Tessa Farmer

Overview

Tessa Farmer offered extra credit to her university students to engage in pro-terror campus activism. Farmer has participated in anti-Israel activism and is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.

As of March 2024, Farmer was listed as an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology and the Global Studies Program at the University of Virginia (UVA).

Offering Extra Credit to Students for Pro-Terror Activism

In October 2023, Farmer reportedly offered her students extra credit to attend a pro-terror campus event on October 12, 2023, titled: DECOLONIZATION IS NOT A METAPHOR Gaza and Palestinian Liberation.” The event occurred just five days after Hamas murdered 1,200 Israeli Jews during the October 7, 2023 terror attacks.

The Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapter at UVA (SJP UVA) hosted the event and promoted it as “a teach-in and demonstration about the current situation in Gaza, the events and history that led to this moment, and a discussion about how we can be in solidarity with Palestinians resisting occupation.” Farmer copied the text into her email to inform students about the extra credit opportunity.

Among Palestinians and anti-Israel activists, the term “resistance” can be a euphemism for nationalistic terror. It is often used to excuse or even glorify anti-Israel and anti-Semitic violence.  

One speaker at the event reportedly said: “There is no correct way for people to resist oppression.” The speakers argued that “violent resistance” by terrorists was “warranted” given the “historical and ongoing oppression on the part of the Israeli state.”

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, over 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.

Anti-Israel Activism (BDS, JVP, SJP)

Farmer signed a resolution encouraging the American Anthropological Association (AAA) to boycott Israeli academic institutions. The resolution also accused Israel of “ethnic cleansing, colonization, discrimination, and military occupation.”

In June 2016, the AAA announced that the resolution to boycott Israeli universities was defeated, but there were “other actions planned.”

Farmer signed a January 25, 2017 letter, authored by the anti-Israel group Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) condemning Fordham University’s decision to block the establishment of an SJP chapter on campus.

In 2016, Fordham reportedly blocked the formation of a Fordham SJP chapter “based on the reported behavior of other [SJP] chapters on other campuses,” indicating that “the establishment of a local branch could be ‘polarizing’ and pose a safety concern to students and faculty.”

Signatories demanded that Fordham “immediately rescind the rejection of SJP as a student group on campus, apologize to the students affected by this harmful decision, and reaffirm Fordham’s commitment to free speech and academic freedom.”

The petitioners also highlighted SJP’s BDS activity, claiming that SJP’s promotion of an anti-Israel boycott was part of “a time-honored non-violent mode of political expression.” The petition accused Fordham’s administration of a “fundamental misunderstanding of what boycotts are, the purpose of a university, and the goals of SJP.”

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

LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/tessa-farmer-3923402a/

Personal Website:https://www.tessafarmer.org/

University Website:https://mesalc.virginia.edu/faculty/profile/trf6k [Deleted]

University Website 2:https://anthropology.as.virginia.edu/people/tessa-farmer