Ridaa Khan

Overview

Ridaa Khan was editor-in-chief of an anti-Israel publication that spread an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory and expressed support for terrorists. She has also spread hatred of Israel and engaged in anti-Israel activism.

Khan was affiliated with Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) at Wayne State University (SJP WSU) in 2023. WSU is located in Detroit, Michigan.

Khan is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.

Khan’s activism took place during Israel’s war against Hamas terrorists. Israel launched the war, called called “Swords of Iron,” after a series of Hamas terror attacks and war crimes against Israeli civilians, including mass murder, torture, rape, beheadings and kidnappings. The atrocities were executed on October 7, 2023, and left approximately 1,200 Israelis dead, hundreds kidnapped and thousands wounded.

Hamas has been designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S., Canada, European Union, Israel and other countries. Founded in 1987, it has killed thousands of Israeli civilians through mass shootings and suicide bombings. Hamas has also kidnapped children, families and the elderly and held them hostage in Gaza. It has desecrated [slide 7] dead bodies and launched numerous rocket attacks against Israeli civilians.

As of April 2023, Khan was editor-in-chief of Window Magazine, a pro-Hamas student newspaper closely affiliated with SJP WSU.

While Khan served as editor-in-chief of Window Magazine, the newspaper promoted BDS in November 2023 and February 2024.

As of October 31, 2023, Window Magazine deleted their website, stating: “...the website builder we previously used, Wix, is an Isreal-based company and that is uglier !”

As of July 2024, Khan was listed as a “4th-year media arts and studies major” student at WSU’s College of Fine Performing Arts and Communication, as well as a student senator since October 2022.

As of July 2024, Khan’s LinkedIn profile said she was slated to graduate from WSU in 2025 and that she was located in Troy, Michigan.

Spreading an Anti-Semitic Conspiracy Theory

On November 13, 2023, Window Magazine published the second issue of the Falastin Post, which claimed [slide 2] that Israelis “harvest our [Palestinian] skin and organs for decades in Israeli organ banks because even in death, they do not want us to know rest.”

Accusations against Israel stealing or harvesting organs have been revived over the years, echoing old anti-Semitic blood libels against Jews.

Falastin Post was a newly-created “section exclusively dedicated to the coverage of Palestinian history and current affairs” featured in Window Magazine since November 2023. In January 2024, Falastin Post officially moved to SJP WSU’s Instagram page. Khan reportedly said that one of the reasons for the move was because “the work behind the writing [was] being done by its [SJP] members.”

Support for Terrorists

On November 7, 2023, Falastin Post published its first issue, featuring [slide 1] a photo of the members of the Black Panther Party meeting with the members of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) in their main office in Algeria on the front cover.

The PLO’s stated goal in its 1968 Charter was the “liberation of Palestine” through “armed struggle.”

The Black Panther Party (BPP) was a revolutionary Marxist political organization founded by Bobby Seale and Huey Newton in 1966. BPP advocated the use of violence and guerilla tactics to overthrow the U.S. government. BPP members were involved in many fatal firefights with police; in 1967, Newton allegedly killed police officer John Frey.

The article read [slide 3], referring to Hamas’s October 7, 2023 terror attacks against Israel: “Our hope is our resistance…Honor to our freedom fighters who resisted against this brutal occupation for the past 75 years…And honor to our martyrs…May we all live to see a free and liberated Palestine, and until then, our resistance continues unwavering.”

Anti-Israel activists use the term “resistance” to refer to violence and terror perpetrated against Israeli civilians and their allies. It is used to glorify anti-Israel and anti-Semitic violence. Anti-Israel activists chant slogans such as: “Resistance by any means necessary!” and “Resistance is justified when people are occupied!” in response to terror attacks.

The modern State of Israel was founded 76 years earlier, in 1948.

The article also featured [slide 4] a photo of Ghassan Kanafani captioned: “...Palestinian author and politician.”

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.

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.

Hatred of Israel during a Hamas War

On October 17, 2023, Khan wrote an article for Window Magazine, in which she accused [slide 3] Israel of “ethnically cleansing Palestine.” Khan also wrote [slide 5]: “I am not Palestinian, however my hatred for Zionism and vigor against it are personal.”

Zionism is the belief that Jews have the right to self-determination in their own national home, and the right to develop their national culture.

Anti-Israel Activism (SJP, BDS)

On November 30, 2023, SJP WSU organized a pro-BDS rally calling on the public to “Stand with SJP and our allie’s [sic] urging the Wayne State University to divest from war manufacturing firms and DEMAND for a ceasefire resolution!”

Khan spoke at the rally and said [00:00:07] that WSU must “divest from the companies whose stock value is rising and whose weapons are wiping out families” and accused [00:00:05] Israel of committing “genocide.”

On November 2, 2023, Khan sponsored a BDS resolution in the WSU student senate. The resolution was passed “to ensure that we [WSU] are not complicit in war profiteering and investing in companies that knowingly contribute to or benefit from human rights violations in Palestine and around the world.”

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.