Alia Alaraj

Overview

Alia Alaraj [Alia Haneen Alaraj] has whitewashed terrorists and demonized Israel. Alaraj was a 2016 board member of Students For Justice in Palestine (SJP) at the University of Illinois (UIC).

As of March 2021, Alaraj’s LinkedIn said that she was a “Public Health Administrator II” at the Chicago Department of Public Health since October 2020 and a Healthcare Assistant Manager with Southwest Physicians & Associates since January 2020.

Alaraj’s LinkedIn also said that she received a master’s of public administration in “International Public Health/Policy” from UIC in 2019 and a bachelor’s degree in Public Health and International Relations and Affairs from UIC 2018.

As of March 2021, Alaraj went by the handle “captain3aloosh” on Twitter.

Whitewashing Terrorists

Alaraj retweeted a March 21, 2021 tweet that said: “‘Fatmeh [my wife] means the world to me. She is [my] home. She was able to give our children[unconditionally] for 20 years. This is the greatness of the Palestinian woman’- Majd Barbar, Palestinian prisoner freed today after 20 years in Israeli prisons.”

Majd Barbar was sentenced to “20 years in jail on charges of affiliation” with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and for “his role in armed resistance” in 2001. Barbar reportedly formed “an armed resistance group” in Jerusalem, during the Second Intifada.

The PFLP — designated a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada, Israel, the European Union, the Gulf Cooperation Council and Australia — pioneered aircraft hijackings to draw attention to their movement’s demands, most notably with the capture of an Air France plane in 1976.

The hijackers flew the plane to Entebbe, Uganda, where they separated nearly 100 Jewish passengers from the others and threatened to execute one Jew per hour. Israel, however, launched a successful commando raid to rescue the hostages.

The PFLP also claimed “credit” for the November 18, 2014 Har Nof Synagogue massacre — where PFLP operatives murdered six people with a gun, axes and a butcher knife during morning prayers. PFLP Gaza leader Hani Thawbta stated: “We declare full responsibility of the PFLP for the execution of this heroic operation..."

Alaraj retweeted a November 10, 2020 tweet that said: “A Palestinian cancer patient who contracted COVID19 this past July has passed away in Israeli prisons. He has been detained by Israel since 2003. Israel won't be held accountable. Kamal Abu Waar. Free all political prisoners.”

Kamal Abu Waer (Kamal Abu Waar) was serving multiple life sentences for carrying out multiple mass shootings and bombing attacks against Israeli civilians during the second intifada, killing four Israelis and wounding nine.

Abu Waer reportedly contracted and recovered from the coronavirus in July 2020 and later died from cancer while receiving medical care at Asaf Harofeh Medical Center in Israel.

Alaraj retweeted a June 1, 2019 tweet that said: “Syrian-Palestinian film The Knife(1971), based on Palestinian revolutionary Ghassan Kanafani‘s novella All That’s Left To You; an allegorical story of Palestinian attachment to land and family, and the sorrow over their loss.”

Kanafani was a leading member and spokesperson for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) during the terrorist organization’s early years. Kanafani announced the PFLP’s responsibility for the Lod Airport Massacre of May 1972 and was linked to the airport attackers. The attack killed 26 people and wounded 80 others.

Demonizing Israel

Alaraj retweeted a February 22, 2021 thread hat said: “Re: #SNL's 10-second ‘joke’ on #Israel's vaccinations. There is no way that anyone with a cursory understanding of the situation could honestly argue that any entity has more power over the lives of occupied Palestinians than Israel. #Palestine is NOT a sovereign state. ⅕”

Another tweet in the thread claimed: “Che, a comedian, might have presented this in a crass, simple way, devoid of nuance. Sure. But the underlying fact remains; Israel could, & was legally obligated to, do more to vaccinate Palestinians, & they consistently deflected; every time they did, they had to be pushed. ⅗”

The tweet Alaraj retweeted referred to a comment by comedian Michael Che on Saturday Night Live (SNL), suggesting that Israel only vaccinated the “Jewish half” of its population against coronavirus.’

Under the Oslo Accords [p. 5], the Palestinian Authority (PA) is responsible for providing health services to Palestinians under its jurisdiction. In December 2020, PA officials reportedly contacted Israel’s Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) department to request the vaccine, which Israel agreed to provide.

Alaraj retweeted a January 25, 2020 tweet that claimed: “Yesterday violent illegal Israeli settlers kidnapped this little Palestinian boy. They threw him in a lake in occupied Jerusalem. Today his little body was found. He is just 7 years old. His name is Qusai. RIP little one

#FreePalestine from #ApartheidIsrael.”

In January 2020, Qais Abd Abu Ramileh, an eight year old Arab boy, reportedly fell into a rain-filled pit near his home in Beit Hanina and drowned. The boy’s family initially claimed that he had been kidnapped but later retracted.

Alaraj retweeted a November 3, 2019 tweet that said: “Israeli soldiers shooting #Palestinians to entertain themselves & liberal institutions in the US threatening to condition aid if #Israel makes its de facto annexation of the West Bank de jure. Why? The political game obscures and prolongs this violence. #EndAidToIsraelNow #BDS.”

SJP UIC Pushing BDS

In January 2016, SJP UIC launched UIC Divest, a campaign calling for UIC “to divest from companies that support the illegal occupation of Palestine such as G4S, Caterpillar, Hewlett Packard and Boeing.

In February 2016, SJP UIC united with 23 other student groups to co-sponsor a BDS resolution that proposed “divestment from companies profiting from human rights abuses and violations of international law in Palestine.”

The resolution’s wording was later modified due to efforts to blunt its original anti-Israel focus and called on UIC to divest from “companies actively engaged in human rights violations in Palestine, Syria, China, United States, US-Mexican border, and Chicago.”

On February 15, 2016, the modified resolution passed unanimously.

Later that day, SJP UIC’s press release stated: “While tonight’s divestment vote is an important step in the divestment movement, we recognize that this is just the beginning. We are committed to working towards urging the university to divest wholly from the Israeli occupation....”

In April 2016, SJP UIC celebrated on Facebook the resolution’s passing and suggested it called on “the university to remove all their investments in companies complicit in human rights violations of the Palestinian people and the occupation and colonization of Palestine!”

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.