Linda Ereikat

Overview

Linda Ereikat attempted to shut down a campus talk by an Israeli dignitary and expressed support for terrorists. Ereikat has also expressed support for pro-terror academic partnerships at San Francisco State University (SFSU). 

Ereikat was a leader with the anti-Israel student group General Union of Palestine Students (GUPS) at SFSU (GUPS SFSU) in 2016. GUPS is an affiliate of the national campus group Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP).

Ereikat has engaged [slide 1] in anti-Israel activism with multiple organizations, including the Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC), and is a supporter [p. 7] of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement. 

As of November 2022, Ereikat’s LinkedIn page said she had been working as an “Innovation Grants Analyst” at the California Interagency Council on Homelessness since August 2022. The council is under the protection of the State of California’s Business, Consumer Services and Housing Agency (BCSH).

Prior to that, Ereikat’s LinkedIn said she worked for BCSH as an Executive Fellow. Among other tasks, Ereikat “Supported management of cross-departmental working groups focused on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and Tribal Affairs.” 

Ereikat’s LinkedIn also said she had worked as an Administrative Coordinator at AROC from April 2017 to June 2018, and as a Case Manager at AROC from June 2018 to October 2021. 

Ereikat’s LinkedIn said she graduated from SFSU with a bachelor’s degree in International Relations and Affairs in 2018. She graduated with a master’s degree in Migration Studies from the University of San Francisco (USF) in 2020. She also received a graduate certificate in Applied Policy and Government from California State University-Sacramento (CSUS) in 2022.

As of November 2022, Ereikat’s LinkedIn said she lived in the “San Diego Metropolitan Area.”

Also as of November 2022, Ereikat used the handle “@lindapalestina” on Instagram.

Attempting to Shut Down a Campus Event

On April 6, 2016, Ereikat and other GUPS activists led anti-Israel chants to disrupt a talk at SFSU given by then-Mayor of Jerusalem, Nir Barkat. Barkat’s talk was sponsored by the SFSU Hillel chapter. The protesters forced Barkat to move from the podium and sit with audience members in an attempt to allow them to hear his talk.

Ereikat led [00:00:01] the group in chanting: “Get the f**k off our campus!” and [00:00:02]: “Intifada, Intifada!” 

Since the early 2000s, the term “intifada,” which translates from Arabic as “uprising” or “insurrection,” has carried the connotation of violence.  

Ereikat continued [00:00:09] with the chants: “If we don’t get no justice, then you don’t get no peace!” and [00:00:10]: “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be Free!” 

“From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free” is a chant calling to dismantle the State of Israel. It has also been employed by Hamas leader Khaled Mashal to call for the replacement of Israel with an Islamic state.

Supporting Terrorists (PFLP, Knife Intifada)

On August 18, 2017, Ereikat appeared in an AROC Facebook group photo next to a mural featuring convicted Palestinian terrorist Rasmea Odeh. The post said: “AROC's AYO-Arab Youth Organization honoring Rasmeah today…! ."  

Odeh was a key military operative with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terrorist organization. In 1969, she masterminded a PFLP supermarket bombing that killed two college students. She also attempted to bomb the British consulate in Jerusalem. Odeh later moved to the United States but was deported to Jordan in 2017 for immigration fraud.

In October 2015, during the “Knife Intifada,” Ereikat organized an October 15, 2015 GUPS rally along with GUPS leaders Mohammad G. Hammad and Lubna Morrar. The rally was titled: “CALL TO ACTION: EMERGENCY PROTEST FOR PALESTINE!”

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. The attacks were incited by Palestinian leaders propagating the libel that Israel intended to desecrate the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.

On the website for the event that Ereikat organized, GUPS claimed that “hundreds of Zionist settlers have stormed into Al-Aqsa,” and that Palestinians were “rising against the oppressive Zionist regime and defending Jerusalem.” They urged supporters to “stand united in front of the face of settler colonialism and echo the rage of our Palestinian people!”

Supporting Pro-Terror Academic Partnerships

In 2016, Ereikat signed a letter whose purpose was to “extend unconditional solidarity” to anti-Israel professor Rabab Abdulhadi regarding an allegedly “coordinated attack” by “external Zionist organizations” against Abdulhadi and other Palestinian organizations concerning their “scholarship and social justice work.”

The letter emphasized the need to keep SFSU ties with An-Najah National University (An-Najah) in Nablus by claiming “this academic partnership provides a great opportunity for US and Palestinian universities to build collaborative research and pedagogy on issues concerning Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian communities.”

The Hamas student association at An-Najah, known as The Islamic Bloc, has held various exhibits and events glorifying terrorists and inciting terrorism against Jews. An-Najah is notorious for its exhibit lauding the August 2001 Sbarro cafe suicide bombing, which killed 15 civilians and wounded 130. The exhibit featured bloody plastic body parts suspended from the ceiling, as though blasting through the air.

In December 2021, Israeli security forces uncovered terrorist infrastructure at An-Najah, arresting 11 student activists involved in Hamas operations “under the supervision and direction of senior Hamas officials.”

In 2014, Abdulhadi organized and led an SFSU-funded “academic and labor delegation to Palestine,” which met with terrorist leader Leila Khaled and convicted Hamas funder Sheikh Raed Salah. Abdulhadi also invited students to join the trip, which she called a “political solidarity tour.” 

Abdulhadi was later accused of “taking a publicly-financed trip to Palestinian territories in order to meet with notorious members of U.S.-, E.U-, U.K., and Canadian-designated foreign terrorist organizations.” 

Following the delegation’s visit, a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was reached between An-Najah and SFSU that would enable a student exchange program between the two universities. 

In 2017, a lawsuit was filed against Abdulhadi for, among other claims, spearheading the collaboration with An-Najah, a “known recruitment facility for Hamas.” The lawsuit said: “students indoctrinated to hate Jews would be sent to San Francisco and SFSU students would travel to An-Najah where they would likely be radicalized in ways that could further endanger Jewish students on campus…” 

Anti-Israel Activism (GUPS, AROC and BDS)