DEMAND THE HIRING OF DR. ABDOU | THE GERRY ROSBERG RETROSPECTIVE | COMMEMORATING COMRADE KANAFANI

Contents:

I. DEMAND THE HIRING OF DR. ABDOU! WE KEEP US SAFE!

II. THE GERRY ROSBERG RETROSPECTIVE: FROM GENTRIFICATION TO GENOCIDE APOLOGIST

III. WE NEED REVOLUTIONARY THEORY TO CONSTRUCT A REVOLUTIONARY MOVEMENT: AN ARGUMENT FOR A CUAD CURRICULUM

IV. CUAD READING GROUP - BE PRINCIPLED, GET ORGANIZED, COMBAT DEFEATISM, UNITE BROADLY

V. COMMEMORATING THE 52ND ANNIVERSARY OF COMRADE KANAFANI'S MARTYRDOM

VI. CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

DEMAND THE HIRING OF DR. ABDOU! WE KEEP US SAFE!

At her congressional hearing in April, genocide-profiteer Minouche Shafik stated that Dr. Mohamed Abdou will “never teach at Columbia again” for voicing his support for the liberation of the Palestinian people from the 75-year-long US imperialist and zionist aggression that has killed hundreds of thousands and displaced millions. Dr. Abdou was a visiting assistant professor at Columbia's Middle-Eastern, South Asian and African Studies Program. Following Shafik's congressional targeting of Dr. Abdou, he has been blacklisted from academic institutions, impeding his ability to find employment in the US. As a non-US citizen, this has ultimately led to his deportation from the country.

It comes as no surprise that Spineless Shafik incited Dr. Abdou’s removal from US academic institutions and from the country as a whole. As a bootlicker of imperialism, having infamously served in the imperialist holy trinity of the Bank of England, the IMF, and the World Bank, Shafik maintains her post as the president of Columbia University, an academic institution funding and profiting from the genocide of Palestinians. Professors like Dr. Abdou, who show unwavering support for Palestinian liberation and the campus movement fighting for divestment, pose a threat to Shafik and her predatory Board of Trustees colleagues whose million-dollar paychecks come from investing in the killing of Palestinians.

It also comes as no surprise that, while she expels Dr. Abdou from the university, Shafik renews Shai Davidai’s contract, despite the numerous times he has harrassed students and professors who support Palestinian liberation. Davidai is the son of zionist billionaires owning dozens of companies across Israel and Eastern Europe, including one that manufactures gun parts for the IOF. He claims that his “hero” is his grandfather Benny Davidai, an ill-famed strikebreaker as the former general manager of El Al Airlines. A ruthless strikebreaker herself, Shafik's permission to renew the contract of the pithless coward pampered by billionaire zionist donors is in direct service of her role in safeguarding imperialism.

We can clearly observe that, while zionist professors and students are protected by institutions embedded in imperialism, it is we – the students, faculty, and staff in the movement for Palestinian liberation – who protect us and keep us safe. Our demands of divestment from genocide can only be won with the participation of students, workers, staff, faculty, and community members in our thousands. It is through demonstrating our commitment to protecting each other and keeping us safe that we will mobilize our campus towards a mass movement in its truest form. We are endlessly inspired and invigorated by Dr. Abdou’s steadfast support for Palestinian liberation and camaraderie within our movement. We call on all readers to sign and share the petition demanding Union Theological Seminary hire Dr. Abdou for the 2024-25 academic year!

THE GERRY ROSBERG RETROSPECTIVE: FROM GENTRIFICATION TO GENOCIDE APOLOGIST

Rest in peace, Gerry Rosberg. He's not dead, though, unlike his humanity. Just retired. 

It seems that Cas Holloway, noted ex-Bloomberg admin suppresser of the Occupy Wall Street movement, will replace Rosberg as the university's milquetoast balding man who scolds students and does the banal administrative work behind Columbia's long and proud history of perpetuating injustice. 

Rosberg had a storied tenure. He advised former President Bollinger on matters such as gentrifying Harlem and bungling Columbia's response to COVID-19. Last year, after working behind the scenes for so long, he came into the limelight. As chair of the (definitely not euphemistically) named "Special Committee on Campus Safety," Rosberg oversaw the suspension of SJP and JVP. In his great sagacity, Rosberg saw that protesting against genocide is unsafe, but funding it is actually fine.

Announcing the suspension, Rosberg made it clear that he was "strongly committed to giving space to student groups to participate in debate, advocacy, and protest." Rosberg felt so passionately about this "giving space" that he even attended some demonstrations — like when he trailed a march with the NYPD, who subsequently brutalized protesters. 

We do not know what he plans to do during his retirement. Maybe, though, he will use his newfound free time to ponder big questions that have given him difficulty, such as "are Palestinians human?"

WE NEED REVOLUTIONARY THEORY TO CONSTRUCT A REVOLUTIONARY MOVEMENT: AN ARGUMENT FOR A CUAD CURRICULUM

We, the Political Education Committee of CUAD, are currently working on an organizational curriculum we aim to implement during the upcoming school year. 

We understand that a structured educational framework will equip ourselves with critical insights into historical and contemporary struggles, theoretical foundations, and strategic approaches to resistance. Understanding these principles is vital for effectively challenging entrenched imperialist ideologies and practices. By promoting collective learning and dialogue, the curriculum strengthens solidarity and unity within the movement, enabling us to confront problems with informed, principled action.

The significance of such a curriculum extends beyond education—it cultivates resilience and organizational coherence. By empowering ourselves with knowledge and skills, it prepares us to endure sustained struggle. The point of organizing is to build a new world that contends with the existing one. Such a task requires a deep knowledge of history, theory, and our concrete conditions. Understanding where we are and where we come from allows us to begin building this new world in a principled, scientific manner.

Revolutionary optimism is maintained by the understanding that everything is interconnected, that the inevitability of our victory is found in our present conditions. The parasitical imperialist class gorges itself on profits at the expense of working people, waging a class war that takes on a variety of forms and degrees of intensity. Within the US, the surging cost of food and housing along with stagnant wages take the form of low-intensity class warfare, legitimized through the imperialist electoral farce. In Gaza, this economic and political warfare assumes the form of open genocide, with the imperialists profiting from weapons used for the horrific mass murder of Palestinians. A revolutionary outlook recognizes that the people deserve more and that we must change the world to one that centers humanity instead of profit. 

It has become increasingly clear that imperialism has lost its mask; now we see its ugly face. America and Israel are no longer perceived as democracies that aim to "protect" the world, in much the same way that police are not here to "protect and serve us" and are instead protectors of the imperialist class. Similarly, the administration of Columbia are academic police. 

An anti-imperialist curriculum allows us to see how we exist in the world in the most lucid of ways because we see the world for what it is, not how those in power want it to appear. The resistance in Palestine is heroic because it fights the zionist entity's murder and dehumanization. The work of the resistance is revolutionary in that it recognizes that Palestinians have no avenues but violence to protect and liberate themselves.

In the West, we are often led to believe that armies committing genocide are heroic. Unlearning this is the first step in unlearning propaganda. Understanding the history and structures of Israeli settler violence and the Palestinian resistance, including the 1936-1939 Palestinian Revolution, illuminates the ongoing struggle and the necessity of resistance. Dialectical thinking allows us to analyze patterns across time and understand the foundations of present and future struggles.

Raising our consciousness allows us to recognize the class nature of society and exposes how capitalism teaches us to hate our class and our allies in order to serve imperialist interests. To defeat imperialism, we must challenge its status quo, which relies on repression and misinformation. Recognizing cooptation and the lies of reform is crucial, as the system uses various tactics to quell rebellion. Studying history reveals these tactics, such as the US government's response to the 1968 national rebellion by increasing the cost of higher education to prevent an educated proletariat.

Organizing requires learning from both victories and losses. For instance, the rise of SWAT and the decimation of the Black Panther Party in response to their organization efforts highlight the system's repressive strategies. Books like Black Against Empire provide valuable insights into these historical dynamics.

Columbia University, for example, would have us believe that divestment has no effect on the zionist entity and that the work of our predecessors had no impact. Liberatory theory tells us otherwise—when students and community are unified, we can achieve our desires. Fighting propaganda requires us to vehemently oppose efforts to divide us.

The work of organizers is to combine revolutionary theory with our study of reality and transform it based on the interests of the people and through the efforts of the people. Oppressors fear the truth and therefore lie incessantly, increasing their deceit every day. Organizers tap into suppressed truths to reveal the power and role of the masses in the world and the weakness of institutions built on deceit. Education is liberation, transformation, and revolutionary love.

To paraphrase the late Palestinian martyr Ghassan Kanafani, in the end, man is nothing but a cause. Knowledge reveals people to themselves, exposes the workings of the world, and highlights the weak nature of deceitful institutions. It empowers us with the truth, knowledge, and ability to organize built on love, hope, and a scientific outlook and approach to liberation.

Study provides clarity in the face of obfuscating oppressive systems, granting us the knowledge to change them. Join us in study, read with us, and grow with us. Our collective knowledge is a garden we must water.

We send love,

The CUAD Political Education Committee

CUAD READING GROUP - BE PRINCIPLED, GET ORGANIZED, COMBAT DEFEATISM, UNITE BROADLY

Last Sunday, our comrades convened for our second CUAD reading group, where we read Palestine’s red lines of struggle, Oslo is long dead. Time to revive the PLO, Basil Al-Araj's eight rules and insights on the nature of war, and Ghassan Kanafani's "Letter from Gaza". 

The red lines of struggle, or the thawabet, include but are not limited to, rejecting colonialism in all its manifestations, denouncing normalization in all its forms, supporting resistance against the zionist movement by any means necessary, securing the right of return for all Palestinians, and preserving Palestinian self-determination and autonomy. In the struggle for Palestinian liberation, the necessity for such disciplined red lines arises because counter-revolutionary forces, like the Palestinian Authority (PA), constantly threaten to undermine or co-opt resistance efforts. Strong political discipline ensures that even groups with distinct, contradictory ideologies, like the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and Hamas, can unite under that shared goal of national liberation.

One comrade emphasized that aspects of the thawabet, such as the right to resistance, do not derive legitimacy from international bodies such as the UN or ICC, but are legitimate themselves. These entities are not objective, but rather, are tools for US imperialism and do not serve the interests of the people. The right to armed struggle is affirmed because it is in the interest of the masses fighting against their occupiers.

The student movement has much to learn from the disciplined adherence to the thawabet. While a variety of organizations comprise our movement, we must find political unity surrounding essential lines, such as the following that came up in the group discussion: 1. Recognizing the necessity of armed struggle in defeating imperialism, 2. Supporting the resistance no matter the ideology of its leading force, understanding that the primary contradiction in Palestine is that of US imperialism and Palestine, and hence, any force that is fighting for Palestinian national liberation against US imperialism and its lackeys is progressive, and 3. Imposing our demands upon Columbia rather than depending on authorized avenues to appeal to morals we know are absent in our administration.

One comrade also noted the importance of combatting a default "allergic" reaction to the notion of discipline, highlighting that this reaction comes from the hyperindividualism that has been instilled in us by imperialist propaganda to prevent the masses from uniting and organizing. We must understand that imperialists are organized to carry out oppression and repress resistance, and hence we too must be highly organized and principled in order to effectively defeat them. On the note of organization, one comrade indicated that we are currently not organized to the degree needed to win our demands. They raised the necessity of further democratizing the decision-making and carrying out of our tactics in order to score greater blows against Columbia's administration while preserving our forces. They applied this to tactics of occupying buildings and preventing mass arrests, highlighting that, in our numbers, we have the power to achieve such victories if we are better organized. Another comrade agreed, arguing that our current movement must democratize more to realize a 'mass' movement in its truest form. Such democracy must be realized through mass participation in decision-making on one hand and collective adherence to such decisions on the other.

From Basil al-Araj's 8 Rules, we discussed combatting defeatism within our movement by highlighting his warning against spreading the enemy's propaganda and his reminder that anti-imperialist struggles are protracted. The Palestinian resistance recognizes the zionist entity's attempts to instill defeatism by spreading photos and videos of their depraved actions. They use these images of captured prisoners and targeted assassinations to suggest that the resistance is weakened or collapsing. To challenge this false narrative, the resistance counters zionist propaganda and promotes optimism through successful military actions and its growing organizations and media outlets, highlighting the inherent failure of Israel's methods of assassination and genocide.

We should learn from this practice on two fronts in the student movement. First, we must avoid propagating the liberal narrative that Palestinians are merely tragic victims. In recognizing their suffering, we should diligently promote the primary aspect of the Palestinian struggle: they are fighters combatting an illegal occupation backed by the US. Second, in our own activism, we must recognize that the main way we overcome the enemy propaganda - which portrays our movement as being barbaric, weak, and isolated - is through scoring victories and broadening our movement, understanding that every win serves to show the correctness of our tactics, which draws in more people into the movement. For example, the successes of the first encampment in reigniting the student movement for Palestinian liberation led to an even larger and more disruptive second encampment, which paralyzed business as usual on campus for weeks. We expose the frivolousness of the enemy propaganda through such victories that are rooted in the campus masses.

On the topic of imperialist propaganda, we discussed the question of whether monopoly media conglomerates are our friends or enemies. Comrades agreed that they are primarily our enemies, as we have learned from the monopoly media parasites at the encampment that, no matter what we say in interviews, they will twist our words to serve the interest of imperialism. While there were points raised about journalists who, albeit writing for monopoly media like the New York Times, seem sympathetic to our movement, we reached a synthesis that they are not our friends either, because being employed by a genocidal media conglomerate entails that the positions they put out are bound primarily to the interests of the imperialists. We must learn from the Palestinian resistance and not rely on monopoly media to propagate our positions, and instead utilize the channels we have created ourselves, including our social media, telegram, and this very newsletter.

As Basil al-Araj reminds us, our struggle is protracted; our victory is facilitated by our patience and endurance. The Palestinian resistance embodies this long-term resolve, facing greater human and material losses than the enemy but remaining steadfast due to their willpower and endurance. They understand that their strength lies in their unwavering commitment to the struggle regardless of how many setbacks are faced and regardless of the sacrifice. In our conditions, while Columbia has yet to divest, we celebrate our victories and recognize them, along with our setbacks, as crucial steps in the process of winning our demands. We learn from each action, consolidate our base, and incorporate more people into the struggle. Our struggle does not end with Columbia's divestment from the zionist entity; we are part of a larger anti-imperialist struggle that connects us with the resistance in Palestine and the world over.

One comrade in our study group quoted Ho Chi Minh, saying, "You will kill ten of us, we will kill one of you, but in the end, you will tire of it first." This optimism stems from the decay of imperialism, which is characterized by the mass accumulation of wealth into an increasingly smaller number of hands. By contrast, our numbers continue to grow. We have the numbers, the endurance, the patience, and the resolve to defeat imperialism. Our struggle is fortified by the knowledge that the creative potential of the masses in their millions and billions is invincible, and we will persevere until victory is achieved.

In "A Letter from Gaza", Ghassan Kanafani further reminds us that liberation is achieved only through collective struggle. The letter unfolds as a fictional correspondence from a man in Gaza to his friend who has embarked on a new life in America. Initially, the protagonist harbors the belief that leaving Gaza for America will lead to personal liberation — a path to escape the hardships and constraints of his homeland, a path to "get rich" as he and his friend would once hope. Yet, his perspective completely shifts after witnessing the sacrifice of his niece, Nadia, who throws herself on top of her little brothers and sisters to shield them from the zionist bombs.

We discussed how the story shows that true liberation cannot be achieved through individual success detached from the shared struggles and sacrifices of the people. We discussed how the protagonist's decision to remain in Gaza signifies a deeper commitment to stand in solidarity with his community, to confront the challenges together, and to contribute meaningfully to their ongoing struggle for justice and freedom.

If you would like to join the CUAD Reading Group, please email us at cuadthebarricade@proton.me. 

COMMEMORATING THE 52ND ANNIVERSARY OF COMRADE KANAFANI'S MARTYRDOM

July 8th marked 52 years since Palestinian revolutionary Ghassan Kanafani was martyred by a bomb implanted in his car by the Israeli intelligence agency in 1972. Comrade Kanafani was a Palestinian writer and spokesman of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, whose political writings continue to inspire revolutionaries and progressives around the world. Palestinian Resistance News Network broadcasted his teachings on July 8th, and we share them here in honor of their legacy and relevance to the struggle for Palestinian liberation today.

“Self-sacrifice, within the context of revolutionary action, is an expression of the very highest understanding of life, and of the struggle to make life worthy of a human being. The love of life for a person becomes a love for the life of his people’s masses, and his rejection that their life persists in being full of continuous misery, suffering and hardship. Hence, his understanding of life becomes a social virtue, capable of convincing the militant fighter that self-sacrifice is a redemption of his people’s life.

“The propaganda system of US imperialism is the largest one in human history. They dominate the world’s TV networks and newspapers and provide people with false education and movies by maliciously saying whatever they want. They believe they can do anything. But it is by the people who fight to liberate themselves through armed struggle that things are ultimately decided. Our propaganda is action and struggle. The supreme form of truth is armed struggle. This has to be firmly rooted in the people – the basic form is armed struggle by the masses.

“Imperialism has laid its body over the world, the head in Eastern Asia, the heart in the Middle East, its arteries reaching Africa and Latin America. Wherever you strike it, you damage it, and you serve the world revolution. The Palestinian cause is not a cause for Palestinians only, but a cause for every revolutionary, wherever he is, as a cause of the exploited and oppressed masses in our era.”

- Ghassan Kanafani

The Palestinian resistance fighters carry out Comrade Kanafani’s teachings today by choosing to fight oppression. They stand as iron-willed combatants exposing the futility of imperialist propaganda, which portrays them as victims, and embolden the people of the world into organizing mass movements and armed struggles against imperialism. Let us continue to be inspired by Comrade Kanafani and the resistance fighters and go against the tide with unwavering optimism for a better world.

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

We would love to hear your comments, critiques, and perspectives! If you would like to contribute to The Barricade, please email cuadthebarricade@proton.me.

This week's prompt is:

"How do we combat the imperialist's attempts to liquidate and institutionalize our movement?"

We believe this question to be critical amidst the rise of opportunistic elected officials whose ‘support’ for Palestinians have amounted to recognizing the reactionary puppet Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority and continuing to recognize the legitimacy of the zionist state, effectively sustaining genocide in more discrete, slower forms (see: AOC, France’s New Popular Front, the UK’s Jeremy Corbyn, etc). How do we continue to grow our movement for Palestinian liberation and combat the imperialist's attempt to pull us back into believing in the legitimacy of electoral politics?

DIVEST AND BOYCOTT THE GENOCIDAL APARTHEID STATE OF SO-CALLED ISRAEL

GRANT COMPLETE AMNESTY TO STUDENT PROTESTORS

LONG LIVE THE STUDENT INTIFADA

LONG LIVE THE PALESTINIAN NATIONAL RESISTANCE

FREE PALESTINE FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA WITHIN OUR LIFETIME

GLORY TO ALL OUR MARTYRS