Pro-Hamas group sues school for canceling Israel-bashing event on anniversary of Oct. 7 massacre
The SJP planned to host an event on Oct. 7 blaming the Jewish state for committing ‘genocide.’
The university president wrote that the Oct. 7 anniversary represents ‘horrific suffering,’ and that the school decided ‘to host only university-sponsored events that promote reflection on this day.’
A pro-Hamas group at the University of Maryland sued the university after the school canceled an anti-Israel event scheduled for Oct. 7, one year after Hamas’s terrorist massacre of innocent Israelis.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations announced the lawsuit on Sept. 17 during a press conference. The group filed the lawsuit on behalf of the controversial student activist group Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), which was planning to host a “vigil” to condemn Israel’s campaign against Hamas terrorists as a “genocide.”
The lawsuit also refers to Israel’s counterattack against Hamas as a “genocide,” and asserts that “[t]he First Amendment does not allow campus officials to establish free-expression-black-out days, even on occasions that may be emotional or politically polarizing.”
[RELATED: PHOTOS: Students hold ‘vigils’ for Palestinian ‘martyrs’ as they demand universities cut ties with Israel]
The University made its decision to cancel the event on Sept. 1. UMD President Darryll Pines sent a letter to the community explaining his reasoning.
Pines wrote that Oct. 7 represents “horrific suffering,” and said that, “out of an abundance of caution, we concluded to host only university-sponsored events that promote reflection on this day.”
The upcoming anniversary of Hamas’s atrocity will feature several other controversial events.
The National SJP is also organizing a “Week of Rage” across American campuses that will start this Oct. 7. “For over 11 months now, the Zionist entity, with the backing of the U.S. and our universities, has committed a horrific assault on the nearly 2 million Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip,” the group wrote.
Wake Forest University in North Carolina is planning to host a controversial professor, Rabab Abdulhadi, on Oct. 7, for an event titled “One Year since al-Aqsa Flood: Reflections on a Year of Genocide and Resistance.” Abdulhadi has repeatedly condemned the Jewish state and wrote on the day after the Oct. 7 massacre that Hamas terrorists were “merely defending themselves.”
When asked for comment, the University referred Campus Reform to President Pines’s letter.
Campus Reform has reached out to the University of Maryland’s Hillel group for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
