FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 27, 2015
CONTACT: Coalition Against Speech Suppression – Brooklyn College
Email: cass4bc@gmail.com

  Brooklyn College, Breeding Grounds for ISIS?

Students at Brooklyn College praise ISIS at Pamela Geller event, part of a pattern of support for radical Islamists at CUNY

There aren’t many in the US who are inclined to praise ISIS. But the audience for a lecture by Pamela Geller at Brooklyn College on April 22, 2015 proved to be the exception: a crowd of students  – when they weren’t disrupting the lecture – showed enthusiastic support for the terror group, as shown in the photo below and video link.[i]

Students at the event giving the ISIS index finger salute[ii]

Unfortunately, it is just another example of CUNY’s soft spot for Islamic radicals. Here’s the history.

• In 2002, the CUNY faculty union contributed to a defense fund for Sami Al-Arian, who later pleaded guilty to contributing services to a terrorist organization.[iii]
• Mohamed Yousry, an adjunct lecturer at CUNY’s York College, was convicted in 2005 of providing material aid to terrorism.[iv]

• Three days after Mohamed Yousry was sentenced on terrorism charges, the CUNY Faculty Senate Chair speculated that he might be looking for work as a teaching adjunct.[v]

And with an educational incubator like CUNY’s, it’s not surprising how some students respond:

• Farrooque Ahmed, who graduated from CUNY’s College of Staten Island in 2003, was sentenced in 2011 to 23 years in prison for his role in planning bombings in Washington D.C.[vi]
• Syed Hashmi, a 2003 graduate of CUNY’s Brooklyn College, was sentenced in 2010 to 15 years for attempting to supply military gear to Al Qaeda.[vii]
• Noelle Velentzas, an alumna of York College, was arrested in 2015 for a plot to prepare an explosive device to be detonated in a jihadist-inspired terrorist attack in the United States.[viii]

The world-view of those who teach at a university counts. There is a pattern of support for radical Islamic causes at CUNY.

Parents, tuition payers, and the tax paying public should think twice before choosing CUNY.

[i] http://pamelageller.com/2015/04/the-brooklyn-zoo.html/

[ii] http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-09-04/isis-has-new-hand-sign-and-it-means-far-more-we-re-1

[iii] http://archive.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=5608 and minutes of the PSC-CUNY Delegate Assembly of 4/25/02

[iv] http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/07/nyregion/07translator.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

[v]https://www.dropbox.com/s/oys5nmihx3we4sg/Post%20to%20CUNY%20Faculty%20Senate%20Forum%20Oct.%2019%2C%202006.pdf?dl=0

[vi] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farooque_Ahmed
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/farooque-ahmed-man-busted-alleged-metro-bomb-plot-wanted-fight-overseas-fbi-article-1.192605

[vii]http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/28/nyregion/28hashmi.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/10/nyregion/10hashmi.html; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syed_Fahad_Hashmi

[viii] U.S.A. – against – NOELLE VELENTZAS and ASIA SIDDIQUI, Complaint and Affidavit in support of arrest warrants: filed 4/1/15: http://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/opa/press-releases/attachments/2015/04/02/velentzas-siddiqui-complaint.pdf