Category Archives: Palestine

A Question for the CPUC

Posted on by under activism, Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, Princeton University

Here’s a question I’ve submitted to be asked at the next meeting of the Council for the Princeton University Community (CPUC), to take place Monday, May 4, 4:30-6 pm, in the Multipurpose Room of the Frist Campus Center.

My name is Irfan Khawaja, I’m an alum of the Class of 1991. The University has recently called on alumni like me to “stand up” for the University, but it’s also insisted that it has no intention of disclosing “details about the holdings of its endowment,” to quote Vice President Hilary Parker from the last time I was here (November 11, 2024). The endowment reflects the acted-upon values of the university. So my question is: on what basis does the University expect alumni to stand up for a university that refuses to disclose what it stands for?

Postscript, May 6, 2026: Unfortunately, I was delayed at work on the 4th, and unable to attend the CPUC meeting to ask this question. With that experience in mind, I’ve resolved to get a full day’s PTO for each CPUC meeting next academic year. I’ll post the questions on the blog in due course.

Free Speech in Princeton?

Posted on by under activism, cancel culture, Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, princeton, Princeton University

Statement to Princeton Municipal Council
400 Witherspoon St
Princeton, New Jersey
April 13, 2026

Hi, my name is Irfan Khawaja; I live in Princeton.

Given the dearth of information we’ve gotten regarding this draft ordinance about public demonstrations, I, too, would like to put this issue into a wider context.

In May 2024, the University shut down Gaza Solidarity Encampment, had some people arrested, and shut Cannon Green down to “organized activity” for the first time in 250 years. It’s been closed for two years now, and there’s no indication of when, if ever, it will open.  Continue reading →

JROTC Out of West Orange

Posted on by under activism, cancel culture, Fatwas, Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, War with Iran, West Orange

I’ve mentioned a few times that I split my time between Princeton and West Orange, New Jersey, which is why some of my activism focuses on the one place, and some on the other. West Orange High School has a JROTC Air Force program which it never tires of advertising. The High School recently advertised its Student Life Expo for Incoming Freshmen, to take place April 22. High school freshmen are typically students entering ninth grade, i.e., 14 or 15 years old. Among the student groups advertised for such students, under the rubric of “Honor Societies,” is “Kitty Hawk Air Honor Society (JROTC).”* Continue reading →

A Wake Up Call for Hillsdale College

Posted on by under activism, Fatwas, Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, pedagogy, War with Iran

From the Hillsdale Current, News and Happenings from Hillsdale College, April 11, 2026:

Pentagon to Send Officers to Hillsdale

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth recently announced that the military would begin sending officers to Hillsdale College for graduate studies as part of an effort to cut ties with universities that promote “woke” ideology. President Arnn joined Fox Business to discuss his conversation with Secretary Hegseth about this honor, Hillsdale’s principle of refusing taxpayer funding, and its history of educating military leaders.

Continue reading →

It All Adds Up

Posted on by under activism, Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, Princeton University

The minute I invoke the legacy of Mario Savio for a Princeton audience, I learn that just this past February, Christopher Eisgruber, the President of Princeton University, delivered two lectures in the Clark Kerr Lecture Series at Berkeley. “Kerr’s legacy,” Eisgruber tells us, “is extraordinary”; he led Berkeley through a “turbulent period” in its history. Meanwhile, Savio, the principal source of the turbulence, goes unmentioned. That figures.

There used to be a Mario Savio Memorial Lecture Series associated with a Mario Savio Young Activist Award. The organization involved was based in Guerneville, California, but is not (of course) formally connected with Berkeley. The last lecture was given in 2019; the organization itself now appears defunct. That figures, too.

Get ROTC Off Campus Now

Posted on by under activism, Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, Princeton University, War with Iran

Another letter to The Daily Princetonian, likely to go unprinted. Do I sound like a broken record? Yes. Do I care? No.

The photo below is of members of Princeton Army ROTC this morning, ambling from some ROTC training back to Forbes College. It’s all obviously a game to them: ROTC may as well be some alternative sort of NCAA sport. Somebody needs to tell these students that the sport for which they’re training is civilizational annihilation. Are they willing to play that game, or do they think they should demur? No one at Princeton seems to have the courage or honesty to raise this question directly with them, much less with their officers. I have to confess that I myself was waiting for a bus when I took this picture, and didn’t have the nerve to forget the commute, bail out on my work day, walk over to them, and initiate a conversation. We all have an excuse for inaction, but eventually the excuses have to give way to action–mine, yours, everyone’s.  Continue reading →

A Challenge for Professor Kurtzer

Posted on by under activism, Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, Princeton University, War with Iran

Yet another unprinted letter of mine below, this one (like the last) submitted to The Daily Princetonian. The letter, dated March 29, contains a direct challenge to Professor Daniel Kurtzer, currently Professor of the Practice in International Relations and Professor of Middle East Studies at Princeton, and previously U.S. Ambassador to both Israel and Egypt. Continue reading →

No Words

Posted on by under Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, War with Iran

We’re propagandized incessantly about anti-Semitism and “Islamism”—terms without stable definitions—but there turns out not to be any terminology in the English language to describe the forcible displacement of a whole population on sectarian grounds by a Jewish State, even if that State has spent its entire history and pre-history doing just that, and invokes an elaborate ideology to rationalize it. The predictable result is that we have words for things we can’t define, but lack words for things that keep recurring. The first thing leads to snap judgments, the second, to blindness about the obvious. Continue reading →

No Kings and the Anti-War Movement

Posted on by under activism, migrant defense, Neutrality and Complicity, Notes on the Anti-War Movement, Palestine, Trump 2, War with Iran

We’re about a month into the Iran War at this point. The war is, as predicted, a disaster getting worse by the day. As I’ve argued here before, we desperately need a large-scale anti-war movement, but the movement is, alas, in a low-energy state right now. Not that it’s entirely dead: there are direct actions taking place, some very brave ones, along with some ordinary demonstrations. And there’s no shortage of astute commentary out there as well.

But the movement has a problem in need of solution, and while No Kings seems at first to provide the solution, that appearance quickly evaporates on contact with it. The anti-war movement has a clear goal, ending the war, but lacks the means or numbers to accomplish it. No Kings has the numbers, but seems uninterested in ending the war (or any war), and uninterested even in broaching the topic. So it’s worth discussing the relationship, or anti-relationship, between these things. Continue reading →