Share:
Momodou Taal
Momodou Taal is a British graduate student who called for Israel's destruction, expressed support for Hamas terrorism, glorified a domestic terrorist and spread hatred of Israel and America.
Taal was suspended by Cornell University (Cornell) twice in 2024, the first time for leading anti-Israel encampment protests and the second time for disrupting a campus event.
Taal is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.
Taal's anti-Israel activism and social media posts occurred during Israel’s war against Hamas, called “Swords of Iron.” Israel launched the war after a series of Hamas terror attacks and war crimes against Israeli civilians, including mass murder, torture, rape, beheadings and kidnappings, which were executed on October 7, 2023. The terror attacks left approximately 1,200 Israelis dead, hundreds kidnapped and thousands wounded.
In late October 2023, Taal wrote on Instagram that he was active in a rally organized by the Cornell chapter of the pro-terror student group Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP). During the protest, Taal appeared [00:01:34] multiple times [00:02:06] on stage.
For more information on SJP Cornell's anti-Israel history, check Canary Mission's campaign “SJP Cornell: Hostility, Intimidation & Gaslighting.”
In October 2024, RT reported [00:00:18] that Taal was the leader of the anti-Israel student group The Coalition for Mutual Liberation (CML), which has organized multiple anti-Israel rallies and "die-ins for Palestine" on campus.
Also in October 2024, Inside Higher Ed reported that Taal was "banned from [Cornell's] campus and from teaching his course—What Is Blackness? Race and Processes of Racialization." However, in fall 2024, Cornell released a brochure with a list of courses that included Taal's class.
In February 2025, Democracy Now reported that Taal was a PhD student at Cornell. As of February 2025, Taal's X bio read: "PhDing: Political Economy, Race & Capitalism, Pan Africanism..."
Cornell is located in Ithaca, New York.
On October 18, 2023, Taal posted on Instagram: "From the river to the sea..." and added a video of himself speaking into a megaphone at an anti-Israel rally.
“From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be Free” is a chant used [00:02:47] to call for the elimination of 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. In April 2024, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a resolution condemning the chant as antisemitic.
At the same rally, Taal said [00:00:27]: "I condemn the ethno-fascist state that calls itself 'Israel.' I condemn the Zionist entity that calls itself 'Israel.' I condemn in no uncertain terms 'Zionism.'"
Taal then said [00:01:33]: "We stand for unequivocal liberation of Palestine from the river to the f**king sea!...Where do you stand on Palestine?...It is the oppressor and the oppressed! It is the colonizer and the colonized!"
Taal then ended [00:03:05] his speech by leading the chant: "And from the river to the sea..." The crowd responded: "Palestine will be free!"
On February 5, 2025, Taal posted on X: "This generation will bury Zion*sm here."
On Saturday, October 7, 2023, approximately 2,900 heavily armed Hamas terrorists breached Israel’s border with Gaza. They executed numerous war crimes on civilians, including mass murder, beheadings of children, rape of men and women, torture, kidnappings and mutilation.
Hamas broadcast videos of their butchery on social media, often to victims’ accounts for families to see. Israel retaliated with a war called “Swords of Iron.” As of November 10, 2023, approximately 1,200 Israelis, the vast majority of them civilians, were murdered during the attacks. Hamas kidnapped 242 Israelis, including at least 30 children. At least 3,500 people were wounded, many severely.
A terrorist detained by Israel admitted he raped an Israeli woman when he broke into a kibbutz house during the October 7, 2023 attack. In March 2024, a former hostage of Hamas publicly stated she was sexually abused and tortured while in captivity.
For more information on the October 7, 2023 terror attacks, see the Canary Mission page on Hamas.
On October 7, 2023, Taal posted on Instagram: "...a struggle for Palestinian liberation is also a struggle for Black liberation and for the liberation of all colonised peoples. Free Palestine..."
Also on October 7, 2023, Taal posted on X: "'decolonization is always a violent phenomenon' - Frantz Fanon."
On the same date, Taal wrote on X and later deleted his post: "Shame on every Muslim leader, Nation and scholar who backed normalisation with Isr*ael. The Palestinians know what is at stake and they continue to show the world that their revolution, far from being over, is ongoing. A free Palestine in our life time in sha Allah [God willing]. 
."
On November 10, 2023, Taal posted on X: "Glory to the resistance!" in response to another post that read: "The IDF [Israel Defense Forces] must be crushed. Period. / By that, I mean militarily. / May they never sleep."
Among Palestinians and anti-Israel activists, the term “resistance” is a euphemism for nationalistic terror and is used to glorify and encourage anti-Israel and anti-Semitic violence.
On January 19, 2025, Taal shared on Instagram a screenshot of his post on X that read: "...We will not forget the names of the martyrs, whose blood illuminates the path towards liberation...Glory to the martyrs. Long live the resistance. Free Palestine."
On March 2, 2024, Taal shared on Instagram a graphic glorifying convicted domestic terrorist Assata Shakur.
The graphic promoted a "historic mass emphasis teach-in" on "Palestine, Cuba, Assata + beyond" and featured a cartoon image of Shakur wearing a T-shirt with text that read: "ASSATA SHAKUR / REVOLUTIONARY."
Taal wrote in his post: "Honoured to be a part of putting this together. The types of solidarity and links we need to be making. See you Monday!"
Assata Shakur was convicted of killing a New Jersey state trooper and wounding another in 1973 while a member of the separatist Black Liberation Army (BLA). She escaped from prison in 1979 and fled to Cuba in 1984, where she resides today. She is listed on the FBI Most Wanted Terror List under her legal name, Joanne Deborah Chesimard.
On January 13, 2024, Taal wrote on X and later deleted his post: "Axis of Evil: Israel, USA and United Kingdom."
On January 26, 2025, Taal posted on X: "...US imperialism toward Latin America has to be our focal point of study, it reveals so much about how the empire operates..."
On February 26, 2024, Taal shared on Instagram a video, in which he spoke at a panel titled: "Kwame Ture's Anti-Zionism: The Meeting between Pan-Africanism and Palestine." The lecture was hosted by the Embassy of Nicaragua. One of the speakers was anti-Israel professor Mohamed Abdou.
On April 25, 2024, the first day of Cornell's anti-Israel encampment, Taal posted on Instagram: "A good morning from Cornell’s liberated zone. Now we defend it."
On April 27, 2024, Taal shared on Instagram an interview he gave to the anti-Israel news channel Al Jazeera, in which he confirmed [00:00:11] he had been suspended by Cornell for his involvement in the encampment.
During the interview, Taal said [00:00:24]: "In the early hours of Thursday, we set up an encampment which we called 'Liberated Zone.'"
On April 25, 2024, Cornell students set up a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” on the lawn of the university’s Art Quad. The encampment was organized by the group CML, which the Cornell Daily Sun described as “a pro-Palestine coalition of over 40 organizations.”
Encampment participants demanded [slide 4] that Cornell divest from companies and institutions linked with Israel and called [slide 5] for an “unconditional, permanent ceasefire in Gaza.”
Protesters also demanded [slide 6] the establishment of a Palestinian studies program with representatives from Cornell's SJP serving on the “committees that oversee the hiring of the program’s faculty.” They also demanded [slide 7] public acknowledgment and protection of “anti-Zionist speech, viewpoints, and histories in both religious and academic contexts.”
On April 25, 2024, a Cornell administrator met [00:00:15] with students and told them they didn’t have permission to set the encampment where it was. The Ithaca Voice reported that Cornell set up a deadline for protesters to dismantle the encampment by night facing the risk of arrest. Students reacted [00:00:36] by forming a human chain surrounding the encampment.
During the encampment, anti-Israel protesters chanted [00:00:01]: “Disclose! Divest! We will not stop! We will not rest!” Among the speakers [photo 4] at the encampment was anti-Israel professor Russell Rickford, who called the Hamas’ October 7, 2023 terror attack against Israel “exhilarating…energizing!”
On May 13, 2024, the Cornell encampment ended on the students’ initiative.
Close to 200 anti-Israel college encampments were set up in North America in the spring of 2024. The first took place at Columbia University. Protesters harassed Jewish students, blocked Jews from campus facilities, used anti-Semitic language in their activism, promoted BDS and protested Israel’s war against Hamas.
SJP is the leading 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, who has spread anti-Semitism and defended the Hamas terror group.
SJP organizes anti-Israel campus campaigns, including running annual Israel Apartheid Weeks and pushing the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement. SJP activists have reportedly physically assaulted, intimidated and harassed Jewish students, and SJP chapters have often endorsed and campaigned for terrorists.
The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement was founded by pro-terror activist Omar Barghouti in 2005 to turn “Israel into a pariah state, as South Africa once was.” Barghouti has also called for Israel's destruction and the BDS movement demands would result in that same goal.
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 infiltrating university campuses through lobbying for “BDS resolutions.” In these cases, student governments propose resolutions to boycott or divestment from Israel or Israeli-affiliated entities. 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 and pro-terror activism on campus.
