USF actions incited by politics
By Jaime Walker
Senior Reporter

If Bill O’Reilly had not opened his big mouth there would be no need for this column.
Students at the University of South Florida in Tampa would not be gathered in the campus’ common areas calling for a faculty strike. USF faculty would not be enlisting the aid of the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, and accusing USF President Judy Genshaft and their Board of Trustees of bowing to political pressure.

If Bill O’Reilly, host of Fox News Channel’s popular, often controversial show “The O’Reilly Factor,” had not quizzed Palestinian professor Sami Al-Arian Sept. 26 about statements he made 14 years ago and about his association with known terrorists, Al-Arian would not be in the midst of a political firestorm so intense the university fired him Dec. 19.

University officials say they dismissed the tenured professor of computer science because he did not make it clear in his television appearance he was not representing the University of South Florida. Truthfully, they fired him because he was a liability.

Following his initial appearance on “The O’Reilly Factor,” USF’s administrative offices were flooded with calls and e-mails. Major contributors threatened to pull their funding if Al-Arian was not dismissed. Their alumni offices received tons of e-mails that read “I am taking my diploma off the wall,” and “I am ashamed of USF.”

Al-Arian received death threats. The USF College of Science and Engineering was shut down for hours. So, on Sept. 28, officials agreed Al-Arian be placed on a paid leave of absence until the case could be reviewed.

In wartime, Al-Arian’s presence on campus and his willingness to express unpopular views is too dangerous. His television appearance cost the university too greatly. They simply cannot afford him anymore.

Genshaft told The Associated Press, “This man has been on campus for more than 10 years and 15 percent of time he has gotten paid to do nothing.”

But Al-Arian is known for his knowledge and research in computer science. The USF student newspaper is full of letters to the editor showing support for their teacher. One reads, “If we can’t afford to tolerate Professor Al-Arian’s views now, then we do not deserve to call ourselves an American institution of higher learning. We are simply running on fear and he is the scapegoat.”

Al-Arian, 43, who is paid more than $67,000, is no stranger to controversy. In 1991, Al-Arian, who has never been detained or charged with any crime, founded the World and Islamic Studies Enterprise, Inc., a now-defunct Islamic think tank that was shut down after the FBI froze its assets in 1995. As part of a lecture series agreement with USF, the charity held conferences and speakers forums that drew people later identified as terrorists, such as Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, the Muslim cleric later convicted of a plot to blow up New York landmarks, and Ramadan Abdulah Shallah, who left the university in 1995 to head the terrorist group the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Al-Arian says he knew the men as academics and told O’Reilly he had no connection to their terrorist activities.

Ours is a country founded not only on the principles of academic freedom and freedom of speech, but also on the necessity of due process. The case of Al-Arian is one that incorporates all three freedoms in a politically explosive combination. Just as Bill O’Reilly had a right to pose hard-hitting questions to the professor about his past association, Al-Arian is entitled to express his unpopular views in a public forum. The USF community has a right to be appalled by Al-Arian’s stance. Officials should, and perhaps did, take appropriate steps to suspend him for the remainder of the fall semester.

However, firing him was a hasty and politically motivated judgment. Instead of calculating how much money their institution has lost as a result of Al-Arian’s public appearance, they should have been investigating whether his associations with terrorists or allegations that his charity funded terrorism hold true.

O’Reilly recently did a follow-up to Al-Arian’s story in which he asked the university’s attorney whether the professor’s conduct was to blame for the dismissal or his own conduct was the culprit.

The attorney’s reply: “This is simply a reaction to recent events.”

The situation at USF was a time bomb, the professor and the university are to blame for their questionable association, but O’Reilly was the match.

If only we were not so scared to let opinions be debated, or to allow time for thorough review. If only we did not live in a culture where the words that flow from Bill O’Reilly’s confrontational big mouth are the gospel.

Senior reporter Jaime Walker is a senior news-editorial major from Roswell, Ga.
She can be contacted at (j.l.walker@student.tcu.edu).

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TCU Daily Skiff © 2002