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Students for Justice in Palestine Threatens ‘Revolutionary Violence’ at UNC Chapel Hill

In May, Students for Justice in Palestine poured red paint which resembles spilled blood on the steps of the South Building, an office for administrative staff and the chancellor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Photo: UNCSJP/Screenshot

The campus group Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) announced late last month the beginning of what it described as an “armed rebellion,” proclaiming its right to use political violence as a tactic for achieving its objective of destroying Zionism, Israel, and capitalism.

“We emphasize our support for the right to resistance, not only in Palestine, but also here in the imperial core,” the group said in a manifesto — which was reportedly crafted with the help of anti-Zionist UNC professors — posted on social media. “We condone all forms of principled action, including armed rebellion, necessary to stop Israel’s genocide and apartheid, and to dismantle imperialism and capitalism more broadly. The oppressors will never grant full liberty to the oppressed; the oppressed must seize liberty with their own hands.”

The group then threatened to target the university this upcoming academic year, asserting that last semester’s “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” — a riotous and unlawful occupation of school property which convulsed the campus and resulted in 36 arrests — was “only one stage of a committed campaign to force the UNC-Chapel Hill administration to meet the demands laid out by UNC SJP.”

Spinning conspiracies of a nationwide plot against the group, it continued, “The administration, the injustice system, media outlets, zionists [sic], and other oppressive forces try to fracture us along several real and fictional axes. Students versus non-student, lesser charges versus greater charges, peaceful protester versus outside agitator. We are all outside agitators, and we stand firm as a unified bloc … Liberation may require revolutionary violence, but it must always stem from love.”

UNC did not respond to a request for comment on SJP’s post and apparent threat to the campus.

The group is not the first pro-Hamas student organization to warn that it is prepared to break the law, which may include harming others, to accomplish its objectives. In July, a coalition of anti-Zionist groups based at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM) issued an open threat to Jews who support Israel and Jewish organizations, promising to treat them as “extremist criminals.” That same month, a pro-Hamas Harvard University group mocked the administration for dropping disciplinary sanctions against the organizers of an encampment there and, calling their movement an “intifada,” hinted that more disruptions are forthcoming. Earlier in the summer, Columbia University’s SJP spin-off, Columbia Apartheid Divest (CUAD), endorsed Hamas.

Throughout the 2023-2024 academic year, pro-Hamas students across the country previewed the methods they would potentially employ to impose their will on Jewish and pro-Israel students and administrators, engaging in property destruction, violence, and incitement. Uttering racist rhetoric not seen so pervasively at educational institutions in the US since the Ku Klux Klan launched a campaign of violence and terror to prevent school integration, pro-Hamas activists beat up Jewish students, told Jews “you are not safe here,” and graffitied swastikas on school property. Many evaded justice by concealing their faces with medical-grade surgical masks, a tactic which critics have said is analogous to the Klan’s use of hooded masks.

In July, StandWithUs, a Jewish civil rights group based in California, urged the US Justice Department to facilitate holding violent and unlawful protesters accountable by enforcing legal statutes widely referred to as the “KKK Laws.” Citing pro-Hamas activists’ preference for anonymity, StandWithUs argued that five anti-Zionist groups — most notably SJP — currently operating on the campus of Columbia University have perpetrated Klan-style acts of hate, violating a portion of the 1964 Civil Rights Act which guarantees all students, regardless of race or ethnic background, the right to a safe learning environment.

The situation at UNC is equally perilous, according to Tammi Rossman-Benjamin, a scholar and founder of the antisemitism watchdog AMCHA Initiative. She told The Algemeiner on Wednesday that UNC faculty played a role in writing SJP’s manifesto.

“The fact that UNC SJP’s Points of Unity call for ‘armed rebellion,’ ‘revolutionary violence,’ and ‘resistance by any means necessary’ … not only in Palestine but also here in the imperial core [i.e. the United States] is deeply alarming,” Rossman-Benjamin said. “However, the fact that UNC Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine were collaborators on this post is the most frightening aspect of all. While the university has commendably taken steps to mitigate SJP’s campus behavior, little has been done to address faculty, who not only support SJP’s sentiments calling for violence targeting Jews and Zionists, but likely bring these sentiments into their classrooms.”

She continued, “Unless and until UNC can rein in their out-of-control faculty, antisemitism will continue to spiral out of control at UNC.”

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

The post Students for Justice in Palestine Threatens ‘Revolutionary Violence’ at UNC Chapel Hill first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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UN Security Council Meets on Iran as Russia, China Push for a Ceasefire

Members of the Security Council cast a vote during a United Nations Security Council meeting on the 3rd anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine at UN headquarters in New York, US, Feb. 24, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/David Dee Delgado

The U.N. Security Council met on Sunday to discuss US strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites as Russia, China and Pakistan proposed the 15-member body adopt a resolution calling for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in the Middle East.

It was not immediately clear when it could be put to a vote. The three countries circulated the draft text, said diplomats, and asked members to share their comments by Monday evening. A resolution needs at least nine votes in favor and no vetoes by the United States, France, Britain, Russia or China to pass.

The US is likely to oppose the draft resolution, seen by Reuters, which also condemns attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites and facilities. The text does not name the United States or Israel.

“The bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities by the United States marks a perilous turn in a region that is already reeling,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the Security Council on Sunday. “We now risk descending into a rathole of retaliation after retaliation.”

“We must act – immediately and decisively – to halt the fighting and return to serious, sustained negotiations on the Iran nuclear program,” Guterres said.

The world awaited Iran’s response on Sunday after President Donald Trump said the US had “obliterated” Tehran’s key nuclear sites, joining Israel in the biggest Western military action against the Islamic Republic since its 1979 revolution.

U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi told the Security Council that while craters were visible at Iran’s enrichment site buried into a mountain at Fordow, “no one – including the IAEA – is in a position to assess the underground damage.”

Grossi said entrances to tunnels used for the storage of enriched material appear to have been hit at Iran’s sprawling Isfahan nuclear complex, while the fuel enrichment plant at Natanz has been struck again.

“Iran has informed the IAEA there has been no increase in off-site radiation levels at all three sites,” said Grossi, who heads the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Iran requested the U.N. Security Council meeting, calling on the 15-member body “to address this blatant and unlawful act of aggression, to condemn it in the strongest possible terms.”

Israel‘s U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon said in a statement on Sunday that the U.S. and Israel “do not deserve any condemnation, but rather an expression of appreciation and gratitude for making the world a safer place.”

Danon told reporters before the council meeting that it was still early when it came to assessing the impact of the U.S. strikes. When asked if Israel was pursuing regime change in Iran, Danon said: “That’s for the Iranian people to decide, not for us.”

The post UN Security Council Meets on Iran as Russia, China Push for a Ceasefire first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Israel Rejects Critical EU Report Ahead of Ministers’ Meeting

FILE PHOTO: Smoke rises from Gaza after an explosion, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, June 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen/File Photo

Israel has rejected a European Union report saying it may be breaching human rights obligations in Gaza and the West Bank as a “moral and methodological failure,” according to a document seen by Reuters on Sunday.

The note, sent to EU officials ahead of a foreign ministers’ meeting on Monday, said the report by the bloc’s diplomatic service failed to consider Israel’s challenges and was based on inaccurate information.

“The Foreign Ministry of the State of Israel rejects the document … and finds it to be a complete moral and methodological failure,” the note said, adding that it should be dismissed entirely.

The post Israel Rejects Critical EU Report Ahead of Ministers’ Meeting first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Pope Leo Urges International Diplomacy to Prevent ‘Irreparable Abyss’

FILE PHOTO: Pope Leo XIV holds a Jubilee audience on the occasion of the Jubilee of Sport, at St. Peter’s Basilica, at the Vatican June 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Yara Nardi/File Photo

Pope Leo on Sunday said the international community must strive to avoid war that risks opening an “irreparable abyss,” and that diplomacy should take the place of conflict.

US forces struck Iran’s three main nuclear sites overnight, joining an Israeli assault in a major new escalation of conflict in the Middle East as Tehran vowed to defend itself.

“Every member of the international community has a moral responsibility: to stop the tragedy of war before it becomes an irreparable abyss,” Pope Leo said during his weekly prayer with pilgrims.

“No armed victory can compensate for the pain of mothers, the fear of children, the stolen future. Let diplomacy silence the weapons, let nations chart their future with peace efforts, not with violence and bloody conflicts,” he added.

“In this dramatic scenario, which includes Israel and Palestine, the daily suffering of the population, especially in Gaza and other territories, risks being forgotten, where the need for adequate humanitarian support is becoming increasingly urgent,” Pope Leo said.

The post Pope Leo Urges International Diplomacy to Prevent ‘Irreparable Abyss’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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