Princeton Censors Ex-PLO Speakers; Likely to Hire PLO Professor

Princeton U. Says Campus Event Against Terrorism is "Too Inflammatory"

Princeton University has cancelled a speaking event by three former Middle East terrorists because it says that the use of the word "terrorist" in the promotion for the event is "too inflammatory."

Two of the three self-described former terrorists were members of the PLO. Each of them apparently converted to Christianity. Here is the must-read story of one of the group, Walid Shoebat, who is now an ardent Zionist.

Meanwhile, another former PLO member is likely to be named a full professor: Khalidi is Sole Candidate for History Position

As detailed in Campus Watch:

Rashid Khalidi is trying to weasel out of having worked for the PLO: Mr. Khalidi dismisses the allegation that he served as a PLO spokesman, saying, "I often spoke to journalists in Beirut, who usually cited me without attribution as a well-informed Palestinian source. If some misidentified me at the time, I am not aware of it."

Here is another corroborating quote about being a PLO employee from the New York Times (February 19, 1978) that is not widely known because of an alternate spelling of the last name:

If the Israelis had any brains they could neutralize Palestinian irredentism just by giving back the West Bank," asserted Rashid Khalidy, an American-educated Palestinian who teaches political science at the American University of Beirut and also works for the P.L.O. "It would split us."

Khalidi and Khalidy are clearly the same person. According to the Columbia Spectator, he was a professor at the American University in Beirut before his first stint at Columbia:

Khalidi came to Columbia in 1985 after teaching at Lebanese University and American University in Beirut. He has taught in political science and history departments.

According to the New York Times, the Columbia Khalidi seems to have known Arafat from that time period:

Rashid Khalidi, a Palestinian-American professor at the University of Chicago who has known Mr. Arafat since the 1970's, said he visited Mr. Arafat recently and found him battered not only by the Israeli siege that confined him to his headquarters here but also by the recent calls for reform.

Khalidi should come clean about his terrorist connections. Here is what Khalidi's employer did a few weeks after his Times interview:

On March 11, 1978 eleven terrorists, again coming from Lebanon with Zoadic rubber commando dinghies, landed at the beach of Kibbutz Ma'agan Michael. They killed an American photographer and a taxi driver and hijacked a bus, whose passengers, including many children, were on a day-trip to the north. The hijackers forced the driver to return to Tel Aviv. Driving on the coastal highway, the terrorists fired on passing cars from the bus. When the bus approached a blockade set up by the police at an entrance to Tel Aviv, a shootout took place. The terrorists left the bus and fired missiles. The bus burst into flames and most of the passengers were either burned alive or killed by terrorist gunfire. The massacre left 35 innocent people dead and 100 injured. The terrorists were identified as belonging to Fatah; nine were killed and two captured.

Source: Barak at IRIS