18 February 2026

Two years and four months after the Israeli genocide began, university administrators in the US are still yielding to Zionist pressure to remove or suppress any mention of it. Here is a letter of protest issued jointly by AAUP (the American Association of University Professors) and MESA (the Middle East Studies Association of North America) to the administrators of the University of Arkansas. One is tempted to laugh at the pettiness of their actions, but the need to protest against them illustrates just how corrupting Zionism has been to American higher education.

Letter to the University of Arkansas regarding Mohja Kahf’s posters

• February 18, 2026
• Committee on Academic Freedom
• President Jay B. Silveria, University of Arkansas

Chancellor Charles F. Robinson, University of Arkansas

Brian Raines, Dean, J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences, University of Arkansas

Dear President Silveria, Chancellor Robinson and Dean Raines:

We write on behalf of the Middle East Studies Association of North America (MESA) and its Committee on Academic Freedom to express our dismay and concern at the determination of the administration of the University of Arkansas that two posters on the office door of Distinguished Professor of English Mohja Kahf violate the university’s discrimination policy and must be removed. The posters constitute an expression of political speech and cannot reasonably be regarded as discriminatory or antisemitic. This petty act of censorship violates Professor Kahf’s academic freedom and freedom of speech, and it also betrays the avowed values of your university.    

MESA was founded in 1966 to promote scholarship and teaching on the Middle East and North Africa. The preeminent organization in the field, the Association publishes the prestigious International Journal of Middle East Studies and has nearly 2,800 members worldwide. MESA is committed to ensuring academic freedom and freedom of expression, both within the region and in connection with the study of the region in North America and outside of North America.

On 22 January 2026, the university’s Office of Equal Opportunity Compliance (OEOC) notified Professor Kahf that an investigation, prompted by a single complaint made on 10 November 2025 via the governor’s website rather than at the university itself, determined that “the postings on the door of your University office violate the University’s Discrimination Policy….” One of the two posters depicted, in green, red and black, the phrase “Palestine, from the river to the sea” in English and Arabic. The other poster is a comic strip by the graphic artist Jennifer Camper entitled “I am not a terrorist” and satirizes racist and stereotyping viewpoints. In a 23 December 2025 memorandum of determination, the Title IX office alleged that because the posters contained controversial statements that might offend, their presence on Professor Kahf’s office door was deemed “sufficiently severe or pervasive” enough to “interfere with the ability of students and employees to participate” in university activities. 

The university’s reasoning is partly based on the IHRA definition of antisemitism and its accompanying examples which, as we have repeatedly pointed out (for example here, here and here), improperly conflates criticism of Zionism and the State of Israel with antisemitism. We also note that Federal appeals courts, including a 22 January 2026 ruling by the First Circuit in StandWithUs v MIT, have affirmed that pro-Palestinian phrases such as “From the River to the Sea” are protected speech under the First Amendment. The University of Arkansas has asserted that it understands there is “debate” around the phrase “from the river to the sea,” such that Professor Kahf’s posters “might” be viewed as controversial by “some” yet “ambiguous” to others; yet it has chosen to censor a faculty member by requiring her to remove constitutionally protected expressions of her free speech from her office door. Moreover, the university’s assertion that these two posters constitute a serious threat to the university’s students and employees and to its educational mission is absurd on its face. We must wonder if the University of Arkansas will next insist on examining and censoring the stickers on students’ laptops.

We remind you of our letter dated 16 December 2025 which expressed concern about an earlier infringement by your university of the right to free speech and the principles of academic freedom. We continue to believe that, in these fraught times, university leaders have a heightened responsibility to protect the free speech and academic freedom of all members of the campus community, and we urge you to live up to that responsibility. We therefore call on the University of Arkansas to immediately rescind its determination with regard to the posters on Professor Kahf’s office door and to refrain from any action that threatens or violates her freedom of speech and academic freedom, or the free speech of any member of the University of Arkansas community.

We look forward to your response.

Sincerely,

Ussama Makdisi, MESA President, Professor, University of California, Berkeley 

Judith E. Tucker, Chair, Committee on Academic Freedom, Professor Emerita, Georgetown University

Cc: 

The Arkansas Traveler

Farida Shaheed

United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education