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Randa Abdel-Fattah

The Macquarie University Rank-and-File Committee today called on the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) to hold an urgent campus meeting and rally of staff and students to fight moves to sack Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah. The widely respected academic is being targeted because of her high-profile opposition to the ongoing Israeli genocide and ethnic cleansing in Palestine.

The rank-and-file committee issued its call under conditions where the campaign against Abdel-Fattah is rapidly escalating. Her employment is directly threatened by the decision of the Australian Research Council (ARC), acting at the behest of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s federal Labor government, to freeze her research grant.

Abdel-Fattah’s employment has been directly threatened by last week’s decision of the Australian Research Council, acting at the behest of the Albanese government, to freeze her research grant.

Rank-and-file committee members at Sydney’s Macquarie University call for urgent staff action to defend Randa Abdel-Fattah

 for such an urgent meeting and rally on February 28 during a vice-chancellor’s “town hall” staff meeting, and in a NTEU zoom gathering to observe the town hall meeting. But the NTEU has remained silent.

Today, the committee’s letter, addressed to the Macquarie University NTEU branch committee, stated:

The attacks on Randa Abdel-Fattah are deepening, with the suspension of her ARC grant, directly threatening her employment by the university. The so-called breaches of her research grant are a cover for a serious attack on academic freedom of speech and democratic rights.

As a matter of urgency, the NTEU at Macquarie University must call an all staff and student meeting and rally to defend Abdel-Fattah, and insist that her employment be continued and that the ARC and university reinstate her research grant.

The letter, sent by maths educator Chris Gordon on behalf of the committee, proposed the following resolution for the meeting, similar to the one passed by the Macquarie University Rank-and-File Committee 

A rank-and-file meeting voted unanimously in favour of a resolution calling for a campaign throughout the universities and working class to defend the victimised Macquarie University academic.

Australia: Macquarie University meeting issues strong call to oppose Zionist witch hunt against Randa Abdel-Fattah

This meeting opposes the victimisation and witch hunt of anti-genocide activist Randa Abdel-Fattah and calls for a campaign throughout the universities and the working class against it.

The latest attacks on Abdel-Fattah are aimed at rescinding her research grant and sacking her from Macquarie University and we demand that no such action be taken. The harassment is being led by the Murdoch media and Zionist lobby groups, fully endorsed by the Albanese government. Abdel-Fattah, like others who oppose the genocide in Gaza, is being bullied and slandered as being antisemitic for speaking out in defence of the Palestinian people.

The attack on Abdel-Fattah is not confined to one academic. It is aimed at silencing any opposition to the US-Israeli mass killings, the Labor government’s support for the genocide and the Trump administration’s criminal plan to ethnically cleanse Palestine.

We call on educators, students and workers to pass similar resolutions defending Abdel-Fattah, the right to free speech and democratic rights, including academic freedom.

The ARC’s suspension of Abdel-Fattah’s ARC Future Fellowship grant for a study of “the hidden history of Arab/Muslim social movements” in Australia is a step toward terminating her employment because her job, as a fixed-term appointment, depends on the continuation of the research grant. This is a test case for trampling over both employment and democratic rights, including academic freedom and free speech.

The ARC froze Abdel-Fattah’s fellowship just a month after federal Education Minister Jason Clare ordered the ARC to investigate her grant. The supposed reason is that she allegedly bent ARC rules by holding an online workshop as part of the grant, instead of a formal academic conference.

The ARC decision also followed a demand by Labor MP Josh Burns, the chair of the Labor government’s witch-hunting “antisemitism” parliamentary committee, to know why Macquarie University 

To enforce the escalating attack on free speech, the committee recommended changes to allow universities to discipline or dismiss employees accused of “hate speech.”

Australian parliamentary committee proposes new powers to sack anti-genocide university staff

Clearly, Abdel-Fattah has been targeted because she, like other academics and journalists, has been falsely branded as antisemitic for denouncing the criminal atrocities being committed by Israel in the Gaza Strip and the occupied West Bank.

These mass killings—already officially up to 50,000—and illegal aid, electricity and water cutoffs are intensifying behind the façade of a supposed Gaza ceasefire. Israel’s Netanyahu regime is openly backed by the Trump administration, which has supplied it with fresh multi-billion dollar arms supplies as part of a plan to wipe out or forcibly remove the Palestinian population.

Beside Abdel-Fattah, numerous other anti-genocide academics have been targeted, but the NTEU has not made a single public statement in their defence. Those known to have been victimised include University of Sydney academics 

This case is a major attack on basic democratic and legal rights, seeking to set a wider precedent to suppress any dissent against the escalating Israeli mass killings in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and Lebanon.

Zionist lawsuit initiated against two anti-genocide Australian academics

 and the same university’s sociology professor 

The investigation of University of Sydney sociology professor Sujatha Fernandes is another witch hunt that threatens free speech and other basic democratic rights, including academic freedom.

Australia: Sydney university academic under investigation for exposing Israeli lies

Many other critics of Israel’s barbaric crimes have been tarred as anti-Jewish bigots and persecuted by governments, the corporate media and Zionist organisations. They include journalists 

The Zionist Federation of Australia, sections of the media and the Labor government are seeking to criminalise opposition to Israel’s unfolding genocide in Gaza.

Australian Zionist lobby targets journalist Mary Kostakidis for opposing Israeli war crimes

The ABC is setting precedents befitting a tin-pot dictatorship, where the slightest criticism of an unfolding genocide and the lies used to justify it is met with repression.

Australian Broadcasting Corporation sacks journalist after Zionist witch-hunt

Zionists ludicrously claimed that hearing Peter Lalor’s voice as he commentated Test cricket would make them feel “unsafe.”

Australian cricket commentator sacked for noting mass deaths in Gaza

Sarah Schwartz has been venomously targeted, for exposing bogus claims of far-right and conservative forces to be opposing antisemitism, when they are simply supporting Israeli war crimes.

Australian right-wing launches witch-hunt against anti-Zionist Jewish leader

, the executive officer of the Jewish Council of Australia.

Despite determined opposition by NTEU branch officials, rank-and-file committee members and supporters successfully moved at NTEU branch meetings last month at the University of Sydney and Western Sydney University 

Important resolutions were passed at two National Tertiary Education Union branch meetings to defend free speech, academic freedom and Randa Abdel-Fattah, who is being targeted for opposing the Israeli genocide.

Australian university staff meetings defend Randa Abdel-Fattah against Zionist witch hunt

 to that proposed at Macquarie University, as they had earlier done at 

The resolution adopted by the Footscray High School sub-branch of the Australian Education Union (AEU) “opposes the victimization and witch hunt of pro-Palestine activist, Randa Abdel-Fattah.”

Australia: Teachers oppose Zionist and government witch hunt against Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah

As shown by the wall-to-wall media and government persecution, and 

Police on Tuesday arrested and issued “very, very serious” federal criminal charges against one of the Bankstown Hospital workers being persecuted by the media and the governments in Israel and Australia.

Sydney hospital workers face up to 20 years’ imprisonment after being baited by Israeli provocateur

, of two Bankstown Hospital workers in Sydney, who were goaded by an Israeli provocateur into making stupid comments, the so-called antisemitism crusade is designed to intimidate and silence working-class people across the board.

In a further escalation of the suppression of opposition to the genocide, pro-Palestinian activist Hash Tayeh was last week served with 

By charging Hash Tayeh for declaring “all Zionists are terrorists,” police are asserting dictatorial authority to suppress political speech.

Australia: Opponent of Gaza genocide criminally charged for denouncing Zionism

 for having publicly condemned Zionism as terrorism. This is a direct attack on political free speech.

In recent days, NTEU branch committees at La Trobe and Monash universities have adopted resolutions condemning the actions of the ARC and Clare, while appealing to the NTEU’s national leadership to take a stand.

These resolutions urged the national NTEU to “reaffirm its commitment” to defending the ARC’s independence from “political interference,” to provide Abdel-Fattah with support during the ARC “investigation,” including industrial and legal support, and to organise a public campaign to defend her and academic freedom.

The truth is that the NTEU bureaucrats have refused to conduct any campaign in defence of Abdel-Fattah and other targeted educators. Instead, the NTEU issued a mealy-mouthed media statement in late February saying the union was seeking “assurances from ARC Chair Professor Peter Shergold that this process will not be influenced by external forces, including media corporations.”

That was in line with an October 2023 NTEU National Council resolution, which claimed to commit the union to “active solidarity with Palestine” but proposed no action by workers against the genocide. Collectively, Australia’s union bureaucracies have not called a single strike in defence of the Palestinians, or against the witch hunt of genocide opponents.

As the Macquarie Rank-and-File Committee 

The latest attack on Abdel-Fattah has been spearheaded by the Murdoch media, which has conducted a campaign of bullying and harassment against anti-genocide voices, slandering them as antisemitic.

Oppose Zionist witch hunt against Australian academic Randa Abdel-Fattah

An urgent on-campus meeting and rally of all staff and students must be organised to fight moves to sack academic Randa Abdel-Fattah.

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