Sima Shakhsari
Overview
Sima Shakhsari denied that Hamas terrorists raped Israeli women on October 7, 2023. Shakhsari has also expressed support for terrorists, spread hatred of Israel and endorsed anti-Israel agitators.As of December 2023, Shakhsari was listed as an associate professor in the Department of Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities (UMN). Also that month, Shakhsari was reportedly a “candidate for a senior position at the school’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) department.”
Shakhsari’s denial of Hamas sexual violence occurred following a series of 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 terror attacks left over 1,200 Israelis dead, hundreds kidnapped and thousands wounded. Israel retaliated with a war called “Swords of Iron.”
Shakhsari has engaged in activism with the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP). In 2015, Shakhsari was affiliated with the SJP chapter at Wellesley College (Wellesley), where Shakhsari taught as an assistant professor. Shakhsari also moderated a panel at the 2019 National SJP Conference, held at UMN.
Shakhsari is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.
As of December 2020, Shakhsari was listed as an author for the online magazine Jadaliyya.
Shakhsari received a Ph.D. in Cultural and Social Anthropology from Stanford University.
Denying Hamas Raped Israeli Women
In December 2023, Shakhsari reportedly said Shakhsari hadn’t seen any evidence of Hamas’ sexual violence against Israelis. Shakhsari made the statements as part of an application review for the DEI position at UMTC.Shakhsari said: “Of course, any person who has been raped, I am a rape crisis counselor, I believe the survivors. I am yet to see Israeli rape survivors of Hamas come and speak.”
Denial of the Hamas war crimes of October 7, 2023, among anti-Israel activists has been likened to Holocaust denial among neo-Nazis.
Shakhsari also said: “We know the history of lynching, of black man, lynching, of indigenous man lynching Latinos in this country… because of accusations and they’re kind of violating the innocence of white women, right? And I think that is also this force that is repeated in the context of Israel and Palestine because Arab men have been demonized and have been marked as monstrous people who are rapists and for violence.”
Hamas intentionally targeted youth centers and elementary schools to execute and kidnap children. They also took stimulant drugs to give added energy to murder and maim. Nazis also took drugs during World War II to fuel their anti-Semitic massacres.
Support for Terrorists and Hatred of Israel
In December 2023, Shakhsari reportedly wrote in Shakhsari’s automated email reply: “I stand with the people of Palestine in their struggle for freedom and justice, and condemn the Israeli state’s settler colonial violence and genocide in Gaza.”On October 7, 2023, the day that Hamas terrorists attacked Israel, Shakhsari updated Shakhsari’s Facebook profile picture to one that included the Palestinian flag.
On September 24, 2020, Shakhsari posted to Facebook: “When empty claims of academic freedom, corporate profit, and settler colonialism merge… How often do our students actually get to meet and hear someone like Leila Khaled?”
Leila Khaled is a leading member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and participated in the hijacking of TWA Flight 840 in 1969 and El Al Flight 219 in 1970. As of 2017, Khaled was a member of PFLP's Political Bureau. Khaled has said that the second intifada failed because it was not violent enough, advocated [00:36:07] for the use of children in terror activities and compared Zionists to Nazis.
Shakhsari’s Facebook post referred to Zoom’s de-platforming of a San Francisco State University (SFSU) online “roundtable conversation” with Khaled, originally scheduled for September 23, 2020 and titled: “Whose Narratives? Gender, Justice and Resistance: A Conversation with Leila Khaled.”
On September 22, 2020, the online hosting service Zoom announced that SFSU would not be allowed to use its platform for this particular event due to Khaled’s “reported affiliation or membership in a US-designated foreign terrorist organization, and SFSU’s inability to confirm otherwise…”
In the same September 24, 2020, Facebook post, Shakhsari continued: “I was planning on using the recording of this class/webinar in my classes, and I am sure so did many others. This is perhaps exactly why the Zionist censorship machine hacked Rabab Ibrahim Abdulhadi’ virtual class. This reveals the insecurity of the empire and the Zionist machine. Scared of a 76 year old Palestinian woman…”
Anti-Israel professor Rabab Abdulhadi has cultivated ties with Hamas-dominated universities, glorified terrorists from the PFLP and spread hatred of Zionists.
Rabab Abdulhadi has spread anti-Semitism, led pro-terror academic trips and glorified terrorists. She has promoted hatred of Zionists, America and Israel. She is a leading anti-Israel activist in America and is a supporter of the BDS movement.
In the post, Shakhsari also glorified Khaled, writing: “This also shows the immense power that Leila Khaled has, half a century after she highjacked a plane with her comrades to draw attention to the extreme violence of the Israeli state against the Palestinian people… But she has a lot more to teach us all.”
Shakhsari also referred to Khaled as a “freedom fighter” who is “so popular among students who stand for justice...”
Shakhsari also wrote: “despite the complaints about ‘encouraging terrorism’ when I have shown the film on Leila Khaled (and if you have shown that film, you know how the students love it—but there is always that one Zionist who is enrolledjust to complain), the institutions at which I have worked have had to abide…”
Shakhsari concluded: “Thank you, Rabab for inviting Leila Khaled. I can only imagine your frustration right now.”
On September 18, 2020, Shakhsari shared a petition to Facebook that called for readers to sign: “TO SUPPORT ACADEMIC FREEDOM ON PALESTINE AND LEILA KHALED'S ROLE IN MARKING PALESTINIAN HISTORY AND LIBERATION.” Shakhsari also signed the petition.
The petition referred to Khaled as a: “powerful, inspiring figure... and a national icon” and claimed: “AMED Studies at SFSU is under attack from the ultra-right-wing Zionists for hosting a conversation with Palestinian freedom fighter, Leila Khaled.”
On October 24, 2014, Shakhsari signed an open letter titled: “Feminist scholars to Obama: End prosecution of Palestinian survivor of sexual torture.”
The letter called upon United States President Barack Obama and the U.S. Department of Justice to drop all criminal charges against PFLP terrorist, Rasmea Odeh. The letter glorified Odeh and extended “deepest support to Rasmea in the face of injustice,” calling her a “leader in the international struggle to empower women …”
IPS Supporting Student-Killer Rasmea Odeh
On February 25, 2015, Indiana Palestine Solidarity (IPS) held a "Solidarity with Rasmea" fundraiser for unrepentant terrorist-murderer Rasmea Odeh, misleadingly labeling Odeh’s arrest and prosecution part of a “broader pattern of persecuting Arabs and Muslims who are outstanding and outspoken leaders in their communities throughout the U.S.”
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.
Endorsing Anti-Israel Agitators
On May 13, 2019, Shakhsari posted to Facebook a photo of Shakhsari posing next to U.S. congresswoman Ilhan Omar. Shakhsari commented on the photo: “The look on my face is ridiculous. I couldn’t stop thanking her for her work and for standing up for Palestine. She said she would come for a visit to my class! I love this woman so much!”On August 21, 2014, Shakhsari signed a petition in support of anti-Israel professor Steven Salaita.
Supporting BDS
On May 15, 2019, Shakhsari updated Shakhsari’s Facebook profile photo using a frame from Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI). The frame read: ‘I BOYCOTT EUROVISION IN APARTHEID ISRAEL, HOW ABOUT YOU?” In May 2019, the Eurovision Song Contest was held in Tel Aviv, Israel.Shakhsari signed an October 1, 2014 BDS petition, launched by the American Anthropological Association (AAA). The petition read: “As anthropologists, we feel compelled to join academics around the world who support the Palestinian call to boycott Israeli academic institutions.”
The signatories also pledged to: “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.”
Shakhsari also signed an August 6, 2014 BDS petition that read: “As Middle East scholars and librarians, we feel compelled to join the growing number of academics in Israel and around the world who support the Palestinian call to boycott Israeli academic institutions.”
Moderator at the 2019 National SJP Conference
On November 3, 2019, Shakhsari featured in an SJP at Occidental College photo posted to their Instagram stories and was tagged as a moderator at the 2019 National SJP Conference closing plenary.The panel discussion at the Conference’s closing plenary featured anti-Israel activists, Sandra Tamari, as well as Maytha Alhassen and Stephanie Skora. On that same day, another SJP chapter posteda photo of Shakhsari participating in the same panel.
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.
Social Media and Weblinks
Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/sima.shakhsariTwitter:https://twitter.com/SimaS15745887
- Status:
- Professor
- University:
- Organizations:
- BDS,
- SJP
- Related Profiles:
- Ahmed-Ahmed Ali,
- Last Modified:
- 05/04/2026
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