Controversial CUNY Law valedictorians linked to anti-Israel groups
Two law-school graduates who made headlines for their fiery anti-Israel commencement speeches belonged to a pro-Palestinian campus group that raised money for a Muslim charity that sued the New York Police Department.
CUNY Law School grads Fatima Mousa Mohammed — whose commencement address earlier this month has now been condemned by the CUNY Board of Trustees as hate speech — and Nerdeen Kiswani, whose graduation speech last year demonized Israel, belong to the Students for Justice in Palestine CUNY.
The group, which calls for “the full decolonization of all illegally held Palestinian lands” on its website, is linked to Muslims Giving Back, a Brooklyn-based charity that sued the NYPD with other plaintiffs over surveillance of Muslims at mosques and community centers after 9/11.
The suit, filed in 2013, was settled in 2017 in favor of Muslims Giving Back for the sum of $1,671,868.
In a February Facebook post SJP CUNY featured a photo of Bilal, the group’s keffiyeh-wearing toy beaver mascot, alongside a hand-written sign seeking donations for Muslims Giving Back.
The charity, founded by activist Mohamed Bahi, runs a community center and pantry and has set up a network of bakeries in Yemen that provide bread for impoverished residents of the war-ravaged country.
Emails to both Muslims Giving Back and SJP CUNY were not returned Wednesday.
The Post has also reached out to Kiswani.
Mohammed has declined to speak.
In her May 12 commencement speech, Mohammed, who was born in Yemen and raised in Queens, noted that “the law is a manifestation of white supremacy that continues to oppress and suppress people in this nation and around the world.”
She called the NYPD and military “fascist” and demanded “justice” for the Holy Land Foundation, members of a Texas charity convicted of supporting the Hamas terrorist group in 2008.
Kiswani is a Palestinian activist and the founder of Within Our Lifetime, a radical group that was condemned by the Anti-Defamation League for its support of violence against Israel, and has called for Jews to leave the West Bank and the entire region, and for Israel to be “wiped off the map,” according to reports.
In her May 2022 commencement speech at CUNY Law School, Kiswani criticized Zionists and spoke out against the school for “normalizing” trips to Israel for students and faculty.
