Alaa Abuadas

Overview

Alaa Abuadas was an Executive Producer of an online series promoting the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement in 2016. She also led a BDS divestment initiative on the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) campus in 2014.

Abuadas was the 2014-2015 programming director for Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) at UCLA.

As of July 2021, Abuadas’s LinkedIn said that she was a “Freelancer in Film/TV.”

Abuadas’s LinkedIn also said that she graduated from UCLA in 2015 with a bachelor’s degree in “Communication Studies, Arts, Entertainment, and Media Management.” She also received an associate’s degree and Film Certificate in Arts, Entertainment, and Media Management from Orange Coast College (OCC) in 2013.

Abuadas indicated on LinkedIn that she was located in Placentia, California (CA).

Producing a Pro-BDS TV Show

From 2015-2016, Abuadas was an Executive Producer of a web-based comedy series “Activist,” which told a story of a student who “starts a campaign to force her college to divest from Israel.” The production team was reportedly composed of BDS activists and Open Hillel members.

Open Hillel is an organization that aims to “eliminate” Hillel International’s Standards of Partnership for Israel Activities, which ban partnerships between Hillel affiliates and groups that deny Israel’s right to exist, delegitimize the Jewish state or support the BDS movement.

Hillel International is a Jewish campus organization serving college students at 850 universities worldwide.

In a June 16, 2016 interview with anti-Israel news site Mondoweiss, Abuadas reportedly stated: “This show is about humorously and honestly depicting experiences like the ones we had when we were doing organizing on campus.”

In the first episode, the main character accuses [00:01:23] her mother who is also the Dean of her college, of being “on the take” after noticing [00:01:17] a folder labelled AIPAC [American Israel Public Affairs Committee] in her mother’s purse.

The stated mission of AIPAC is to “strengthen, protect and promote the U.S.-Israel relationship in ways that enhance the security of the United States and Israel.”

The main character also distributed [00:05:07] flyers to raise [00:05:05] awareness about “Israel’s human rights abuses against Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.”

In the June 2016 Mondoweiss article, Joshua Wolfsun, the creator and executive producer of the show, reportedly stated that the folder represented that “administrators get pressured by Pro-Israel lobbyists to silence students.”

Leading a BDS Divestment Resolution at UCLA

In November 2014, Abuadas led SJP at UCLA’s divestment resolution “calling on the Regents to divest from companies that enable and profit from violations of Palestinian rights.”

The resolution claimed that Caterpillar, Cemex, Cement Roadstone Holdings (CRH), General Electric (GE) and Hewlett-Packard (HP) “provided weapons used” by Israel “in attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip” and that investment in these companies “shows implicit support” for “the killings of civilians.”

On November 18, 2014, the undergraduate student government adopted the divestment resolution with a vote of 8-2-2.

Anti-Israel Activism

As of June 14, 2015, Abuadas was listed as a signatory to a petition calling to “Say No to Faithwashing: Boycott Muslim Leadership Initiative [MLI]” petition that called “on the Muslim community in North America to eschew any and all participation, facilitation, or any form of legitimization for the Muslim Leadership Initiative.”

MLI "invites North American Muslim leaders to explore how Jews understand Judaism, Israel and North American Jewish identity through a Zionist lens," and to expand their understanding of Jewish “ethics, faith, and practice.” According to MLI founder Imam Abdullah Antepli, “MLI aims to put mainstream North American Jewry in conversation with their Muslim counterparts.”

The petition said: “We reject the notion that this program is an interfaith one and that there is the need for Muslim Americans to engage with the state of Israel or institutions complicit in its war crimes.”

The petition concluded: “We pledge to engage with Palestinians in our communities and support delegations to Palestine that are meant to highlight the reality on the ground of occupation, apartheid, and ethnic cleansing.”

The petition then recommended participating instead in anti-Israel organizations such as Interfaith Peace-Builders (IFPB), as well as International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN) and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP).

IFPB

IFPB, known as Eyewitness Palestine since 2018, is an anti-Israel NGO that organizes activist delegations to Israel and the West Bank in order to showcase “the everyday violence of war and [Israeli] occupation.” IFPB’s program features lectures by representatives of anti-Israel groups that openly call for the end of Israel, including the designated terrorist organization the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestinian (PFLP).

IFPB has been known as Eyewitness Palestine since 2018.

SJP at UCLA - Support for Terrorists 2015

On October 14, 2015, during the “Knife Intifada,” SJP at UCLA held a demonstration and “die-in” in solidarity with Palestinians, one day after Palestinian terrorists killed three Israelis and wounded more than 20.

October 2015 saw a wave of stabbings, known as the “Knife Intifada,” where young Palestinians throughout Israel were stabbing and attempting to stab Israeli civilians. The upsurge in violence across Israel was incited by Palestinian political and religious leaders. The attacks were sparked and fueled by Palestinian leaders propagating the libel that Israel intended to desecrate the Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.

On October 29, 2015, SJP at UCLA posted on their website a submission published six days prior in the Daily Bruin, titled: “Palestinians are dying too.”

The submission, written by anti-Israel activist at UCLA, Shawndeez Davari Jadalizadeh,

accused the Daily Bruin of taking part in an attempt “to erase Palestinian life” by failing to mention the names of Palestinians also killed during the “Knife Intifada.”

The submission then listed a number of terrorists who were killed, either during or following their attempts to murder Israelis. The list included: Mohannad Halabi, whomurdered two Israelis and injured two others, Fadi Alloun, who stabbed a 15-year-old Israeli boy and Hassan Khalid Manasra, who was shot while he and his cousin were engaged in a stabbing spree, critically wounding a 13 year-old Israeli boy and moderately wounding a 25 year-old man.

Other terrorists listed were Amjad Hatem al-Jundi, who stabbed an Israeli soldier and then took the soldier’s rifle and ran to a nearby apartment building where he tried to shoot and stab a local woman in her home and Bassem Bassam Sidr, who attempted to stab Israeli police officers.

The submission also listed Fadel al-Qawasmi, who was shot after attempting to staband a civilian and an Israeli policeman. and Mohamed Nathmie Shamassnah, who was shot after he boarded a passenger bus, stabbed a 19-year-old Israeli soldier and unsuccessfully tried to grab his gun.

SJP at UCLA - Anti-Semitic Incident 2015

In February 2015, four SJP at UCLA activists, who were also Undergraduate Students Association (USA) senators were involved in a widely publicized anti-Semitic incident.

Sofia Moreno Haq, Negeen Sadeghi-Movahed, Manjot Singh and Fabienne Roth were responsible for initially preventing Rachel Beyda from joining the Undergraduate Students Association Council (USAC) Judicial Board, because she belonged to Jewish organizations.

Ultimately, Beyda’s position on the Judicial Board was confirmed at a re-vote and the four objecting senators submitted a formal apology to Beyda and the Jewish community.

SJP at UCLA - Intimidating Students 2014-2016

In 2016, SJP at UCLA reportedly harassed and intimidated Milan Chaterjee, the former president of UCLA’s Graduate Student Association (GSA), to such an extent that he stepped down from his student government position and left UCLA altogether.

In November 2015, Chaterjee attempted to block an effort by SJP at UCLA to use school funds to promote the BDS movement during a diversity caucus Town Hall event, in accordance with a policy requiring viewpoint neutrality.

Chaterjee said that, as a result, he was “relentlessly attacked, bullied, and harassed by BDS-affiliated organizations and students” for months.

In April 2014, SJP at UCLA members submitted a petition to the UCLA Undergraduate Students Association Council (USAC) Judicial Board against two former USAC members who participated in trips to Israel that were sponsored by pro-Israel Jewish organizations.

SJP at UCLA alleged that the council members committed: “conflict of interest violations” by participating in the sponsored trips and should have abstained from voting on a February 2014 BDS resolution. SJP at UCLA also argued the council members’ votes on the divestment resolution should have been disqualified.

Although the ballot on the divestment resolution was secret, it was assumed that the two council members voted against the resolution because they both spoke against the resolution during discussions prior to the vote.

The USAC Judicial Board later ruled that the trips taken by the council members did not constitute a conflict of interest.

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.