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Academic Association’s ‘Emergency Motion’ on Pro-Palestinian Speech Draws Rebuke from Leading Academic Nonprofit
Pro-Hamas students rallying at Harvard University. Photo: Reuters/Brian Snyder
The Academic Engagement Network (AEN), a higher education nonprofit, on Monday issued a searing letter denouncing that Modern Language Association’s (MLA) passing of an “emergency motion” that endorsed pro-Palestinian speech on college campuses, arguing that its neglecting to mention pro-Israel speech is indicative of anti-Israeli bias.
“The motion that the [MLA] has now endorsed fails to preserve campuses as welcoming learning environments where academic freedom and free expression are guaranteed for all,” AEN’s letter said. “The motion also establishes a virulently anti-Israel orthodoxy, despite the fact that disagreements and debate about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have a long history in English and foreign language departments.”
Founded in 1883, the MLA is a professional association of linguistics and literature scholars comprising, according to self-reported figures, 25,000 members across the world. Voting for the motion discussed in AEN’s letter took place at the organization’s annual convention earlier this month. 140 present members (out of 279) of the Delegate Assembly, who are elected to their positions, could have voted in favor of another motion affirming the right of free speech for all, AEN noted, one that regarded both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict equally, but chose the latter instead and voted against the former by a “wide margin,” according to reporting by Inside Higher Ed.
In addition to favoring pro-Palestinian speech, the motion specifically endorsed the notion that anti-Zionism is not antisemitic, contrary to the beliefs of the majority of the Jewish community, as well as condemnations of US support for Israel and Israel’s military response to Hamas’ atrocities, which included some 1,200 murders, mostly of civilians, rapes of Israeli women, and the taking of 240 hostages, many of which were children or elderly. The alternative motion called for defending from “threats, harassment, and violence all faculty members, students and staff regardless of their position on the conflict in the Middle East,” even though much “pro-Palestinian” speech has been pro-Hamas, defending and rationalizing Hamas’ crimes.
“But politics and policy were not only at stake in the choice,” AEN’s letter continued. “The identities of Jewish and Palestinian students, faculty, and staff, along with their allies, were on the table for judgement. In endorsing a divisive and exclusionary motion, the DA found one identity worthy of the MLA’s action and the other lacking. Such a denigration of the beliefs and experiences of a core MLA constituency is intolerable.”
MLA has in the past avoided endorsing extreme anti-Zionist measures, such as in 2017, when it rejected a motion to adopt the boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement (BDS), which would have required its members to, among other things, commit to denying letters of recommendation to students who seek to study in Israel and and terminating any and all projects with Israeli institutions of higher education. However, that was six years ago, before two wars between Israel and Hamas titled opinion in higher education strongly against Israel and triggered a wave of antisemitism on the campus unlike any seen in the West since the 1930s.
MLA’s endorsement of a resolution affirming only the rights of Palestinians and pro-Palestinians could be a harbinger of its politicization and embrace of anti-Israel advocacy guided by political rather than scholarly goals, AEN executive director Miriam Elman told The Algemeiner in a statement on Tuesday. MLA’s “emergency motion” function, she explained, is new, allowing the Delegate Assembly to exclude the general membership from participating in important votes. Now, once it votes to endorse a motion, that measure is fast-tracked to MLA’s Executive Council, where it is all but guaranteed to be formally adopted by the organization.
The arrangement gives outsized power to the Delegate Assembly’s “radical caucus,” whose influence is growing and stands to shape the future of MLA in the coming years.
“The MLA can be proud of having of having members from over 100 countries,” AEN executive director Miriam Elman told The Algemeiner in a statement on Tuesday. “All are respected, except for Israelis. Basically, the MLA Delegate Assembly has just told them that they are no longer welcome.”
US college campuses have experienced an alarming spike in antisemitic incidents — including demonstrations calling for Israel’s destruction and the intimidation and harassment of Jewish students — since Oct. 7. In a two month span after that day, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) recorded 470 antisemitic incidents on college campuses alone. During that same period, antisemitic incidents across the US skyrocketed by 323 percent compared to the prior year.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Academic Association’s ‘Emergency Motion’ on Pro-Palestinian Speech Draws Rebuke from Leading Academic Nonprofit first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Iranian Media Claims Obtaining ‘Sensitive’ Israeli Intelligence Materials
FILE PHOTO: The atomic symbol and the Iranian flag are seen in this illustration, July 21, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
i24 News – Iranian and Iran-affiliated media claimed on Saturday that the Islamic Republic had obtained a trove of “strategic and sensitive” Israeli intelligence materials related to Israel’s nuclear facilities and defense plans.
“Iran’s intelligence apparatus has obtained a vast quantity of strategic and sensitive information and documents belonging to the Zionist regime,” Iran’s state broadcaster said, referring to Israel in the manner accepted in those Muslim or Arab states that don’t recognize its legitimacy. The statement was also relayed by the Lebanese site Al-Mayadeen, affiliated with the Iran-backed jihadists of Hezbollah.
The reports did not include any details on the documents or how Iran had obtained them.
The intelligence reportedly included “thousands of documents related to that regime’s nuclear plans and facilities,” it added.
According to the reports, “the data haul was extracted during a covert operation and included a vast volume of materials including documents, images, and videos.”
The report comes amid high tensions over Iran’s nuclear program, over which it is in talks with the US administration of President Donald Trump.
Iranian-Israeli tensions reached an all-time high since the October 7 massacre and the subsequent Gaza war, including Iranian rocket fire on Israel and Israeli aerial raids in Iran that devastated much of the regime’s air defenses.
Israel, which regards the prospect of the antisemitic mullah regime obtaining a nuclear weapon as an existential threat, has indicated it could resort to a military strike against Iran’s installations should talks fail to curb uranium enrichment.
The post Iranian Media Claims Obtaining ‘Sensitive’ Israeli Intelligence Materials first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Israel Retrieves Body of Thai Hostage from Gaza
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz looks on, amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, in Jerusalem, Nov. 7, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
The Israeli military has retrieved the body of a Thai hostage who had been held in Gaza since Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack, Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Saturday.
Nattapong Pinta’s body was held by a Palestinian terrorist group called the Mujahedeen Brigades, and was recovered from the area of Rafah in southern Gaza, Katz said. His family in Thailand has been notified.
Pinta, an agricultural worker, was abducted from Kibbutz Nir Oz, a small Israeli community near the Gaza border where a quarter of the population was killed or taken hostage during the Hamas attack that triggered the devastating war in Gaza.
Israel’s military said Pinta had been abducted alive and killed by his captors, who had also killed and taken to Gaza the bodies of two more Israeli-American hostages that were retrieved earlier this week.
There was no immediate comment from the Mujahedeen Brigades, who have previously denied killing their captives, or from Hamas. The Israeli military said the Brigades were still holding the body of another foreign national. Only 20 of the 55 remaining hostages are believed to still be alive.
The Mujahedeen Brigades also held and killed Israeli hostage Shiri Bibas and her two young sons, according to Israeli authorities. Their bodies were returned during a two-month ceasefire, which collapsed in March after the two sides could not agree on terms for extending it to a second phase.
Israel has since expanded its offensive across the Gaza Strip as US, Qatari and Egyptian-led efforts to secure another ceasefire have faltered.
US-BACKED AID GROUP HALTS DISTRIBUTIONS
The United Nations has warned that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine after an 11-week Israeli blockade of the enclave, with the rate of young children suffering from acute malnutrition nearly tripling.
Aid distribution was halted on Friday after the US-and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation said overcrowding had made it unsafe to continue operations. It was unclear whether aid had resumed on Saturday.
The GHF began distributing food packages in Gaza at the end of May, overseeing a new model of aid distribution which the United Nations says is neither impartial nor neutral. It says it has provided around 9 million meals so far.
The Israeli military said on Saturday that 350 trucks of humanitarian aid belonging to U.N. and other international relief groups were transferred this week via the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza.
The war erupted after Hamas-led terrorists took 251 hostages and killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, in the October 7, 2023 attack, Israel’s single deadliest day.
The post Israel Retrieves Body of Thai Hostage from Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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US Mulls Giving Millions to Controversial Gaza Aid Foundation, Sources Say
Palestinians carry aid supplies which they received from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in the central Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed/File Photo
The State Department is weighing giving $500 million to the new foundation providing aid to war-shattered Gaza, according to two knowledgeable sources and two former US officials, a move that would involve the US more deeply in a controversial aid effort that has been beset by violence and chaos.
The sources and former US officials, all of whom requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said that money for Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) would come from the US Agency for International Development (USAID), which is being folded into the US State Department.
The plan has met resistance from some US officials concerned with the deadly shootings of Palestinians near aid distribution sites and the competence of the GHF, the two sources said.
The GHF, which has been fiercely criticized by humanitarian organizations, including the United Nations, for an alleged lack of neutrality, began distributing aid last week amid warnings that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine after an 11-week Israeli aid blockade, which was lifted on May 19 when limited deliveries were allowed to resume.
The foundation has seen senior personnel quit and had to pause handouts twice this week after crowds overwhelmed its distribution hubs.
The State Department and GHF did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Reuters has been unable to establish who is currently funding the GHF operations, which began in Gaza last week. The GHF uses private US security and logistics companies to transport aid into Gaza for distribution at so-called secure distribution sites.
On Thursday, Reuters reported that a Chicago-based private equity firm, McNally Capital, has an “economic interest” in the for-profit US contractor overseeing the logistics and security of GHF’s aid distribution hubs in the enclave.
While US President Donald Trump’s administration and Israel say they don’t finance the GHF operation, both have been pressing the United Nations and international aid groups to work with it.
The US and Israel argue that aid distributed by a long-established U.N. aid network was diverted to Hamas. Hamas has denied that.
USAID has been all but dismantled. Some 80 percent of its programs have been canceled and its staff face termination as part of President Donald Trump’s drive to align US foreign policy with his “America First” agenda.
One source with knowledge of the matter and one former senior official said the proposal to give the $500 million to GHF has been championed by acting deputy USAID Administrator Ken Jackson, who has helped oversee the agency’s dismemberment.
The source said that Israel requested the funds to underwrite GHF’s operations for 180 days.
The Israeli government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The two sources said that some US officials have concerns with the plan because of the overcrowding that has affected the aid distribution hubs run by GHF’s contractor, and violence nearby.
Those officials also want well-established non-governmental organizations experienced in running aid operations in Gaza and elsewhere to be involved in the operation if the State Department approves the funds for GHF, a position that Israel likely will oppose, the sources said.
The post US Mulls Giving Millions to Controversial Gaza Aid Foundation, Sources Say first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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