.

        …Or the selective replies for that matter

    • Scott Lemieux September 3, 2014 at 8:58 am | #

      If Salaita had written tweets like, “”African American political activists: transforming ‘racism’ from something horrible into something honorable since the days of Malcolm X,” (a paraphrase of a similar, actual tweet he wrote about Zionists and antisemitism) would any of his defenders organize to ensure that he is hired? I think not.

      I think so, particularly since for the analogy to be accurate it would have to be clear in context that the tweet was making an anti-racist argument. (Although there’s really no way to make the analogy comparable; it’s just a flat non-sequitur.) In any case, I don’t think that tenured faculty should be fired for expressing political views on Twitter.

      • bor September 3, 2014 at 3:13 pm | #

        “In any case, I don’t think that tenured faculty should be fired for expressing political views on Twitter.”

        I probably agree. I have to think this through a little longer because I’m not sure where I stand on this regarding hate speech, but I generally agree with this statement.

        However, Salaita wasn’t fired. He had yet to be hired officially and had not earned a salary yet. That seems to suggest that he was not yet an employee. It seems to me eminently reasonable to avoid hiring divisive, hateful people who have openly expressed hostility to groups from which some of their students are bound to come.

    • Andrew Miller September 3, 2014 at 11:13 am | #

      So in other words, your entire arguments rests on a) a complete dismissal of academic freedom as a concept, b) a deliberate misinterpretation of a tweet, c) unsubstantiated insinuations that Salaita would be unable or unwilling to treat pro-Israeli students fairly even though not a single student complaint was lodged against him at Virginia Tech and d) false accusations of anti-semitism.

      Sounds about right. If you can’t make an argument on the merits(and what kind of merits can you use when a professor guaranteed academic freedom is fired because his political opinions are considered distasteful by wealthy donors?), just lie and dissemble.

      • bor September 3, 2014 at 3:25 pm | #

        “So in other words, your entire arguments rests on a) a complete dismissal of academic freedom as a concept, b) a deliberate misinterpretation of a tweet, c) unsubstantiated insinuations that Salaita would be unable or unwilling to treat pro-Israeli students fairly even though not a single student complaint was lodged against him at Virginia Tech and d) false accusations of anti-semitism.”

        well, I’d agree except that you a) is false, your b) is false, your c) is false and, shockingly, your d) is false.

        “Sounds about right. If you can’t make an argument on the merits”

        I think I make a couple of arguments on the merits above. I haven’t even began to address his ridiculous book, Israel Dead Soul. Some people seem impressed with his work but I found it to be sorely lacking in facts, substance or even coherent ideas (well, other than “Israel and its supporters are yucky”).

        “(and what kind of merits can you use when a professor guaranteed academic freedom is fired because his political opinions are considered distasteful by wealthy donors?)”

        You have zero evidence this is the case. On the other hand, I can point you to Wise’s statement about the university’s core values which are diametrically opposed to Salaita’s values and I can point you to his egregious, hateful tweets. Academic freedom has ZERO to do with expressing a desire to have hundreds of thousands of people “disappear” – I’m referring to Salaita’s tweet about all the settlers disappearing like the three Israeli teenagers. Seriously, this is what you’re defending as academic freedom?

        You also have zero evidence that he was fired. Did he earn a salary from the university?

        “just lie and dissemble.”

        I think I’ve written very carefully. You may disagree with me, but I’ve been careful to quote directly and my accusations are backed with links and quotes. As for dissembling, it seems to me that you’re projecting.

      • Andrew Miller September 3, 2014 at 4:12 pm | #

        “well, I’d agree except that you a) is false, your b) is false, your c) is false and, shockingly, your d) is false.”

        A very well-reasoned argument. Everything I said is true; you can stick your fingers in your ears all you want but that doesn’t change reality. You believe that firing someone for having viewpoints not appreciated by wealthy donors is not only acceptable, but good administrating, showing that you have no respect for the concept of academic freedom. You are clearly misinterpreting the tweet in order to smear him; it’s crystal clear that he is criticizing false accusations of anti-semitism, not promoting anti-semitism. He has repeatedly denounced anti-semitism and explained his position yet you insist on interpreting his tweet in a way that was not intended. You can choose to interpret his tweets with as much bad faith as you want; your dishonesty is not his responsibility.

        “I haven’t even began to address his ridiculous book, Israel Dead Soul. Some people seem impressed with his work but I found it to be sorely lacking in facts, substance or even coherent ideas (well, other than “Israel and its supporters are yucky”).”

        For one thing, it helps to at least cite the book’s title correctly. For another, nobody cares about your opinion on his scholarly work. Actual experts in the field have reviewed his scholarship and found it to be of excellent caliber. There is a process in universities to evaluate a candidate’s suitability and Salaita passed with flying colors. The quality of his scholarship or his teaching are not in doubt, even according to UIUC.

        “You have zero evidence this is the case.”

        Read the article above. It’s clear that donor pressure was behind this.

        “On the other hand, I can point you to Wise’s statement about the university’s core values which are diametrically opposed to Salaita’s values and I can point you to his egregious, hateful tweets.”

        Oh, wow. You read the boilerplate letter? I guess the case is closed, folks! And nothing in his tweets approaches hate speech. Having strident political views is not grounds for firing a professor(and here I refer you to my comments above about your complete lack of respect for or understanding of academic freedom.)

        “Academic freedom has ZERO to do with expressing a desire to have hundreds of thousands of people “disappear” – I’m referring to Salaita’s tweet about all the settlers disappearing like the three Israeli teenagers.”

        Wishing for the disappearance of the illegal settlements and the settlers is the consensus of the international legal community. Demanding that criminals be forced to cease their criminal acts is hardly hate speech. But again, this is to be expected given that you don’t understand what academic freedom is.

        “You also have zero evidence that he was fired. Did he earn a salary from the university? ”

        People much better versed in employment and 1st amendment law can explain in detail why the university won’t find much help in this argument. He was told he was hired, he was scheduled to teach classes and the only procedure he needed to go through was the pro forma approval of Board of Trustees whose role is to rubber-stamp hiring choices, not second-guess or even review them.

      • bor September 3, 2014 at 5:04 pm | #

        “A very well-reasoned argument.”

        Thanks.

        “Everything I said is true; you can stick your fingers in your ears all you want but that doesn’t change reality. ”

        I didn’t stick my fingers anywhere. I merely pointed out that you were wrong on all four counts.

        “You believe that firing someone for having viewpoints not appreciated by wealthy donors is not only acceptable, but good administrating, showing that you have no respect for the concept of academic freedom.”

        Salaita wasn’t fired. And you’re misrepresenting what I wrote. I wrote that nobody should expect donors to keep funding any institution just because they have in the past. They have a right to walk away. If I were a donor to this school, I would walk away. That has no impact whatsoever on academic freedom because the university continues to function. It doesn’t need me as a donor, the building can look a little aged or a couple less kids would get scholarships, but that’s about it. I give to charities that I are aligned with my world-view and I don’t to those that aren’t, even if I have a nostalgic connection to them. You take my money because you can and if you feel that taking it is onerous, you don’t keep me as a donor. I most certainly don’t believe donors should influence hiring decisions.

        However, if I were running a university and many of my donors were contacting me to alert me to a problematic hire, I would certainly investigate that hire extremely carefully. And if I found out that this person is someone who, for example, isn’t such a strong scholar or is extremely hostile and divisive to certain groups, then as leader of a university I might decide that I don’t want him there. Another administrator might decide that this candidate has merit beyond any concerns and then hire him. There is no right or wrong, I was explicitly stating that there is no evidence that anything else happened here.

        “You are clearly misinterpreting the tweet in order to smear him; it’s crystal clear that he is criticizing false accusations of anti-semitism, not promoting anti-semitism.”

        It’s not only unclear, many others have read this tweet precisely as I have. Are they all trying to smear him? Or is it that he is trying to smear and has been found out? I’ll answer for you: it’s the latter.

        “He has repeatedly denounced anti-semitism and explained his position”

        Which is why he wrote that Israeli border guards at international crossings conduct large amounts of anal and vaginal probes on Palestinians in order to satisfy their depraved Orientalist-derived sexual desire for Arabs and Muslims. I guess he was just being anti-Zionist.

        “yet you insist on interpreting his tweet in a way that was not intended. You can choose to interpret his tweets with as much bad faith as you want; your dishonesty is not his responsibility.”

        My dishonesty? Even an anti-Zionist Jew tweeted in response to one of his tweets that he was uncomfortable with their content. If you like, you can accuse me of misunderstanding him, but bad faith and willful misinterpretation? Nah.

        “For one thing, it helps to at least cite the book’s title correctly.”

        Oh, wow. I have written a ton here today, and extremely quickly. Expect some typos and grammatical errors and grow up.

        “For another, nobody cares about your opinion on his scholarly work.”

        Then why are you commenting on it?

        “Actual experts in the field have reviewed his scholarship and found it to be of excellent caliber. There is a process in universities to evaluate a candidate’s suitability and Salaita passed with flying colors. The quality of his scholarship or his teaching are not in doubt, even according to UIUC.”

        I’m permitted to disagree. Also, let’s be perfectly honest here. The department (and presumably search committee) that hired Salaita is/was led by a known BDS advocate. So what if the new hire, who happens to be a really nice guy and someone who is a political colleague, may have written some things that don’t really have citations and are made up from whole cloth while pressing an anti-Israel agenda? It’s okay because we’re all about settler-colonialism.

        “Read the article above. It’s clear that donor pressure was behind this.”

        No, it seems to me that donors brought this to the attention of the most senior member of the university because they have access. She then researched and made a very understandable decision. The article above and even the emails to which it links do not suggest donors are what drove her decision. Did they influence it? Perhaps. But her stated reasons are all about civility on campus and fairness to all students. In the case of a professor who tweets that all supporters of Israel are awful human beings, her stated reasons are self-evident.

        “Oh, wow. You read the boilerplate letter?”

        Actually, the letter is far from boilerplate. You should read it respectfully. And anyway, I was referring to her statement last year regarding boycotting Israel.

        “And nothing in his tweets approaches hate speech.”

        In response to the kidnapping of three boys who weren’t even settlers: “I wish all the fucking West Bank settlers would go missing.”

        Cary Nelson points out that Salaita retweeted that Jeffrey Goldberg should get “the pointy end of a shiv.” I guess he didn’t author that, though, so perhaps that isn’t hate speech, just murderous rage.

        “Having strident political views is not grounds for firing a professor”

        I completely agree. Where have I written otherwise?

        Of course, Salaita wasn’t fired. He just wasn’t hired or, if you like, his hiring was stopped in process.

        “(and here I refer you to my comments above about your complete lack of respect for or understanding of academic freedom.)”

        And as I demonstrate again, your claim is false.

        “Wishing for the disappearance of the illegal settlements and the settlers is the consensus of the international legal community.”

        Ha ha ha. Your Jewish Israeli-American neighbor’s son gets kidnapped. Your other neighbor, the Palestinian-American whose house faces his, puts up a huge sign on the exterior of his garage saying, “I wish that you and the rest of your family should also be kidnapped…” I like how you try to dress that up as “international consensus.”

        “Demanding that criminals be forced to cease their criminal acts is hardly hate speech.”

        No, he was demanding the forced disappearance of hundreds of thousands of people (I won’t even address the BS about criminality). I have refrained from going all out in attacking it, but one reading of this tweet could easily indicate a violent desire for genocide.

        “But again, this is to be expected given that you don’t understand what academic freedom is.”

        Just because you learned when you were 4 years old that asking your mom for candy over and over would finally get her to give you some, doesn’t mean that repeating a mistake over and over will convince other adults who aren’t your mom or become true suddenly.

        “People much better versed in employment and 1st amendment law can explain in detail why the university won’t find much help in this argument. He was told he was hired, he was scheduled to teach classes and the only procedure he needed to go through was the pro forma approval of Board of Trustees whose role is to rubber-stamp hiring choices, not second-guess or even review them.”

        And I’ve seen legal opinions expressed that suggest otherwise. We will all see how this plays out and learn from it. As of right now, Salaita had never taught a day at this university, had never received a salary and, therefore, was not yet employed there. Will some lawyers prevail on a technicality that suggests he was actually hired? We’ll see.

        Gosh, all that writing and you still haven’t proved a thing.

      • Andrew Miller September 3, 2014 at 7:46 pm | #

        “I merely pointed out that you were wrong on all four counts. ”

        No, you falsely claimed that I was wrong, without presenting any evidence. You still haven’t presented any evidence.

        “I wrote that nobody should expect donors to keep funding any institution just because they have in the past. They have a right to walk away…I give to charities that I are aligned with my world-view and I don’t to those that aren’t, even if I have a nostalgic connection to them.”

        Of course donors can donate to whoever they like. However, the role of a university is to foster a lively debate and a diversity of opinions, not to please the university’s donors. If that’s what you want, give money to a think tank or a PAC. Academic freedom was designed to protect against just this kind of meddling. For a president to veto the hiring decisions of university committees in order to please her donors is precisely the kind of political interference that academic freedom is designed to protect against. Again, you do not understand academic freedom.

        “And if I found out that this person is someone who, for example, isn’t such a strong scholar or is extremely hostile and divisive to certain groups, then as leader of a university I might decide that I don’t want him there. Another administrator might decide that this candidate has merit beyond any concerns and then hire him.”

        Hiring decisions are done by expert committees to prevent exactly this kind of political machination.

        “It’s not only unclear, many others have read this tweet precisely as I have. Are they all trying to smear him? Or is it that he is trying to smear and has been found out? I’ll answer for you: it’s the latter.”

        Congratulations; you’ve proven Salaita’s point about how dangerous and common false accusations of anti-semitism are. You may be forgiven for misunderstanding his tweet, but your decision to deliberately misread it in order to smear him is unforgivable. You ignore what he meant and how he explicitly clarified and reiterated his position, making it clear that he was criticizing malicious and false accusations of anti-semitism, not celebrating anti-semitism(which he was denounced on numerous occasions.) Instead, you create some half-baked conspiracy theory whose key pièce de conviction is that Salaita took a couple of hours before replying to a tweet(the possibility that he was taking a nap, making a phone call, watching TV, taking a walk or eating a meal never occurred to you; it must be a conspiracy!)

        “Which is why he wrote that Israeli border guards at international crossings conduct large amounts of anal and vaginal probes on Palestinians in order to satisfy their depraved Orientalist-derived sexual desire for Arabs and Muslims.”

        So decrying the dehumanizing and oppressive treatment of Palestinians is anti-semitism?

        ” Even an anti-Zionist Jew tweeted in response to one of his tweets that he was uncomfortable with their content. If you like, you can accuse me of misunderstanding him, but bad faith and willful misinterpretation? Nah. ”

        The anti-Zionist in question asked for clarification, which Salaita happily provided. If you had done the same, you wouldn’t still be trying to smear Salaita. Or would you?

        “The department (and presumably search committee) that hired Salaita is/was led by a known BDS advocate. So what if the new hire, who happens to be a really nice guy and someone who is a political colleague, may have written some things that don’t really have citations and are made up from whole cloth while pressing an anti-Israel agenda? ”

        So a supporter of Palestinian human rights is incapable of critically evaluating a colleague? This sounds suspiciously like a certain anti-semitic trope, just used against Palestinians and their sympathizers.

        “In the case of a professor who tweets that all supporters of Israel are awful human beings, her stated reasons are self-evident. ”

        So by this standard, any professor who says mean things about religious fundamentalists, Holocaust deniers, climate change deniers, etc. should also be fired, right? And certainly pro-Israeli academics who accuse anti-Zionists of being anti-semites should all be fired, too, right? Or do you not care about the rights of anti-Zionist students?

        “In response to the kidnapping of three boys who weren’t even settlers: “I wish all the fucking West Bank settlers would go missing.”

        Again, not hate speech. Not even close. Wishing that the settlers, a group defined not by their race, religion or ethnicity but by their actions and their racist ideology, would be removed from Palestinian land is not hate speech; it’s respect for basic morality.

        “I completely agree. Where have I written otherwise?”

        This entire conversation where you’re justifying the firing of a professor for expressing his political beliefs in support of the Palestinian people? Do you have amnesia?

        “Of course, Salaita wasn’t fired. He just wasn’t hired or, if you like, his hiring was stopped in process. ”

        According to the law, there is no meaningful difference. And the chilling, anti-democratic effect is the same.

      • bor September 4, 2014 at 12:57 am | #

        “No, you falsely claimed that I was wrong, without presenting any evidence. You still haven’t presented any evidence.”

        Sure I have.

        “Of course donors can donate to whoever they like.”

        See how easy that was?

        “However, the role of a university is to foster a lively debate and a diversity of opinions, not to please the university’s donors.”

        I find it highly amusing that a defender of a BDS activist who seeks to boycott Israeli academics is telling us that universities are supposed to offer a lively debate and a diversity of opinion. What you mean is that you want them to be places where Salaita and company can openly ply their attempts to stifle open debate and diversity of opinions.

        As for pleasing donors, that isn’t the the role of a university. However, you are certainly welcome to point me to universities where encouraging donors isn’t on the agenda. You’ll find virtually none. Of course, if what you mean by “pleasing donors” is that debate should be stifled as Salaita wishes, then needless to say that is something that should be avoided at all costs. But if we’re completely honest here, like good ol’ friends having a l’il ol’ debate about academic freedom, I’m fairly certain that those whom you’re defending, the people who seek to boycott Israeli universities, are far more dangerous to openness of debate than the vast majority of donors who simply want to help their alma mater or a school they care about continue to provide an excellent education and experience to their students.

        Your and Salaita’s hypocrisy here is intense, huh?

        “Academic freedom was designed to protect against just this kind of meddling.”

        You mean, the meddling of shutting down all communications with Israeli universities and trying to shut down their research? Yes indeed, academic freedom was designed to protect against this.

        “For a president to veto the hiring decisions of university committees in order to please her donors is precisely the kind of political interference that academic freedom is designed to protect against. Again, you do not understand academic freedom.”

        And again, if you continue to misconstrue what I didn’t say, what I don’t believe actually happened and what no evidence demonstrates actually happened, then you’re just acknowledging that my much briefer answers at the start were accurate. You were and are simply wrong.

        “Hiring decisions are done by expert committees to prevent exactly this kind of political machination.”

        And yet, there is a hierarchy and after committees, decisions are still run by deans and perhaps the provost and perhaps the president or chancellor and perhaps by an additional board. Don’t look at me, man, I think administrations are too cumbersome and over-populated and all sorts of internal systems are too elaborate, but that’s the reality.

        “Congratulations; you’ve proven Salaita’s point about how dangerous and common false accusations of anti-semitism are.”

        Nothing of the kind. I’m extremely cautious when I make a claim of antisemitism. Extremely. Having never heard of Salaita previously, I first read Salaita’s lousy book. Then I read and reread the chapter which I discussed the other day at length. Then I looked at his tweets and then at his defenders’ parsing of the tweets and his critics’ parsing. Then I finalized my opinion. In my opinion, Salaita would like to deflect attention from the times when he stops prancing around with rhetoric and expresses, fairly deviously I might add, nasty ideas about Israeli Jews and their supporters (particularly Jewish ones).

        “You may be forgiven for misunderstanding his tweet,”

        I fully understood it. You clearly don’t or you’re seeking to divert attention.

        “but your decision to deliberately misread it in order to smear him is unforgivable.”

        On the contrary, your defense of his inexcusable tweets is unforgivable. Would you like a few hundred thousand Jews to disappear as well?

        “You ignore what he meant and how he explicitly clarified and reiterated his position,”

        I didn’t ignore it. I read it, and since I have no stake in this game, unlike you, Salaita, the BDS movement and his other supporters, my views are objective and my views are that what he meant was hateful. Had he apologized and removed his offensive tweet, you’d have grounds to complain about what I’m saying.

        “making it clear that he was criticizing malicious and false accusations of anti-semitism, not celebrating anti-semitism (which he was denounced on numerous occasions.)”

        For your edification, I’ll repeat what I wrote in another comment here about Salaita’s marvelous scholarship: “next time you’re at an Israeli airport, if you look at the security people and think to yourself that they are sexually perverse and probably want to anally probe the Arab who just walked by them, chances are you’ve been reading something antisemitic.”

        As for making “antisemitism” honorable, you can try to dissemble all you want, but he is doing nothing more than making excuses for it. When someone wants to argue on the merits of what is happening, they do so. When someone wants to besmirch others, suddenly the conversation becomes very different. Look at the example I give above using African Americans. Don’t like that one? Here is another version. “Palestinians: transforming ‘Islamophobia” from something horrible into something honorable since 1948.” Still confused? I understand Salaita trying to get away with this, but why are you supporting him?

        “Instead, you create some half-baked conspiracy theory whose key pièce de conviction is that Salaita took a couple of hours before replying to a tweet (the possibility that he was taking a nap, making a phone call, watching TV, taking a walk or eating a meal never occurred to you; it must be a conspiracy!)”

        Actually, he responded within 5 minutes to that comment. I guess nobody else challenged him until then. However, it was still 3 hours after the original tweet.

        But here comes the best part of this entire back and forth with you, Andrew:

        I wrote:

        ““Which is why he wrote that Israeli border guards at international crossings conduct large amounts of anal and vaginal probes on Palestinians in order to satisfy their depraved Orientalist-derived sexual desire for Arabs and Muslims.”

        And you completely evaded my point by responding:

        “So decrying the dehumanizing and oppressive treatment of Palestinians is anti-semitism?”

        Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. That is the most disingenuous answer to that point that you could have given. Do try again, you’re embarrassing yourself and your friend because you don’t have an answer.

        “The anti-Zionist in question asked for clarification, which Salaita happily provided.”

        Of course he asked, because he was stunned and he didn’t know what to do. After all, he wants to be a good little anti-Zionist and here is a beloved, leading figure in the BDS movement writing what is clearly a hateful comment attacking Jews. And Salaita happily sidestepped the challenge.

        “If you had done the same, you wouldn’t still be trying to smear Salaita. Or would you?”

        Oh, unlike the anti-Zionist, as I explained above, I did a lot of research before coming to my conclusion. And, unlike the anti-Zionist, I have no skin in this. I don’t know Salaita, have no connection to this school, have never visited this site prior to this situation. I am Salaita-agnostic. And I am not “smearing” Salaita, I am expressing my views of what he has said on the basis of careful reading and reviewing both his supporters and detractors. I also explain how I came to those views and have defended them when challenged. Salaita is welcome to join this conversation (assuming you’re not his sock puppet) any time. I thought you were all for lively debate!

        “So a supporter of Palestinian human rights is incapable of critically evaluating a colleague?”

        Well, first of all, thanks for acknowledging the political positions of those who hired him. It was an open secret. Second, don’t you find it amusing that having donors influence a hiring decision bothers you, but having a friend in the BDS movement help secure a tenured position doesn’t?

        Third, I am fairly confident that supporters of Palestinians are capable of critically evaluating colleagues. If, in this instance, they considered his book, Israel’s Dead Soul, to be solid scholarship, then in my opinion these particular supporters of Palestinian rights aren’t very good judges of scholarly work. If, however, they opened a door for a comrade in arms, then in my opinion at least letting this book slide as serious scholarship doesn’t reflect poorly on their capabilities, and they should be more concerned about their choice of friends.

        “This sounds suspiciously like a certain anti-semitic trope, just used against Palestinians and their sympathizers.”

        Ha ha. I understand your desire to be clever. I do. I don’t want to discourage you just because it’s not working, so do keep trying because if you keep throwing wet toilet paper at a wall for long enough, eventually some of it will stick.

        “In the case of a professor who tweets that all supporters of Israel are awful human beings, her stated reasons are self-evident.

        So by this standard, any professor who says mean things about religious fundamentalists, Holocaust deniers, climate change deniers, etc. should also be fired, right?”

        First of all, Salaita wasn’t fired. He hasn’t taught a single class and he hasn’t received salary from this university. As I’ve already told you, what worked with your mom when you were a little boy – demanding candy over and over until she gave in – doesn’t work in the grown-up world.

        However, if you’re asking me whether Salaita should be hired, the answer is NO. He is a person who actively promotes bigotry and exclusionary status for people. He is a person who actively seeks to stifle all debate, as his pursuit of boycotting Israel demonstrates. He is a person who targets one country above all and one people above all. And I do believe this should apply to other bigots, scholars who seek to stifle other academics and scholars who seek to disparage students for their beliefs.

        And, I just want you to clarify for me: did you just compare Jewish students who support Israel to Holocaust deniers? And, is this coming from you or are you Salaita’s sock puppet?

        “And certainly pro-Israeli academics who accuse anti-Zionists of being anti-semites should all be fired, too, right?”

        First of all, Salaita wasn’t fired. He has never worked a day in his life for UI. Second, accusing someone of being an antisemite is not the same as being antisemitic. You seem confused.

        “Or do you not care about the rights of anti-Zionist students?”

        Depends. Do you mean the ones who harass and punch Jewish students on campus?

        http://www.jta.org/2014/08/21/news-opinion/united-states/temple-u-jewish-student-punched-at-pro-palestinian-groups-booth

        They should be jailed.

        Or do you mean the ones who disrupt an audience’s right to hear a lecture?

        http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/09/irvine-11-sentenced-probation-no-jail-time.html

        They were arrested. And convicted. As they should have been.

        Or do you mean anti-Zionist students who humiliated and restricted a group of students and professors entering their classroom?

        http://legalinsurrection.com/2014/03/anti-israel-academic-boycott-turns-ugly-at-vassar/

        They got away with it, but my view is that it is the DUTY of any faculty to report these students to the police and to campus authorities, to have their organizations (usually Students for Justice in Palestine or the Muslim Student Association though the memberships are often interchangeable) subjected to sanctions and, if necessary, to expulsion.

        I’m positive you agree with me since you are all for ensuring that campuses are not dominated by fear but by open and respectful discourse. You do agree that all these violators of other students’ rights should be heavily sanctioned, yes?

        ““In response to the kidnapping of three boys who weren’t even settlers: “I wish all the fucking West Bank settlers would go missing.”

        Again, not hate speech. Not even close.”

        In what universe?

        “Wishing that the settlers, a group defined not by their race, religion or ethnicity but by their actions and their racist ideology, would be removed from Palestinian land is not hate speech; it’s respect for basic morality.”

        Oh, the universe where you lie.

        “This entire conversation where you’re justifying the firing of a professor for expressing his political beliefs in support of the Palestinian people? Do you have amnesia?”

        That’s not the conversation we are having. We are discussing my justification of Salaita not being hired because he is a professor who not only writes mediocre books but particularly because the manner in which he expresses his support for Palestinians involves putrid attacks on Israelis and those who support Israel, including attacks that are antisemitic in nature.

        “According to the law, there is no meaningful difference. And the chilling, anti-democratic effect is the same.”

        When the lawyers are done with this, we will learn what the law has to say about this. Morality has already voted, however, and it tells us that Salaita got precisely what he deserves. I’m not even worried for a second about democracy since scholars who advocate for boycotting other scholars are the last people we need to protect democracy precisely because they seek to undermine the voices of those with whom they disagree.

        It’s been fun, but let’s not continue. Your little game of gotcha is just making Salaita look worse and worse.

    • chewie September 3, 2014 at 1:11 pm | #

      bor: “If Salaita had written tweets like, “”African American political activists: transforming ‘racism’ from something horrible into something honorable since the days of Malcolm X,” (a paraphrase of a similar, actual tweet he wrote about Zionists and antisemitism) would any of his defenders organize to ensure that he is hired? I think not.”

      If the situation was that those african american political activists had gained political and great military power in a nation, had pursued an ever growing occupation including illegal settlements against another people for decades, had also exerted control over one other area of that other people, had that control included preventing air, land and sea transport routes into that region and systematic destruction of electricity and other infrastructure, had they bombed densely civilian populated sites in that area with many civilian deaths as a result and had they then accused those who opposed that set of actions of “racism” then, yes, I would rally in defence of Salaita’s right to say that and keep his employment at the University of Illinois. I hope others would to.

      • bor September 3, 2014 at 3:53 pm | #

        “If the situation was that those african american political activists had gained political and great military power in a nation, had pursued an ever growing occupation including illegal settlements against another people for decades, had also exerted control over one other area of that other people, had that control included preventing air, land and sea transport routes into that region and systematic destruction of electricity and other infrastructure, had they bombed densely civilian populated sites in that area with many civilian deaths as a result and had they then accused those who opposed that set of actions of “racism” then, yes, I would rally in defence of Salaita’s right to say that and keep his employment at the University of Illinois. I hope others would to.”

        Aside from getting many of your claims wrong, I think you get the wording of what you mean wrong. But I understand, you’re trying to suggest that if these African-Americans conquered New England but then treated Connecticut in ways that you believe to be highly improper, then you deem it is necessary to point out that racism isn’t racism but rather it is “racism” that is nothing more than manipulative garbage intended to provide cover for the bashing Connecticut is getting from these uppity African Americans.

        I disagree because I think you’re doing a serious and grave injustice to a valid historical injustice, that of racism against blacks throughout the world, over the course of many centuries. You are devaluing a proper term that carries important historical meaning and weight in order to sell your political views (and since you could be wrong in some of your assertions, as your comment above demonstrates, you are devaluing this meaningful, historical term on the basis of errors), you’re causing offense to those African Americans who still believe that racism exists and that its history is irrefutable and not to be minimized (especially so you can poke jabs at your political opponents), you’re attacking those African Americans who believe that the history of slavery and prejudice has compelled them to build a homeland in their indigenous home of New England (okay, I admit, this is where the analogy fails, I should have picked a territory in Africa) in order to provide precisely a place where they could control their own destiny and not live as an oppressed minority, and you’re attacking their supporters as well (who believe the wars and terror attacks on New England, including from Connecticut, have forced the hand of these African Americans to establish strong defense mechanisms and whose efforts to protect themselves and their families from precisely the type of outcome we have seen in Egypt, Iraq, Libya, Syria are now evident to all, even if some couldn’t see this before).

        You are welcome to make an argument that the New England African Americans don’t have a right to Connecticut and should abandon that territory, but you don’t need to use the term “racism” to make that point. When you CHOOSE to use it, however, you are causing great offense and you’re also ensuring that your students and prospective students are going to be very cautious around you, if they even dare to join your class.

  4. Laura September 3, 2014 at 12:26 pm | #

    1. The point is not what we think of the tweets–that is dangerous territory, because one person’s incivility is another person’s protest or speaking truth to power. The Supreme Court has been quite clear on this issue: hecklers and people who say things others find obnoxious are protected by the First Amendment. I fear that in this and related conversations, “academic freedom” is coming to mean less than that. But “academic freedom” is the corollary concept to the First Amendment that one might be forced to invoke at a private college or university, where rights are more easily curtailed. Because UIUC is a state university, however, this is a story about the state directly limiting someone’s freedom of speech by revoking a job offer, which on the face of it is an absolute violation of constitutionally protected speech.
    2. Employment law is likewise not at all fickle when it comes to state universities, where one has a “property interest” (i.e., a financial interest) in their job. An offer was made and accepted. Every other new professor at UIUC this year will have their contract voted on at the Sept. 11 Board of Trustees meeting–meaning that procedurally, it is not a requirement for starting the job. Wise and the BOT are going to have an extremely hard time explaining to a judge how this was handled in the same way as all other appointments.
    3. This seems like a painfully clear example of what happens when states and the federal government systematically underfund state universities: chancellors and presidents can be bought and sold by donors and BOTs, selling out their own best principles to donors who have a different set of interests.

    • Ligurio September 3, 2014 at 1:32 pm | #

      Laura gets it right. I actually disagree with some of Salaita’s views. But who cares? Others have demolished the arguments of “bor” (whose name at least is apt), but I will go one further. It is “bor” who is actually legitimizing REAL anti-semitism by repeating the tired canard that to be anti-Zionist is really to be anti-Semitic.

      In fact, there are many pro-Zionists who are also, more or less, anti-Semitic. I have several southern evangelical friends who are stridently pro-Zionist on account of their misreading of the Book of Revelation, but who are also mildly anti-Semitic. The fact is, AIPAC, the JDL, Hillel and the rest actually are MORE opposed to anti-Zionism than they are to anti-Semitism. An anti-Semite who happened to be a great friend of Israel is one thing; a friend of the Jewish people and culture who stridently opposes Zionist colonial rule…..that’s not to be allowed…

      • bor September 3, 2014 at 4:10 pm | #

        I suspect my arguments haven’t quite been demolished.

        Regarding anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism, I think the two may indeed be separate from each other. Unfortunately, in countless cases they aren’t. I can point you to the supposedly anti-Israel demonstrations in Europe that devolved into attacks and screeds against Jews, to the constant intermixing of “Jewish lobby” with “Israel lobby” (and that’s without getting into the premise of the “Israel lobby” according to Walt and Mearsheimer by which they claim that a majority of Jews directly and indirectly participate in the Israel lobby because every Jewish organization and synagogue is used by the lobby as if they are part of its membership), the political attacks on Israel on the basis of theological claims by prominent groups and individuals, the attacks on Israel and on Israel’s supporters on the basis of “Jewish values” and on and on and on.

        Let’s not play games here. There is a historical phenomenon called antisemitism. It is real. It has led to oppression and genocide of Jews. It has existed for hundreds and hundreds of years. It has most certainly not disappeared and in many venues has actually grown thanks to manipulative governments as well as political and religious leaders. Israel is a country that identifies itself a Jewish state on the basis of Jewish nationality. When people use antisemitic concepts while attacking it and its supporters, that isn’t anti-Zionism, that is antisemitism. When governments or the UN or NGOs single Israel out in a manner that distinguishes it from every other country – and especially when particularly egregious violators of human rights and promoters of antisemitism get to fund these organizations or drive their agendas – that isn’t anti-Zionism, that is a manifestation of antisemitism.

        It is perfectly fine to criticize Israel. Criticize it as you would another country such as, say, Turkey in its inexcusable and unjustifiably oppressive occupation of Cyprus. But if you treat it uniquely and criticize it differently from all other states or tacitly bring up accusations that have clear historical echoes of things such as blood libel, then you have crossed a line.

      • Ligurio September 3, 2014 at 5:14 pm | #

        Meant to be a response to the post @410pm by bor. Not sure where it will end up.

        You write: “When people use antisemitic concepts while attacking it and its supporters, that isn’t anti-Zionism, that is antisemitism.”

        Assuming this is true, can you provide me with any evidence that Salaita “uses,” as opposed to “mentions,” such antisemitic concepts in his tweets?

        Finally, I agree that antisemitism is real and bad. But I think that it is in the interest of AIPAC and the rest to confuse and conflate antiZionism and antisemitism. By doing so they are further able to characterize all antiZionist rhetoric as antisemitic, thereby rendering it beyond the pale. If you don’t think this is their intentional and obvious strategy I just don’t know what to say.

        By the way, it makes more sense for U.S. citizens to care more about Israeli atrocities than Turkish atrocities. We directly fund and abet the Israeli war machine, and our politicians annually fellate it. We should hold ourselves responsible for this, and take action to stop it, if we can. Our relation to the government of Turkey is far more tenuous. I’ve never heard about the U.S. and Turkey being “special friends” and so forth. Have you?

      • bor September 3, 2014 at 7:15 pm | #

        Turkey and the US?

        http://www.todayszaman.com/news-269076-obama-names-turkeys-erdogan-among-top-five-international-friends.html

        Salaita using antisemitic notions? His paragraph which I discussed endlessly the other day from his book Israel’s Dead Soul where he claims that Israeli guards at international crossings are using their depraved Orientalist-derived sexual desire for Arabs and Muslims to drive incessant anal and vaginal probes of Palestinians at these crossings.

        And tweets: How about “Zionist uplift in America: Every little Jewish boy and girl can grow up to the leader of a murderous colonialist regime.” I’m not sure whether he means America. What do you think?

        “At this point if Netanyahu appeared on TV with a necklace made from the teeth of Palestinian children, would anybody be surprised?” You can argue this targets only Zionists, but this has the definite stench of blood libel.

        And, of course, the now classic: “Zionists: transforming ‘anti-Semitism’ from something horrible into something honorable since 1948”

        As for the silly remark about some strategy “AIPAC” has regarding conflating antisemitism and anti-Zionism, I have bad news for you: that isn’t their strategy. It’s nobody’s strategy. It happens that there are a lot of people and organizations who use antisemitic claims or even ideas in order to press their case against Israel. That is a fact. Playing the game of “this is antisemitic vs this is anti-Zionist” is just that, a game. It’s not that hard to tell the difference.

        Now that I think about it this way, though, here is a clue that helps to discern when you’re seeing the vile stuff: next time you’re at an Israeli airport, if you look at the security people and think to yourself that they are sexually perverse and probably want to anally probe the Arab who just walked by them, chances are you’ve been reading something antisemitic.

      • bor September 4, 2014 at 1:21 am | #

        Ligurio, you wrote “I’ve never heard about the U.S. and Turkey being “special friends” and so forth.” So I provided you with a little bit of information. There is much more where that came from. Turkey has a very close and important strategic relationship with the USA and at least on the diplomatic level a much better one than Obama-Netanyahu. It also has had an occupation going on in Cyprus for 40 years now.

        That’s not to say that Americans shouldn’t care about Israel, but let’s knock off this business of Israel being priority number one for criticism. As I write, so many horrendous things are going on around the world and yet, once again, Israel is the target. It not only embarrasses those who target it, in this last war with Gaza we have finally seen the hypocrisy of the entire movement. While the war was going on, Mosul’s Christians were evicted or violated with violence. Yet the anti-Israel crowd focused on Israel. Hundreds of people died in Syria. Hundreds more died in Iraq. We’re talking about precisely the same time frame. And yet, Israel was being criticized on campuses and on numerous internet sites. While the war was going on, Russia made some geostrategic moves that should scare most of us that a huge war could break out. The focus of the anti-Israel crowd? Israel.

        It shames Israel’s critics and it seriously undermines the legitimacy of what was supposed to be a modern era governed by civility among nations.

        If it’s okay with you, I don’t feel like debating the rest of your points. I’ve already addressed them in one form or another in my other comments in this discussion and the Mary Beard one. What you ascribe to irony is most certainly not irony. At the end of the day, Salaita has to take responsibility for what is evident in his writings. He wants to be at the front lines of this war against Israel on campus and, unfortunately, he has let his passionate hatred of Israel and its supporters dominate his ideas. There is nothing ironic in wishing for the disappearance of hundreds of thousands of Jews. Even if you call them “settlers.”

    • Jasmine mar September 3, 2014 at 9:15 pm | #

      If you look at cases of promissory estoppel, as some claim applies here, it is clear that the status of employment needs to be unambiguous. In other words, employment has effectively started, salary paid, etc.
      As for the problem with underfunding of universities, if this is the level of scholars that are hired, why should tax payers fund that?

      • Jasmine mar September 3, 2014 at 10:29 pm | #

        Ligurio, “By the way, it makes more sense for U.S. citizens to care more about Israeli atrocities than Turkish atrocities. We directly fund and abet the Israeli war machine.” We also sell some very sophisticated weapons to Qatar, who funds ISIS, who murders our own citizens in the most barbaric ways, and is mass murdering thousands of helpless people in Syria and iraq, using American weapons.
        That same Qatar, who is very good friend of America, almost as good as Turkey, also funds Hamas, who is a terrorist organization involved not only in killing Jews, but their own people, uses child labor and routinely violates human rights. Qatar itself is country that uses forced labor and routinely violates human rights. It is a country where only a minority holds citizenship, the majority has no political or other rights. There is also Saudi Arabia, which routinely beheaded people, oppressed women and violates basic human rights on a daily basis. What about our biggest trading partner, China? Maybe we should boycott China for having one of the worse human rights records in the world. The list goes on and on. America is in bed with many oppressive countries, with far worse records than Israel, yet no one thinks of boycotting them. It seems that a special standard is applied when it comes to Israel. It is interesting that in academia, a place of inquiry, nobody is curious to know why.

      • Ligurio September 3, 2014 at 10:47 pm | #

        Bor, please. Are you seriously suggesting that the article on Turkey and U.S. establishes evidence against my contention that the U.S. should care more about Israeli actions because we are more proximately involved in supporting and abetting those actions? Really? Nobody’s gonna buy that, pal. The claim was not that the U.S. has no involvement with Turkey, the claim was that we have an especially enabling and morally corrupt relationship with Israel. Your citation provides no evidence to the contrary.

        None of the instances you cite are “using” antisemitic tropes. They are “mentioning” those tropes ironically in order to make a different point.

        1. Orientalism of the sort described by Salaita is regularly applied to lots of different Western powers, not just Israel.

        2. This is clearly a critique of Zionism and not Judaism: the point is that it is NOT GOOD that Jewish children be brought to identify themselves with Zionism insofar as Zionism is a murderous colonial regime.

        3. “Would anybody be surprised?” The point is that Netanahyu, ridiculously, is doing more to encourage ludicrous beliefs about Jews precisely by so equating “Jewishness” with the murder of children. Hence the question. “The most ridiculously false and destructive stereotypes of Jews are being encouraged NOT by antisemites–even those crazies couldn’t dream this up–but by Netanahyu himself.” That’s the meaning.

        4. What you call the ‘classic’ is in fact just as or more evidently trading in irony as the other examples. There’s a reason why “‘anti-semitism'” is in scare quotes. What Zionists do, Salaita claims, is respond to attacks on Zionism with accusations of antisemitism, thereby creating a faux ‘antisemitism’ which is used to silence those who dare criticize Israel. This faux ‘antisemitism’ is noble–since it is not antisemitism at all, but antiZionism–even as antisemitism itself is something horrible.

        Your reading of 1 is immaterial, and your readings of 2-4 are not remotely plausible. I mean, the irony isn’t too difficult to pick up. It’s not like Salaita is Jonathan Swift or somebody. I suppose that if you really are unable to read the irony in the tweets I don’t know what to say. My suspicion, though, is that you’re choosing not to read the irony there, because you’re committed to the very position that Salaita is meaning to critique. Lulz.

  5. Patrick Sudlow September 3, 2014 at 7:19 pm | #

    Reblogged this on patricktsudlow and commented:
    The systemic anti-Semitism and racism, that corrupts modern academia, in the USA. Money should count for nothing, what corporate and ethical considerations has this university in place, if any? Would they quite happily take money of the likes of Hitler or Stalin, which, what they are doing equates to?

  6. GerardO September 4, 2014 at 3:08 am | #

    I note the exaggerated sense of entitlement from the pro-Israel crowd — American academia is full of ultra-right wing Jews (and many more Christian Zionists) yet Arab, Muslim and anti-Zionist students are expected to cop this on the chin. And why do the “feelings” of Jewish students (most of whom are in the university system under false pretences) trump the idea of freedom of speech?

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