Ron Hayduk

Overview

Ron Hayduk is an advocate of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement and has expressed support for anti-Israel Professor Rabab Abdulhadi.

Hayduk is an associate professor in the Department of Political Science at San Francisco State University (SFSU).

Supporting BDS

On August 29, 2014, Hayduk signed the “Open Letter on Gaza and BDS from the Middle East Caucus of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies.”

The letter described “indiscriminate and disproportionate violence that has been waged… by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) against the civilian population of Gaza” that it characterized as “the largest ‘open air prison’ in the world.”

The letter went on to endorse the BDS movement and to conclude that “the violence has taken an unprecedented and savage turn, having reached genocidal proportions.”

On August 6, 2014, Hayduk signed the “Middle East Scholars and Librarians Call for Boycott of Israeli Academia.”

In signing this petition, Hayduk and others committed “not to collaborate on projects and events involving Israeli academic institutions, not to teach at or to attend conferences and other events at such institutions, and not to publish in academic journals based in Israel.”

Hayduk also signed his name to a list of endorsers of the US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (USACBI).

Supporting Rabab Abdulhadi

In October of 2016, Hayduk signed a petition authored by the National Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), whose purpose was to “extend unconditional solidarity to Professor Rabab Abdulhadi.”

The letter described a conspiracy theory, whereby pro-Israel organizations “have waged a coordinated smear campaign—employing Islamophobia, anti-Arab racism, outright lies and innuendo, and defamation against Professor Abdulhadi.”

According to a Middle East Forum report, Professor Rabab Abdulhadi has — since at least January 2014 — sought to cultivate alliances between SFSU and two Hamas-dominated Palestinian universities.

During an SFSU faculty event, Abdulhadi praised international hijacker Leila Khaled as an “icon in liberations movements and… an icon for women’s liberation.”

In 2016, Abdulhadi signed a letter to Vassar College President Catherine Bond Hill defending Jasbir Puar. Puar demonized Israel, suggesting that Israelis harvest the organs of dead Palestinians.

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.

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.

Social Media and Weblinks

University Website: https://politicalscience.sfsu.edu/people/25358/ronald-hayduk