More than 950 University of Maryland community members are calling on this university’s business school to cancel an event featuring former Israeli politician Einat Wilf and Egyptian writer Dalia Ziada.
The panel discussion, which is scheduled for Sunday, will explore the history of political negotiations in the Middle East, according to the business school’s website. This university’s Students for Justice in Palestine chapter organized a letter campaign in response to the event and is demanding it be canceled. The panel would “spew racist ideologies” and harm students who support Palestine as well as the Muslim and Arab communities on campus, the letter read.
“Although the two invited speakers have different faith and ethnic backgrounds, they share the same pro-Israel sentiments which are racist and dehumanizing especially towards Palestinian and Muslim students,” Students for Justice in Palestine wrote in a Feb. 6 Instagram post.
Management and organization professor Rellie Derfler-Rozin and the business school’s Ed Snider Center for Enterprise and Markets managing director Jacqueline Manger organized the event to highlight business applications for dispute negotiations in the Middle East.
In a statement to The Diamondback, Derfler-Rozin and Manger wrote that this university invited both speakers due to their significant expertise in Middle East negotiations.
The organizers said Sunday’s event will not promote “the extremes” and urged students to respectfully express their opinions during the panel’s Q&A portion.
“We want all viewpoints to be heard,” the statement read. “We anticipate that [attendees] will bring challenging questions that open opportunities for an empathetic but fact-based discussion.”
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Ziada and Wilf did not respond to The Diamondback’s requests for comment.
Wilf, a self-proclaimed Zionist, was a member of Israel’s parliament from 2010 to 2013 and previously served as an intelligence officer for the Israel Defense Forces. The Harvard University alum has also authored multiple books about Israel’s history and politics, including her controversial 2020 book titled “The War of Return: How Western Indulgence of the Palestinian Dream Has Obstructed the Path to Peace.”
The book says Palestinians who were forcefully displaced during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War have no “right of return” to their homeland. According to the Associated Press, about 700,000 Palestinians fled or were permanently expelled from their homes in 1948 during the Nakba — “catastrophe” in Arabic — because of the war after Israel’s establishment.
Palestinians wanting to return to their homes is “one of the largest obstacles to successful diplomacy,” Wilf’s website reads.
Palestinian-American student Bilal Odeh said Wilf’s rhetoric toward Palestinians is “very racist” and offensive to his family. Students for Justice in Palestine’s letter campaign will help raise awareness about her “extreme” views, the junior information systems major added.
“The fact the [business school] even allowed such people to be invited to the campus to speak is honestly shameful,” Odeh said. “There’s no room for racism like that.”
While free speech is important, students have the right to be in an inclusive environment, Odeh explained.
Senior biology major Hershel Barnstein said he was shocked after reading Wilf’s social media posts. The posts are “blatantly racist” toward the Palestinian and Arab communities, Barnstein, an executive board member of this university’s Jewish Voice for Peace chapter, said.
In a Jan. 10 post on X, Wilf said believing in “Palestinianism” is the “respectable mask for antisemitism [and the] mark of failed societies and organizations.” Wilf also reshared a December post on X that mocked Palestinians who fled during the Nakba.
“The campus as a whole should not be platforming speakers with racist views, with views that undermine human rights, and in this case, views that unfairly malign Palestinians, Muslims and Arabs,” Barnstein said.
Conversations around negotiating a long-term peace agreement between Israel and Palestine have increased since Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel. Hamas killed more than 1,200 people and took about 250 hostages in its 2023 attack, according to the Associated Press. Israel declared war on Hamas the next day and its military forces have killed more than 48,000 Palestinians since, the Associated Press reported Tuesday.
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Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire agreement in January. The ceasefire’s current phase is slated to end in early March, the Associated Press reported.
Ziada has also written multiple books about Middle Eastern politics. She has served as the Middle East and North Africa regional director for the American Islamic Congress, a civil and human rights organization.
Since Hamas’ 2023 attack, Ziada has been a vocal supporter of Israel’s military actions in Gaza. Last month, she praised President Donald Trump’s executive order that threatened to deport “Hamas sympathizers” on college campuses.
Students for Justice in Palestine member Matt Foos said Ziada “openly disparages” people who support Palestine. The business school’s event is in “poor taste” as it attempts to conflate political situations and business practices, the junior philosophy and physics major explained.
“This is very insulting,” Foos said. “The things that [the speakers] said … seemed pretty openly racist and bigoted.”
Foos hoped the business school’s event would platform multiple perspectives, including someone who supports Palestine.
“I just wish, in the future, either more dialogue comes from the university or the university really, really double checks the people that they invite to speak,” Foos said.
This university’s Jewish Student Union wrote in a statement to The Diamondback that the organization understands the importance of “healthy dialogue” on campus. The organization urged community members who attend the event to express their views in a “respectful and civil manner,” the statement said.
