Abberley Sorg
Overview
Sorg is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement and attended the 2012 American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) conference in Chicago.
As of November 2017, Sorg’s Facebook said she studied at Bowling Green State University (BGSU), UT and Owens Community College (Owens).
In May 2013, Sorg posted on Facebook that she was accepted into a sociology master's program. In September 2013, she posted on Facebook that she was in graduate school.
As of August 2019, Sorg said in a January 23, 2018 post on Facebook that she was a “PhD student in the Sociology department at Wayne State University (WSU)”.
Also as of August 2019, Sorg was listed as a member of the “faculty and staff” in the Department of Sociology in the College of Liberal Arts at WSU. She was also listed there as a graduate teaching assistant for the Fall 2018 term.
As of the same date, Sorg was listed as an instructor for a Spring 2019 online course in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at UT.
Denying Anti-Semitism
On November 22, 2013, Sorg signed and shared a Change.org petition on Facebook written by the General Union of Palestine Students (GUPS) at San Francisco State University (SFSU).GUPS sent the petition to SFSU President Leslie Wong after the group was accused of anti-Semitism. GUPS called upon President Wong to “(c)ondemn this smear campaign.”
On November 18, 2013, the AMCHA Initiative, an organization that monitors anti-Semitism on college campuses, sent a letter to President Wong accusing GUPS of hosting an anti-Semitic event that glorified terrorist violence.
On November 14, 2013, GUPS celebrated a Palestinian mural on SFSU’s campus by setting up an art station for students to create their own placards. The art station included a stencil that said “MY HEROES HAVE ALWAYS KILLED COLONIZERS,” as well as a stencil featuring the outline of Leila Khaled.
Leila Khaled is a leading member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and participated in the hijacking of TWA Flight 840 in 1969 and El Al Flight 219 in 1970. As of 2017, Khaled was a member of PFLP's Political Bureau. Khaled has said that the second intifada failed because it was not violent enough, advocated [00:36:07] for the use of children in terror activities and compared Zionists to Nazis.
On November 19, 2013 SFSU President Les Wong released a statement condemning the GUPS mural event as a “glorification of violence.”
Demonizing Israel
On February 22, 2013, Sorg posted an article to Facebook promoting BDS and likening Israel to the Jim Crow South. The article was published by the anti-Israel Electronic Intifada website.In the comment section of her post, Sorg accused Zionists of having “a disproportional influence on the culture” of academic tenure boards.
She also claimed that “Israel kills literally dozens of Arabs for every Jew killed by Arabs,” and that “ Israel was the original aggressor who stole and continues to steal the Palestinians' land and property.”
UT SJP - Defending Terrorism
On October 29, 2015, during the Knife intifada in Israel, UT SJP held an anti-Israel demonstration at the university's student union using propaganda posters depicting Palestinian terrorists as victims.In October 2015, there was an upsurge in violence across Israel incited by Palestinian political and religious leaders. The wave of stabbings, known as the “Knife Intifada,” was characterized by young Palestinians throughout the country stabbing and attempting to stab Israeli civilians.
One of UT SJP posters read: “Israeli forces have killed 25 Palestinians this month. 8 of them children.” The poster then listed the “children” which included Ahmed Manasra, Marah Bakris [Marah Al-Bakri] and Israa [Asraa Zidan Tawfik Abed] Abed.
In September of 2013, UT SJP held a mock checkpoint event to demonize Israel, where SJP member Katrina Bacome was photographed spray painting “Long Live the Intifada” on the mock “apartheid” wall.
Since the early 2000s, the term “intifada,” which translates from Arabic as “uprising” or “insurrection,” has carried the connotation of violence.
UT SJP - Demonizing Israel and Israelis
On August 4, 2014 UT SJP posted to their Facebook page a graphic denying that Hamas used human shields and claiming that Israel deliberately targeted Palestinian civilians.Israel commenced Operation Protective Edge (OPE) in July 2014, to stop rocket fire targeting Israeli civilians and to destroy Hamas attack tunnels.
Armoush also interviewed Bacome, who claimed [00:01:10] that Israel is committing a “slaughter of innocent Palestinians” and referred to Gaza as “the world’s largest open-air prison.”
On March 18, 2014 — during UT SJP’s Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) — UT SJP performed a play which demonized [00:08:12] Israeli soldiers as irrational, [00:05:20] cruel and [00:10:24, 00:36:21] violent.
One character in the play labelled [00:39.34] Israel a “brutal racist system” while another character claimed [00:37:13] that Israel locks Palestinian children in cages outdoors.
UT SJP - Hosting Hamas Supporters
On October 3, 2016, UT SJP hosted Hamas propagandist Mads Gilbert.Gilbert has been banned indefinitely from entering Gaza through Israel because of his connections to the Hamas leadership.
In 2008, 2009, 2012 and 2014 Gilbert was stationed at a hospital that served as a Hamas command center and rocket launching site. During that time he acted as a propagandist for the Hamas government in Gaza.
In 2001, following al Qaeda's September 11 terrorist attacks, Gilbert expressed support for the terror acts as a “legitimate response.” In December of 2009, Gilbert was accused of faking resuscitation on a dead child in Gaza for dramatic effect for a CNN video.
On April 19, 2014, UT SJP co-hosted a “Gaza Fundraising Dinner.” Speaking at the event was Osama Abu Irshaid, the national policy director of the American Muslims for Palestine (AMP). Abu Irshaid formerly served as editor of Islamic Association for Palestine's Arabic periodical, Al-Zaitounah — a mouthpiece for pro-Hamas propaganda.
UT SJP - UT Divest
In 2015, UT SJP launched and ran a divestment campaign under the slogan “UT Divest,” as part [01:34:54]of the wider Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) movement.On February 17, 2015, the UT Student Government (SG) held a closed meeting on the Divestment resolution. The Students Judicial Council ruled [00:02:03] that the resolution was unconstitutional because it would be impossible for student senators to remain neutral.
UT SJP - Supporting Rasmea Odeh
On September 20, 2017, UT SJP shared a photo of Rasmea Odeh to their Facebook page, adding: “We stand with Rasmea!”Odeh was a key military operative [00:02:08]with the terrorist group the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). In 1969, Odeh masterminded a PFLP bombing that killed two college students in a Jerusalem supermarket. Odeh also attempted to bomb the British consulate.
Odeh confessed, in a highly detailed account, the day following her arrest. In a 2004 documentary, one of Odeh’s co-conspirators directly implicated [00:10:53] Odeh as the mastermind.
In 1970, an Israeli court tried and convicted Odeh for her involvement in both bombings and sentenced her to life imprisonment. However, Odeh was released 10 years later, in a prisoner swap and emigrated to the United States.
On November 10, 2014, a Michigan federal jury convicted Odeh for immigration fraud because she failed to disclose her prior conviction and life sentence on her immigration application. On March 12, 2015, she was sentenced to 18 months in prison.
In 2017, after an appeal and a lengthy court battle, Odeh admitted to immigration fraud, was stripped of her U.S. citizenship, deported to Jordan and banned from re-entering the U.S.
SJP
SJP is a student organization engaged in anti-Israel activity on North American college and university campuses.
The first chapter of SJP was founded in 2001 at the University of California at Berkeley by Professor Hatem Bazian. Bazian has spread classic anti-Semitism, reportedly promoted religious anti-Semitism and defended the Hamas terror group. In 2004, Bazian called for “intifada” in America.
SJP organizes anti-Israel campaigns, including running annual Israel Apartheid Weeks, often in collaboration with Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and Muslim Students Association (MSA) campus chapters.
SJP has been a major force in pushing the anti-Semitic Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement on campuses. Chapters have initiated dozens of BDS resolutions in student governments, which have been proposed on or around Jewish holidays, a time when many Jewish students are off-campus.
SJP activists have reportedly physically assaulted, intimidated and harassed Jewish students, disrupted pro-Israel campus events and demonized pro-Israel campus organizations.
Chapters have often endorsed and campaigned for numerous terrorists and whitewashed terrorism.
BDS
The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement was founded by Omar Barghouti in 2005 to challenge “international support for Israeli apartheid and settler-colonialism.” BDS is an allegedly “Palestinian-led movement,” although leading BDS activists have admitted [00:01:01] this is not true.
One of the demands of BDS includes [point 3] what is generally known as the “right of return,” a demand discredited as a way to eliminate Israel. Barghouti said the “right of return” is a means to “end Israel’s existence as a Jewish state.”
Barghouti has said that BDS “aims to turn Israel into a pariah state, as South Africa once was.”
In his activism, Barghouti has also said [00:05:55] regarding Israel: “Definitely, most definitely, we oppose a Jewish state in any part of Palestine. No…rational Palestinian, not a sellout Palestinian, will ever accept a Jewish state in Palestine.”
The movement has been linked to numerous terrorist organizations and received a public endorsement from Hamas in 2017.
BDS initiatives include calling on institutions and individuals to divest from Israeli-affiliated companies, promoting academic and cultural boycotts of Israel, and organizing anti-Israel rallies, protests and campaigns.
The movement’s most notable achievement has been the infiltration of university campuses through lobbying for “BDS resolutions.” In these cases, student governments and student groups, backed by their own anti-Israel members and affiliates, have proposed resolutions on some form of boycott of, or divestment from, Israel and Israeli-affiliated entities.
Boycott resolutions, although non-binding, have been passed by student governments on numerous North American campuses.
BDS activity is often aggressive and disruptive. It has been noted that universities that pass BDS resolutions see a marked increase in anti-Semitic incidents on campus. On one campus, when the student government debated a BDS resolution, reports emerged of violent threats against those opposing it.
AMP
American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) was founded by UC Berkeley Professor Hatem Bazian as a vehicle to generate mainstream support in the United States for the Palestinian national cause.
On its website, the organization lists Bazian as the chairman of its national board and describes itself as “a national education and grassroots-based organization, dedicated to educating the American public about Palestine and its rich cultural, historical and religious heritage.”
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has accused AMP of promoting “extreme anti-Israel views and has at times provided a platform for anti-Semitism under the guise of educating Americans” about Palestinians. The ADL further stated that AMP is directly involved in campus-based anti-Israel activity through Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP).
Prior to founding the AMP in 2006, Dr. Bazian created SJP together with fellow UC Berkeley Professor Snehal Shingavi in 2001. The close working relationship between AMP and SJP has been documented several times over the years by several organizations, including NGO Monitor and StandWithUs.
In addition to providing financial, public relations and legal assistance to SJP, AMP has also been accused of having connections to Hamas. The AMP national board includes former members of both the Islamic Association of Palestine (IAP) and Holy Land Foundation (HLF), both of which were found liable for aiding and abetting Hamas. The IAP was founded by Mousa Mohammed Abu Marzook, a senior member of Hamas.
