Scurrilous attacks on Sari Nusseibeh

My thanks to David Hirsh of the British Engage Online Website (which battles academic boycotts of Israel) and Ami Isseroff of Mideast Web for dissecting the right-wing attacks on Dr. Sari Nusseibeh, the Palestinian peace activist who heads Al-Quds University in East Jerusalem.

Keep in mind that Nusseibeh has campaigned vigorously and courageously for a two-state solution, even in refugee camps, insisting that the Palestinians must give up on the "right of return" to what is now Israel. He's also been outspoken in opposing academic boycotts of Israel. If you just read the beginning of Isseroff’s piece (below), you might believe the attacks against him, so please go on to read both Isseroff and Hirsh in their entirety (including Nusseibeh's response):

As noted by Engage, the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) has called for a boycott of Al Quds University in East Jerusalem in response to alleged comments made recently by Sari Nusseibeh, the university's president and translated by MEMRI. In a television panel with Ahmed Tibi, Nusseibeh said:

The Israelis now living in the territories of the future Palestinian state should return to living within the borders of the state of Israel. No Jew in the world, now or in the future, as a result of this document, will have the right to return, to live, or to demand to live in Hebron, in East Jerusalem, or anywhere in the Palestinian state.

A number of right-wing bloggers have characterized these words as antisemitic. According to the heavily cut interview clip, Nusseibeh also insisted that Jaffa, Acco and other Israeli cities could or should be annexed to annexed to a Palestinian state. Campus Watch, like ZOA, seems to support a boycott of Al-Quds University and Sari Nusseibeh.

This is not the first time that ZOA and similar organizations have painted Sari Nusseibeh as an enemy of the Jewish state. ... Link to Mideast Web for the rest and don’t forget David Hirsh at Engage.