Duke's Weekend of Terror
By Stephen Miller
November 2004

You can't make evil disappear by simply closing your eyes. But that is exactly what Duke would have us do-close our eyes, so we cannot see that just a few short weeks ago, Duke invited evil onto its campus and catered to its every need.

Allow me to explain.

A group called the Palestine Solidarity Movement, or PSM, which has had trouble finding a venue, was welcomed with open arms at Duke University, under the new leadership of President Richard Brodhead. And so, to the horror of many, the fourth annual conference of the PSM was held at our campus October 15th through the 17th, with Duke footing most of the bill (around 60 thousand). In a concerted effort to further expose the organization, I, along with a number of other Duke students, attended the conference to record the proceedings. At the end of that long weekend it was clear that Duke had done a lot more than just provide the terrorists with moral support and valuable PR-Duke had given them new recruits.

The PSM is a Palestinian activist group that seeks to pressure companies into "divesting" or stop doing business with companies that provide resources to Israel, on the grounds that Israel is an apartheid state, a horrible abuser of human rights, and illegally occupies Palestinian lands. The PSM refuses to condemn suicide bombings, and is organized by individuals whose hatred for Jews is matched only by their lust for murder. The speakers the conference invites are no better, and are also on the record supporting terrorism and the destruction of the Jewish people. To give one small example, a past PSM speaker once said that "in the Hadith, the Day of Judgment will never happen until you fight the Jews. They are on the west side of the river, which is the Jordan River, and you're on the east side until the trees and the stones will say, oh Muslim, there is a Jew hiding behind me. Come and kill him!" The same PSM speaker also once declared that "it is about time we have an intifada in this country." Another past PSM speaker turned out to be the head of the American branch of the Islamic Jihad terrorist organization, and is now in jail after a US indictment.

The PSM is infamous for the anti-Semitic, pro-terror nature of its conferences, and for its fabricated history lessons and fictional accounts of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The blatant lies and absurd accusations would be laughable, was their purpose not so insidious and their effect not so dangerous.

None of this, however, phased the school's administration, which were adamant against all protest, to have Duke provide a forum for the PSM to spread its propaganda and recruit the gullible and sinister alike. President Brodhead even had the audacity to bill the event as being "education through dialogue."

Unfortunately, the problem goes even deeper than this. As the administration was repeatedly warned, the PSM is inexorably tied to the ISM, or the International Solidarity Movement, a group that recruits in America and operates in Palestine seeking to aid and abet terrorists. The ISM has ties to terrorist groups such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad-which were even admitted at the conference-and they readily admit to interfering with the activities of Israeli Defense Forces, activities they claim to be for the sole purpose of oppressing the Palestinians. In reality, they are interfering with Israel's anti-terror operations. And during the conference, the PSM, as it has every year, brought representatives from the ISM down to recruit at the conference. (I must admit, I was surprised there were not longer lines at the restrooms to use the sinks, considering how many people at the conference had blood on their hands.)

My efforts to prepare for the conference involved several approaches. First, I vocally opposed the PSM and had pro-Israel literature handed out and anti-PSM flyers posted; secondly, I worked to get as many people as I could to attend the conference on behalf of Israel (this turned out to make Brodhead's assertion that the conference would be "education through dialogue" that much more absurd, given that whenever anyone, such as myself, spoke out politely in support of Israel, they were immediately shouted down); and thirdly, I tried to get a number of people inside, like myself, to attend the entirety of the conference and record what went on. Since during a number of sessions no press or recording equipment was allowed to ensure total deniability for the PSM, this would be vital to further exposing this contemptible organization.

During one of the workshops I attended at the conference, eager students were fed outrageous lies about Israel by ISM representatives, which then tried to convince students to join the ISM, attend a one-week training session in Palestine, and then begin fighting the evil Israelis, by building human walls in front of IDF Bulldozers, interfering at security checkpoints, and tearing down the security wall. Naturally, the bulldozers were not described as targeting terrorists and bomb-making facilities, but the homes of innocent Palestinians to "even out demographics." The security checkpoints were described not as being used to prevent explosives for suicide bombers from getting into Israel, but for the purpose of "humiliating and degrading Palestinians". And the security wall was described not as for keeping out terrorists, but for maintaining "and apartheid state," which, as we were told during the conference's opening lecture, was actually not a fair comparison, as what the Israeli's were doing was far worse than the South Africans. One of the recruiters at this session was none other than the co-founder of the ISM, who admitted that the organization worked with Islamic Jihad and Hamas, which is only natural, given that the efforts of the ISM are invaluable to the terrorists and their efforts to slaughter innocent Jews.

And thus, thanks to Duke, the terrorists now had a fresh batch of students to help them out. (The students might even be rewarded for their efforts with a meeting with Yassar Arafat, as was implied at another ISM recruiting session later that same day.) Students were informed, of course, that they had to lie to the Israelis about their involvement in the ISM, or else they would be deported after arriving in Israel. When I told the Executive Vice President, John Burness, who was instrumental in pushing for the PSM to be allowed on campus, about the ISM's recruiting efforts, which he had been warned about in advance, he told me that the ISM's activities were in many ways akin to the activities of the black civil rights groups of the 60's.

A number of the students, shockingly, supporting the PSM and the ISM were Jewish. They too, had fallen for the lies and propaganda, very similarly to how some Jews supported Stalin, too blind to see what was so plainly clear. It seemed to me that the PSM/ISM attracted mostly disenfranchised college kids looking for a sense of belonging, of personal power, of importance, which this sinister franchise is more than willing to provide them with.

Most of the students supporting the ISM, and going over to Palestine, are probably not aware that they are helping the terrorists, but are instead being used as tools. These naïve, but nonetheless culpable students, serve several purposes. First, they can interfere with the IDF, believing they are fighting for human rights, not realizing they have blood on their hands. Secondly, they can take pictures and video of the Israeli Defense Forces, which can be edited and shown out of context as valuable propaganda pieces, and thirdly, they can serve as a mouthpiece for the terrorists, by coming back the US and reporting-as they did at the conference-that there is no anti-Semitism in Palestine, that the IDF is the enemy of human rights, and the Palestinians want nothing other than to live in peace. In other words, these students are brought to Palestine, indoctrinated, showed a completely false reality, then sent back to the US to spread the deadly propaganda. Of course, the higher-ups, a number of whom attended the conference to aid in the recruiting, know exactly what is going on, and are aware of all of the blood on their hands. This is similar, in some respects, to the relationship that developed between the rabid anti-war activists of the 60's and 70's and the Vietcong.

In the aftermath of the conference, I was disturbed yet further, to see all the mainstream press outlets simply disseminate the PSM propaganda. The PSM organizers and speakers have all been trained on how to deal with the media, explaining how they are "a non-violent organization, seeking a peaceful solution to Israel's occupation of Palestinian land," and to "bring an end to Israel's terrible human rights violations," etc. Though I was interviewed for several TV news stations and newspapers, and the campus paper, they either did not use my quotes or eviscerated them to the point where they were near meaningless. In fact, one could not even find any mention of the ISM in the news pieces that were produced, despite the fact that they were recruiting at the conference, just as they had in the past and as many people warned the administration they would. The conference was an incredible success for the PSM and the enemies of Israel, and America as well (in fact, the conference even had a workshop supporting the Iraqi Insurgency)

Shattering any small amount of remaining respect I had for President Brodhead, after the conference he had the gall to call it "constructive" I ask, how can three days of anti-Semitic lies, with Zionism being called a "disease," false history lessons, and recruitment taking place to aid and abet terrorist attacks on Israel, be considered constructive? President Brodhead has shamed Duke University and prostituted the campus to terror. And now more strength, more support, and more recruits have been given to those who would destroy Israel.

The bottom line is this: America is the midst of a war on terror, where in the end we will either meet victory or death. And as we are engaged in this life and death struggle, Duke just gave its time, money, resources, space, and student body to help out the enemy. The conference is not only helping those who would destroy Israel. As George Bush has made clear, terrorism cannot just be reduced to Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, as terrorism is world-wide confederacy, with a common desire to bend the world to the will of its radical Islamist beliefs, and to kill every Jew, every Christian, and every American that stands in the way. We are up against true and complete evil. And as it's always been, evil's best friend is naiveté. So whether knowingly or unknowingly, Duke's administration had not been simply fighting on the side of the first amendment, as it has claimed, but rather, on the side of evil.

As I stated at the beginning of the article, Duke committed a terrible crime, catering to every need that the terrorists and their supporters have. They gave them positive PR, they damaged the image of Israel, they disseminated anti-Semitic propaganda, indoctrinate the ignorant and the misinformed, they helped them enlist new recruits, and they lent them vital legitimacy. But we cannot do what Duke wants so very badly, and close our eyes. We have to let Duke know they will not be given a free pass for their reckless, dangerous behavior.

Please e-mail Vice President Burness john.burness@duke.edu and President Richard Brodhead richard.brodhead@duke.edu and tell them that no one in your family will be applying to Duke or donating money to Duke or in any way supporting Duke, and that you will encourage others to similarly shun Duke university, until they apologize for what they've done and help reveal the truth about the Palestine Solidarity Movement. And if they have any decency at all, this is exactly what they will do.