They Went TOO FAR – Time To Pay Up!

(ConservativeSense.com) – Jewish groups have asked the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to investigate the City University of New York (CUNY) for allowing “hate speech.” The National Jewish Advocacy Center and the International Legal Forum want the IRS to look at whether the university is engaging in political advocacy or lobbying, thereby violating the conditions of its non-profit, tax-exempt status.

The groups wrote to IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel after a speaker on the CUNY campus called on students to rise up against Zionism.

Fatima Mohammed delivered the speech at a graduation ceremony on May 12th. She encouraged her classmates to fight “against capitalism, racism, imperialism, and Zionism around the world.” Mohammed accused Israel of mass murder, promoting lynch mobs, imprisoning children, and even attacking graveyards and funerals. She also described American law as a manifestation of white supremacy “that continues to oppress and suppress people in this nation and around the world.”

Jeffrey Lax, CUNY Professor of Law, said it was the most disturbing speech he’d heard at the university and was filled with antisemitic tropes. He also described the speech as a call for American insurrection.

National Jewish Advocacy Center Director Mark Goldfeder and International Legal Forum CEO and lawyer Arsen Ostrovsky told Werfel that CUNY had already breached non-profit status rules when it passed a resolution supporting the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanction (BDS) movement last May.

The resolution to support the left-wing BDS campaign contained descriptions of the Middle East conflict as “colonization” and “military occupation.” It said Israel was guilty of “structural racism,” supported by the United States. It demanded the university cut all ties with Israel; if it did not, it would be complicit in “apartheid, war crimes, and genocide.”

The CUNY Board of Trustees and Chancellor Felix Matos Rodriguez condemned Mohammed’s speech and called it “unacceptable.” The Jewish groups, however, said this was too little, too late, and the university has a history of antisemitism and should be held accountable. Dozens of faculty members supported Mohammed and her speech.