Negotiating with Terrorists

The UW encampment disbands, but what does the future hold?

Last Friday, the University of Washington came to an agreement with anti-Israel activists to disband the encampment on the quad. This agreement came just days after President Ana Marie Cauce put out a strongly worded letter condemning “some of the rhetoric and language used in chants and signs within the Quad and at protests,” which she deemed “vile and antisemitic.”

Cauce’s May 15th letter stated:

The representatives of the encampment have presented a series of changing and escalating demands, including most recently demanding the creation of a new department that would have an “anti-Zionist” litmus test for faculty hiring; granting a student group oversight of awarding new, religion-based University scholarships; and a blanket amnesty for all violations of the law and student code, including not solely camping, among other demands. Many of these demands, especially the most recent, are contrary to academic freedom and/or to state or federal law.

So it was surprising to some that two days later, on Friday the 17th, the university had reached an agreement with these same representatives. In that letter, Cauce agrees to provide transparency around investments and funding sources, to commit to create a “more inclusive University by addressing concerns over Islamophobia and regarding potential discrimination related to study abroad,” and to extend their “policies supporting students from disaster areas to include students from Gaza, among other commitments.” The UW agreed to “forgo referrals for citations or conduct violations for camping” and follow non-retaliation policies against staff, faculty, and students involved. This came a day after someone spray painted “free Gaza” and “kill your local colonizer” on a statue of George Washington.

Read the full agreement here.

It’s hard to read this without imagining President Cauce gagged and bound to her office chair. But UW spokesperson Victor Balta claimed not to see Friday’s resolution as out of step with Cauce’s Wednesday letter or as a capitulation to protesters’ demands.

Balta framed the resolution in an email to me as an ongoing conversation that resulted in a safer space for Jews:

We are glad to have reached a resolution to peacefully end the encampment, which we know — as President Cauce noted in her statement Wednesday — has created an unwelcome and fearful environment for some members of our community, especially those who are Jewish.

Predictably, the backlash has been harsh, though muted. The JCRC sent an email out expressing disappointment and encouraging community members to share their feedback with the UW:

The impacts of the encampment and the University’s handling of the situation will have ripple effects across the Puget Sound Region, far beyond the campus, including further normalizing ideas that undermine Jewish inclusion and safety.  UW did not meaningfully address the lack of inclusion and safety on campus for the vast majority of Jews who believe Israel has a right to exist as an independent Jewish and democratic state. It is unacceptable to have spaces that only welcome some Jews. There’s a word for that - antisemitism. 

Additionally, a petition is going around to revoke the resolution, which not only echoes the JCRC’s concerns about how this agreement enables future actions to perpetuate isolation of Israeli, Jewish, and pro-Israel students, but also calls into question the organizing body, the United Front for the Liberation of Palestine. It criticizes the administration for not holding the group accountable for its rhetoric and not making any demands on them to change their behavior. According to the petition, the UW has “engaged in dialogue and formal agreement with individuals of undefined standing” and pointedly asks, “What is UFPLUW’s precise affiliation with the UW?”

The petition refers to an April 12th Medium post by the United Front group, which justifies the damage done during their sit-in at the HUB. “We prioritize the safety of people over property, and firmly rebuke Cauce’s claims that property is a red line in the struggle for Palestinian liberation,” the organizers write. It ends with the assurance that their “work will continue until our demands are met and Palestine is liberated, and our work also carries with it an inherent commitment to improving itself after every action so that our movement continually grows stronger.”

The United Front popped up only recently on campus. Leader Zho Ragen (aka Sarah Ragen), shares in her bio that she’s active in a group called Resist US-Led War Seattle, which holds a particular grudge against Boeing and the US military industrial complex. Resist’s Instagram, which started in 2022, features an almost adorable anti-war UW student club promo video (dated October 8th, with no mention of Gaza or Israel). Ragen does not appear to have any history of anti-Israel activism.

On January 12th, Resist posted a solidarity statement with Yemen, probably (hopefully?) not realizing that the flags in the image belong to the Houthis, with their cartoonishly evil slogan, “God Is the Greatest, Death to America, Death to Israel, A Curse Upon the Jews, Victory to Islam.” Ragen commented with Palestinian and Yemen emoji flags and an emoji heart.

It’s not clear where the United Front came from. (Obviously, it came from California, like most things these days, but this warrants more investigating.) Unlike the Resist movement, which is mostly just pissed at Boeing, the United Front appears to be modeled after the PFLP terrorist organization, as I’ve reported before. They have nearly the same logo and the same demands. (Watch this video. It’s not scary at all. Not at all.)

unitedfrontforliberation

A post shared by @unitedfrontforliberation

The PFLP flag has been spotted at The Evergreen State College, the notoriously anti-Israel campus where protesters got the administration to agree to a ceasefire statement and explore divestment from Israel.

The red PFLP is seen here at Evergreen, along with Palestinian flags and a sandwich board about “thawabit,” a list of Palestinian liberation non-negotiable demands. Thawabit derives from Islamic jurisprudence and basically means immutable religious laws.

In response to questions about the United Front’s possible connection to the PFLP, Balta said, “I can’t speak to — nor would I claim to know about — any purported connections that anyone from this loosely organized group of students may have. But we do know they are UW students and that was the level on which we engaged with them.”

Well, we can see how democracy ends now. Could the Founding Fathers, who drew inspiration for their vision of freedom from their revulsion over the Spanish Inquisition, have imagined the First Amendment going down this dark path? Why are university administrators so apparently blind to this danger and willing to meet it halfway in hopes that it will just go home and order a pizza?

If anything is clear, these “loosely organized groups of students” will only be emboldened to make more demands and more messes, knowing that these inches eventually add up to a mile. Our universities need not just to stop this, but also to peel back the onion and reckon with what’s at the rotten heart of the demands.

Further reading:

They Don't Care About Gaza

Don't Call It a Jihad

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