The White House's newest hire is a City University of New York (CUNY) professor who has accused Israel of "ethnic cleansing" and "systematic genocide," a move that is raising alarms among the many people who are already concerned about the Biden administration's failure to combat anti-Semitism on America's college campuses.
Ramzi Kassem, a professor at CUNY's law school, was tapped to serve as a senior policy adviser for immigration in the White House's Domestic Policy Council. Kassem is a vocal Israel critic who spent a portion of his time as an undergrad at Columbia University writing scathing criticisms of the Jewish state, a Washington Free Beacon review found. Kassem, who helped defend terrorists held at Guantanamo Bay, charged the Jewish state with genocide and decried "unconditional" support for Israel.
Kassem's hiring comes as the Biden administration fights the perception it is feeding Israel's opponents. A closely watched White House plan on combating anti-Semitism, for instance, was recently watered down by anti-Israel activists. The State Department admitted on Monday that it is boycotting research partnerships with certain Israeli organizations.
CUNY announced that Kassem "will work to support the Biden-Harris agenda across a range of immigration issues" using his expertise as "a national leader on progressive immigration reform." Kassem enters the White House after working for more than a decade at CUNY, which has repeatedly found itself in hot water for promoting anti-Semitic hate speech and, in some cases, subjecting Jewish students to "severe and persistent anti-Semitic harassment." CUNY's law school, in particular, promotes anti-Semitic boycotts against Israel and recently featured a graduation speaker who accused Israel of sending "lynch mobs" after Palestinians.
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