It's Been a Bad Week for Duke

Things haven’t been going so well at Duke University in the past week or so. First, its basketball team lost to arch-rival North Carolina in the NCAA basketball semi-finals. Now it is dealing with anti-Semitism in the usual platform of “Israel Apartheid Week”.

In recent years, Duke has had more than its share of anti-Semitic issues on its campus. This year is no exception. I am cross-posting two articles dealing with the speaking appearance of some guy named Mohammed el Kurd, who is regarded by many as an anti-Semite based on his history of anti-Semitic rhetoric. He was scheduled to speak this week on behalf of Students for Justice in Palestine (an anti-Semitic organization) at Duke’s annual Israel Apartheid Week, and his appearance-to the tune of $16,000- was causing worry among the school’s Jewish students.

So who is this charming fellow, Mohammed el-Kurd? Here is what the Anti Defamation League says about him.

https://www.adl.org/resources/backgrounders/mohammed-el-kurd

The below article was printed in Duke’s student newspaper, the Duke Chronicle. It was written by Alexandra Ahdoot, a Jewish student and president of the Duke chapter of Students Supporting Israel, in anticipation of el-Kurd’s appearance.

https://www.dukechronicle.com/article/2022/03/03252022-ahdoot

So it turns out that El-Kurd’s appearance went forward, and when it comes to inflammatory rhetoric aimed at Duke’s Jewish students, he lived up to expectations. The below article is written in Times of Israel by Amy Rosenthal, co-founder of the North Carolina Coalition for Israel.

https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/antisemitic-speaker-at-duke-university-mocks-jewish-students/