PFLP 'Charity' Arm Samidoun Has Long Played a Role in Anti-Israel Movement on U.S. Campuses

Anti-Zionist group Samidoun, sanctioned by the U.S. in October 2024 for its role as a “sham charity” operating as an international fundraising arm of the U.S. government-designated terror organization the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), has long played a role in the anti-Israel movement on U.S. campuses. The group, which the U.S. considers to be an “entity who commits, or poses a significant risk of committing, acts of terrorism,” has been featured as a “pro-Palestinian” resource for years on some university websites such as City University of New York (CUNY) and California Institute of the Arts. Its representatives have also been invited for speaking engagements at campus events on several occasions.

Since the October 7 Hamas-led terror attack in Israel, in which the PFLP took part, Samidoun has co-sponsored several protests and events across the U.S. -- alongside groups such as Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) -- that have featured some of the most extreme pro-terror rhetoric and messaging in the anti-Israel space. These protests have also included instances of harassment and at least one on-campus event where activists engaged in the physical assault of Jews.

A March 2024 webinar at Columbia University featured Samidoun leader Khaled Barakat, who spoke of his ties to designated terror groups and lauded the October 7 attack. Barakat was personally sanctioned by the U.S. Department of Treasury earlier this month for his role as a PFLP leadership member and fundraiser.

Protests and events

Perhaps the most egregious incident involving Samidoun on university campuses occurred on September 3, 2024, when a protest at Baruch College led to a reported assault of a Hillel staff member and harassment of Jewish students, who were reportedly called “baby killers” and told to go “back to Brooklyn.” The protest was cosponsored by Samidoun, SJP Baruch, SJP affiliate PSA Hunter College, John Jay SJP, SJP CCNY, Baruch College Middle Eastern and North African Society and New York City Revolutionary Youth.

It was held to target Hillel, the largest Jewish student organization on campus, and call for CUNY to “cut ties” with the group. Just one day after the funeral of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, an American-Israeli hostage who was executed by Hamas in late August alongside five other abductees, one of the protestors was filmed yelling at Jewish students, “Where’s Hersh, you ugly ass bitch?”

Another disturbing incident involving Samidoun occurred at Columbia University in March 2024 when student activists hosted a webinar called “Resistance 101.” The online event featured Barakat, his spouse Charlotte Kates who serves as Samidoun’s Canada-based international coordinator and National SJP Steering Committee member Sean Eren. During the webinar, Barakat referred to “my friends and brothers in Hamas, Islamic Jihad, you know, the PFLP in Gaza” and praised the “Al Aqsa Flood operation,” Hamas’s name for the October 7, 2023 attack.

Another noteworthy incident on campus occurred on March 29, 2024, when a PFLP flag was displayed at a banner drop at the University of Washington cosponsored by Samidoun, Palestinian Youth Movement, Global Solidarity Network Seattle, Healthcare Workers for Palestine and Support the Palestinian Voice.

In other instances, speakers affiliated with Samidoun have been panelists at events on campus.  For example, in November 2023, Kates was advertised as a panelist at an event titled “Teach In: Contexts And Histories Of Palestinian Resistance” at City University of New York. A year prior, in November 2022, a page for an event hosted by New York University’s law school stated that among the panelists was “Hussein from the NY/NJ chapter of Samidoun,” who is referred to as one speaker among “other U.S.-based abolitionist organizers.”

Samidoun’s platforming on university websites

Several U.S. university websites contain pages that promote Samidoun as a pro-Palestinian resource or advertise past events that have featured the fundraising arm of the PFLP. Of note, the California Institute of the Arts website contains a page from April 2024 titled “Resources for Palestinian Liberation” that features Samidoun under Grassroots Media Outlets. Other examples include:

• Fall 2024, City University of New York (CUNY): In the editorial introduction to the Fall 2024 issue of the CUNY Graduate Center’s student-published, peer-reviewed journal, Theory, Research, and Action in Urban Education, the editors reference “the critical work of organizations to free political prisoners such as Jericho and Samidoun.”
• May 2021, University of Illinois, Chicago: “A Statement of Solidarity with Palestine from the UIC Global Asian Studies Program” encourages readers to contact Samidoun to promote their events in support of a Palestinian strike.
• December 2020: The Orfalea Center for Global & International Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara includes a link to Samidoun’s website and Facebook page, in a list of Resources and Organizations on a page titled Structural Violence, Police/Prison Abolition, and Decoloniality.

Recommendations

University leadership nationwide must ensure that Samidoun, like all proxies for U.S.-designated terror organizations, has no place on campus. Allowing such groups to influence the campus environment – including campus-based protests – risks normalizing terrorism and threatens the safety of Jewish students and all members of the campus community. It is critical that policies designed to address the influence of such external actors are developed and strictly enforced. College campuses must not become places where extremist agendas and ideologies flourish.

Campus-based support for terrorist organizations is just one of the trends ADL is actively tracking in the campus anti-Israel movement. For more information on this, and on other trends, read our Six Trends blog. To learn about the steps universities must take to address the campus antisemitism crisis, read ADL’s Six Asks, and urge administrators to act now.