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    • Samidoun is now a designated terrorist group, but why does it matter?
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    Samidoun is now a designated terrorist group, but why does it matter?

    Pabio Posted on

    Over the past year, Jews and non-Jews alike have been rightly dismayed by the blatantly anti-Semitic and terrorism-glorifying undercurrents within pro-Palestinian protests. On American streets – not to mention Qatar-funded universities – the most extremist activists have praised Hamas and its October 7 attacks while leaders simply wiggled their fingers or looked away.

    However, the joint terrorist designation of the United States and Canada announced on October 15 could mark a much-needed shift in the right direction. This targets a group called Samidoun for his role as a “sham of charity” for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).

    The PFLP was founded in 1967 as a Marxist-Leninist organization by George Habash, the mastermind of the group’s hijacking of four airliners in 1970. More recently, the PFLP “has been active in the Israel-Hamas conflict” and took part in the October 7 attacks, according to the US Treasury.

    His summary, however, is in many ways irrelevant. Today’s PFLP is essentially a miniature Hamas with a hammer and sickle painted on it. As such, Samidoun functions as a Trojan horse, using the left-wing veneer of the PFLP to inject the agenda of Iran and its proxies into Western activist communities.

    Founded in 2011, Samidoun unreservedly asserts that the October 7 massacre was justified, that Israel must be wiped out, and that violence is the only path to victory.

    Samidoun has offices across Europe, America and the Middle East, including Iran. As SITE reported, its international coordinator, Charlotte Kates, even traveled to Tehran last August to receive a human rights award – as absurd as that may sound.

    Groups like Samidoun are no different from the old brown shirts. (credit: Courtesy)

    A pernicious influence

    SAMIDOUN’S INFLUENCE increased after the Hamas attacks on Israel on October 7. Over the past year, SITE has reported on a wide range of protests and events organized, coordinated or promoted by Samidoun in cities including Atlanta, New York, Chicago and Seattle in the United States, as well as in other cities. others in France and Canada. , Spain, Belgium and elsewhere.

    Worse, Samidoun’s influence has also grown within educational institutions, including Columbia University, the City University of New York (CUNY), Princeton, and Rutgers, where he aims to indoctrinate students to that they embrace armed struggle against Israel, support Hamas and other FTOs, and reject any form of normalization.

    Telegram channels aimed at university student groups in North America and Europe – some with thousands of subscribers – also praise off-campus Samidoun events.

    Samidoun/PFLP images have been seen several times on university campuses. For example, footage of a protest at Rutgers University, shared on social media last spring, shows students chanting “Israel must fall” while a Samidoun-branded poster depicting PFLP Secretary General Ahmad Sa’adat, is displayed in the background.

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    Behind the scenes, Samidoun’s activities are even more worrying. In a webinar titled “Resistance 101,” Kates and Samidoun leader Khaled Barakat spoke with activists at New York universities. In footage from the webinar shared online, Kates told student activists at Columbia University that October 7 was justified and that “there is nothing wrong with being a member of Hamas, with being a leader of Hamas , to be a Hamas fighter.”

    Kates also places Samidoun’s agenda within Iran’s. She says: “This is not just a battle taking place in Gaza… This is a battle for the entire region… we are also talking about Iran as a nation alongside the Palestinian people intervening and building a resistance movement (not only) to liberate… Palestine from Zionism, but to liberate the region from American imperialism.

    Barakat also highlights Palestinian leadership in the decades-long struggle, even describing hijacking as “one of the most important tactics the Palestinian resistance has engaged in,” saying that “not a single no one was injured or killed during this entire struggle.” these operations. »

    Among the Columbia students listening were Nerdeen Kiswani, CUNY School of Law alumnus and leader of Within Our Lifetime (WOL); and Sean Eren, a member of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP).

    “I was in the National SJP and I actually got kicked out for being too radical. And now I’m sitting at Columbia University next to a NSJP representative today,” Kiswani says, nodding to Eren.

    Kiswani, who participated in campus protests, adheres to slogans such as “Long live the Intifada.” Just and his group, WOL, hailed Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar as a “martyr.”

    The webinar provides a revealing insight into the extreme, overtly terroristic programs being imposed on impressionable students. As Eren himself told The New Yorker last year, SJP aims to “appeal to people who don’t know anything.”

    This campaign continued throughout the summer holidays and into the fall. As SITE reported, Samidoun’s New York/New Jersey chapter held a series of study events in Brooklyn over the summer to examine the PFLP’s 1969 manifesto.

    It was through these extremist positions that Samidoun helped generate support for the October 7 massacre, dubbed “Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.”

    A series of October 8 tweets from Samidoun Toronto declared “LONG LIVE OCT 7TH” and detailed an event to celebrate his birthday, which he had previously announced, as SITE reported.

    Kates was reportedly arrested in Vancouver after giving a speech praising October 7. In response, Samidoun released a statement congratulating her, accompanied by an image declaring in Arabic and English: “Long live October 7.”

    UNTIL NOW, Samidoun has encountered virtually no obstacles to his blatantly terrorist-supporting activities. But today, with the designation of terrorism between the United States and Canada, there are very important legal deterrents to stop it. Those who promote Samidoun, associate with it, host it or attend its events now run real risks of consequences.

    Frank Figliuzzi, former deputy director of counterintelligence for the FBI, put it this way: “Samidoun is now toxic to the touch…individuals and other organizations are now on notice that you cannot do business in any way, shape or form.” whatever, with them. »

    I am well aware of the impacts of such designations. In my book Terrorist HunterI document the years before 9/11 that I spent conducting undercover investigations into Hamas front groups like the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) and the Islamic Association of Palestine (IAP), and how my findings contributed to shed light on possible government designations against them.

    Over those years and many years since, I have seen recruiters and fundraisers act with impunity in the absence of legal deterrents – and how their operations are significantly weakened when designations well-designed are finally put in place. This is why, during the aforementioned webinar with students from Columbia, Kates emphasizes that it is important to “popularize campaigns to completely abandon the US terrorist list” or “remove” aligned groups from it.

    In either case, groups like Samidoun are not only dangerous to Israelis or Jews in general. It also harms the Palestinians they claim to support.

    They exist solely to promote the interests of terrorist groups and those who support them, without regard for the massive suffering caused by the events of October 7 – or the way their anti-Semitic hatred drowns out good faith advocacy for peace. between Palestinians and Israelis.

    The writer is the executive director of the SITE Intelligence Group and has written two books on extremism: Saints and soldiers (Columbia University Press, 2022) and Terrorist Hunter (HarperCollins, 2003).



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