Several student organizations at American University and other surrounding colleges are cosponsoring an event occurring on Thursday, March 17, in which known antisemite Mohammed El-Kurd will be speaking on settler colonialism. There are many quoted instances of El-Kurd's antisemitism, including when he spread the false blood libel trope in his poetry book Rifqa (“they [Israelis] harvest organs of the martyred [Palestinians], feed their warriors our own") and on his Twitter ("State-settler collusion emboldening an unquenchable thirst for Palestinian blood & land"). El-Kurd has also been quoted equating Israelis with Nazis, and implicated a non-Israeli Jewish person in Israel's actions using Holocaust terminology ("YOU ARE... KRISTALLNACHTING US...") on his Twitter. He also has dismissed the indigeneity of Jewish people to Israel as "fictional." For a more in-depth look at his quotations of antisemitism, visit https://www.adl.org/resources/backgrounders/mohammed-el-kurd

There is a line between criticism of Israel's actions and antisemitism, and El-Kurd continually crosses this line. One can criticize the Israeli government and support Palestine without being antisemitic. The cosponsoring of this event is a harmful act and we call on these organizations to revoke their cosponsorship. The organizations cosponsoring the event include:

Students for Justice in Palestine 
Arab Student Association 
Black Student Union 
Students Advocates for Native Communities 
Hawai'i Club 
South Asian Student Association 
Albanian Club 
Sunrise Movement 
Ethiopian & Eritrean Student Association 
AU Pride 
Public Health Association 
Caribbean Circle 
AU Dissenters 
AU Triota 
African Student Organization 
League of United Latin American Citizens 
School of Education Graduate Student Council 
Blacklist 
Muslim Student Association 
She's The First 
Heal Da Homies 
School of International Studies Graduate Student Council 
Unity Coalition 
Students for Justice in Palestine University of Maryland 
Students for Justice in Palestine
George Washington University 
Students for Justice in Palestine University of Virginia 
Students for Justice in Palestine Columbia University   
Students for Justice in Palestine 
George Mason University
Students for Justice in Palestine Georgetown University
Department of Critical Race, Gender, and Culture Studies 
Arab World Studies 
Anti-Racist Research & Policy Center 
Department of Sociology 
Department of Anthropology
IMES@AU

Please join us in calling on these organizations to revoke their cosponsorship.