Judy Rohrer

Overview

Judy Rohrer has expressed support for the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, as well as for terrorist Rasmea Odeh and has defended disgraced anti-Israel Professor Steven Salaita.

As of August 2018, Rohrer’s LinkedIn page said she was the director of Women and Gender Studies at Eastern Washington University (EWU).

She was formerly an Assistant Professor and Director of the Institute for Citizenship & Social Justice (ICSR) at Western Kentucky University (WKU) from 2013 to 2017. Prior to that, Rohrer was an Assistant Professor in Residence at the University of Connecticut’s Women’s Studies Department.

Supporting BDS

Rohrer signed her name to a list of individuals endorsing the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI).

In an article published on January 13, 2014, it was reported that Rohrer was a caucus member of the American Studies Association (ASA) who supported a resolution to join the academic boycott of Israel.  

Supporting Rasmea Odeh

Rohrer signed a petition, authored by the anti-Israel Electronic Intifada website and published on October 24, 2014, expressing support for convicted terrorist Rasmea Odeh.

Odeh was a key military operative [00:02:08]with the terrorist group the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). In 1969, Odeh masterminded a PFLP bombing that killed two college students in a Jerusalem supermarket. Odeh also attempted to bomb the British consulate. 

Odeh confessed, in a highly detailed account, the day following her arrest. In a 2004 documentary, one of Odeh’s co-conspirators directly implicated [00:10:53] Odeh as the mastermind. 

In 1970, an Israeli court tried and convicted Odeh for her involvement in both bombings and sentenced her to life imprisonment. However, Odeh was released 10 years later, in a prisoner swap and emigrated to the United States.

On November 10, 2014, a Michigan federal jury convicted Odeh for immigration fraud because she failed to disclose her prior conviction and life sentence on her immigration application. On March 12, 2015, she was sentenced to 18 months in prison. 

In 2017, after an appeal and a lengthy court battle, Odeh admitted to immigration fraud, was stripped of her U.S. citizenship, deported to Jordan and banned from re-entering the U.S.

Defending Steven Salaita

Rohrer signed a petition published on August 21, 2014, by the BDS movement titled: “A Call to People of Conscience Not to Speak at the University Of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Until Chancellor Wise Honor [sic] the Contract to Hire Professor Steven Salaita.”  

In 2014, The University of Illinois withdrew an offer of employment to Salaita after becoming aware of his anti-Semitic tweets. One tweet, posted shortly after Hamas kidnapped three teenage Israeli high school students, read: "You may be too refined to say it, but I’m not: I wish all the f**king West Bank settlers would go missing.” In 2017, Salaita posted to Facebook: “People ask if I would go back in time and change anything. I would not…I will die unapologetic.” In February 2019, Salaita stated that he had become a school bus driver in the Washington, D.C., area.

Social Media and Weblinks

University Website: https://www2.ewu.edu/css/programs/womens-and-gender-studies/womens-and-gender-studies-contacts?mode=full

Personal Website:http://judyrohrer.strikingly.com/

LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/judy-rohrer-7536446/