A student group at City University of New York School of Law is facing mounting criticism after promoting an event that frames Hamas terror infrastructure as a form of “resistance.”

The campus chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine announced a March 5 discussion featuring Hadeel Assali, an anthropologist affiliated with Columbia University Center for Science and Society. The event is billed as an “anthropologic investigation” into Gaza’s tunnel network, described as “social organization in resistance to colonization.”

In past writings, Assali has called the tunnels “an essential form of resistance,” portraying Hamas’s underground network as part of a relationship between Palestinians and the land — completely ignoring their use in kidnappings, torture and attacks on civilians.

The invitation drew backlash from Columbia Faculty and Staff Supporting Israel, which noted that Assali was named in a lawsuit against Columbia University and Barnard College over failures to protect Jewish students.

The Columbia Jewish Alumni Association warned that the event reflects a broader trend of politicized scholarship spreading across campuses.

“This is how it happens,” the group said.

Brandy Shufutinsky of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies called the program “a dangerous reframing of terror,” stressing that “no number of teach-ins can erase the atrocities.”

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)