Meet the California students and profs who say Hamas are 'freedom fighters,' not 'terrorists'

'We join a growing international chorus of voices holding the Zionist Israeli government accountable for the violence that we have witnessed over the last several days.'

Students, academic workers, alumni, and staff affiliated with Ethnic and Gender Studies programs from several campuses within the University of California system (including UCLA, UC Berkeley, UC San Diego, and UC Irvine) recently signed a letter condemning the university system for not standing with Palestine and blaming Israel for the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attacks on Israel

“As we witness the atrocities taking place in occupied Palestine, many of which have been ongoing for the last 75 years, we have watched as our campus leadership continues to ignore and/or disparage the struggle of Palestinian people for liberation and against their annihilation,” the letter reads. “We condemn in the strongest possible terms the UC’s failure to create a safe environment for Palestinian students and their supporters.” 

[RELATED: Vanderbilt ‘wokescientist’ defends ‘any means necessary’ from Hamas]

The letter then pivots to discuss the state of Israel directly—blaming it and holding it entirely responsible for the unfolding of violence that began with the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attacks against Israel itself. 

“More specifically, we join a growing international chorus of voices holding the Zionist Israeli government accountable for the violence that we have witnessed over the last several days,” it states. 

The joint letter, signed by over 50 students, faculty members, student organizations, and alumni, takes aim at slaughtered Israeli civilians.

[RELATED: MARSCHALL: Nazis forbade my Jewish grandfather from journalism. Now this prof wants to kill me for being a Jewish journalist]

“We strongly condemn the University of California’s attempt to reproduce Western media’s narrative of ongoing violence in Palestine,” it says. It continues to state that this “includes the victimization of Israeli women and children to manufacture consent for intervention and further violence against Palestinians.”

”We urge the community to practice critical media literacy when consuming mainstream media stories of violence against women and children committed by Palestinian resistors which serve to frame Palestinian freedom fighters as evil, monstrous ‘terrorists,’” it continues. 

”These justifications are ahistorical and erase the violence that racialized women and children face daily under occupation. Similarly, to globally label Palestinian rebels as rapists marginalizes a real, ongoing pattern of gendered violence against Palestinian women by Israeli Defense Forces as part of its ongoing occupation for the past 75 years. Are Palestinian women and girls not worthy of empathy, too?”

Campus Reform identified 30 professors, graduate students, PhD candidates, and student researchers who have signed their names to the letter. They are as follows:


University of California, Santa Barbara

William I. Robinson: UCSB Distinguished Professor of Sociology 


wirobins@soc.ucsb.edu
(805) 893-5607 


Bri Reddick: UCSB Graduate Student 


bri@umail.ucsb.edu


Kimberly Soriano: UCSB Graduate Student 


ksoriano@umail.ucsb.edu 


Kristian E. Vasquez: UCSB Graduate Student


kevasquez@ucsb.edu 


Alex Mireles: UCSB Doctoral Student

mmireles@ucsb.edu 


Milla Wu: UCSB Undergraduate Advisor 

millawu@ucsb.edu
(805) 893-7624 


Cristina Awadalla: UCSB Graduate Student 


cawadalla@ucsb.edu 


Maile Young: UCSB Graduate Student 


maileyoung@ucsb.edu 


Paul Kim: UCSB Graduate Student


paulkim@ucsb.edu 


Zach McLane: UCSB Graduate Student 


zmclane@ucsb.edu 


Emma Schuster: UCSB Graduate Student


eschuster@umail.ucsb.edu 


University of California, Los Angeles 


Maga Miranda: UCLA PhD Candidate


magalintzin@ucla.edu 


Jorge Cruz: UCLA Graduate Student

jcruz92@ucla.edu 


Sophia Sambrano: UCLA Graduate Student


sophsamb@ucla.edu 


Dylan Kupsh: UCLA Graduate Student 


dkupsh@cs.ucla.edu
(925) 788-1865 


Maritza Geronimo: UCLA Graduate Student 


mgeronimo1@ucla.edu 


University of California, San Diego 


Radhika Marwaha: UCSD Graduate Student  
rmarwaha@ucsd.edu 


Muhammad Yousuf: UCSD Graduate Student


syousuf@ucsd.edu 


Liliana Sampedro: UCSD Graduate Student 

lsampedr@ucsd.edu 


Josh Bender: UCSD Graduate Student

j2bender@ucsd.edu 


University of California, Riverside 


Sneha George: UCR PhD Student 

snehaelizabethh@gmail.com 


University of California, Berkeley 


Isabella Garcia: UCB Graduate Student

isabellagarcia@berkeley.edu 


Larissa Nez: UCB Graduate Student 


larissa_nez@berkeley.edu 


AJ Kurdi: UCB Graduate Student

kurdi_aj@berkeley.edu 


University of California, Irvine 

Rosie Sanchez: UCI Graduate Student


rosies@uci.edu 


Annie McClanahan: Associate Professor, English School of Humanities at UCI 


annie.mcc@uci.edu 


University of California, Santa Cruz 


Rosa Navarro: UCSC PhD Student 


rmnavarr@ucsc.edu 


Anjie Sijun Lou: UCSC PhD Student

anslou@ucsc.edu
(425) 286-5269 


University of California, Davis 


Willa Smart: UCD Graduate Student

wsmart@ucdavis.edu 


Sam Fuller: UCD Graduate Student Researcher


sjfuller@ucdavis.edu