UCT denies responsibility for terrorist talk on campus

The University of the Cape Town (UCT) has denied responsibility for allowing members of terrorist groups Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) to address an audience on its campus via a video call from Iran.

At the event on Monday evening, 20 March, hosted by the Palestine Solidarity Forum (PSF), Hamas and Hezbollah flags were draped around the room while members of terrorist groups Hamas and PIJ addressed the audience.

Nasser Abu Sharif from PIJ and Khaled Qadomi from Hamas were hosted online by the PSF at its “Israeli Apartheid Week” (IAW) event.

In response to queries from the SA Jewish Report, UCT spokesperson Elijah Moholola said, “The University of Cape Town is aware of an event hosted by one of the students’ societies on campus … where the two speakers in questions participated. Concerns around the speakers were raised by another students’ society prior to the event. An engagement followed between the two students’ structures on this matter.”

He went on to say that it wasn’t “an institutional event, but one hosted by a students’ society”.

However, the university didn’t acknowledge the impact on students – both Jewish and not – of inviting terrorist organisations onto campus.

Erin Dodo, the chairperson of the South African Union of Jewish Students (SAUJS) Western Cape, says, “I believe this impacts on the safety of Jewish students and students in general. These speakers are known to have a long list of crimes that they and their organisations committed. Welcoming them on campus compromises everyone’s safety, and makes UCT a place for violence to be excused.”

Dodo did everything she could to stop the speakers from addressing the event. “SAUJS and the PSF had a meeting with department of student affairs to disclose plans and speakers for IAW. However, the PSF made absolutely no reference to the two speakers they would have on Monday night [20 March], both of whom represent their organisations in the Islamic Republic of Iran.

“This goes directly against our agreement to disclose speakers. Therefore, on Monday at 10:42, I phoned one of the department of student affairs’ directors to alert her. She asked me to put it in an email so she could escalate the matter, which I did.”

Dodo wrote in the message, “I have no idea how UCT can allow this.” She then listed every terror attack that PIJ had perpetrated, as the Hamas speaker had not yet been announced at that stage. “This terrorist organisation has labelled Jews as their enemy to be killed,” she wrote.

“To say this makes Jewish students feel unsafe is a ridiculous understatement,” continued her email. “We feel threatened, targeted, and ostracised. I cannot believe I even have to write an email that an organisation that supports the military regime of Iran and a terrorist organisation shouldn’t be given a platform to speak.”

Dodo waited but received no response from student affairs. She did receive a message from the PSF representative (who was copied in the email to the university), who she said, “ignored what I had written (in the email), and went on to claim the speakers were ‘Jewish allies’.

“The South African Jewish Board of Deputies (SAJBD) contacted the acting vice-chancellor, Professor Daya Reddy. I had copied him in my email and still, nothing,” she continues.

Cape SAJBD Executive Director Daniel Bloch says, “There was no response to our initial email sent on 20 March whereby we raised our concerns and requested that the messages by PIJ and Hamas not be screened.

“We sent a second letter on 21 March, whereby we voiced our concerns at UCT for allowing this to happen. Professor Reddy responded that evening [on 21 March] saying he would get back to me.” That’s the last Bloch heard from UCT.

Dodo heard nothing further from UCT, but still hopes the university will properly address the issue. “SAUJS, together with our partners like the SAJBD, are committed to ensuring Jewish students on campus feel safe and are able to express themselves in an environment free from discrimination and prejudice,” she says.

The event was held at the same time that Israeli Or Eshkar (32) passed away, murdered by a Hamas terrorist because he was Jewish. The Hamas charter calls for the killing of Jews and subscribes to antisemitic tropes of Jews controlling the world. The PIJ is the most radical terrorist organisation operating in the Palestinian arena, dedicated to violent jihad. Both have been designated as terrorist organisations by Australia, Canada, the European Union, Israel, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Photos on the PSF’s social media show that less than 10 students were listening to the terrorist leaders. On the same evening, the PSF also held a poorly-attended “vigil for martyrs”, in which students held Hezbollah and Hamas flags and a student wrapped his face in a scarf with a Hamas logo while holding up pictures of “martyrs”.

“The Cape SAJBD is appalled [at this event],” says Cape SAJBD Chairperson Adrienne Jacobson. “We recognise that the UCT decision was made under considerable time pressure on account of the brazen failure of the hosting organisation to give the mandatory seven-day speaker identity notification.

“The PSF consciously chose to sow disharmony and hate with its choice of speakers. At the same time, we’re disappointed that the university authorities chose not to heed our concerns but rather allow this to go ahead.”

Jacobson said, “[PIJ representative] Sharif is on record as having not only incited violence against Israel but of maligning Jews in the most egregious and racist terms. Iran is a country associated with terrorism and human rights abuses, actively calls for the violent destruction of Israel, and propagates hatred against all Jews.

“The SAJBD finds it bewildering that UCT has so palpably failed to stand by its statement of values, in which a firm commitment is made to ‘build an equitable social order based on respect for human rights’”, says Jacobson. “Students look to UCT to provide platforms for engagement in meaningful, respectful discussions, free of discrimination, persecution, or hate. SAUJS and PSF had agreed to rules of engagement, which UCT neglected to enforce and allowed the PSF to breach.

South African Zionist Federation (SAZF) spokesperson Rolene Marks says, “Our universities shouldn’t be hostile environments which encourage the dissemination of propaganda from extremist organisations. Places of learning in South Africa must be clear on the dangers of incitement and hosting speakers who call for the discrimination, annihilation, and destruction of Jewish people.

“The SAZF condemns the PSF for encouraging the discriminatory, racist, and extremist political ideologies of Hamas and the oppressive regime of Iran on South African campuses, and calls on UCT to join us in condemning this behaviour.”

In UCT’s response to the SA Jewish Report, the university stated, “UCT management is not involved in the speakers’ invitation process for events hosted by staff and/or student structures who are autonomous in this context, nor does management necessarily align with any views held or expressed by any invited speaker.”