Pajamas Media

Terror War on Campus

In this exclusive Pajamas Media video interview, former PLO terrorist Walid Shoebat urges American universities to wake up to the dangers of Islamic radicalism on campus. Shoebat spoke with PJM's Aaron Hanscom at the University of California Irvine, which has been a center of confrontation between Muslim and Jewish students. More by Hanscom on the situation at UCI below.

June 4, 2007 - by Aaron Hanscom

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On the afternoon of May 31, a rally titled “Stand Together for Tolerance” was held in UC Irvine’s bucolic Aldrich Park, a 19-acre botanical garden in the center of the campus. Although the 200 students and faculty didn’t hum Kumbaya (they did sing the Beatles’ “All You Need is Love”), their wishful thinking was evident when they joined hands in a circle to honor religious diversity. Academic Senate Chairwoman Martha Mecartney told the crowd, “We have a simple message - we, the faculty, staff and students of UC Irvine, believe in religious tolerance.” If only wishing made it so.

The unfortunate reality is that the anti-Semitic and pro-terrorism activities of UC Irvine’s Muslim Student Union (MSU) have turned the southern California campus into a hotbed of radicalism. Whether it’s through calling for the destruction of Israel or wearing “Intifada” T-Shirts, MSU members have done their part to stand in the way of the campus harmony UCI administrators so desperately want to portray to the public.

On the same day as the rally, UCI Chancellor Michael Drake spoke to the Jewish Federation of Orange County about the anti-Semitism on campus. “The antidote to hate speech is not more hate speech,” he said. “It is speech of love and beauty.”

Walid Shoebat, a former PLO terrorist and campus militant at Loop College in Chicago, couldn’t disagree more. Speaking at UC Irvine that night with two other ex-terrorists, Kamal Saleem and Zak Anani, he told the audience: “Do I promote hate speech? Sure. I hate terrorism. I will speak against terrorism my entire life.”

Shoebat’s desire to see the UCI administration display the same amount of fortitude was only one of the many wishes he expressed to me in the interview.

8 Comments

Johan Amedeus Metesky:

Perhaps the Jewish students at UCI should wear their own t-shirts. My daughter goes to Wayne State in Detroit which has a significant Arab and Muslim student population. After her Urban Studies professor called Israel a “terrorist state”, and pro-jihadis were demonstrating on campus, she started wearing one of the t-shirts that I had made, that say Am Yisrael Chai / Ummat Isra’il Hiyyah, “The Nation of Israel Lives” in Hebrew and Arabic.

It’s particularly annoying to the jihadis because ummah, the Arabic word for nation, is also used to describe the worldwide Muslim community, and many Muslims an Arabs will deny that Jews are a nation, that they are just a religion.

Jun 4, 2007 - 11:47 am Ari:

And the irony is that the FBI today reported that Irvine is the safest city in America.

It seems that UCI is a world of its own—a scary one at that.

Jun 4, 2007 - 1:59 pm Ay Uaxe:

Glad to see Ms. Metesky’s response at Wayne State. It is past time for all of us to stand up against the scourge of islam. It is not a nation or a religion, it is an exploitative death cult. We should all express as loudly and emphatically as possible that we will not submit to islam, we will continue to support our friends and allies, e.g., Israel and Denmark, and radical, jihadist islam will not be tolerated or accorded the respect of a religion, but will be treated as the seditious, violent cult that it is.

Jun 4, 2007 - 2:08 pm Metullus Cimber:

Perhaps Irvine is so safe because there are so many undercover FBI agents on campus.

Jun 4, 2007 - 2:11 pm Redball6:

These are important conversations, as a teacher, I wish you would make these available on real player or quicktime for download, it does me no good with Flash! if there is a charge so be it, but make them available!

Thanks

Frusrtrated

Jun 4, 2007 - 5:04 pm Reut Cohen:

Wonderful interview, Aaron!

Jun 4, 2007 - 5:16 pm JFarr:

Thank you for this video. It goes a long way in helping me understand this puzzle. I would like to hear more from this man.

Jun 4, 2007 - 5:16 pm shmu:

fantastic…too bad amerika kant bomb the hell out of the iranians

Jun 7, 2007 - 6:41 pm