The Harvard School of Public Health suspended its partnership with a Palestinian university whose faculty and students have endorsed and collaborated with Hamas and other terror groups, according to the Harvard Crimson.
The suspension follows extensive reporting by The Daily Wire into Birzeit’s terrorist ties that led to 27 members of Congress calling for Harvard to “immediately shut down this partnership and condemn Birzeit University.”
Harvard suspended the partnership as part of the Harvard School of Public Health’s investigation into Harvard’s FXB Center, which started last summer, School of Public Health spokeswoman Stephanie Simon told the student paper.
A memorandum of understanding between the FXB Center and Birzeit expired in recent months and Harvard decided not to renew it, according to Simon. While an official partnership will not exist, the FXB center, which collaborates with Birzeit faculty and scholars, will reportedly continue.
In an Q&A with the Harvard Gazette, Dean Andrea Baccarelli said a “blue-ribbon panel of experts” were appointed to conduct the review of the FXB Center to “rigorously evaluate the FXB Center’s current status and future potential.” The review is expected to conclude this spring.
The FXB Center co-hosted the “Palestine Social Medicine Course” with Birzeit University last summer, where students learned about “settler colonialism.” The program was originally supposed to take place on Birzeit’s campus in Judea and Samaria, also known as the West Bank, until it was relocated to Jordan “due to security concerns.” Under the suspension, Harvard will no longer co-sponsor the program this year and Harvard students will not be eligible to participate because of security concerns. Instead the 2025 Social Medicine Course will be sponsored by Birzeit and the World Health Organization.
At the time, Simon told The Daily Wire she was aware of Birzeit’s student body’s association with Hamas, but said it has not affected its program.
“Student government elections at Birzeit typically involve candidates affiliated with each of the major political parties in the region, including Hamas,” she said. “These student government elections are not germane to and have not affected the FXB Center’s work with the scholars and students at Birzeit’s Institute of Community and Public Health.”
Birzeit University called for “glory for the martyrs” after Hamas’s October 7 terrorist attack on Israel, and has a long history of promoting terrorists on its campus. The university has hosted funerals and parades for terrorists on its campus, where several buildings are named after terrorists.
Hanan Ashrawi, chairman of Birzeit University’s board of trustees, denied that Hamas sexually assaulted Israelis on October 7, and has defended Hezbollah and the lynching of Israeli soldiers, according to CAMERA UK.
On its website, Birzeit boasts that it is a “thorn in the side of the occupation,” and says it is committed to making an impact through “resistance.”
In 2023, the Birzeit student body elected two blocs affiliated with terrorist organizations — Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP )— into the student government. In the election, which had a 77 percent voter turnout, the Hamas-affiliated Islamic bloc won 25 of the 51 seats, while the PFLP picked up six, according to the Jerusalem Post.
In July, five members of the student council were arrested for attempting to carry out a terror attack on behalf of Hamas. The students were found with an assault rifle and thousands of dollars of cash from Hamas, the Times of Israel reported.
Birzeit shared a letter from its faculty and employee union last April which praised the “global intifada,” called for an Israel boycott, and refrained from calling the United States by name, instead opting to use “Turtle Island,” a term used by so-called “anti-colonialists” to suggest that the United States exists on stolen Native American land.
Birzeit’s faculty includes notable terrorist sympathizers, including assistant professor Basil Farraj who wrote a eulogy for Walid Daqqa, the leader of a group that kidnapped and killed an IDF soldier.
Philosophy professor Abdaljawad Omar appeared at a PFLP-linked conference attended by Rep. Rashida Tlaib, where he praised the October 7 attacks for opening “so many doors of political possibility” and said the “promise of liberation it holds would not have manifested in our conference without the capacity to resist.” Omar also denied accusations of rape and criticized the IDF for refusing to allow Israel to be taken over by the “Palestinian military” in an op-ed shortly after the attack.
“Israel chose not to engage in negotiations with any groups within its borders, leading to substantial collateral damage in numerous hostage situations,” Omar wrote. “The Palestinian military strategy aimed to delay Israel’s retaking of the area around the strip. In contrast, Israel was intent on swiftly reclaiming the territory, seemingly without regard for the safety of its own citizens.”
Several other schools have had relationships with Birzeit, including Rutgers University, which affirmed its relationship with Birzeit in May amid student encampment protests. William Paterson University entered into an agreement with the Hamas-run university in 2022 for exchange programs, sharing curricula, and joint degree programs. Other schools, such as MIT, have recently co-hosted conferences, invited Birzeit professors for speaking events, or had student groups visit its campus.
