Yale purges Dr. Helyeh Doutaghi, another targeted Palestine activist

Helyeh Doutaghi

Dr. Helyeh Doutaghi, deputy director of the Law and Political Economy Project at Yale Law School, was suspended, cut off from her information technology accounts and banned from campus in March of this year. She was accused of terrorism for allegedly belonging to the Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, by an obscure, artificial intelligence-controlled, right-wing website, Jewish Onliner. The U.S. State Department claims Samidoun donates funds to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. 

The suspension was based on information provided by a bot!

Dr. Doutaghi, in a statement posted on X, said: “Rather than defend me, the Yale Law School moved within less than 24 hours of learning about the report to place me on leave. .. I am being targeted for one reason alone: for speaking the truth about the genocide of the Palestinian people that Yale University is complicit in. 

“The Endowment Justice Coalition has exposed Yale’s deep financial ties to weapons manufacturers, using publicly available tax filings. The university’s asset managers include JLL Partners, linked to General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin, and Farallon Capital, which invests in HowMet Aerospace, a company that produces key components for US F-35 fighter jets used by Israel in committing genocide.” (Mondoweiss, March 13)

Dr. Doutaghi goes on to say: “This crackdown, now formalized under the recently

announced ‘Catch and Revoke’ initiative, marks a dangerous escalation in state repression — one explicitly designed to foster an atmosphere of fear across university campuses. It should cause profound concern to all defenders of free speech that those infamous words, ‘Are you now or have you ever been a member of … ’ are once again becoming a common refrain.”

Era of Zionist McCarthyism

Dr. Doutaghi explains: “We are entering an era of Zionist McCarthyism — a time when dissent is invariably met with crackdown, careers are destroyed for speaking the truth and the mere act of standing in solidarity with Palestine liberation is treated as a crime. Just as McCarthyism sought to crush anti-imperialist resistance through fear and repression, this new iteration aims to silence, intimidate and purge those who challenge Zionist settler colonialism and U.S. imperialism. 

“This is not a display of strength; it is the last refuge of a crumbling Order — an empire in decline, resorting to brute repression to stifle and crush those who expose its unraveling hegemony. … A clear choice now confronts the Western left: Either rise to the challenge to fight back the tide of repression, or continue in silence at the service of genocide. 

This principled Palestinian supporter affirms: “But I will not be silenced. I am proud to have used my voice and my pen to support the struggle for Palestinian liberation. They may strip me of my rights and privileges, but my commitment to a free Palestine and to the complete dismantling of U.S. imperialism across the world is not contingent on institutional recognition or material stability.

“ It is rooted in the collective struggle of the oppressed but powerful, in the ongoing anti-colonial struggles in our region and in the certainty that liberation will come — not through the benevolence of empire under ‘Democrat’ or ‘Republican’ parties that are unified in the genocide of our people but through its political defeat. 

 “Living under a fascist dictatorship in the U.S. can feel suffocating, creating the illusion that we are isolated and outnumbered. But the reality is the opposite — we stand with the vast majority of the world, from Palestine to Lebanon, Iran, Yemen, Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua and beyond. Ours is the struggle of the oppressed but powerful, the ‘Wretched of the Earth.’”

Repression fails to crush solidarity

Dr. Doutaghi continues: “The relentless campaign to crush Palestinian solidarity through mass arrests, intimidation, harassment and censorship has failed, That failure is why the state now turns to brute force, as seen in the latest escalation at Columbia, where protesters have been brutally beaten, and Columbia student Mahmoud Khalil — now a political prisoner — has been forcibly abducted by the state in collaboration with the university. 

She asserts: “I stand in full solidarity with Mahmoud Khalil. This is a flagrant violation of the most basic constitutional rights, marking yet another step in the United States’ descent into lawless tyranny. But the university is not just a site of repression — it is a site of struggle. We must recognize it as such and rise to reclaim power over these institutions or, where necessary, dismantle and disrupt them. The time for passive critique has long passed; we must act collectively to expose, challenge and resist the role of Western academia in upholding empire and genocide.

Dr. Doutaghi declares: “I will not be intimidated. I will not retreat. I remain steadfast in my commitment to the liberation of our peoples from U.S. imperialism, to justice, to truth and to the unbreakable solidarity that binds us in the struggle for a Free Palestine.” 

‘We owe it to Palestinians to speak up!’

In an interview with Jeremy Scahill, Dr. Doutaghi told him that the doxxing actions against her have continued, “all I could think about was that I had food that night to break my fast with, and I had people, loved ones to do iftar that evening with and all I could think about was Palestinians, who don’t have anything to eat for their iftar and don’t have anyone, any loved ones to break their fast with because of the American Zionist genocide. … 

“We owe it to Palestinians to speak up, because if we don’t, we’re telling the genociders that our voices are expendable. … We can’t afford to let them normalize genocide!” (Dropsite News, March 14)

Sign the open letter in support of Dr. Doutaghi at: https://openletter.earth/statement-of-support-for-helyeh-doutaghi-18ce8d84