Joshua Stacher

On June 27, 2016, during a period of high tension on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, Stacher tweeted an article titled “Israeli forces storm Al-Aqsa 2nd day in a row, as right-wing Israelis tour compound.” Stacher commented “Rocks vs. Steel Marbled-Sized Bullets with a Rubber Coating. #AlAqsa.”

The allegation that Jews “threaten” to destroy the Al-Aqsa Mosque has been a traditional pretext for Arab attacks on Jews long before the existence of the modern Jewish state. Such propaganda served as the excuse for an upsurge in Palestinian violence that flared in the fall of 2015 and incited Palestinians to attempt mass casualty attacks on Israeli civilians in July 2016.. In September 2016, Joshua Stacher’s Twitter cover photo glorified Palestinian rock-throwing.

On December 15, 2017, Stacher posted on Facebook a photo of a sign reading “Hands off Jerusalem” and commented that “Someone hung this in the Student Center at Kent State U #HandsOffJerusalem.” He then “liked” a comment below his photo that read “I hope no one gets in trouble over this because they shouldn’t.”

Demonizing Israel

On November 20, 2016, Stacher published an op-ed in The Kent Stater about Golda Meir, in which he demonized Israel and revised Israeli history, accusing Israel of “ethnic cleansing.”

On September 18, 2016, Stacher retweeted a  video from the anti-Israel Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) organization that accused Israel of “institutionalized discrimination” against non-Jews.

The video also claimed that Israeli Arabs are second class citizens of Israel, and presented Israeli security policies as discriminatory and unjust. The film portrayed Israel as an aggressive, oppressive force that can be influenced only through pressure. It also rejected peace talks as “theater to cover a land grab.”

In July 2016, Stacher tweeted an article urging that black American activists should “highlight police brutality in Israel” under the hashtag “#BlackPalestineSolidarity.”

  
On August 25, 2016, Stacher twice tweeted that Israel was committing a “genocide” of Palestinians. He linked to an article by the anti-Israel Center for Constitutional Rights that promoted claims that Israel has “violated a number of human rights protections contained in international human rights law, genocide being among them.”

Hosting Anti-Israel Speakers

As of June 2018, NOCMES, which Stacher helped found, described itself as “a unique mode of collaborative public education dedicated to teaching and research on the modern Middle East.”

NOCMES has hosted speakers including anti-Israel activist Omar Shakir, BDS activist Noura Erakat and anti-Israel professor and JVP founder Joel Beinin on multiple occasions.

In February 2015, Stacher encouraged KSU students to attend a NOCMES event featuring Beinin and described him as “one of the finest scholars in the United States providing a very high level researched lecture.”

The presentation was titled “High-risk Activism and Popular Struggle Against the Israeli Occupation in the West Bank.”

For decades, Beinin has leveraged his academic authority to demonize Israel at colleges, high schools and middle schools. Beinin has described Israelis as “blood thirsty,” “Nazis,” “fascists” and “terrorists.”

Supporting BDS

On November 18, 2016, Stacher was one of the organizers of a panel titled “BDS, MESA [Middle East Studies Association],and the Politics of Academic Associations.”

According to the event’s description, the panel was set up to explore “BDS as a political and intellectual strategy as it relates to academic associations in general, and to MESA in particular.”

The panel was co-organized by Sherene Seikaly and chaired by BDS supporter Samera Esmeir. Its panelists included BDS activists and supporters Michelle Hartman, Charles Hirschkind, Mary Layoun and Judith Tucker.

In 2015, Stacher voted for a MESA resolution in support of BDS and called for MESA to “provide platforms for a sustained discussion of the academic boycott and foster careful consideration of an appropriate position for MESA to assume.”

MESA is considered the most important academic association of Middle East Studies.

Supporting Anti-Israel Activists

On May 27, 2018, Stacher posted on Facebook photos from an event with Joel Beinin and commented “Celebrating the Life of Beinin as a scholar, mentor, activist, and friend.”

On September 25, 2016, Stacher tweeted a link to an article that misleadingly depicted Issa Amro, a violent agitator and head of the Youth Against Settlements (YAS) movement, as practicing and teaching “nonviolent resistance.”

Anti-Israel agitator Issa Amro is known for vandalism and attacks on Israeli soldiers and civilians. Amro heads the Youth Against Settlements (YAS) movement, an anti-Israel organization based in Hebron that promotes anti-Semitism, rock-throwing and violence against Israelis.  

On September 14, 2016, after anti-Israel Professor Elliot Colla tweeted that he would donate money to JVP that month every time Canary Mission “attack me.” Stacher replied to Colla’s tweet: “I’m in as well.”

Supporting Steven Salaita

On April 9, 2018, Stacher tweeted promoting an event at KSU featuring anti-Israel professor Steven Salaita.

In 2014, The University of Illinois withdrew an offer of employment to Salaita after becoming aware of his anti-Semitic tweets. One tweet, posted shortly after Hamas kidnapped three teenage Israeli high school students, read: "You may be too refined to say it, but I’m not: I wish all the f**king West Bank settlers would go missing.” In 2017, Salaita posted to Facebook: “People ask if I would go back in time and change anything. I would not…I will die unapologetic.” In February 2019, Salaita stated that he had become a school bus driver in the Washington, D.C., area.

BDS

The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement was founded by Omar Barghouti in 2005 to challenge “international support for Israeli apartheid and settler-colonialism.” BDS is an allegedly “Palestinian-led movement,” although leading BDS activists have admitted [00:01:01] this is not true. 

One of the demands of BDS includes [point 3] what is generally known as the “right of return,” a demand discredited as a way to eliminate Israel. Barghouti said the “right of return” is a means to “end Israel’s existence as a Jewish state.”  

Barghouti has said that BDS “aims to turn Israel into a pariah state, as South Africa once was.”

In his activism, Barghouti has also said [00:05:55] regarding Israel: “Definitely, most definitely, we oppose a Jewish state in any part of Palestine. No…rational Palestinian, not a sellout Palestinian, will ever accept a Jewish state in Palestine.”

The movement has been linked to numerous terrorist organizations and received a public endorsement from Hamas in 2017.

BDS initiatives include calling on institutions and individuals to divest from Israeli-affiliated companies, promoting academic and cultural boycotts of Israel, and organizing anti-Israel rallies, protests and campaigns.

The movement’s most notable achievement has been the infiltration of university campuses through lobbying for “BDS resolutions.” In these cases, student governments and student groups, backed by their own anti-Israel members and affiliates, have proposed resolutions on some form of boycott of, or divestment from, Israel and Israeli-affiliated entities.

Boycott resolutions, although non-binding, have been passed by student governments on numerous North American campuses.

BDS activity is often aggressive and disruptive. It has been noted that universities that pass BDS resolutions see a marked increase in anti-Semitic incidents on campus. On one campus, when the student government debated a BDS resolution, reports emerged of violent threats against those opposing it.

SJP

SJP is a student organization engaged in anti-Israel activity on North American college and university campuses.

The first chapter of SJP was founded in 2001 at the University of California at Berkeley by Professor Hatem Bazian. Bazian has spread classic anti-Semitism, reportedly promoted religious anti-Semitism and defended the Hamas terror group. In 2004, Bazian called for “intifada” in America.

SJP organizes anti-Israel campaigns, including running annual Israel Apartheid Weeks, often in collaboration with Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and Muslim Students Association (MSA) campus chapters.

SJP has been a major force in pushing the anti-Semitic Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement on campuses. Chapters have initiated dozens of BDS resolutions in student governments, which have been proposed on or around Jewish holidays, a time when many Jewish students are off-campus.

SJP activists have reportedly physically assaulted, intimidated and harassed Jewish students, disrupted pro-Israel campus events and demonized pro-Israel campus organizations.

Chapters have often endorsed and campaigned for numerous terrorists and whitewashed terrorism.

Social Media and Weblinks

Twitter:https://twitter.com/jstacher

University Website:https://www.kent.edu/polisci/profile/joshua-stacher