Alejandro Paz

Overview

Alejandro Paz [Alejandro I. Paz] defended a pro-terror slogan and a phrase that calls for Israel’s destruction. He joined in an anti-Israel encampment at the University of Toronto (UofT) in May 2024, as a faculty member in support of protesters.

Paz has also dismissed anti-Semitism and spread hatred of Israel. He is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.

The incidents took place after Hamas terror atrocities and war crimes against Israeli civilians, including mass murder, torture, rape, beheadings and kidnappings, which were executed on October 7, 2023. The attacks left about 1,200 Israelis dead, hundreds kidnapped and thousands wounded. Israel retaliated with a war called “Swords of Iron.”

As of March 2024, Paz served on the founding coordinating committee for the anti-Israel group, the Jewish Faculty Network, which was launched in December 2021. As of May 2024, he was a member [00:00:06] of its steering committee. Paz was also affiliated with Independent Jewish Voices (IJV), another anti-Israel group, from 2021 to 2022.

As of March 2024, Paz was listed as the co-chair of the “Hearing Palestine” initiative at the University of Toronto (UofT), which states its mission is to “Provide an intellectual hub for the study of Palestine.”

As of the same date, Paz was listed as an associate professor of anthropology at the UofT Scarborough campus (UTSC), since 2018. Previously he worked as an assistant professor of anthropology from 2010 to 2018, and assistant professor of linguistics and humanities from 2009 to 2010 at UofT.

Paz received a PhD in anthropology and linguistics from the University of Chicago (UChicago) in 2010. He graduated from Tel Aviv University with a master’s degree in Middle East history in 2000.

As of March 2024, Paz indicated on Twitter that he was located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

As of April 2024, Paz went by the username “Alejandro I. Paz” and used the handle “@alejandroipaz” on Twitter.

Defending a Pro-Terror Slogan and a Call to Destroy Israel

On March 22, 2024, Paz posted on Twitter referring to a tweet with photos of posters that were put up at UTSC: “...These posters are racist because they caricature legitimate Palestinian protest as genocidal or terroristic. Shameful!!! @UofT.”

One of the posters showed a photo of a bus on fire and said: “‘INTIFADA’ / literally means uprising / but practically means this…” Text under the photo of the burning bus said: “Do we really want to ‘globalize the intifada?’”

The term “intifada,” which translates from Arabic as “uprising” or “insurrection,” carries the connotation of violence. Palestinian intifadas waged against Israel have been marked since 1987 by hundreds of hijackings, shootings, stabbings, bombings and suicide missions.

The second poster explained that the anti-Israel slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” originated as a call for Israel to be replaced with “a single Palestinian state between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea …in which millions of Jewish inhabitants are eradicated, expelled, or are rendered a minority with no self-determination.”

“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.

On March 5, 2024, speaking in a Jewish Faculty Network webinar, Paz claimed [00:32:26] that the phrase “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” is [00:33:12]: “a challenge to the Israeli settler colonial project.” He also suggested [00:34:33] that criticisms of the slogan were “based in…anti-Palestinian racism.”

In the webinar, referring to Israel’s “Swords of Iron” war, Paz accused [00:37:15] Israel of “carrying out a genocidal war against Palestinian civilians with violence that is many times greater than the horrifying Hamas led massacre and assault on Israeli civilians.”

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.

In December 2023, Paz co-wrote [00:32:32] a primer for Hearing Palestine in support of the slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”

The primer claimed [p. 17] that the phrase “does not meet the requisite thresholds for inciting or promoting hate.” The primer alleged that to interpret its use in protests according to Hamas’s “eliminationist” meaning of the phrase [p. 15-16] “runs the risk of evoking anti-Palestinian racism.”

The primer also promoted [p. 8] the “right of return.”

The “right of return” is a Palestinian demand discredited as a means to eliminate Israel. International law mandates no absolute right of return and UN Resolution 194, which defined principles for “refugees wishing to return to their homes,” was unanimously rejected by Arab nations following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.

May 2024 - Anti-Israel Encampment at UofT

In May 2024, Paz participated multiple times in an anti-Israel encampment at UofT as a faculty member in solidarity with protesters who were demanding that UofT divest from companies doing business in Israel.

On May 2, 2024, Paz reportedly said that it was set up by “students who feel very aggrieved by what is happening in Gaza and the genocidal war the Israeli state is waging on the Palestinian people.”

On May 8, 2024, pro-Israel activists held a counterprotest at the UofT encampment that they called “Walk Against Hate.” During the counterprotest, an anti-Israel activist led [00:00:10] protesters in chanting: “There is only one solution, intifada revolution!...Intifada, intifada! Long live the intifada!...” He later remarked [00:01:27]: “Look how ridiculous this is, the cops say they’re here to protect us but they’re…facing us, they’re not facing the f**king agitators!…”Protesters also chanted [00:04:45]: “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free!,” a call to dismantle Israel.

Also on May 2, 2024, Paz spoke in an interview on CBC News from the encampment, where he said [00:05:14]: “...All the students here are part of the university and it’s their space as well…” Gesturing at the tents, Paz said [00:05:25]: “This is the best model of university education.”

In a May 3, 2024 press conference, Paz said [00:00:08]: “Day one went really well. I think the students made it clear that they’re not going to be told no to peaceful protest…They’re not obstructing anyone. In fact, they’re learning together…”

Paz also said [00:01:55]: “...Students are taking their education extremely seriously. We always get messages here as faculty of the University of Toronto stating that we should do more experiential learning. And then when the students actually do that, well ‘that’s a little bit too much.’ And so, this is the exciting moment…”

In another May 3, 2024 interview, Paz also reportedly said: “It’s a little bit weird for the president of the university not to be willing to come here and engage and see what a remarkable set of students at the university that he’s president of.”

In a video interview the same day, Paz said [00:01:31]: “...In the diaspora, Jews and Palestinians, Jews and Arabs, Jews and Muslims are not enemies. In fact, we form a community together who can fight for the liberation of all the peoples between the river and the sea…”

On May 8, Paz said [00:02:18] in a video interview posted to Instagram: “These are not hateful students…calling them hateful is actually hate speech itself.”

Dismissing Anti-Semitism

In November 2023, Paz reportedly defended the vandalism of a Toronto bookstore called Indigo, with red paint and posters accusing its Jewish founder, pro-Israel philanthropist Heather Reisman, of “funding genocide.”

Police charged eleven suspects with “hate-motivated mischief” and “criminal harassment.” The police said the suspects “engaged in threatening conduct that caused a person to reasonable fear for their personal safety.”

One news story about the incident reported that Paz “said Toronto police may have gone too far in designating those charged in the Indigo vandalism with being motivated by hate. He said the protesters do not appear to be targeting the CEO for being Jewish, but for her work promoting Canadian support for the Israeli state, through activities such as co-founding the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs.”

Another news story about the incident reported: “Alejandro Paz…says he doesn't believe the definition of antisemitism has become murkier since Oct. 7. He said ‘there's nothing antisemitic’ about protesting what some suggest is ‘genocide in the making’ in Gaza. He also says it's ‘demonstrably false’ for some organizations to say it's antisemitic to use terms like ‘apartheid’ or ‘decolonization’ or ‘settler colonialism’ to describe Israeli policies.”

One way that anti-Israel activists spread anti-Semitism is by claiming that Jews have no connection to the Land of Israel.

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) highlights multiple forms of contemporary anti-Semitism related to Israel, including “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor” and “Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.” The U.S. State Department adopted the IHRA’s working definition of anti-Semitism in 2016. Over 40 other countries have adopted the definition as well.

On April 11, 2021, Paz co-authored an article where he claimed that the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism “equates legitimate protest against Israel with antisemitism.” Canada has also endorsed the IHRA definition, which highlights another example of contemporary anti-Semitism: “Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.”

In Spring 2021, Paz also signed a statement, titled: “Jewish Faculty Against the IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism.”

Hatred of Israel

On November 2, 2023, Paz posted on Twitter: “Read this article, it offers more hope than we most can aspire to right now: / ‘You as well, can and should join this brave decolonisation project...’ / Not easy, but it should be our constant goal. Amen.”

Paz’s post referred to an article on AlJazeera.com that accused Israel of “genocide” in Gaza, with the support of the West, and called to “oust Western European and North American states…from our political and economic lives everywhere around the globe.”

On October 25, 2023, Paz spoke at an anti-Israel protest at UofT where he said: “My strongest fears, however, are about the Israeli killing machine and the enormous support the Israeli state has received from North Atlantic imperial powers.”

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.