Tala Malo

Overview

Tala Malo expressed support for a Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) initiative launched by the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapter at the University of Chicago (SJP UChicago) in 2023.

Malo was affiliated [p. 7] with SJP UChicago when she engaged in anti-Israel activism in 2021.

As of May 2023, Malo was the Secretary of the Muslim Student Association (MSA) at UChicago (UChicago MSA). 

Also as of May 2023, Malo’s LinkedIn page said she was pursuing a bachelor’s degree in “Pre-Medicine/Pre-Medical Studies” at UChicago, slated to graduate in June 2024.

As of the same date, Malo’s LinkedIn said she was located in the greater Chicago area.

SJP UChicago BDS Campaign

In January 2023, Malo signed [p. 9] an SJP UChicago statement calling on UChicago to ban Israeli scholars who previously served in the Israeli military from teaching on campus. The statement referred to these scholars as “complicit Israeli military personnel.”

On January 5, 2023, SJP UChicago launched a BDS campaign titled: “#IsraeliMilitaryOffOurCampus,” which they also promoted with the hashtag: “#CounterColonialism.” 

The campaign called [slide 5] upon students to boycott a class being taught by retiredIsrael Defense Forces (IDF) General Meir Elran, to “oppose his presence (and the Israeli military’s) on our campus” and to “protest the university’s relationship with the Israel Institute.”

In January 2023, Elran was teaching a course at UChicago titled: “Security, Counter Terrorism and Resilience, the Israeli Case” as a visiting lecturer. The course was organized through an academic exchange program sponsored by the Israel Institute, a nonprofit organization that pairs colleges and universities with Israeli scholars who teach courses about the State of Israel.

SJP UChicago’s January 2023 boycott initiative was part of a BDS campaign [slide 7]the group initially launched in January 2022. The campaign urged students to boycott “S**tty Zionist Classes,” which included “classes on Israel or those taught by Israeli fellows.” 

On January 5, 2023, SJP UChicago announced [slide 2] on Instagram that Elran’s course was “the s**ttiest, most racist class of them all…being offered this winter.” Their Instagram bio provided an access link to their “Statement on General Meir Elran’s 'Counter-Terrorism' Course.” 

In the statement, SJP UChicago claimed [p. 2]: “Elran’s career has been defined by and dedicated to securing Israel's colonial project and crushing Palestinian resistance to it.”

Among Palestinians and anti-Israel activists, the term “steadfastness” (sumud) is the will to resist or persevere in the face of opposition, while "resistance" is often a euphemism for nationalistic terror. Both terms are often used to excuse or even glorify anti-Israel and anti-Semitic violence.

SJP UChicago also described [p. 1] as “particularly damning…the role Elran played in repressing the first intifada (1987-93), a popular Palestinian uprising against apartheid and occupation…” 


In the statement, SJP UChicago accused Israel of being “an expansionist apartheid state predicated on the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian land” and a “colonial enterprise” with “genocidal practices.” The statement concluded by urging students to sign a petition “against General Elran's course and the broader presence of the Israeli military on UChicago's campus.”
 
SJP UChicago linked to a document in their Instagram bio titled: “18 Reasons to Oppose General Elran's 'Counter-Terrorism' Course," in which SJP UChicago wrote: “What he really teaches and represents is militaristic racism.”

The same document said: “The technologies, tactics, ideological justifications and ‘research’ (General Elran’s speciality) Israel uses against Palestinians are the same as those used against racialized peoples in the U.S.” 

The accusation that Israeli law enforcement teaches American police brutal tactics during police exchange programs is used to demonize Israel. Participants in these programshave stated [00:02:14] that the training in Israel focuses [00:13:36] on public policy, counter-terrorism and leadership training in the form of lectures and discussions.  

In the same document, SJP UChicago wrote: “In fact, Israel is a foundationally racist colonial regime that must be dismantled, held accountable, and replaced by a truly just social order.”

On January 10, 2023, SJP UChicago published an op-ed in the UChicago student newspaper, the Chicago Maroon, titled: “Israeli Military Off Our Campus!” The teaser read: “...Meir Elran’s ‘counter-terrorism’ course represents an incursion of the Israeli military into our campus and classrooms. It must be opposed.”

The op-ed accused Israel of “biological warfare against Palestinian civilians,” the “torture of Palestinian children” and “periodically massacring the Palestinians it holds captive in the Gaza Strip.”

SJP UChicago concluded the op-ed with its desire that “the University’s Palestinian students will no longer be forced to watch leading participants in their ongoing Nakba be hired by their administration, welcomed on their campus, and handed positions of power in their classrooms.”

The term “Nakba” is generally translated as “catastrophe” in Arabic, referring to the outcome of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. It is a term often used to delegitimize the creation of the State of Israel by defining it as a catastrophe.

On February 2, 2023, SJP UChicago held [slide 1] a campus protest outside Elran’s classroom, which they organized to demand “#IsraeliMilitaryOffOurCampus while honoring the 10 martyrs recently massacred in Jenin by Israeli ‘Counter-Terrorist Forces.’”

On January 26, 2023, nine Palestinians were killed in a shootout after IDF soldiers entered the Jenin refugee camp to arrest a cell of Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terrorists, who were reportedly planning a terror attack. During the attempted arrests, members of the cell as well as other Palestinian gunmen opened fire on the soldiers.

The protest included [slide 7] slogans chalked on the building walkway such as “Elran Off Campus,” “IDF Off Our Campus” and “Free Palestine From the River to the Sea,” a chant used to call for the elimination of the State of Israel. 

Anti-Israel Activism (SJP, BDS)

In the wake of Israel’s May 2021 Operation Guardian of the Walls (OGW) against Hamas, Malo signed [p. 7] a petition in support of a joint statement made by SJP UChicago and the incoming Undergraduate Student Government (USG) at UChicago calling on the university to endorse BDS. 

In May 2021, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terrorists fired over 4,300 rockets from Gaza at major population centers in Israel. Israel responded by launching OGW, carrying out targeted military strikes in Gaza.

The petition read: “We hope that this petition of University support will show that this statement was a justified and necessary commitment to Palestine, that absolutely does speak for many University constituents, particularly Palestinian students. We, the undersigned, support a USG that stands for a Free Palestine.”

The joint statement said: “We support the divestment of the University of Chicago from Israelicompanies [sic] in compliance with the larger standing Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, endorsed by 170+ Palestinian organizations…We stand against the ideology of Zionism that has been used as a justification for the murder, displacement, and traumatization of Palestinian people.”

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.

The statement also said: “From the river to the sea, USG supports a Palestine that is free.”

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.